Not wanting to waste any more time than necessary, Cynrik went around collecting everyone and herding them into the living room for another meeting; this time, he wasn’t so casual, as things had changed slightly.
Once everyone was sitting in their regular positions, Cynrik took up his spot on the opposite side of them and crossed his arms.
“Alright, you guys have had most of the day, and everyone has chosen their Primary Class, let me start with Benny and Selene; you two will have a hard grind ahead of you if you want to get used to all of your new skills. I want both of you to sit down and figure out how different your fighting ability is with them added to the mix. The biggest takeaway is resource management. With their dual costs, If you aren’t careful, you will quickly burn through all of your MP and STAM, turning into sitting ducks out there.”
Selene and Benny nodded sharply, indicating they understood.
“Both of you have difficult classes to master; if we were talking about a video game, they would be considered high control classes. This means they require a higher level of thought process and timing to bring out their full potential. Thus, Brance will be working with Selene, and I will be working with Benny. So expect your workload to increase in the coming days.” Shooting a glance at Brance, Cynrik dropped his idea for the two Unique Class holders.
“Gabby, your job is to look online and figure out what kind of creature you want to take as your bond partner. I won’t intercede too much since this is something that needs to be done by you and only you. If you need advice or potential options, I can help, but at the end of the day, this is a big decision since you only get one Beast Partner.” The girl’s excited reaction made Cynrik shake his head and look back at Benny.
“In the beginning, I didn’t want to force anyone to pick a specific Sub-class and was keener on allowing you all to pick and choose what fit you best; however, some things have changed—starting with Benny and his new class skill [Hoplite’s Weapon Bond Ritual]. In itself, this skill presents so many difficult issues that need to be addressed, the biggest being that line stating, “A Bonded weapon can only be repaired or worked on by the person it is Bound to. The moment another being tries to, the weapon will turn violent and fight back or self-destruct.” Because of that, Benny, you have no choice but to pick up some form of BlackSmithing or WeaponSmithing class.”
“But even that presents its challenges. If we had known sooner, we could have gotten you the necessary prerequisite skills, allowing you to train up and get the hang of how to work on weapons. Unfortunately, that isn’t an option anymore. Uncle Jessup and I have already spoken about your gear, and we will start with the redrafting and forging process from the beginning. An entirely new sword and shield need to be made. Not only that, but I requested he didn’t assemble any of the parts, and instead, he will be sending the fragmented pieces so that YOU can complete and finalize your new weapon and shield. Your biggest goal is to hit the library as soon as Melody wakes up and go through the different types of weapon creation and modification classes until you locate one that fits your needs.”
At the mention of the still unconscious Melody, everyone but Cynrik looked at their feet. It had been several hours, and she still hadn’t woken up, worrying most of the members of MyrkLys.
“Stop your moping. Do you think I just bounced back from forcefully halting my overdrafted Codex? The first few times, it took me almost a full day to recover completely, and that is with my insane pain threshold and willpower; why do you expect a frail Summoner/Mage to bounce back immediately. She will be fine, so just leave it to Benny; she is his Lil crush after all.” Cynrik spat sarcastically while rolling his eyes.
“So far, that leaves only Benny and me as having our Sub-Classes somewhat chosen. I need to hear what you three have come up with so far.” Cynrik said while facing Selene, Gabby, and Brance.
“Gemsmith,” taking the lead, Brance said, making Cynrik scrunch up his face in confusion.
“Come again? Did you just say Gemsmith? As in cutting raw gemstones and making them usable?” Wearing an expression like he had either smelled the worst fart ever or eaten the sourest candy, Cynrik questioned his brother’s decision.
“DEX, INT, It’s a dual stat boost class, giving me what I lack. Not to mention we will need someone who can handle the gems we get, thanks to my idiotic Miner Class. The way I see it, it’ll give me something to do, like a hobby of sorts. The prereq isn’t too hard to get either, just a tad expensive. You need rock carving skills, and since very few people have this sub-class, it is frequently up on the market.” Brance said as he patted the clearly excited Gabby’s thigh, who only had sparkly diamonds and ruby’s on her mind.
“If that’s what you want, I guess. Although necessary, I would have preferred that one of us with high DEX went after it, but if you are deadset, so be it. In that case, Gabby, what do you think about going with Alchemist? They need DEX and MIND, and your Chloro Affinity will be a huge help.” Turning his attention to Gabby, who shrunk back when he said her name, Cynrik smirked.
“Alchemist? Me?” Gabby murmured in confusion.
“Yes, the potioneering skill is relatively cheap on the market and isn’t that difficult to find since it frequently drops in Green Egresses. All we would need to do is pick up a kit with all the essential tools you’d need and grab a few recipes. Plus, since you would be making the potions we need, such as Health, Mana, and Stamina pots, we would not only save a lot of money, but you would effectively be doing more than you would to keep us in top shape than you could as a cleric.” Knowing just what to say to grab her interest, Cynrik stated his reasoning, and Gabby repeatedly nodded within a couple of seconds.
“Gotcha, Big Bro Cyn, I’ll head to the market and look for the prereq skill and some herb glossaries, OH OH, I also need to get a kit, Brancie, you’ll come with, right?” Gabby excitedly babbled.
