Chapter 5. Hunting for Raid

"You!!! I told you not to play until the evening, and you played until the morning?! You're not even come to the office for our presentation!!" I shouted to Solem.

Solem covered his ears, pretending not to hear my screams.

"How else? Yesterday was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity in this game."

He is....!!!!

"Which is more important, work or games?!" I asked sharply.

"Games." he answered without thinking.

Damn it. I forgot that he was a rich man. I want to hit his real face right now.

"Never mind, I won't be late again. I promise! When will I not keep my promise?" Solem said.

"Often..." I replied.

"I ... won't do it again."

I took a deep and long breath. If you weren't my best friend, I'd have punched you in the face.

"Never mind. I don't care about that anymore."

"Care a little bit."

"More importantly was the announcement this morning! They have already announced the first layer boss and the release of the second layer, Nidavellir!"

He changed the topic. Well, what has passed can't be repeated. I can only live from what happened, so I followed the topic.

"Yes. I've heard the announcement. They will open the boss layer dungeon in the middle of the night, right?"

"Yes! And we must participate in the raid layer boss!" Solem said.

"Yeah, yeah-eh?"

Wait a moment! What did he say? He wants me to join the raid?!

"You... must be kidding, right?"

"No way. The rewards from this raid are what we need in the future."

What do we need in the future? Hmm... don't tell me...?

"You mean the raid reward is...?!"

"Yes. The prize is a guild emblem and a majesty crown! We can establish guilds and nations if we have them! This is a once in a lifetime opportunity!"

"But... my level..."

Unlike Solem who had hunted to level seventy-five, I was still at level thirty. Even if I join the raid, I'll just be a burden. Moreover, I can't have a party because I'm a summoner.

"Yes, that's why we have to raise your level. At the same time, I also want to raise mine to the maximum."

The maximum level in this game is currently one hundred and will increase to two hundred when the second layer is released. It's funny it's only been a day, but the second layer is immediately released. Usually, people wait a long time for the next part to be released, right? Just like when reading J*jo, we have to wait a few years until the next part is released.

"Can we really level up that fast? Only six… no, only five hours until raid time, right?"

"Yup. We can. Although it might be a little tiring, but because of you we can do this."

Hmmm?

Because there's me? What are the merits of a summoner that I can get such words from Solem? I only summoned monsters to fight on the side—don't tell me what you mean?

"You want to ask me to do a force leveling with my summoned monster?!"

Force leveling, a leveling method that uses the most effective skills to kill a lot of monsters and collect exp. The method in this method is to use wide area skills to kill monsters in one area. Skills like that usually have a long cooldown time, so normally the party will rotate to maximize the experience gained.

I heard Solem got a wide area skill like that, but he also said that the cooldown of the skill is up to twenty-four hours. Instead, the skill dealt enormous damage to the entire area. I'm sure Solem wants to keep it until the boss raid midnight tonight, so he won't be using it right now.

That's why he wanted me, or rather my summoned monster, to take his place. He wanted to tell me to summon my summoned monsters and have them spread out to kill off the other monsters alone.

It's true that it's the fastest and most accurate strategy for hunting with this class of mine, but I'm not sure my summoned monsters are strong enough to do that. Coupled with that strategy, I had a hard time fighting because I was alone.

But the fact that I wanted to quickly level up didn't change, so...

"Okay! Summons: Rock Viper, Gray Wolf, Earth Wyvern, Earth Taratect!"

I summoned four monsters with the highest level I had. I gave them orders to fight the monsters in the respective cardinal directions. Solem whistled a little when he saw me calling them four.

"Wyvernkids aren't strong enough to fight alone, so I thought I'd keep them. As for the Earth Dragon General ... out of question, I need ten times my current MP to be able to summon him."

"Alright! Then let's farm to a level ten in nearby dungeon."

"Eh?! I can't summon any other monster besides wyvernkid you know?!" I screamed.

"It's okay. I'm strong enough to do that alone."

He was the one who could clear the world's dungeons alone. Ordinary dungeons can't be a hindrance to him huh...

"Alright! Let's enter the Killer Siren dungeon!"

"Don't take me to a dungeon with such a terrible name!!!"

"All the dungeons here have that name, so get used to it."

"Ugh..."

With that my hand was pulled tightly towards a dungeon near the beach. In the real world the distance from the original city to the coast was about twenty-five kilometers, but in the game world it was only about ten kilometers.

