55 (55) Intermediate Boss Gathering

"Wow, we were pretty lucky then." Pyschi exclaimed after listening to Kraton's story. Him and Kim had also passed through the clearing and seen the remnants of the battles, however they didn't think the brawl was as recent as that very day. Although, it did make sense that another Boss would do it.

After an hour of talking, everyone had caught up on their recent stories. After the tale about the Golden soldiers, Psychi immediately linked it with the disruption in the human world.

Kim hadn't really bothered with what was happening with the humans, and Kraton and Lysine didn't actually know the huge commotion they caused, nor the reason behind it.

Psychi, on the other hand, still read and listened to what was happening in the upper world. This was because certain monster species were actually admitted to enter certain player strongholds.

Although it was as carefree as in the said 'Utopia', these strongholds would treat the visiting monsters as guests, as long as no commotion ocurred. Any fights, challenges and duels were to be taken just outside the city or town. This way, businesses would not be affected by any brawls.

It might also be pointed out that these strongholds were all large, powerful regions, each having its own, large combat force and governance. Some powerful runemasters were stationed in these strongholds and they were capable of blacklisting any entity and forbidding them from entering the city's boundaries.

Pyschi had read up and overheard the dispute between a Great Family and a Noble one. It had been said that the son of the Noble family of Irrigance had prevented the daughter of a Great Family from forming a party with whom she wished.

The media had stated that the son declared all of the party members as "trash, insincere" and of "commoner blood". The son was only half right.

It was true that the party members were composed of people from different standings, however the daughter had chosen these people herself from the guards and servants of her family.

They were one of the most loyal people to the family, therefore the elders of that family had also agreed to this. However, the arrogant man had not investigated them far enough and had only stopped at their bloodline.

This caused him to make several mistakes. The first was threatening and attacking the party members, the second was making the Irrigance family help patch things up instead of an apology. And the third was his downfall.

He had publicly proposed, and the media quoted that he "would not stop threatening the commoners until they marry." This had led to the challenge, and then eventually to his shameful loss and bankruptcy.

From the start to finish, the man had been held in bad light in the eyes of the public. After each mistake he made, a heavy blow was sent to his name. With the help of the media (with some partial 'encouragement' from the Great Family), the whole continent - no the whole world turned against this second rate Noble Family.

Psychi predicted that if the Irrigance Family didn't want to disappear, they had to do two things. The son would be exiled in an attempt to redeem the family's pride, as well as casting a warning to the other sons. But in order to retain the Noble status, they would have to find a source of income, quick.

And the easiest solution for this? It was to raid dungeons and sell the loot. Psychi's forecast hinted at an upcoming surge of raiders in all the dungeon which was worth the time for. The most expensive and precious loot was high-tier materials, not equipment.

This was because custom equipment was much better than dungeon loot; it could have desired effects, ergonomics and hidden attributes or mechanisms.

Another precious loot was skill fragments. For players, skill shards were a convenient way to acquire new skills outiside the Base Skills without manually learning and practising them.

The most common fragments were usless, however the higher the quality, th higher the price went exponentially. Not even a billion fragments of a low quality skill would match the price of a 'legendary' skill fragment.

And as it so conveniently happened, the Immortal species had the highest drop rate of these skill fragments. A smallpiece of researched data also showed that the more skills and mastery of them that the Monster had, the higher chance to drop skill fragments of a higher quality, even if it wasn't the same skill that the monster had.

This was the reason why Psychi had to keep in touch with the upper world, things like this would mean opportunites, but he had to prepare first.

This piece of knowledge concerning the players could be labelled as valuable information, who wouldn't want to stay on top of the game?

But since they were all friends for a long time, Psychi shared this informatio for free, especially since the matter revolved around Kraton and Lysine. Furthermore, it would also benefit Ophid Crypt, as a recorded regular loot for the dungeon were precious crystals. Most were ornamental or basic energy crystals, but there was still quite a few with attributes attatched to them.

These loot crystals were different from the ones Barren cultivated. Although they were both resources, the loot crystals would disappear if the party left the loot alone.

Additionally, the loot crystals were nowhere as high in quality as the cultivated crystals. One was pure, the other one could be said to be a tainted alloy. The loot ones may have several or varying amounts of attributes.

The analysis of one of these would look like this:

<Analysis: Resource: Crystal>

<Quality: Low>

<Attributes: Flame:+2 and Physical Defence: +1 (or any combination of attributes, higher the quality means the higher possibility of more attributes on the same crystal>

According to all historical records, and experimentation, the highest quality crystal -which was a Superior Quality crystal- had five different attributes, with an enhancement of plus 9 or 10 for each.

