Trial 9 "Mysterious Egg" (2) - 16

I smacked her in the back of the head.

"You thought that I jumped down here without a plan for going back to the surface, you think I'm dumb or something?"

We just need to walk a little further and then there'll be a staircase leading out of here.

'Of course I wasn't dumb enough to create an opportunity in my game and then forget to make it so that you could get out of this place or it would have just been a damn trap!'

Just walking a little further down the canyon, we found a staircase leading up.

"Why the heck didn't we just use these stairs to get down here?"

Instead of smacking her this time, I kneaded her in the head instead.

"Heeuuuuhhhheeeuuuuhhhhheeyyyyy stop!"

"Why the fuck did you do that!"

"You really haven't learned anything?"

"What do you mean?"

"Couldn't you have noticed that we fell for more than 30 minutes just to get to the bottom of this canyon! Now, try and calculate how much time that would take to climb down stairs that far down."

"Dummy."

After I finished berating her, we started our long trek up the stairs.

"Huff, huff, huff, huff, huff." Hope panted, collapsing on the stairs.

We had only spent an hour going up and Hope was already this tired.

'I guess she didn't put that much stat points into her stamina stat. She really needs to be more balanced.'

"Hey brat, next time, put more points into stamina and don't hold me back, or I'll leave you behind."

That immediately perked her up and we continued.

Climbing up the stairs and then resting every hour, we finally saw the dark sky again after 8 hours.

"Fuck that's cold." Said Hope, trying to wring out her wet hair and clothes that hadn't been dried back in the cave due to the conditions where there was no heat or wind to dry her clothes and hair.

I only felt a slight uncomfortableness from the cold, probably because my high stamina stat also increased my resistance to heat and ice.

"Come on, we're moving on to the next location."

We went and climbed up another mountain, reaching the peak of it.

We then proceeded to kill the mythical A ranked Roc living there and obtained two blood red mana beads.

Again, we fed the entirety of the beads to our eggs instead of consuming them for ourselves.

Finally, we swam to the bottom of a huge lake, which was glowing through bioluminescent algae.

At the bottom, we found the two hibernating golden toads and stole their spiritual essence orbs from them, turning them into dried husks and then fed them to our eggs.

Keep in mind that the last two tasks took more than 5 days to complete, as first, I hadn't focused on the familiar beast quest in a long time, as I could always clear the tower without the beast anyways and had just hatched a bunny or something every time and just ate it. Second, we had to again climb 8 mountain peaks before finding the right one as the roc moved based on its hunting pattern which was powered by a random position generating AI and the toads had been buried under the dirt in the deepest part of the lake, and as I hadn't memorized where they were either, it also took more than 200 tries to find.

After getting the 3 necessary ingredients, we just hunted monsters on the last day, but it still wasn't enough for us to level up, as my level was 83 and Hope's level was 44.

'I guess I should check my stats again.'

[Player Shinubwa Lv. 83 (175,317,044 TC):

Strength: 29

Stamina: 52

Agility: 40

Mana: 42

Hp: 32

Perception: 42

Intelligence: 32

Extra Stat Points: 40

-------------------------------

Job: None

Titles: "Perseverance Maniac", "Millionaire"

Skills: Tactical Domination (S), Figureless Shadow (AAA), Firestorm (AA+)]

'Hmmmm, I guess I got some spare coins from some gods that were watching and I also now have 40 extra stat points. Where should I place them?'

After thinking for a bit, I started spreading out my stat points, balancing my stats.

[Player Shinubwa Lv. 83 (175,317,044 TC):

Strength: 37 (+8)

Stamina: 57 (+5)

Agility: 47 (+7)

Mana: 47 (+5)

Hp: 37 (+5)

Perception: 47 (+5)

Intelligence: 37 (+5)

Extra Stat Points: 0

-------------------------------

Job: None

Titles: "Perseverance Maniac", "Millionaire"

Skills: Tactical Domination (S), Figureless Shadow (AAA), Firestorm (AA+)]

'It's kind of funny that all my stats end in 7's now.'

Seeing my grinning face, all Hope could think about was what perverted thoughts were going through my brain right now.

"Wipe that smile off your face, it's kind of creepy."

"It's not my problem, just deal with it."

