Trouble of One's own Making and Level Cap

It's been a day since Kirou started hunting monsters, starting with those brown bears. Right now, he was locked in combat with a bunch of giants wasps.

Monster: Jade Forest Silverwing Wasp

Monster Level: 23

Health: 27,000/27,000

Attack: 140

Defense: 70

Skills: Poisonous Stinger, Penetrating Drill, Bug Buzz, Reinforcement Call

The creature itself wasn't anything special, just a half meter tall wasp that was slightly faster than average for a monster at its level. That being said, it shouldn't be underestimated as this monster has had Kirou busy for over twenty minutes now. The reason for this is due to the final skill that the Silverwing wasp possesses, <Reinforcement Call>.

Roughly half an hour earlier, Kirou had found three of these wasps on his search for prey. Looking at their numbers and noticing that he was just a few kills away from hitting level 20, Kirou decided to make those three wasps his prey. At first, everything went according to plan with Kirou killing off two of them within five minutes before turning his blades towards the final wasp. Kirou hadn't killed it with the other two as that skill caught his attention. With just a few more kills necessary to level up and a creature before him capable of summoning more to him, Kirou thought that it would be fine to have it summon help, saving him the extra time of searching for more monsters. Unfortunately for him, however, was that he forgot that the Silverwing wasp was still a wasp.

Less than two minutes after Kirou allowed the creature to call for backup, Kirou was now surrounded by a swarm of wasps, each displaying the same stats. Kirou wasn't sure whether he should laugh or cry at this as he never expected that the creature would have summoned over two dozen wasps with that single call. Left with no other choice, Kirou had to summon two shadow clones to help him deal with the swarm of wasps, along with Shadow Arachne that was up in the treetops spinning its web. Roughly fifteen minutes later, Kirou and his clones had managed to cull the swarm of wasps back down to just a few of them. Before Kirou and the clones could move in for the kill, however, these few wasps had all used the <Reinforcement Call> skill to request backup.

At that point, Kirou had to make a choice. It was either he killed the few remaining wasps and flee the area, leaving behind all the corpses he hadn't yet looted, or stand his ground and fight to the bitter end. A normal player would have easily chosen the first option without hesitation. Kirou wasn't a normal player.

Seeing that the reinforcements were already on their way and even he wouldn't be able to loot all the corpses around him before they showed up, Kirou decided to prepare for them in advance. He practically ignored the few remaining wasps before him as he summoned out both Tank and Asura. As soon as the two were summoned, they immediately pounced on the remaining wasps, making quick work of them as Kirou took out a few grenades from his inventory. Unlike the previous grenades that he's used that the system has personally restricted, the current set in his hands faced no such restriction as they were much weaker, damage-wise. That being said, they did carry an effect that Kirou will be able to make use of..... for this battle. Kirou had the strangest feeling that the moment he was out of the woods with these wasps, his new grenades were gonna be restricted. Well, that's a thought for then.

Less than a minute later, Kirou was once again surrounded by a swarm of wasps. This time, the swarm swelled from twenty-four wasps to seventy-two. Kirou stared at the swarm with a blank expression on his face. Even his pets looked on in wonder at the size of the swarm.

'What the deuce? How come there are so many of these things now when I barely ran into any monsters during my earlier tour of this place?' That was Kirou's thought as he contemplated retrieving his pets and fleeing the area. Kirou shook his head free of that thought as he stared at the group of wasps getting closer.

"I really hope that these will be enough, otherwise I really will have to abandon my precious loot," said Kirou under his breath as he took a glance over the more than two dozen corpses in the area. Having steeled his resolve, Kirou shouted to his pets, "Tank, give me some noise and then lead them to me. Asura, armor up and do the same. Shadow, I need threads."

Following those words, Kirou's body sunk into the shadows while his clones got to work. Now used to his orders, the pets got to work as well. Tank started by using its skill, <Feral Roar> which forcefully attracted all the aggro of all the wasps within a twenty-meter radius, followed by it using <Stone Skin> to increase its defense and finally used its shield to land a few hits before turning around and heading down a forest path. Tank's actions led to him being the target of over half the swarm, which promptly gave chase.

Next up was Asura, now donning an armor made of earth. This badger bole, with its mischievous nature, was somehow able to get a firm hold on the aggro for two-thirds of the remaining swarm of wasps by making use of its <Earth Control> skill. Asura had used the skill to gain control of a large number of pebbles which it had then used to smack most of the wasps in the face. While the damage itself was non-existent, it did piss off the wasps, resulting in them chasing after the badger mole which was now making its way down another forest path.

As for the remaining wasps, roughly a dozen, they were dealt with by the two clones and Shadow Arachne some ten minutes later, before the demonic spider attached a thread to each corpse and started dragging them in the direction of Kirou's body. The two clones followed behind, each dragging a corpse or two with them.

*******

While Tank and Asura went about their jobs of attracting the swarm of wasps, Kirou had moved to a different clearing in the forest to set up his trap. Even he had to admit that a few of his grenades wouldn't allow him to deal with so many wasps. As he waited for his pets to lead the swarm to him, Kirou took a look at the grenade in his hand.

