Although my fight with Haruka had been unexpected, I'd managed to get her to submit. Currently, I was confirming her stats. The stats I'd seen before were fake, so I didn't actually know Haruka's true strength.
I wasn't truly doubting her or anything, but Haruka did still seem as if she were hiding something. So I decided it wouldn't be a bad idea to get a firm grasp of her abilities, just in case.
[ Haruka ]
[Level]: 1000
[Race]: Half-Elf
[Class Levels]
・Acolyte: 200
・Priest: 200
・Ranger: 100
・Strider: 100
・Mage: 200
・Sorcerer: 200
[HP]: 35000
[SP]: 16000
[STR (Strength)]: 1750
[DEX (Dexterity)]: 3000
[VIT (Vitality)]: 2050
[INT (Intelligence)]: 11550 (+2000)
[AGI (Agility)]: 3700
[MND (Mind)]: 8902
[LUK (Luck)]: 1930
[Equipment]:
・Head: -
・Right arm: Bracelet of the Sage (INT +1000)
・Left arm: Bracelet of the Shadow (INT +1000)
・Body: Traveler's clothes
・Legs: Traveler's boots
・Other: -
That was how her stats went, but… What the hell is with that super back line specialization?
It was great that I'd managed to see Haruka's real stats, but they were really imbalanced. She had only bothered with back line classes, and she also had several classes at level 200, which you would normally have to pay for. On top of that, her equipment only served to stretch her INT stat even further. I could only say that she was being really thorough.
Her attack power and HP were far lower than what I would expect from a level 1000 player, but her INT stat alone was higher than any stat-boosting could get you. She wasn't quite at the level Juvia had been in her prime, but she was still ridiculous. However, this meant that she'd be easy prey for Penny.
After the fight, Haruka and I cooperated and somehow managed to fool Penny and Fiona, who of course came chasing after us. We said that the planet was an attack from someone somewhere else, and that I'd dealt with it for now.
Actually, me dealing with it wasn't a lie. It was just that Haruka had been the one who'd attacked.
Also, this didn't really matter, but Haruka had gone back to her usual red haired look at some point.
She was using the Water element spell 'Illusion', it used mist to show others an illusion and could even change one's form. In the game, all the spell did was raise the target's evasion rate. At least, that was how I understood it.
People did complain, saying that if that was the case, why not change the player avatar like the lore indicated? But there wasn't a peep from the company about changing it.
To think that that would bear fruit now… Truly anything can happen.
Apparently, having two affinities was a racial skill for half-elves. For Haruka, they were Metal and Water.
Like, what? That's totally unfair.
I was told that half-elves had good INT and MND growth, though not as good as elves. They also had decently balanced growth in everything else, though not as good as humans. So, not only did they have good stats for magic and heaven-arts use, they even got two affinities. And unlike normal elves, they could eat meat. Since elves were subjects of the forest, they couldn't do so. That was why Juvia had such low HP even though her stat-boosted with items, and thus was one-shottable by Brachium.
In the game, elves had a definite handicap, since they couldn't eat meat. On top of that, people only realized that fact after they'd started to stat boost… In other words, after they'd reached level 1000. It was a truly mean-spirited trap.
But half-elves have none of those drawbacks, huh? What the hell? That's totally cheating. Nerf it. Now.
Actually, devs, just make an HP-boosting item that isn't orc meat.
At any rate, now that Tayuya had joined the party and Haruka was once again my subordinate, we entered Honda and left Gjallar behind.
It's starting to get tight in here with all the new people. I should think about expanding Honda. While I'm at it, why don't I take the chance to try adding in bulletproof glass and carbon fiber and stuff?
Those materials didn't exist in the game, but it should be possible now. Materials only possible because of my knowledge from 'the other side'… I wonder how high-level a golem I could make with them. I'm kind of tempted.
In the game, it was impossible to improve or incorporate other materials into a golem once it was completed. If you wanted a golem with new materials, you needed to build an entirely new one. However, it might've been possible now. This world resembled the game, but it wasn't the game, after all.
"By the way, Tayuya. Do you have any useful information? You were with the grimmfolk, so you should have heard something."
