Dungeon Hunter - Chapter 54
Chapter 54: Episode 14. Where the Gods Fell (7)
My titles collapsed and changed.
I was a bit confused, because this was the first time seeing this kind of thing, so I opened my status window.
Name: Randalf Bruciel
Occupation: Count of Devildom (Dungeon Master)
Title:
<ul>
Dungeon Hunter (Abilities+1 when taking over a dungeon, hunting down a devil)
Unbreakable Warrior (Ex U, All Abilities+2)
First One Blessed by a Fairy (U, Mana+6)
</ul>
Abilities:
Power 79 (+9), Intelligence 64 (+2)
Speed 74 (+2), Strength 80 (+2), Mana 82 (+8)
Potential (379+23/500)
Remaining Abilities: 3
Fight Force: 64MW
Others: The heart of the Hell Lord was planted (Full power has not been open), Lightning God Power is changing. Unable to predict the result.
Skills: Skill combination (R), Mind’s Eye (Ex U), Lightning God Power (???), Rage (Epic)
‘There’s no… level.’
Was there a title like this…?
I was surprised that there was no level indicated, but also, according to the explanation on my title, I had a chance to add to the remaining abilities up to 140.
That meant there were 70 dungeons and 70 devils!
Frankly, it wouldn’t have been possible for me to take them all, but I had a high possibility of taking large parts of them.
The remaining abilities were precious elements that could help me break through my limits.
Even if I filled up all 500 Potential points, with the remaining abilities, I could break through that limit.
When one ability was over 90, I could feel the difference of one from two quite clearly. I couldn’t even imagine how it would feel when I reached 100. However, the status window was showing that I could go beyond 100 and reach 110, or even 120.
Or maybe even more.
‘This is crazy.’
It was an insane title, and it was the perfect title for me.
I was a lone ranger.
I had decided that I would slay every devil and dungeon to be on the top.
The more I hunted, the stronger I became. This title was much better than any other titles that would just give a little level-up of one’s overall abilities.
And the status window showed the remaining abilities, as well.
I’d found an Easter egg from the Auction of Devildom and had one remaining ability. Now, I added two to have three remaining abilities in total.
“Haha!”
I felt like I had been punched by someone, hard.
If I had no power and no memories from my former life, this title wouldn’t have seemed useful.
The more I hunted down the devils and took over dungeons, I would have more enemies who kept their eyes on me.
It was like a double-edged sword, but for now, the title Dungeon Hunter was a legendary treasure for me.
‘But it isn’t over yet.’
I was smiling for real, which I hadn’t done in a long, long time.
I had killed Adol and took his dungeon. Now, it was time for me to find additional benefits that I needed to take from this dungeon.
“Guyo, how many points are left from Adol?”
Guyo looked at me as if he was scared to tell me. “Four… four thousand and five hundred…. points.”
“…”
The number took my smile away.
I had been happy that I received 200,000 points for hunting a devil for the first time, but this stupid idiot Adol used all his points just to create Onish!
I decided to invest 500,000 points in the Japanese dungeon, and to do that, there was something I had to deal with first.
I started inside affair mode and checked the status of the Japanese dungeon.
There were random monsters all over the place. It seemed like I had to spend some time just to organize them all.
Anyway, when I looked at the total number of monsters, they had repopulated quite well.
Forty thousand Goblins, 10,000 Kobolds, 10,000 Knols, 4,000 Orcs…
“What about Arc Goblins? There are many of them. Did Adol summon them all?”
Arc Goblin was a mid-level Level-2 monster. It was similar to a regular Goblin, but it was much stronger and faster. It was called a “little predator” because it ruthlessly killed all the creatures around it.
Forty-eight Arc Goblins. The number almost reached 50.
I remembered that I saw some of them on my way up here.
Adol loved monsters like Orcs, so it was quite strange to see such a high number of Goblins.
When I asked Guyo, he shook his head and answered, “No. The Arc Goblins popped up naturally.”
“There’s a limit of numbers to have mutants. This wasn’t a natural mutation.”