“Yes, I will go with, calm down; Cyn isn’t done with the meeting.” Catching her hand, which Gabby was flailing around as she spoke, Brance calmed her down before looking at Selene.
“Selly, you’re the only one left; what are you going for?” Gabby chirped as she leaned over Brance’s lap to poke her roomie’s shoulder.
“Me…” Looking from Gabby to Cynrik, Selene fell deep into thought before raising her head and looking to her boyfriend for advice.
“Honestly, I would say either Artificer, Runist, or Armorer. The goal from the inception of the party was to be able to self-sustain without any outside help. We’ll need someone covering all the bases; I have Engineering, Aiden and Benny will take care of Blacksmithing, Gabby will do Alchemist, and Brance will end up as our Jeweler since he can handle gemstones and such. That leaves three lifestyles open: Runist, who would inscribe all our new gear with specific customized Runes; Artificer, who works on magic equipment; and Armorer, who would be responsible for all the non-metallic gear we wear daily.”
“Regardless of what you end up picking, each of them has its drawbacks; of course, if it suits your taste, you can also choose a secondary Combat class, but honestly, I would advise against it since right now, you already have a fuck ton of skills on your plate to work through.” Uncrossing his arms and shoving his right hand into his pocket, Cynrik listed the potential classes the party would need.
“Armorer, I will go with Armorer. With so many of us needing light armor, which let’s call it like it is, Blacksmiths aren’t really the best at making; we need someone to handle the hides and leathers we get. I will do it.” Selene made her choice; her reward was a small smile from Cynrik that only she saw because he brought his hand up to cover his face, leaving the space that only someone sitting close to him could see.
This simple gesture was enough to make Selene know she had made the right choice, so she latched onto his arm, stuffing it between her chest, and with sparkling eyes, looked up at Cynrik.
“Alright, with that out of the way, we have a big task to discuss, and that is our plan for reaching Tier-3 before the competition begins. I have taken the liberty to give you the detailed list of how much XP will be necessary to raise ourselves from 0 to 35, and this goes for all the Tier-2 Sub-classes as well.” Removing several sheets of paper, Cynrik passed them to Gabby, who quickly gave everyone a sheet.
“Now, don’t freak out when you see the numbers.” Cynrik tried preparing everyone for what they were about to read, but it was useless, as the other four sucked in sharp breaths when they started going down the lines and saw the final total. After receiving information from Geralt and running the numbers with Tobs, he worked out a full XP table.
: Tier-2 Level Chart:
: Level 0 = 252,616 :
: Level 1 = 259,633 :
: Level 2 = 267,051 :
: Level 3 = 274,905 :
: Level 4 = 283,236 :
: Level 5 = 292,087 :
: Level 6 = 301,509 :
: Level 7 = 311,559 :
: Level 8 = 322,303 :
: Level 9 = 333,814 :
: Level 10 = 346,177 :
: Level 11 = 359,492 :
: Level 12 = 373,871 :
: Level 13 = 389,449 :
: Level 14 = 406,382 :
: Level 15 = 424,854 :
: Level 16 = 445,085 :
: Level 17 = 467,339 :
: Level 18 = 491,936 :
: Level 19 = 519,266 :
: Level 20 = 549,811 :
: Level 21 = 584,174 :
: Level 22 = 623,119 :
: Level 23 = 667,628 :
: Level 24 = 718,984 :
: Level 25 = 778,899 :
: Level 26 = 849,708 :
: Level 27 = 934,679 :
: Level 28 = 1,038,533 :
: Level 29 = 1,168,349 :
: Level 30 = 1,335,256 :
: Level 31 = 1,557,799 :
: Level 32 = 1,869,359 :
: Level 33 = 2,336,699 :
: Level 34 = 3,115,599 :
: Level 35 = 4,673,398 :
-Total XP Necessary to reach the level cap: 29,924,558-
-Total XP Necessary to reach Full Cap : 89,773,674-
“Fuck me, how the hell are we supposed to get to 90 million in six freaking weeks. Cyn, I think we bit off more than we can chew this time; how in the fuck do we pull this off when it would clearly take YEARS to do it by the average pace.”
“That, my little brother, is all part of the plan. Sitting down with Headmaster Rivia, I figured out a few things, such as what researchers had come to find out about how XP correlates with the Tier and level within the Egresses, for example, up until now, when we fought against Tier-1 or Tier-0 beings we would receive 100 XP per level. So, when they were level 20, we would get 2k; however, thanks to that little passive of yours….” Cynrik trailed his words off, but everyone knew what he meant; he was talking about Brance’s Double XP buff.
Smirking cockily, Cynrik flicked his wrist and fired four slips of paper to everyone.
“That is top secret right there, but yall are smart enough to understand what it means. Destroy the paper once you memorize it.” Basking in the reactions of his party, Cynrik waited for everyone to understand that written on the paper was the formula he had come up with to determine how much XP they would receive from Tier-2 Creatures they killed once the Farming Began.
-Tier-2 Creature XP: (1000 x Level) = Base, (Base x BC )= Actual, where B = Brance Modifier (2), and C is Double XP (set to 1 unless double rewards)-
-This series is exclusively published on WebNovel if you are reading it anywhere else…You Wrong, Fam. PS Check out the discord, https://discord.gg/dcxKNJEMwg