Chapter 123: What Aosa Left Behind (2)

[Map updated.]

Nice!

Kai activated the map and confirmed that the path to the Elven Village was now marked.

With this, I’ve got the mermaids and the elves... Now, all that's left is the City of Dwarves, is it?

However, Kai's relaxed expression seemed to concern Ayana's mother, prompting her to say, "Kai, if I may offer some advice... be careful of the forest guards."

"What do you mean by that?"

"Under normal circumstances, they never reveal the village to outsiders, especially humans. Even knowing the path, finding it is not easy."

It was still difficult to reach even if one knew the path? Kai tilted his head, trying to understand her implication.

What does that mean? Of course, the Elven Forest is known to be vast, but...

The Elven forest was indeed vast. Very vast. Furthermore, it was home to monsters over level 200, making it a place even top-ranked players hesitated to hunt in.

But that's only for

most

rankers.

Globally, players ranked up to 10,000 were considered rankers, but not all rankers were the same. It’s common sense that the skill levels of those ranked 9,000 or 5,000 wouldn't be the same as those ranked 500 or 100.

Those referred to as the “heavenly ranks” have been operating in the Elven Forest recently.

This was something only someone who constantly checked the rankers' news and the video section daily could find out.

But no one has reported seeing an elf yet.

That was why Kai needed a map leading to the Elven Forest, specifically, the Elven Village.

"Knowing the path but unable to reach it, what does that mean?"

"The elves are called the watchers or guardians of the forest. Do you know why?"

"I don't."

"It's because they monitor all entities approaching the village."

"Do they only monitor?"

"They usually just monitor. But if you approach the village, they kill you."

Kai, still not understanding, asked, "Don’t elves... usually have a peaceful image?"

"Yes. However, people overlook that their peace is for elves alone."

At this moment, Kai genuinely wanted to argue that this was exclusionism disguised as peace.

"...So, in other words, the map is useless. Because approaching the village means death."

"Oh, of course, if you approach rashly, they'll attack. But you don’t necessarily have to approach rashly, do you?"

"What does that mean... Ah!" looking at her smiling face, Kai exclaimed. "I have to make them see me as a guest, not an intruder, right?"

"Exactly. Clearly state your purpose for visiting the forest to the guards. If your sincerity is conveyed, they will willingly reveal the village."

"Thank you."

Kai's expression was brighter than ever as he thanked her.

Without her advice, he would have headed to the Elven Village and been killed without understanding why.

"Of course. It's nothing compared to what you’ve done for my family."

"No, it’s a huge help to me."

After a few more hours of conversation, they naturally moved to the front door.

"Kai... C-can't you stay a bit longer?" Ayana, who had come out to see him off, looked up at him with a sad expression.

Her tear-filled eyes made Kai's heart soften.

N-no, I mustn't.

Forcing himself to hold on to his weakening heart, he patted Ayana’s head and said, “I’ll come visit often, so study hard.”

Of course, he would visit often. There were few places as good at making potions as the Smile Clinic.

Eventually, Ayana burst into tears.

“

Waaaah.

”

Kai comforted her for a long time before he could finally bid farewell to her family.

“Another task completed.”

He wasn’t entirely unaffected by the farewell to Ayana, but he couldn’t just settle down there.

Strengthening his determination, he opened the map to plan his next steps.

First, I need to report the mission’s completion to Tardal in Aquaria, but...

The problem was that Whitehall’s teleport gate was broken. This meant he would have to travel to a nearby territory and use their gate instead.

I need to find a carriage.

In the past, Kai would have walked the distance, but he saw no need for that since he a fat wallet now.

Moreover, time is more precious to me right now than money.

He headed straight to the city gate and found the taxis, no, carriages waiting for customers. Of course, there was no need to hesitate about which one to choose.

Activate Friendly Brother.

Using the skill, Kai immediately noticed the coachmen who showed interest in him, indicating they were followers of the Church of Solaris.

Among them, Kai approached a carriage pulled by the most agile-looking horse.

“How much is it to the nearest town?”

“It’s 1 gold and 5 silver, but since you seem like a good man, let’s make it 1 gold.”

“Thank you. Here you go.”

After paying the coachman and boarding the carriage, Kai deactivated the skill.

The interior was more comfortable than expected.

As the carriage departed, Kai leisurely checked his status.

Let’s see, I still have nine days left of the exhaustion and fatigue debuffs. I guess hunting is out of the question for now.

In fact, he needed rest. In his current state, even fighting level 100 monsters would be challenging.

I guess I should think of this as a short vacation.

After the short break awaited an endless race through hell.

Kai made up his mind, and as a thought suddenly crossed his mind he said, “Oh, right...”

Recalling what he had been doing before he fell into a state of exhaustion, Kai opened his inventory.

[Incomplete Core]

Grade: Unique

A core that once served as the essence of Aosa. It will awaken if infused with holy power.