“I don’t know…” Guyo looked down.
While thinking about the numbers, one thought came to my mind: ‘Is this the specialty of this dungeon?’
Every dungeon had different waves of Mana. There were monsters that adapted themselves to the wave well, while some couldn’t. By the end of the war, devils found out about this specialty, but not many devils used that to their benefit.
I’m sure I wouldn’t have thought of the dungeon’s specialty if I hadn’t seen the abnormal number of Goblins.
‘Maybe the Mana wave of this dungeon suits Goblins’ destructive power waves, just like animals or plants that thrive in some special environment or temperature.’
It was worth an experiment.
“Guyo, put all the monsters in one place except for the Goblins.”
The Core Fairy was able to control monsters under the orders of the dungeon master.
Monsters with extremely low intelligence could be a bit of a struggle, but Orcs or Trolls were at least communicable.
And as for the monsters with low intelligence, there was a way as well. All I had to do was summon the monster leaders that could control Kobolds and Goblins. It would take some time, but the separation was a necessary process.
“Okay. This is my first task, so I will do my best.”
Guyo didn’t look very confident when he flapped his wings. It seemed like he had been traumatized by Adol.
‘He doesn’t say his own name though.’
That was a bit different from Lyhee. Maybe it was a matter of self-confidence? I didn’t know much about fairies so I thought it was just their personality.
I didn’t think of fairies for long and started to touch my chin instead.
‘Maybe Goblins gave birth to Arc Goblins to survive in this mess. I need to do some experiments.’
I came back to life, but that didn’t mean I knew everything. I didn’t know much about dungeons, and this kind of challenge excited me.
To intervene to change the dungeon ecosystem as I saw fit would make me feel like I became God. Maybe that was one of the reasons devils didn’t even care about the human world.
Anyways… If I succeeded in this experiment, I could use it to improve my Korean dungeon as well. I would be able to repopulate a massive number of monsters that fit my dungeon. This could be the most effective way to increase my number of monsters.
Then, I ordered Krithli to use Pyrok and find the altar while concentrating on the inside affairs of the Japanese dungeon for a week.
The first thing I did was separate the monsters and place some on each floor.
I put Goblins on the first floor, Kobolds on the second floor, Knols on the third floor, Orcs on the fourth floor, and Trolls on the fifth floor.
I separated them all to find out what happened when they had no nemeses.
‘Goblin’s abnormal repopulation changes when they have no nemeses.’
Naturally, I kept my eyes on the Goblins in particular.
I wanted to know if Arc Goblins were there for survival or because of the dungeon’s Mana wave.
The repopulation rate was remarkable. When they had no predators, the repopulation rate decreased. I only observed for one week, but I was able to check the records and found out that the rate decreased by 30 percent. It was proving my theory correct.
Not many baby Goblins survived for a long time. When a Goblin gave birth to eight babies, at least six of them would die in about six months.
With or without nemeses, I’d seen that in the Korean dungeon.
I thought it was due to natural selection and that there was some unknown force that kept the rate stable, but that was something I needed to spend six months to prove… so I just checked the rate of death immediately after birth.
‘The survival rate is extremely high.’
Five hundred thirty-seven Goblins were born in a week, and 519 of them survived.
Only 18 of them died at birth.
This would have been impossible in my Korean dungeon. At least 20 percent of them were dead at birth in the Korean dungeon. If it had been tested in the Korean dungeon, at least 100 out of 537 would have been dead at birth.
It was too early to tell for sure, but still, the difference was too big.
‘There’s something going on.’
When I felt this way, I was rarely wrong.
If the Japanese dungeon was optimized for the Goblins, there had to be a monster that was optimized for the Korean dungeon.
‘The Mana wave of a dungeon is like the weather or environment—the basic force that makes monsters survive in the dungeon. I’m sure it’s related to the mutants, so Goblins are the favored ones here… I should take a look at which monster is optimized for the Korean dungeon.’
I didn’t have to check the monsters that I had kept until now, since none of them had shown any abnormalities. I just had to place different monsters there and test them out one by one.
