Chapter 9 - Improvement

Chapter 9 - Improvement

Ten days later (Dungeon Time), inside the dungeon. It was almost 9 in the morning. Lucas was seen exercising in the grassland. It had only been a few days but Lucas had gone through a transformation. 

After training his body for ten days using the Universe Body Cultivation Technique, Lucas was not the previous skinny teen. He did not bulk up or have any obvious muscle (six-packs, etc). His body did not look flabby and he had developed some sturdy meat on his body. 

He had been exercising hard for seven days without skipping any of them. As a result, he had managed to maximize all of his stats. From health stat to comprehension stat, all of them were 10. All he needed now was to break through to Stage 1 Rank 2. 

Even so, Lucas held himself from breaking through. He did not want to rush in breaking through. He wanted to get used to the new stats first before he broke through. He decided that that day, he would call Fury back and they would start exploring the dungeon together. 

Although Lucas had made the schedule where he would fight monsters, he had fought a wild furball once and he was almost killed easily. As easy as stepping on an ant. Lucas had no idea that the most popular house pet like furball would be that furious in the wild. 

Lucas knew he was too weak to even fight a rank 1 wild furball. After that, whenever he went searching for pet foods, he would stay alert and avoid any monsters he met. 

Lucas decided to fight them officially with Fury. He knew now why humans relied on pets when in the dungeon. The monsters were too powerful, vicious, and dangerous. His view of the cute, fluffy furball had changed drastically after he was almost killed once. 

[Lucas, it's 9, time to rest] said Sery. Lucas stopped his training. He was sweating hard and decided to take a shower in the small stream nearby. Once he got there, he took off his clothes and jumped into the stream. 

The first time he went shower after Sery appeared, he was really shy. He felt like someone was peeking at him while he was naked taking a shower. The feeling was strong especially when most of the time, Sery acted more like a human than a machine like in the novels. 

Sery even made fun of him the first time Lucas was taking a bath. After a few days of getting teased, Lucas got used to Sery's presence. He did not mind getting naked in front of Sery. As for the future when he got married, he would think of that later. 

[Are you going to start exploring today?] Sery asked. 

"Yes, I think we are ready to fight rank 1 monsters. They will not pose much danger to us. We might be clumsy for the first battle but we will get used to it," said Lucas. Ten minutes later, Lucas finished cleaning his body and decided to call Fury back. 

"Summon Fury!" Lucas said. A card with Fury's picture on it appeared in front of Lucas. The card shone and Fury appeared in front of Lucas. 

"…" Fury stared at Lucas and its eyes turned crescent. Fury bounced towards Lucas happily. A furball could not talk and could not make any sound, so there was no happy sound coming from Fury. Even so, Fury hopped and got onto Lucas's arm. He nudged his soft, furry white fur on Lucas's chest. 

[He must have missed you a lot] said Sery. 

"Well, we met like for a few minutes, and then, I immediately sent it for training. It might be a few hours outside but inside here, ten days had passed," said Lucas. He petted Fury's fur and due to the connection with Fury, Lucas could feel that Fury was extremely happy getting a pat from Lucas. 

Fury's physical state had no change. He was a tiny bit larger but it did not look that much. Fury was still as big as a fist. He was not heavier or anything but Lucas felt like Fury's fur was much fluffier and stronger. 

Since the start of the training, Fury's stats had been going through considerable change. All of his stats had maxed out and in a string of luck, Fury gained an additional stat. Similar to Lucas's soul stat, will stat and comprehension stat, Fury gained a Normal element stat. 

A pet gaining a new stat had happened many times before but they were rare. Fury was lucky… was what Lucas thought until Sery told him that it was the effect of training in the nursery dungeon. 

Fury had been eating and bathed with the thick Stage 1 normal element energy in the dungeon for eleven days. With intense training every day, it was not a surprise for him to gain a new stat. Even if his potential was low, the nursery dungeon was so good for pets that they could gain many things. 

Since then, Fury's strongest skill was his tackle. With the normal element stat added to his body, all of his normal element skills would have a boost in power. Not only that, but Fury's normal element stat had also now maxed at 10 and no Rank 1 monsters in the normal dungeon would be able to defend against his tackle. 

Other than that, Fury's talent had a slight increase. His normal element talent had increased by 5% and now it was at 35%. Since Lucas decided to focus on training his stats, he let Fury train his skills without him by the side. With an increase of 5% in his normal element talent, Fury's tackle had leveled up to 7. 

Fury's tackle had an attack of 5 when it was level 1 but after it reached level 7, its attack increased by 6. His tackle would now have an attack of 11. Added with his own 5 attack stat, the total attack of his tackle was 16. With his normal element stat, a single tackle would have an attack of 26. 