I was sitting on a sofa I'd prepared in the car. Tayuya sat across from me in her human form. Fiona was next to her, gnawing on some corn I'd bought for lunch in Gjallar.
"Well… First, I know of another of the Twelve Zodiac's Guardians who was working with the grimmfolk."
"Oh? Who else was there? Speak."
"Anko of the Scorpio constellation, became a vengeful demon and is fully supporting the grimmfolk. Unlike me, where our relationship was simply one of mutual interest, she desires to destroy humanity so much that she probably does not mind becoming a simple tool of the grimmfolk. Hrotti—the country that the Adventure Princess, Neo Politan, founded—was destroyed by her hands."
And there's the current winner of the 'who's done the worst things' contest.
I somehow managed to fight the desire to facepalm but couldn't stop myself from heaving a sigh.
Anko the Poison Queen was… well, exactly as it said on the tin. She was a scorpion monster. Her monster name was 'Emperor Berserk Scorpion.' Nickname: 'The Berserk Ruler.' She could apply poison to her normal attacks and sprayed poison mist. Even if you were already poisoned, she could poison you more, turning it into 'lethal poison'… Basically, she was a poison specialist who fought by poisoning you, poisoning you again, and then poisoning you even more .
She didn't have any other means of attack, but she was really, really tough, so she forced her enemies into a war of attrition. You might feel relieved, since her attack power was low, but once she lost a certain amount of HP, she went into a berserk state and attacked with amazing momentum. She was quite nasty as a boss.
But to me, she wasn't actually that scary an opponent. I kind of feel bad for thinking it, but thanks to my dress, any opponent who relies on status ailments is basically nothing to me.
But to towns and countries these days, there probably wasn't a scarier enemy out there. After all, she could spread her poison mist over a wide area. If she really tried to kill an entire country, she'd be really good at it. No joke.
"Ahh, Anko… She really worshiped Lady Naru, didn't she?" After finishing her corn, Fiona spoke up understandingly. "If all that turned into hate, then she could be a very dangerous individual right now."
Is she really that dangerous?
Tayuya nodded in agreement. "Yes. As she is now, she's so immersed in her revenge that she won't even listen to us. In fact, her hatred is so great she broke through her level constraints. Right now, she's level 900. Sorry, but I am no match for her."
She did something that amazing?! The maximum level for a Tamer's monster is 800. How the hell did she break that on her own? That nut.
I glanced over at Penny and asked her a question. "Penny, what would happen if you tried to fight her?"
"…I predict my probability of winning to be around 62%. Using my past data on Anko to project her current level of strength, I believe my battle capability exceeds hers. Although a preemptive use of Brachium should shave away a lot of her HP, it will not be enough to kill her. After that, it will be a simple comparison of our statuses and abilities. In other words, a question of whether Anko or I will fall first."
So it's even dangerous for Penny, the strongest companion I have at the moment. I'd figured that she'd definitely win, since poison doesn't work on golems, but I guess Anko is just that dangerous.
But Fiona should've been able to match Anko's poison with her Mesarthim. No matter how high her defenses were, it was basically meaningless in the face of percent damage. Fiona should have higher HP, too. They were both Fire element as well, so even if Anko went berserk, it shouldn't matter too much to Fiona. She matches up pretty well with her.
Tayuya herself had admitted that she was no match for Anko, so she was out.
As for Haruka… She had the advantage in attribute affinities, but her HP was far too low. I don't think she'll be able to last through a berserk scorpion's attacks. I wasn't entirely sure how well she could fight, so I couldn't be certain, but it was probably impossible for her.
That means if we meet, Fiona'll have to step up, huh?
But Anko should be in grimmfolk territory right now, so we'll have to let her be for the moment.
"Other than that… Sienna of the Leo constellation and the Rose Princess Rozelia Ruby are at war and skirmish daily. It's a full-force fight to the death between the strongest of the Twelve Zodiac's Guardians and the strongest of the Seven Maidens of Midgar. Even the grimmfolk's Seven Destruction won't go near, since they might get caught up in the fight and die."
"Hm… Ruby should have the slight advantage for that fight. She even outdid us at close range combat, after all."
