11 Challenge Alby Dungeon!
The lovely voice from inside the grocery store vibrated from a slightly plump faced, long haired girl in her 20s. She was a wearing an apron over her long dress, as if it was for working in the kitchen all day. Her shiny long brown hair seemed to make her entire face light up, and it reflected a hidden cuteness from afar. When one got close, her apron smelled like cookies and fresh flowers.
"Hi there, I would like to trade in this gray wolf meat for some spare gold."
The girl's eyes lit up. Then she continued to say,
"Are you the newbie adventure Axel that's been in town the past few days?"
Axel's eyebrows twitched a bit. Was he already this famous after being in Tir Chonaill just for a couple of days?
"Um, I heard it from Dilys who was tending to you the past couple of days. You are very brave to have fought off a black wolf while facing the Field Boss and the entire wolf pack!", the grocer girl's voice mellowed out like a sweet bird chirping.
A warm gushing feeling rushed up his heart. Axel felt a sense of achievement and reverence that he hadn't felt ever since playing the original game of Mabinogi. Not to mention, the adorable gaze of the grocer seem to imprint on his entire being.
"Oh I forgot to introduce myself. I'm Caitlin and I run the Grocery Store in Tir Chonaill." Caitlin said.
Of course Axel knew this, and this was true for all the dwellers of Erinn that he had met up to this point in this world. He was afraid of calling out their names first since for the residents here, it would be the first time meeting Axel in person.
"Nice to meet you, I'm Axel as you know already! Along with the wolf meat, I would like to buy some bread for rations as well." Axel chuckled as he blushed looking at Caitlin.
"Wolf meat is about 150 gold per unit that you bring in. If you can bring in more wolf meat in the future, that would be great!" Caitlin said happily.
"Oh cool, instead of giving me gold, I'd like to trade the meat for 3 loaves of bread." Axel replied.
"One moment please." Caitlin said as she went to the storage room to retrieve the bread.
As Axel set the wolf meat on the table, she came out in a jiffy and brought out 3 loaves of bread.
"Here you go! Come again!" Caitlin said as she set the bread down and went to the kitchen to continue working.
Axel gobbled down one loaf of bread in a few breaths and then set out for the Tir Chonaill Inn.
...
Upon setting foot near the Inn, he saw Nora idling around to welcome customers. When she saw Axel, she gasped,
"Thank goodness you got back safe! You kind of wasted 1 day of your room fees though!"
"Haha, I was unconcious for a while after the Field Boss summon in the pastures." Axel chuckled as he was led inside the Inn by Nora.
Piaras was leaning over the table counter as usual and his almost statue like pose showed signs of life when he saw Axel come in.
"You want to reserve for 2 days of lodging again?" Piaras asked.
"Sure." Axel replied.
Upon handing Piaras 100 gold for 2 days of lodging, room keys were quickly placed in Axel's hands and he rushed up the stairs to his room without saying anything back. He could barely walk from all the exhaustion from training with Master Max and hunting the Gray Wolf. No matter how much improvements he had made in the last few days, he was still Level 3 and was at risk of dying in one hit from most monsters that were similar in strength or stronger than him.
He swished his body like a basketball onto the bed and dozed off immediately.
...
Next morning, he headed out to fight a few more Gray Wolves at the pasture and by lunchtime, he had hunted about 5 gray wolves and teared off their pelts for the original request in Dunbarton. Additional pelts would profit him greatly once he got back to report to Eaven. Since his inventory bag was a dimensonal space that could not hold organic items like a monster's entire corpse, he could only hike one wolf corpose at a time from the pasture to Caitlin's grocery store. He took a break after the third 3rd trip and ate the 2nd bread he had.
By the time he had finished transporting all the wolf corpses, it was almost time for his combat lessons with Max. As he waved goodbye to Caitlin, he giggled to himself. 5 wolf corpses had filled his wallet with a total of 750 gold! Although he had used around 300 gold the past few days for food and lodging, upon adding the 750 gold to his 50 remaining gold, he was no longer a poor adventurer that struggled to get by in the first few days. According to his calculations, 800 gold could sustain about 1 week of lodging and rations. This meant that he no longer had to work everyday without rest to secure these basic living expenses. He could spend more time on refining his skills with Master Max and practicing different combat techniques that could benefit him in battle. He could even work on life skills, and learn some simple crafting to also earn a salary that was separate from risking himself in battle every time.
As he arrived at the Tir Chonaill School, Max was taking a nap while sitting next to a straw dummy with his back leaning on it. Before Axel could even get within a few meters of him, he immediately stood up in a combat ready stance.
"Remember Axel, you should always never let your guard down in any situation. This is especially true in dungeons where monsters are rampant and traps can take your life at any moment." Max sternly said.
"Understood Master!" Axel replied cheerfully.
"With your current level and status, the only skill I am able to teach you that will benefit you for the time being is the 'Smash' skill. Only problem is all the monsters near Tir Chonaill are too weak for you to train on in order to grasp mastery over the skill. By using my authority as a Mythril ranked adventurer, I can take anyone below my rank to go in a dungeon as a "trainee". For the next few days, we'll be clearing Alby Dungeon which is to the north of Tir Chonaill." Max went on like a priest giving a sermon.
Axel gave what Max said a thought. If Alby Dungeon was considered "easy" enough for a Mythril ranked adventurer to babysit a newbie adventurer like himself to go train the skill 'Smash', he guessed that most melee-type adventurers at Mythril rank had at least 100 points in the Strength stat. In the earliest stages of the Mabinogi game, having about 10 to 30 points in the strength stat was barely enough to do Alby Dungeon. If one had between 50 and 100 strength points, Alby Dungeon would be rather easy to run. One thing that worried him was that this world differed greatly from difficulity of enemies than it was portrayed in the game. After all, Eaven at the Dunbarton Town Office had warned him to always enter dungeons in a party of 3 or more. Although Axel could resurrect himself upon reaching 0 health points at the closest town to where he was slain, he did not dare to experience that event again. Unlike just becoming unconscious in the game, being defeated by a monster in the game felt exactly the same as if one had died in reality.
"I'll follow Master anywhere for training!" Axel exclaimed.
With this, Max nodded and took his broadsword from the ground and both of them set off north to Alby Dungeon. This would be a fruitful yet terrifying experience for Axel's first run of this world's dungeon.