"Uggh, fine, but how much longer are we going to have to wait for our eggs to hatch."

"It should be happening soon, after all, a week has passed."

And right after I said that, Hope's face lit up.

"Ohh, I just got the notification that its hatching!"

"Fuck it, all that work better have paid off."

Right when she took it out of her inventory, cracks started to form and a blinding white light started illuminating from the inside of the egg.

After a few seconds, the light died down and the egg shattered, leaving a small, white weasel like creature in Hope's arms.

The peculiar thing about this familiar beast was that instead of the regular four limbs that a weasel had, it had sharp, sickle like limbs instead.

And, even though its limbs were all amazingly sharp, it was able to masterfully crawl around Hope's body without leaving a single scratch on her by using the flat sides of the sickles to do it.

"What the fuck is this!" Screamed Hope as it crawled around her.

"How the fuck should I know? Think of the words "Familiar Beast" and you should see a separate status window pop up."

<Little Hope's POV>

Hurriedly thinking the words "Familiar Beast" in my mind, a slightly familiar screen popped up.

[Familiar Beast "Unnamed" Lv. 0 (SSS+++ Ranked - Female):

Strength: 1

Stamina: 12

Agility: 800

Mana: 2

Hp: 5

Perception: 1,000

Intelligence: 200

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Species: Kamaitachi

Skills: Slash (SS)

Description: A weasel like yokai that has blades for their arms and feet. They are extremely agile even from birth and their perception is unmatched, making them the perfect one hit, hundreds killed, in 1 second, war machine. As a baby, it won't be able to talk to its owner but can still follow instruction and once its "Intelligence" stat surpasses 500 points, it will be able to freely make conversations.]

All I could do was gape in astonishment.

'Just what the fuck were these stats!!!!???'

I mean she was extremely weak and could probably be killed in one hit, but that was only if you could actually hit her. (A/N: If you didn't notice from the status window above, the weasel's a female.)

'This is just the perfect familiar beast for me, an assassin!'

'The only problem is that the white hair would be really flashy, especially when moving at high speeds, but the rest more than made up for that one flaw.'

"Okay, I decide to name you Kiseki, as you are a miracle for me!"

[Familiar Beast Kiseki Lv. 1 (SSS+++ Ranked - Female):

Strength: 6

Stamina: 17

Agility: 805

Mana: 7

Hp: 10

Perception: 1,005

Intelligence: 205

-------------------------------

Species: Kamaitachi

Skills: Slash (SS)

Description: A weasel like yokai that has blades for their arms and feet. They are extremely agile even from birth and their perception is unmatched, making them the perfect one hit, hundreds killed, in 1 second, war machine. As a baby, it won't be able to talk to its owner but can still follow instruction and once its "Intelligence" stat surpasses 500 points, it will be able to freely make conversations.]

'Wow, naming it leveled it up, that's great.

I then just spent the next few minutes playing with "Kizi", feeling her soft, sleek fur all the while giggling like a child.

<Shinobu's POV>

'I guess she's really happy with what she got, seeing that she's grinning like a kid on Christmas morning.'

"Hey, aren't you going to ask me what my little baby is and how awesome she is?" She asked, while rubbing her cheek against her "baby".

"You know you shouldn't be just freely giving out this information right? Shin's lesson number 3, always keep at least 5 trump cards that you can pull out, with another final final trump card that is almost definitely going to kill your enemy, so as to give you the best chance in preserving your life in a battle."

"I can't even share it with you, the only person I trust?" She asked me with puppy dog eyes.

'Fuck, stop making that face, it fucking looks too cute, almost like when my little sister was begging me for money or candy.'

Shaking my head to get out of the enchantment, I kept a stern stance, replying with a firm no that made her downtrodden.

'I guess a kid is still a kid after all, as even though she's a cold-blooded killer, she still wants to show off her newest toy.'

After laughing inwardly at her childishness, a system alert showed up in front of me.

[Congratulation, you have passed the 9th trial.]

[Due to a few god's interference (paying bribes so that they can further their entertainment), your egg will now be hatched at the end of the Tutorial Tower, when all the rewards will be calculated together.]

[You will now be forcibly moved onto the next floor.]

A bright light engulfed us.