Infinite Competitive Dungeon Society

Durability – 500/500 (Auto-repair)

Defense – 2,000

Equipment Requirement – Kang Shin

Option – Dexterity +40, Magic +40, Charm +40. Immune to sneak attacks. Flame Sucker is always active.

Flame Sucker – Absorbs all flames up to SSS rank and converts them to magic and constitution. Flames above SSS rank can be nullified, but EX rank flames cannot.]

Although I had many questions, I asked the most important one first.

“What’s an EX rank flame, Lin?”

“Imagine the flame breath of a 10,000 year old high dragon that’s prepared to burn its throat, That’s EX rank. Or, imagine the Demon Lord from the Luka continent sacrificing his arm to make a flame. That would be EX rank. It’s hard for the dungeon to estimate anything above that. Just think of them all as EX rank.”

“So it’s an ultimate flame that can even injure the user. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Demon Lord will bear the risk to use something like that, so I guess I’ll be in trouble if I think I can block all flames...”

“Good, now you’re thinking.”

Lin nodded with satisfaction. Then, he shoved his face toward me and continued.

“Kang Shin, be careful with that armor. I’m the one who made it, but it’s too overbearing. I managed to make use of its aggressive nature to greatly increase the chance of landing critical hits, but its aggressive nature also increases the wearer’s chance of receiving critical hits by a whole 50%. It’s going to be quite troublesome. You have to be especially wary of Devourer’s side effect.”

“The mutation, you mean?”

“Yeah, that. I’ve seen many people who have made fun of it, but only ended up being done in by it. What I’m trying to say is, don’t use Devourer so freely. Got it? If you mutate due to the Demon Lord factor... Damn, noonim’s going to end me.”

Lin glared at the black bracelet on my wrist with a look that seemed to say, ‘should I take it back?’ I nodded seriously and retorted.

“I’m immune to mutations so it’s okay.”

“Right, since you’re immune to mutations, you should try not to use... Immune to mutations!?”

“Right. Isn’t being immune to mutations the basic requirement of all explorers? Are there explorers not immune to mutations? That can’t be, right?”

“Ku, kuuu... I want to... hit you...!”

I thanked Lin again and left Fairy Garden. For some reason, Lin’s expression wasn’t so happy when I thanked him!

Mm, being able to tease Lin was very satisfying. Today was turning out to be great!

[Name: Kang Shin Race: Human Sex: Male

Class: Elementalist (Sub – Skill Mixer, Tamer) Title: Savior Hero Rank: Gold 7

Level: 60

HP – 55,860/55,860 MP – 60,960/60,960

Strength – 275(+124) Dexterity – 250(+127) Constitution – 250(+79)

Intelligence – 40(+82) Magic – 320(+157) Charm – 87(+147) Luck – 39(+72)

Normal Skills – High-rank Martial Arts (Lv 7), Peruta – Mad Typhoon (Lv 2), High-rank Crossbow Marksmanship (Lv 1), Wing King’s Rage (Lv 3), High-rank Heroic Strike (Lv 3), High-rank Provoke (Lv 7), Divine Speed (Master), Return (Master), Peruta Circuit (Lv 9), Dimensional Travel (Lv 5), Overwhelm (Lv 3), Absolute Soul (Lv 3), Deific Manifestation, Riding

Class Skills – High-rank Spirit Mastery (Lv 4), High-rank Spirit Aura (Lv 3), High-rank Elemental Control (Lv 3), High-rank Elemental Contract (Lv 3), Lightning Spear Storm (Lv 2), Mid-rank Elemental Blade (Lv 9), Mid-rank Elemental Tempest (Lv 9)

Subclass Skill – Endow Skill, Taming (Lv 4), Spirit of the Collector, Spirit of the Mixer, Spirit of the Tamer (Lv 4)]

Before I challenged the dungeon’s 60th floor, I checked my status to celebrate getting new equipment. At the same time, I used up all the bonus stats I hadn’t had the time to use. I had become Gold Rank 7 before I noticed, and a few stats had grown unbelievably high. Strength, dexterity, and constitution stats didn’t need much explaining. As for intelligence, while the base stat was only 40, I was getting 82, almost double the base amount, as bonus. Even my luck stat had reached an absurd 111 points.

As for magic, which was my highest stat, I didn’t even know what to say. Unlike the other stats that were extremely difficult, if not impossible, to grow naturally, it was constantly improving along with Peruta Circuit’s usage.

In terms of stats, I was most likely one of the highest in the dungeon. Though the two additional Legend-grade equipment heavily increased my bonus stats, I’ve gotten rather aloof about stat increases.

Of course, I could still feel myself getting stronger every time my stats increased, but with so many explosive increases in a short period of time, my body hadn’t adapted to the change and was pretty much always in the process of updating. With all the stats I’ve gained from Event Dungeons, Event Raids, Beyond, and other sources, it was if I’d broken through the dungeon’s 100th floor. That was even including all the stats one could gain by grinding Floor Masters!

However, to be so overconfident in my stats, there were too many things I learned from the Panan continent. Traps, special attack methods, power of one’s levels, and even the level-ignoring difference in one’s league of existence; knowing all these, it was impossible to be happy with an increase of 10 or 20 stat points. Rather, I realized that I needed to focus on honing my skills, which were in a unique and independent position.

In that sense, having all skills increase by a level for defeating a world’s enemy was an outstanding benefit. Though, there were skills that had to be ‘updated’, like stats.