And yes, a dungeon with an entrance that looks like a cave is already in front of me. It reminded me a bit of the dungeon we previously conquered, but this dungeon had a sea feel with some shells and aquatic plants adorning the cave.

"We ... will really get in here?"

"Yup. I want to show you something."

"Something?"

"Come on, come in!"

With those words, Solem went inside followed by me from behind. Once the two of us were in the dungeon, Solem took out his wand and placed it in front of his body.

"O devil who symbolizes wrath and heroism, unite with me and make me a great demon. BAAL!!!"

Solem chanted something. After he cast that, the staff he was holding shattered and disappeared into particles. Solem's body started to give off a bluish glow and I could see electric sparks emanating from his body. In addition, a pair of cat ears appeared above his head.

"Hmm... So this is Baal huh..." Solem said.

"It was...?"

"A skill I got after defeating Baal alone. This skill increases all my stats and gives me additional lightning power."

Solem looked at me, making me realize that her eyes had also changed to those of a frog.

"But your wand ... also, you said the skill can only be used once a day?"

"Ah, I don't need my wand anymore."

Solem took out a sword from his inventory bag.

"I already have this."

The sword that Solem took out was a curved sword that had two sharp edges like snake tongues.

"This sword that Baal dropped is three times better than my wand! Each attack deals physical damage and lightning elemental damage! Plus it's a unique item so only I can wield it! Bwahahaha!!! I'm a top player now!!! For my skill, i use item enchant to enchant it to my wand so I don't need any cooldown."

Ever since Solem started explaining I've covered my ears. As I expected he would say such a thing lightly and quickly. As a friend of his who often hears that, I really thought that maybe Solem would become a rapper if he put in the effort. Unfortunately, Solem is too lazy to try hard except for games.

His talent didn't just stop there, but as he showed in the battle with the Earth Dragon General, he had an insane memory ability to the point of remembering boss attack patterns. Once he remembered that he could estimate the pattern down to a margin of error of tenth percent.

BUT HE'S MORE OF AN EXPENSES AT PROJECT WORK! I REALLY DON'T UNDERSTAND HIM!

"Oh, I'm up to level eighty." Solem said.

"Eeeh?! So fast?!"

"Other top players are ready at level one hundred you know? Level eighty is common."

"Jump to level one hundred in a day, all players in this game are NEETs or what!?"

"W-more or less..." said Solem while looking away.

He didn't refute my lines huh... so this game's top players is indeed a NEET.

"Ah, level up."

"Looks like after clearing this dungeon we can reach the max level." Solem said.

"Heeh... Good, good..."

Solem quickly took out his sword and slashed at a Red Crab. With I have no other monsters to summon, I can only let Solem deal with this.

"Bomb!"

While fighting, Solem throws a gem and it explodes. The explosion of the gem managed to destroy several red crabs without a trace. I want that item for extra attack power. While thinking that, several Hermit Crabs appeared. They have a tougher shell than the Red Crab, but their attack power is weaker and slower.

"Arrows!"

Solem once again threw some gems. The gems exploded and each one shot a magic arrow towards the hermit crab.

"Alright, with this-"

Just as I thought we had passed all the waves of attack, another crab appeared suddenly. This crab is different from the previous ones. It was four times the size of either me or Solem's, making it eight times larger than other crabs.

"Midboss huh? Very good."

As usual, he was happy at something like this. I have absolutely no idea why he likes to fight like this. I'd rather be role-playing than just fighting monsters like this. Plus, I don't have enough strength to fight, so I can't do anything here.

"Don't forget that I can't fight right now you know." I said.

"If it's just an enemy like this, I'm alone would be enough." replied Solem.

The crab immediately jumped at Solem. Unlike other crabs in the dungeon, this midboss crab can jump straight at its opponent while other crabs can only jump left and right. Its speed also faster than red crabs.

"Enchant: Speed!"

Solem activated one of his skills. He then miraculously managed to increase his speed to avoid the crab's jump.

"With only that speed, you can't even touch me." Solem said.

Solem landed casually a few steps back from where he was before.

"Your defenses may be higher than red crabs or hermit crabs... but can you withstand this? Lance!" said Solem, snapping his fingers.

The instant after Solem said that, several tens of magic spears shot out from under the giant crab. All of those magic spears pierced through his supposedly hard skin and took out all of its HP.