‘But I wouldn’t be stupid enough to fill up the dungeon only with the most optimal monsters. If I filled the Japanese dungeon only with Goblins, that would become a fatal weakness… I need to control the numbers even if I find which monster is optimal. It’s just something I need to refer to.’
I had decided.
Although I hadn’t found the one, even if I did find it, I would be strategic in its placement.
These kinds of thoughts made me a deeper person.
Anyway, finding the optimal monsters for the wave would be a great help to make dungeons stronger. Until now, it had just been a theory, but if it was true, I would save a lot of points while raising many high-level monsters naturally.
“My Dungeon Master, I found the place that is suspected to be the fire altar.” Krithli came to see me with Griffin and Pyroks behind him.
I looked at her for a while.
She had been hanging out with Griffin all the time, and it seemed like Krithli was good at training as well.
Anyhow, it was the perfect timing.
I finished everything I could at the time inside affair mode. Other things would take time.
I nodded and told him, “Lead me.”
<hr />
There were four different kinds of altars in every dungeon.
An altar was a control tower of Mana flowing inside the dungeon and also a medium that created a strong barrier along the dungeon walls. If all four altars were destroyed, the outer dungeon wall barrier would disappear, and the dungeon would be exposed to human weapons.
There were two high-level Golems protecting each altar to prevent destruction.
The Golems were programmed to attack anyone who approached their altar who wasn’t the dungeon master.
On the other hand, if the dungeon master found them, the dungeon master could use the altars to control the monsters.
But… What really interested me wasn’t those two high-level monsters but the message there from the gods, a message that would show up after reaching 100 in intelligence.
I wanted to know why it had stressed intelligence, because in my former life, I’d never heard any devil that reached 100 in intelligence.
There were many that reached 100 in other abilities but not intelligence, so I had a theory that the gods thought I would remember my former life and one day, I would reach 100 in intelligence. And hence, they made such a condition.
Of course, when I wasn’t there, the words disappeared.
I had checked that with Krithli.
‘Maybe they thought easy come, easy go?’
They called it a “present.” Maybe they didn’t need a condition but they thought people used things easily when they could get them easily, so they took that into consideration?
I gave Griffin as a present. Top-notch monsters were next level creatures, even if they were on a low level. It was a monster that could be called a hidden ace of the game, and I knew that was important, so I put a condition on the gift.
Intelligence 100 was something that wasn’t easy to reach… I thought the present carefully would be weighed carefully with regards to his intelligence.
Since I hadn’t able to reach Intelligence 100, I was able to read it only because I had Krithli, just like now.
“Where God has fallen. This is our tomb and shackle. The one who will bring us back to the origin. I’m Gav, God of Earth. I will be with you… Take my last present.” These were words of the Goddess of Wisdom Minerva in the Korean dungeon.
It sounded almost exactly like what Krithli had said, but it was quite different.
Minerva just explained why dungeons had appeared, while the God of Earth Gav was saying a coded message.
A tomb and a shackle to bring them back to the origin…
When I was trying to understand the meaning…
Craaack!
The roof above the altar started to crack.
It wasn’t Chaotic Mana; it was the holy power of Gav that came from a far distance. Soon, a huge monster tore up space and came out of it.
‘Giantes!’
It looked to be about 13 feet tall, a Giant warrior in black armor and helmet.
I was able to look and saw shiny red eyes with heat that showed the power of the top-notch monster.
It was a top-notch Level-1 monster like Griffin, but it was much more aggressive.
My lips were dry when I opened my Mind’s Eye.
Name: Giantes
Abilities:
Power 94, Intelligence 71
Speed 75, Strength 92, Mana 74
Potential (406/414)
Others: Giant Dark Knight who was in the God of Earth Gav’s inner circle. He is a noble creature and won’t bow down to anyone. To have him, you need to pass his test.
Skills: Giantic Slash (Epic), Chest of Earth (Ex U)
Giantes.
It was looking at me with anger.
It was not difficult to understand what the test would be. That made me laugh.
‘So, you want a fight.’