On majority, five crystals or gems could be fitted into the same item, therefore if a sword had five crystals of +10 physical damage, then it would sum up to have +50 physical damage.

But, this was with crystals. Once a crystal was turned into a gem, the attributes would multiply depending on the quality of the outcome. Blacksmithy was a hard job; an error could set back the quality by one, making a High Quality Crystal a Medium Quality Gem. But when fortune strikes, the quality could increase by one.

Each gem quality would increase the crystal attributes by around 1.2, 1.4, 1.6 and 2 respectively.

So in theory, a perfect sword with physical damage would gain +100 physical damage points.

Although this may not seem like a lot compared with a Boss' health, it was still significant in a fight as every attack would stack up the damage.

Even the lowest quality loot crystals were still valuable, this was why Ophid Crypt was regarded as a gold-mine, even though these crystals was still quite rare and hard to obtain.

The Irrigance Family knew very well that the three Bosses seemed impossible to defeat. But there was still a chance to recieve the crystals from the other monsters in the Dungeon. Somehow, dungeons would look at all its inhabitants and give a chance to drop the other monster's loot.

Naturally, the greater the level disparity between the monsters, the less likely the loot would drop. Therefore, getting the crystal drops from the crystal Boss was highly unlikely, but there were still two other crystal golems in the dungeon which were around the two weaker Bosses' level.

Surely, if the Irrigance family sent a lot of it's men into this dungeon, they could continuosly clear the upper floors in hope to acquire some crystals.

Monsters with synergies would also drop more related drops. Coincidentally, the third floor of Ophid Crypt housed Gargoyles. There was ssome relation between these stone monsters and the crystal Golems, moreover, they weren't as hard to deal with as the Nagas or the Golems themselves.

Therefore, this dungeon really was a treasure trove for crystals.

All of this information came together in Kratons head, it was a miracle he hadn't got a headache yet. Once Psychi had finished talking, Kraton and Lysine understood very well what he was hinting at.

Soon, their dungeon would become much more popular, another opportunity to reap experience (and take even more revenge for a certain lady).

"Hell's Dungeon is openening for all invited Bosses, please make your way inside."

A loud voice boomed throughout the courtyard, interrupting everyone's conversation. The person who had spoken out was a demon servant wearing blue garments which suited the azure flames that danced ontop of his head.

The Intermediate Bosses were all taken to the same room which was used for the Novice Gathering, but this time there were less chairs and a more open space.

It was clear that they were not here for a speech this time, but to communicate with others.

Our four Bosses were one of the last to enter; they didn't want to fight with others and cause enmity by pushing in the crowd.

As everyone piled in, the Bosses subconsciously formed and arc around the Boss standing in the centre. Behind him, were many other senior and/or powerful looking beings sitting down.

Each of them held their own aura, but they all exuded dominance over the Intermediate Bosses.

The scariest being in the room was in truth the Boss standing in the centre. He was a Demon, with curved ram-like horns and a bright, white fire flickering upon his head.

The strange thing was, that he did not exude any powerful aura, but somehow the auras from the Bosses behind him were suppressed by him. He gave a sense of elderly wisdom and primeval power.

"Welcome, young monsters, and congratulations for making it here," The Demon spoke, despite his young appearance, and strange energetic accent, every Monster in the room felt the weight of centuries bore ontop of them.

"Some of you have already seen and greeted me, you should be honoured for that. My name is Fynd, one of the hundred Great Demon Leaders, and a guest to this event."

Fynd let this sink in, some of the Bosses behind him rolled their eyes, but stayed respectful to the Demon.

"The purpose of this Gathering is to make new acquaintance, and maybe become a disciple, or be recognised by either me or my fellow Bosses and Great Leaders behind me."

"Please stay friendly to one another, and I would advise you all not to lie and decieve us. We have ways to see all your information and percieve through your lies. Just a single word from us can destroy or lives forever, so stay on our good side."

With that cheerful conclusion, the demon stepped back and the other Bosses behind him stood up.

The Intermediates stood awkwardly in place, unsure on how to start the Gathering.

A courageous male Fae stepped forward and approached the talking group of 'Higher' Bosses. Before he could introduce himself, one of the Highers turned to him and scowled. Telling him aloud to "Screw off and talk with others first", but in a much more ruder way.

This procured a few laughs from the group of Highers, but one of them shouted out advice amidst his laughter.

"Go talk to your peers, if any of you catch our attention, we'll find you. Don't annoy us if we don't."

This left the Intermediated downspirited. It seemed like the Higher Bosses were all here for free food and to talk with each other, instead of with the Intermediate Bosses instead.

Eventually, the atmosphere relaxed and the Intermediate Bosses started introducing themselves to one another.

"Hi, I'm Kraton-"

"Piss off Sasquatch."

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