"No, well… Sienna, uhh… Well, unlike the other Twelve Zodiac's Guardians, she's never been exactly loyal to you… Once you disappeared she completely returned to the wild, and she's back to being level 1000."
Wow, now that's chaos for you.
So they're ignoring me or any potential heroes to fight for the top of the hill?
A fight between Ruby in her prime and Sienna from back when she was a boss enemy was the stuff of dreams. I actually want to watch, but I also don't really want to get too close.
"Hey, Tayuya… Wasn't Ruby really stuck on seeing Lady Naru as her rival…?"
"She was. Ever since she lost to our king once in the past, she's set on surpassing our king as her goal. She's very tenacious about it, too. The Fauna Queen's the same. She used to be hailed as the strongest monster, but she was beaten by our king and added to her forces. Even though she obeyed her, she was always on the lookout for the chance to usurp her position."
"A warning, Master. If you were to ever get close to their fight, there is an 80% probability of Ruby and Sienna stopping their fight and charging at you instead."
…I take it all back. It's not just that I don't really want to get too close. I don't want to be anywhere near them.
Apparently Sienna and Ruby were complete outliers to the usual Twelve Zodiac's Guardians or Seven Maidens of Midgar in that they viewed me as an enemy. Just imagining a level 1000 stat-boosted character and a level 1000 boss monster rushing me along with their armies is scary.
I can't even joke about it. Yeah. Let's leave those two for last. They can just keep each other company for a while.
"Also… this might not really matter, but it seems that the country of swords, Laevateinn, has succeeded in summoning a hero."
"Oh?" I couldn't stop my voice from sounding a little hoarse after hearing that news.
Apparently a proper hero had been summoned to this world.
By 'hero' it probably meant that they had the hidden class 'Chosen'. It was the strongest front line class. Normally, raising Warrior, Light Warrior, Heavy Warrior, and Swordmaster to level 200 was required before unlocking it. In the game, no one had even known it existed until Erza discovered it. And as far as I knew, there were no other players who'd taken that class other than Erza.
I mean, the unlock conditions for it were just awful.
The abilities for Warrior, Light Warrior, and Heavy Warrior were all similar. If someone wanted warrior-like abilities, only taking one of them was basic common knowledge. On top of that, the player would have to pay real money to raise the max class levels of all those not-especially-powerful classes to 200 when there was literally no other merit in doing so.
The only classes worth paying to raise the max level of were upper-tier classes like Swordmaster or classes for which an upper tier didn't exist, like Alchemist. This was also basic common knowledge for anyone who played the game.
However, the muscle-brained Erza did this anyway. She ignored how awful and inefficient her stat growth was and stuck to only being a front line swordsman. Since she completely ignored the most efficient character builds, I and everyone else viewed Erza as a joke character. I believed the player behind Erza herself also at least half played her as one, too.
Everyone, including me, believed there was no way she'd ever become strong.
But at the end of that ridiculous character build lay a hidden class, and Erza suddenly jumped all the way to being the strongest character in the game. All her terrible stat growth until then was more than made up for once she got the class, and her arsenal of skills became insanely brutal.
The skill 'Climax': is at the top of that list. This allowed the Chosen to revive when their HP hit 0 and counterattack, and also raised their crit rate to 100%.
If that class was unlocked at the start… the hero would most likely rival us stat-boosted characters easily just by leveling.
I put my hand to my chin and muttered, "That's bad…"
The hero class was strong. That was why this was terrible news.
Why is it terrible? Because the grimmfolk know about it.
The fact that I got this info from Tayuya meant that the grimmfolk already knew this. And they should also have known how dangerous the Chosen could be from fighting Erza. They might try to end him while his level was still low.
But if he managed to raise his level, he might become a monster to rival me or the Seven Maidens of Midgar. And the grimmfolk knew that, too.
Now if that's the case, what'll happen? What should I do? If I were the grimmfolk, how would I act?
No need to dwell on it… I'd kill him before he grew too dangerous. That's the best course of action.
"That hero will be killed if he is left alone."
The hero was humanity's faint ray of hope. And he was already in danger right from the start.
No one in the car objected to my statement.