Item: Basic Fire Bomb

Item Level: 5

Item Type: Uncommon

Item Cooldown: 1 second (one bomb) 10 minutes (three bombs in 5 seconds)

Blast Range: 5 meters

Description: A one-time use item that does minimal damage on contact but adds the <Slow Burn> effect on the target. <Slow Burn> does flat 50 damage every 5 seconds and lasts for 5 minutes. If used on targets weak to fire, the burn damage is doubled. <Slow Burn> can be stacked up to three times.

Looking at the item description and doing the simple math, Kirou knew that even if he triggered the double damage for <Slow Burn> on the wasps and stacks the effects, he wouldn't be able to finish off those wasps easily. That being said, Kirou had another trick up his sleeves. It was for this reason why he rushed to another clearing so quickly, as he needed some time to set up. He had an especially nasty surprise for those wasps.

'I really hope no one else enters this forest right now, otherwise, they will be in for a very warm time,' thought Kirou with a feral grin on his face as he hid in the shadows of a tree, waiting for his pets to arrive.

*******

Roughly five minutes later, both Tank and Asura were bolting into the forest clearing that had Kirou's trap set up. Both were covered in various degrees of injuries but they still managed to get the swarm to the clearing. Upon entering, both were a bit confused as they didn't see Kirou. Before this thought could unsettle them, however, a few lines of wires grabbed them both, pulling them to the other side of the clearing.

While the wasps were still chasing after the two pets, something fell from the treetops in an arc and landed in the middle of the swarm. Before the swarm could even register this foreign object, a flash of light erupted from this object, causing the swarm to immediately stop in their tracks and fall to the floor. Immediately after this, Kirou instructed Asura, "I need a wall around everything that just hit the ground."

While a bit confused at the order, the badger mole did as it was told and erected a circular with a space of thirty meters inside, surrounding the bulk of the wasps in the clearing. Following this action, Kirou pulled on another thread, causing a few barrels containing liquid to fall from the tree and land inside various sections of the recently erected earth wall. As soon as the barrels hit the ground, they broke into pieces, splashing the liquid they contained on the vast majority of the swarm.

Now covered in this liquid, none of the wasps that were hit could use their wings and are now struggling on the floor. As for the lucky few not in the encirclement, Kirou directed Tank to deal with them as he spoke to Asura, "Double the height of the walls."

Still confused as to why it was doing this, Asura followed its master's orders and increased the height of the earth walls from its initial three meters in height to six. Seeing this, Kirou nodded his head in satisfaction before tossing out three spherical objects into the encirclement. If there was another person present to see Kirou's actions, they would be quite confused at first. It would only be after they saw the result of Kirou's actions that they would realize what he had done.

Following the three objects falling into the encirclement, a slight wave of heat was generated, immediately followed by the hiss and screams unique to wasps. From within the treetop of where he stood, Kirou watched as the fire from the three bombs he threw into the encirclement started to spread. The fire generated by the bombs caused the liquid on the wasps to ignite and slowly spread to the rest of the swarm. While Kirou had no idea of the modern techniques used to create such a liquid, he does know a thing or two about creating flammable substances.

Kirou watched as the wasps caught on fire with an impassive face, completely ignorant of the fact that he had unintentionally recreated a weapon of war from the modern era. That being said, Kirou knew that this wouldn't finish off the swarm so he tossed a normal grenade in the center of the encirclement, before taking out his gunblade tonfas and started raining down bullets on the wasps.

Shadow Arachne and his two clones arrived two minutes later to see a thirty-meter encirclement with a fire in its center, along with Kirou just shooting into the fire with an impassive expression on his face. The clones just dropped their hauls and took up positions in their own treetops and joined Kirou in raining down bullets on the already suffering wasps. This went on for another five or so minutes, three minutes after the slow burn had already worn off but the damage had already been done to the wasps.

Since the conflict with the swarm of wasps began, Kirou had long since been enveloped by a ring of white light, signifying that he had already gotten to level 20. To a lesser extent, his pets had also been covered in a ring of light as well but Kirou never noticed. That being said, he completely ignored this and focused on dealing with the wasps before him. By the time Kirou had stopped firing, the fire in the encirclement had long gone out and the corpses were reduced to pieces. Instead, the entire encirclement was littered with various forms of gear. Kirou lamented at the fact that he was unable to skin all these wasps but he was thankful that the danger had passed.

Kirou climbed down the tree he was in and ordered Asura to lower the earth walls. Following this action, all of Kirou's pets were greeted by the sight of the thirty-meter area being covered with various gear. Each pet was given a fright at this before they calmed down and started gathering up the loot. While it was surprising to see this much gear, they were already used to their master's methods and just went along with their usual routine of gathering the loot.

As for Kirou himself, he was currently staring at his status menu. More specifically, he was looking at his experience bar. While he wasn't sure when Kirou knew that he had leveled up earlier. At the moment he was looking at his experience bar that was stuck on 99%. He was sure this wasn't normal as so far this was the first time he's ever seen his experience bar stuck with him literally just requiring one exp to level up.

'I better make a trip over to Elderwood Village when I'm done. I'm sure this has something to do with this class.' That was Kirou's thought process as he put the matter of the experience bar at the back of his mind as he approached the corpses that he could dissect.