So far, they had each earned 864% experience after the third and fourth encampments, and Eva had used a 2x exp boost scroll too! This allowed them to increase their levels greatly, and was the key to their power increase.
At the same time, their gains had also been reduced to match their growth. As such, Eva became even more certain that fighting Rank 1 enemies was a colossal waste of time.
She wasn't limited like Draco who earned 10% experience, she still earned 70% at the least. This difference meant that should she kill a Rank 2 monster, they would be able to earn bucketloads of experience.
Roma went to level 33, 85% from level 25, 21%, giving her 40 stat points.
Zaine went to level 17, 51% from level 8, 87%, giving her 45 stat points.
Eva went to level 46, 51% from level 37, 87%, giving her 21 stat points.
Hikari went to level 43, 22% from level 34, 58%, giving her 45 stat points.
Coupled with their progress from before, Roma had a total of 60 points, Zaine had 60 points, Eva had 30 points and Hikari had 60 points unallocated.
The stat gain for NPCs was truly frightening at Rank 1. It was no wonder why players found it very difficult to kill NPCs more than monsters just based on this fact.
Eva tapped her lip a little and decided to cave in. She allocated Roma's points into her Intelligence, bringing it to 100 points, easily hitting the second threshold, though Eva was unsure if the stat modifiers worked the same way for NPCs.
Eva placed Zaine's points into Intelligence as well. She had no intention of allowing Zaine to exercise her fantasies of becoming a melee fighter, and Zaine's natural s.e.xiness meant she could easily leave Charisma as her dump stat.
Eva placed her own points into Dexterity, bringing it to 80 points. She was very close to the second threshold, but with the number of levels she had left to the cap, it would be impossible to reach it.
As for Hikari, Eva placed her points into Spirit. As had already been established, it was the only stat the Dragoness had any actual use for. With this, Hikari's Spirit reached 215 points, a whopping amount.
Hikari would now become an even more overpowered healbot, one whose only fear would be to run out of Worldly Energy!
After doing this, Eva had led the group into the final encampment. The colossi soldiers there once again surrounded them with malevolent intentions and asked for their purpose.
Eva naturally dropped a few caustic replies which incensed the colossi. They roared and began the battle immediately, clashing with the Witch Slaves who met them head-on.
The Witch Slaves numbered around 30, far less than the 100 Specialists here. However, they were able to wreck those fellows rather quickly.
After all, it wasn't like the fellows here were stronger than the ones from before, and unlike the soldiers, the Witch Slaves had grown from one encampment to the other. The only difference was that there were 3 more Sergeants and one Captain Rank here, raising the difficulty higher.
The four women were not interested in dragging things out. Now that they saw the end of their objective, they wanted to be done with it as soon as possible so they could continue strengthening themselves.
Hikari switched on the autocast for both her active skills and concentrated on the fight. She had one other skill she hardly used so far because it was the only one in her repertoire that had a cooldown.
｢White Barrier – Active skill
Effect: Create a defensive barrier that reduces all forms of damage by 50% and restores 20% of that damage as health to the target of this skill.
Duration: 5 seconds.
Cooldown: 30 seconds｣
It was a skill that allowed White Dragons to provide some defense to their dragobonded soulmates. A Black Dragon had insane offensive power, but below-average defense.
Black Dragons were basically the closest thing to glass cannons of the Dragon race. Still, their offensive might meant that before you could kill them, you would probably be dead anyway.
Zaine now had 90 points of Intelligence, her Telekinesis and Telesthesia were nothing like before. Telekinesis on its own required a strong mind, heavy mental stamina, and precise thinking.
Zaine's stats had been low before, her only saving grace being Telesthesia that had smoothed things out. It would be impossible for someone at level 1 to form a blade storm of knives with Telekinesis alone, if that wasn't obvious already.
Now, Zaine could lift far heavier objects and move them at higher speeds. She directly seized many weapons from the hands of unsuspecting colossi fighters and impaled their owners with it.
After doing so, she kept these weapons and used them to engage two of the Sergeants on her own. What was amusing was that the weapons didn't fly around like missiles, but moved as if a person was the one to wield them.
It looked like an invisible man was performing sword/spear/club techniques. Of course, Zaine knew dogshit about these fighting styles, so the skill of these 'phantom fighters' was trash.
However, quantity could always make up for quality. With so many weapons attacking at once, the Sergeants were rapidly losing their lives without even being able to fight back.
Psychics were truly terrifying.
Roma took on three Sergeants on her own because her level and stats were higher than Zaine. These Sergeants tried to close the gap between her and them, but it was impossible.
While Roma normally used the Mystic Arts in its raw state - sort of like subjective magic - she had objective forms of the field of combat as well. These were skills even Draco found useful and used often, just that they were low-level for Roma.
Evil Curse!
Necrotic Hands!
Illusion!
Evil Curse struck the first Sergeant, granting him a <Weakened> Status. He wobbled unsteadily and felt most of his power flee him like he was the plague, plunging his combat capability to unsalvageable levels.
Necrotic Hands captured the second one and locked her down for 1 minute. She then became the target for Roma's next spell, as Roma pointed at her and began chanting with her eyes glowing green.
The final Sergeant was trapped in a simple illusion. Roma was not like Draco who needed specific situations to use this skill, it was a part and parcel of the Gypsy race.