(Notes: Tackle [Atk 11] + Attack Stat [5] + Normal Element Stat [10] = 26)

Other than tackle, Fury's roll skill had the highest level. It was level 10 and another level up it would advance to Rank 2. Due to the nature of the skill, Fury used it a lot to escape from danger. So, the skill leveled up the most. 

Now, Fury's roll would increase Fury's speed by 14. Added with Fury's speed stat of 10, he would have an increase in speed by 24 points. That was a lot considering that Fury was a Tier 1, Stage 1, Rank 1 pet. He was the lowest and weakest monster. 

Tackle and Roll were not the only skills Fury had. Thanks to the powerful nursery dungeon in training pets, Fury gained two new skills. They were fur guard and fur balls. 

Fur guard was a fur element's defensive skill. However, the defense it gave was weak. It only raised Fury's defense by 1 at level 1. It could not even consider a defense skill because it was too weak. Fury had never once succeeded in defending using the fur guard skill. 

When Fury used fur guard, the fur on his body would expand and his size would increase by ten times. From a fist-size to barrel size. 

Furballs were an offensive skill but it was not as powerful as a tackle. Furball was similar to Fur guard. It was weak with only an attack of 1. Fury had increased the skill to level 5 and it now had an attack of 5. Even if the skill was weak, it was the only mid-range skill Fury had. Thanks to furball, Fury could attack from far. He did not need to get close to his opponent to attack.

When Lucas was given the notifications about Fury learning fur guard and furball, he was shocked. From his knowledge, furball could not learn these two skills. 

In the beginning, Lucas thought that maybe he was the few people who raised furball to fight in a battle. Perhaps, furball could learn more skills but that was unknown to people because most people did not train their furball for battle. Even so, Lucas was wrong.

According to Sery, Fury created those skills by himself. It was desperate to survive and created the skill by accident. This was the reason why the skills were weak. 

Sery further explained that pets have endless potential. Fury was not a secluded case where he created new skills. Many pets and monsters went through the same situation. Even so, it was rare. 

Most pets and monsters that managed to do so had high potential. Those with S potential had the highest chance of creating new skills. 

However, Fury managed to create the skill thanks to the nursery dungeon and his desperation to survive. These two factors contributed to him creating the two skills. 

Sery also added that all pets training in the nursery dungeon would have the chance of creating new skills. No matter their potential, with desperation and help from the nursery dungeon, the pets could create many different kinds of skills. 

Skill creation was not the only advantage of training the skill in the nursery dungeon. Pets could also get some influence from the surroundings and their opponents and learned their opponent skills even if it was impossible for them to learn the skill. 

When Lucas heard this, he was shocked. He finally understood the high price of training in his Pet Nursery (compared to the nursing and care service. The training fee for the training service was still cheap compared to other pet nurseries). He also understood the reason why Sery limited the number of sessions his customer could train in the nursery. 

He also understood when Sery said that he did not want his customer to be stronger than his master. Although Lucas had the cheat system, he was not a genius naturally. He could become strong thanks to the pet nursery system. 

There were many geniuses in the world and even without the cheat system, they could become super strong. Not only that, but there were also other cheat system users in the world and they would undoubtedly be as strong as Lucas. 

As Lucas's system, Sery could not let Lucas's future rivals and opponents be stronger than him. Sery's power was also limited. If Lucas thought that having the cheat system made him the most powerful, he was wrong. 

Luckily, Lucas was not that kind of person. He was hardworking and used Sery's power properly. Sery was relieved that Lucas was a hard worker. If not, the gift by the guardian would be useless. 

Fury was not the only one advancing in skills. Lucas had some small advancement in his skills too. His mastery of the four skills he learned before had increased. It was not much because Lucas rarely used them. 

The skill that he used the most was Appraisal Eyes and that skill had a 60% mastery. 40% more, Appraisal Eyes could advance to the next rank. 

"Fury, for now, let's hold on to your rank advancement. I want you to max out all of your skill levels first before you advance," said Lucas. He wanted Fury to be the best in his rank before he let Fury advance. Lucas did the same to himself too. He wanted to max out everything first before he advanced. 

For the skills to advance in rank, the user (Pet, Monster, and Human) needed to advance in ranks too. The rank of the user was the limit of the skill. Fury and Lucas were still rank 1 and thus, that was the furthest they could advance their skills, Rank 1. 

However, no one would be as hardcore as Lucas and Fury. Usually, tamer and their pets would at most raise the stats to half the maximum before they advance to the next rank. Raising the stats needed a long time. They would waste a lot of time if they focused on that. 

Most Tamers did not even bother to raise their stats because when they advanced, they would receive a stat increase too. So, they would usually focus on advancing in cultivation rank rather than raising their stats. 

Lucas had the luxury of raising his stats thanks to the Pet Nursery System. Without the cheat system, Lucas might do the same as most tamers, focusing on advancing their cultivation rank. 

"Let's have breakfast first and then, we will go hunting," said Lucas.