“That means Beyond is just that important.”

Not only did clearing a Beyond’s floor raise my HP and MP, but it also added experience to the skills I used to clear that floor. Beyond would undoubtedly help me hone my abilities. To defeat the Demon Lord I met in the Luka continent, the current me was still lacking. Plus, I had to think about the other world’s enemy that had yet to make its appearance. I couldn’t be content with just this. I had to get much stronger.

Though not even a month had passed since Loretta’s announcement of a 2 year time limit, I felt anxious. Perhaps it was because so many things had happened in the past month. Regardless, I couldn’t do much about this feeling of anxiety. Knowing you might die in 2 years and cause the entire world to fall to ruin, it was impossible to be completely unaffected. The important thing was knowing what to do about it.

To deal with this anxiousness, I decided to tackle the 60th floor. After all, when things seemed complicated or when I just wanted to sweat off the stress of everyday life, climbing the dungeon was the best thing to do!

... Though something felt off, I decided not to pay any attention to it.

Just like before, I equipped the armor by imbuing mana into the bracelet. Unlike the Crimson Scale Armor, which had hints of black on a red base, the Pure Black Desire was a pure black full plate armor just like its name suggested. That said, across the black armor were strange engravings, which looked sophisticated and seemed to give off magic power.

These engravings maintained a black glow and grabbed my attention. It was a rather ominous glow that seemed to suck me into a trance when I looked at it. Overall, it was a cool armor that provoked the desires of puberty hidden within me!

With the help of the new armor, I broke through the 60th floor in just 3 hours and found myself in front of the Floor Master room. Next to me was Lotte in her human-form. In the past, she couldn’t fully spread her wings out in the dungeon’s narrow passageways. Now that she could take the human form, she was an excellent damage dealer with both speed and power. As she was treated as my tamed beast, it still counted as a solo clear when I brought her along.

“Whew. Considering how the number of golems increased as I climbed last few floors, the Floor Master is probably a golem too...”

“Golems are annoying because my claws don’t penetrate them well. Regardless, let’s finish this quickly and go rest, Hero.”

Lotte, you easily break them with aura-imbued attacks or flame breath. Don’t lie...

However, since the dungeon liked to play tricks on explorers, it was entirely possible for the Floor Master to be a mimic. I tightened my grip on Chaotic Spear and kicked the door open.

“Fight me!”

[Guoooooooooooo!]

A loud, strange roar greeted us. The ceiling was unusually high, and an enormous steel giant was looking down at us. It had the exact appearance of a 12 meter tall human covered in steel. I trembled excitedly at the overwhelming sense of existence I hadn’t met in a long time.

“Lotte, you can fly here!”

“I’ve been waiting for those words, Hero!”

Lotte immediately transformed to her wyvern form. I jumped onto her back and raised my spear. It was the perfect chance to test one of my new armor’s abilities. Desire Thorn and Devourer were both straight-forward. However, Sacrifice seemed to have a somewhat ambiguous clause.

[Sacrifice – Usable with any attack skill. Receive half the damage of the skill, but doubles the skill’s effect. The damage received by Sacrifice cannot reduce your HP to under 10%.]

Just like its name suggested, Sacrifice traded one’s flesh for the enemy’s bones. Although the skill wouldn’t kill me, it could potentially put me on the verge of death. I had to be careful before I used it.

The ambiguous part was receiving half of the skill’s damage. Did it double the skill’s effect after I received half the damage? Or did I receive half the damage from the doubled skill effect? In other words, given that the skill’s damage was 100 and the amplified damage was 200, I didn’t know whether I took 50 or 100 damage. That was what this fight was for. Once I tried it, I would get a feeling for it.

I immediately readied Sacrifice and aimed my spear toward the enemy.

[Kuaaaang!]

The giant golem raised its fists and sent a jab toward me. This guy, he knew boxing! Though Lotte seemed surprised by its quick jab, she flew backwards swiftly and dodged it. Meanwhile, I slowly gathered energy in my spear. Sacrifice wasn’t a skill that could be used only once per day. As such, there was no need to save the skill for anything. There was nothing wrong with being a bit bold and using it now.

“Elemental Blade!”

In an instant, the spear blade elongated by over 10 meters. Immediately after using Sacrifice, I made Lotte accelerate and thrust my spear toward the giant golem’s left shoulder joint.

[Critical Hit!]

[Kuaaaaaang!]

“Kuhuk, that hurts!”

That hurt enough to make me scream! Immediately after cutting off the golem’s arm, I checked my HP after feeling the electrifying pain. Shockingly, my HP had decreased by 35%. I really couldn’t use this skill freely! I grit my teeth and gulped down a potion. At that moment, Lotte called me.

[Hero.]

“Yeah? What’s wrong?”

[That guy seems to be a weakling.]

“... What?”

I confusedly turned around. The golem that had lost its arm was roaring and charging toward me. Indeed, it did look quite pitiful. Wait, Elemental Blade was powerful, but still, it instantly cut off its arm?

“The 50% damage I took...”

Did it hurt so much because I got a critical hit? But even critical hits only doubled the damage. That meant that the Elemental Blade with Sacrifice had dealt 4 times the normal damage. Mm, I couldn’t quite understand how it worked. Maybe if it had bones and was affected by the Skull Breaker effect... Ah!

[I’ll kill you, Humaaaaaaaaaaan!]

So that guy has bones!?