She refrained from using it because it split her focus, but her increased stats made things far, far easier. She could now trap an enemy of a higher level in an illusion with relative ease.
As for Eva, she naturally took on the Captain Rank colossi of the final outpost.
｢Name: Rocksolid – Captain Rank monster
Level: 50
HP: 295,000/295,000｣
Not only was the fellow a Captain Rank monster, but he was a named boss as well! This was clearly something that Eva expected, as a Divine dungeon could not be so simple.
A named boss and an unnamed one were two entirely different things. Do not look at that weak Bone Golem, Boneshaker, and think that every one of them was like that.
A good standard would be Kilean the C.o.c.katrice. Players would never be able to kill him with a simple party. To kill Kilean would require a raid, and the same would be true for Rocksolid.
His skin was far coarser than the other male colossi, even showing jagged lines here and there. He was half a head taller and much more robust.
Not only that, but he also had a great sword and a shield equipped, as well as heavy armor. This Captain Rank monster was a Tank!
One of the most annoying types of bosses a player could encounter was the tank type. They literally behaved like c.o.c.kroaches, refusing to die no matter how hard you stomped them.
Eva fought him head-on with her Chaotic Blades, yet she invested almost no effort. She had many skills and abilities through her equipment that she hardly used since these enemies didn't warrant them.
Just like Draco, she hardly ever went all-out when facing same-level monsters unless they were like the Metal Dragon or void monsters. She wasn't even using her bloodline, despite her Legendary Eye of Heaven boosting it greatly!
This fight was more of a stage to build their collective chemistry in battle as well as refine Zaine, Hikari's and Roma's battle senses. The latter two had been trained by Draco somewhat, but Zaine was completely new.
That lazy woman actually wanted to focus on melee when her talent was clearly mental/ranged battle! Just look at that!
Soon, Zaine killed the first Sergeant Rank colossi and assisted Roma with one by taking over, meaning they were fighting two each. Roma quickly dispatched the one she had been working on, leaving only three remaining.
The Witch Slaves had already cleared out most of the soldiers, and the rest were collecting the loot quietly. They had already developed great intelligence since way back in the Flora and Fauna quest, so they knew that their mistress did not need them to interfere.
Also, thanks to the vile work of Qiong Qi back during the Flora and Fauna quest, Roma began using her Witch Slaves to collect loot, and it had become the norm for them.
They even thought it was part and parcel of their existence. To turn the world's greatest undead elites into the equivalent of harveeys… Qiong Qi had to be punished!
After a little more time, Roma and Zaine finished off the remaining Sergeants, pausing to watch Eva handle the Captain on her own. Her blade work was magnificent, a clear display of skill and grace.
Eva's own techniques were more aesthetically pleasing than Draco's which were all plain and direct. It was possibly a side-effect of being a Celestial Maiden, everything she did seemed to harness grace and refinement.
Cough, maybe not everything. Eva was mostly unlike Amaterasu, while Draco was almost exactly like Lucifer. It could be chalked up to their life experiences on this matter.
Eva easily suppressed the Captain with the passives of the two swords, both of which were extremely terrible on their own, and downright demonic when used together.
Literally every strike from Eva was a critical hit, dealing 3x damage. When she used the active skills Chrono Slash and Void Slash, the Captain could only spit blood in pain.
Where did these monsters come from? How could a bunch of mothers be so powerful? No, first of all…
Who the hell would bring their children to a battlefield?!
This was the only question on the mind of the poor Captain as he died to Eva's speedy assault. He would've given anything to understand why the hell they had their kids here, but death was too excited to claim him, so he never got the chance to ask.
After this final battle, everyone gained 309% experience each. Eva was crystal clear that this amount was only possible because of the higher amount of Sergeants and the single Captain present here.
Roma went to level 36, 94% from level 33, 85%, giving her 15 stat points.
Zaine went to level 20, 60% from level 17, 51%, giving her 15 stat points.
Eva went to level 49, 60% from level 46, 51%, giving her 9 stat points.
Hikari went to level 46, 31% from level 43, 22%, giving her 15 stat points.
Eva allocated her own points into Dexterity and left the others. They were now done with the quest and planned to head back to turn it in. After collecting the spoils of war, the group of beauties leisurely returned to the pick-up point.
There, they waited for a few hours for the exit squad member to arrive at the arranged time each day. After the squad member came, she took them back, allowing them to return to the Lady's office and inform her of their completion.
With surprise at their extreme efficiency, she gratefully thanked them. She then told them that she would have more tasks for them in the future, and asked them to return later.
Eva naturally understood this as the dungeon being over for now, needing to reset. As such, she only checked the reward for the quest while leading her compatriots towards the gateway.
｢Probing Strike – Legendary Quest
Description: Destroy 5 colossi scout encampments that are close to discovering the existence of Leikarthi Village.
Stage 1: Exit the village using their special method. - Complete
Stage 2: Clear the first encampment. - Complete
Stage 3: Clear the second encampment. - Complete
Stage 4: Clear the third encampment. - Complete
Stage 5: Clear the fourth encampment. - Complete
Stage 6: Clear the fifth encampment. - Complete
Rewards: Legendary item, 10,000 platinum｣
｢Congratulations on completing: The Probing Strike Quest
Time elapsed: 6:24:13
Monsters killed: 410
Objectives complete: All
Assessment: A
Reward:
10,000 platinum
Legendary Item｣