I still don’t know what this is, but it’s Unique-grade...

All the items and materials dropped by Aosa were of Unique-grade.

And not a single one was trash.

This fact made Kai’s heart race. Filled with anticipation, Kai placed the core on his lap and drew holy power from his hand.

“Now, let’s see what this is for.”

As soon as Kai’s fingertips touched the core, a message window appeared.

Ding!

[The Incomplete Core responds to holy power.]

With the message, the core began to ooze a liquid similar to mercury. The liquid quickly enveloped the core.

No, it’s more solid than mercury... or rather, this looks exactly like Aosa.

Kai stared in disbelief at the object on his lap. The only difference from Aosa was that the blue color had turned silver, and it was now several dozen times smaller.

As he watched it, he suddenly jumped.

“Oh, that scared me!”

It had moved. Like a newborn chick looking around the world with sleepy eyes, the indescribable thing slowly wiggled and moved its body.

Kai cautiously poked it with his index finger.

It was squishy! A pleasant sensation spread from his fingertip to his body.

“What on earth are you...?”

At his question, the system message answered his question.

[The Incomplete Core has accepted the holy power of the Solarian Church and is now operational.]

[You have tamed the Incomplete Core.]

[You can equip tamed monsters with gear, and later use skill books for summoning and unsummoning.]

“

Huh

...?” Kai blinked. “Th-this is a pet?”

It didn’t look like a living creature at all. After all, it had no eyes, ears, or even a nose to breathe with.

Kai sighed as he watched the creature wriggle away from his lap and up the wall of the carriage.

“It seems like this is the only dud among the items Aosa left behind.”

An event-themed pet item. That was Kai’s conclusion upon seeing the creature.

Well, if the game kept handing out big wins all the time, where would the fun be?

Playing with cheat codes got boring quickly!

“

Hmm

?”

At that moment, the Incomplete Core, which had been sticking to the window, wiggled a few times and then took the shape of a rabbit.

Kai stared blankly at the rabbit, unable to process the situation. It had no eyes, ears, nose, or mouth, but its long ears clearly resembled a rabbit.

[Incomplete Core used Mimic.]

“It used... Mimic?”

The rabbit leaped onto his lap, lay down, and fell asleep with a purr.

Shaking off his dazed expression, Kai quickly opened the pet status window.

[

Incomplete Core

]

Rank: Raid Boss

The Incomplete Core is an artificial lifeform created by the Church of Muldine, but it is now completely purified by the holy power of the Solarian Church.

The core considers the being who infused it with holy power as its parent. It will follow you blindly and trust you above all others.

Satisfaction: ∞

Loyalty: 100/100

[

Beginner Mimic Lv.1

]

Grade: Unique

[

Crisis Detection (Passive)

]

Grade: Rare

It had a pathetic skill window with only two skills.

But one Unique-grade skill is better than dozens of miscellaneous ones.

Kai immediately checked the information about the Mimic skill.

[

Beginner Mimic Lv.1

]

Grade: Unique

Copies the form of other monsters.

The higher the skill level, the more of the stats and skills can be copied from the target.

The skill can fail if the level is insufficient.

Cooldown: 12 hours.

(Not usable against neutral NPCs.)

"N-no way..."

Kai's pupils began to shake as if an earthquake had struck them. The tremor started mildly, but escalated from a minor tremor to a moderate, and then a major one. His eyelids trembled as if they had motors attached to them!

That was the magnitude of how shocked he was.

Depending on how I use this...

Its potential was limitless.

Realizing this, Kai's mind started racing.

Mimic has a 12-hour cooldown, but there's no limit on the duration.

In other words, once it started mimicking someone, it maintained that form until it mimicked another or the skill was canceled!

Of course, the skill level could be an issue.

The description mentioned it could fail depending on the skill level. In other words, with a low skill level, it couldn’t mimic high-level monsters.

But I can solve that problem.

In online games, power-leveling referred to a high-level player leveling up a low-level player. Of course, in

MID Online

, power-leveling other players was highly inefficient.

Because without contribution, the gained XP is negligible.

But that was different with pets, as pets shared XP with their owners!

That's the case with Blizzard, too.

If he summoned Blizzard and hunted monsters, Blizzard would take 10% of the gained XP.

Using that system, he could quickly level up the Incomplete Core.

And since it's level 1 right now...

If he decided to hunt seriously, its level would exponentially increase!

"

Hehehe

."

Kai looked at the core with loving eyes.

Thought it was a dud, but it's a massive jackpot!

The fact that only he could obtain it in

MID Online

was also appealing.

“After all, the real fun in games comes from hitting the jackpot. What's the point if you only get duds?”

His attitude flipped as easily as turning his hand!

"From now on, your name is Molkang[1]."

Kai wore a greatly satisfied expression, clearly pleased with his incredible naming sense.

1. Molkang ?? or ???? is an onomatopoeia for something soft, squishy, jelly-like ☜