My Servant System

I hummed happily to myself as I watched about twenty notifications roll into the System, each one netting me roughly 8,000 experience each for a total of 162,422 experience, which pushed me over to Level 51, allowing me to place a point into my INT to bring it closer to matching my WIS.

My arcane stats were outpacing my physical stats with ease currently, though one real session of training with Lady Fenryas would fix that right up if I decided I wanted to enjoy the warm, welcoming comfort of a hell bent Wolf that was determined to break as many bones in my body and carve pieces off of me like I was a turkey.

I may be more than willing to break and cut into a living person however I pleased, but that didn't mean I wanted to be on the receiving end of that treatment if I could avoid it; it may be hypocritical of me, but who cares?

The ones receiving those broken bones and cut flesh are definitely~ deserving of it, and they could always pick the easy way out if they truly wanted to end their suffering earlier... it just seems that no one wants to take that route, which is a blessing for me~!

Anyways, the others were currently unaware that the cluster of idiots from earlier had met an untimely - yet deserved - demise at the benefit of myself, which came in the form of experience and understanding just how far I could push the limits of my mana and ability to control my spells.

A timed explosion of ice on your neck would certainly do the trick, but the real trick was in making sure that spell wasn't noticed and as able to activate when I wanted it to activate, which would mean it functioned without being directly 'connected' to me.

It was all a bit of trial and error, and that trial went swimmingly for me.

Watching as the others buried the loot and made sure to clean the area up, I continued to hum quietly as I stood guard, looking out towards the slope leading down to the shelf.

There were a few people coming up and leaving, but we were a good couple hundred feet away and nestled between some small boulders, so we were hidden enough from normal adventurers eyes.

When they finished storing the loot away, we returned to the first shelf to find that everyone was keeping a wide berth from us, and I continued to hum even as the others all looked around curiously, wondering what had happened and if the entire area was now deciding to treat us with the caution they should have been using.

Of course, it wasn't able to remain hidden for long that the previous group had met an... unfortunate end, and upon seeing the various headless corpses scattered about the far edge of the shelf, everyone looked towards me, since a slightly closer look revealed them to have frost rimming their wounds.

"Frost in a hot, dry place... now how could that have gotten there~? Any ideas?"

I gave everyone an innocent smile as I asked that question, and Jahi just shook her head before leading us down to the second shelf, not reprimanding me at all for that since she was also likely going to try and have them killed before we left; we were a rather tight knit, possessive group, after all...

Everyone mostly ignored that, with only Adelina giving me a weird look before shaking her head as we traveled down past the second shelf and down onto the third, where we found less Resource Tortoises than before, but more normal monsters, specifically worms.

The Tortoises were milling around in various locations, just roaming and doing nothing, while the worms moved around them like an entourage, their gaping maws scooping up and flakes or chunks of material that fell off of the Tortoises, eating it down rapidly and sustaining themselves.

Down here were fewer adventurers than before, most just going for the quick buck that was above on the second shelf instead of risking themselves for something more down on the third, which meant we had to keep an eye on everyone down here since they'd be a bit more seasoned and stronger.

Unsheathing our weapons, we located a Resource Tortoise that wasn't being hunted by another party and began to make our way towards it, moving around the various clusters of worms and going straight for our prey; we were largely ignored by everything, since the worms seemed more interested in feeding then fighting, and only the Resource Tortoises seemed to be bothered by us, turning and beginning to move away from us.

The shelf was a bit darker than the previous ones, the sun needing to shine rather far down into the Canyon to illuminate the area, so it was cooler down here, the heat trapped up top and leaving the depths to mill at a set temperature, though the air was stuffy, dry, and laden with dust...

All around us was orangish brown dirt that occasionally had a glimmer of metal flakes inside it, while the thin patches of gravel usually were churned and broken down by the worms, creating new dirt to be spread across the shelf.

Completely barren save for the monsters, the Canyon wasn't the most visually stunning place I had ever been to, but it was one of those places that placed more importance on the contents of the place and not its appearance.

After all, the contents of this Dungeon just so happened to be large, rumbling Tortoises with thick, mana laden shells that allowed various ores and crystals to grow freely, while the mana around us could - rarely - condense into a physical form in the manifestation of a gemstone.

So while it was a tad hideous to look at, I didn't care for this place for its looks, but instead on how it could benefit me and my family; even more so since the hunting here was easy and to the point, unlike back at Zhu'Rong Caverns.