Power-Levelling After Dark – Part 1

“Pfff… Ah-ah-ah!”

“I swear I’m gonna send ya to Hell. Just ya wait.”

“Sorry, sorry. It’s just… seeing a priestess with horns and a demon tail is just too funny.”

Yzara actually looked about to vomit for a hot second while inside the church, but after we left, she seemed to get much better. I tried to convince her otherwise, explaining that now that she had a Holy Magic class, she’d slowly recover her HP inside, but she categorically refused to stay there any longer.

After we got out, we decided to try and rank up her newly-acquired class. And yes, I did manage to convince the Demon Queen to put on the outfit. After all, it did provide a modest boost to her Holy Magic—not that that sort of logic completely convinced her.

“Fine, I’ll put it on,” she eventually said, “but just because the sun’s setting, and it’s gettin’ chilly.”

Man, she can be such a tsundere.

I’d also given her that <Priestess’ Staff> that cut the MP consumption of Holy Magic skills.

“Well, there is one good thing about it,” she added under her breath as we made our way out the church.

“And what is that?”

“Literally no one will suspect I’m the Demon Queen while dressed like a priestess.”

“I suppose so. And after you hide your horns and tail and what have you, even more so.”

High-level demonkin—like Yzara—looked more humanoid than lower-leveled ones. Past a certain level, they could outright hide their demon features with magic and look like regular humans.

“By the way, I forgot to ask this before. Was this thing just layin’ around there?”

“Ah.” My voice got caught in my throat. I had half convinced myself that the outfit had just been lying around, but her question brought that skull back to the forefront of my mind.

Heck, this is the Demon Queen, we’re talking about. As if she’d care. I told myself as I shook the image from my mind. I took a deep breath and spoke with as level of a voice as I could.

“There was a skeleton wearing it.”

“…A skeleton?” She raised an eyebrow. “That’s gross. You did use your gun on this, didn’t you?”

A look of disgust crossed her face.

“Of course. I’m not a sadist.”

“Huh. Guess ya really are a strange Hero.”

That’s all she said.

We took a few more steps in silence before it became too much to bear.

“Wait, what do you mean by that? I thought you, of all people, wouldn’t care about this.”

After all, it’s just a skeleton.

But Yzara’s answer took me by surprise. She stopped, then turned around with a strange look.

“Look, I don’t. I’m the queen of the demons, the ruler of Profane Magic. I couldn’t care less about desecrating a corpse. My Demon Horde had its fair share of undead, too. And ya did reset this, so it’s as good as new,” she said as she flapped cloth covering her legs.

“Then—”

“But.” She said, interrupting me, her voice holding on that single word. “This is not somethin’ I expected a Hero to do. Pilferin’ a skeleton. Even a Hero who takes on Profane Magic usually respect the dead. I was just surprised, that’s all.”

Well, I’ll be damned.

I just stood there, looking at Yzara. This demon, reprimanding me from apparently committing this apparent sin. I started feeling a bit gross myself—no, I was feeling gross at myself.

No, that’s stupid. It’s just a prop. It’s not a real skeleton.

While I was internally debating the matter, Yzara had since moved on.

“Anyway, enough of that. So we’re huntin’ Wisps? I feel bad hunting my former minions.”

Even with the Holy Magic upgrades, Yzara was still very much on the bottom of the class ranking. However, I had a plan for that too—and the setting sun was the perfect opportunity.

“Well, you no longer control them, now, do you? And they are by far the best source of experience around here.”

Wisps were wandering clocked, ghost-like mobs that appeared everywhere on the field at night. They used elemental magic, and because they were undead, they could use also Profane Magic, and were weak to Holy Magic. They were a great source of EXP too, which was necessary to progress through the classes.

“Ya really think we can do it with just beginner magic?”

“Yeah, just trust me and the Debuggun. I have a plan.”

To hunt them, we stepped out of the safety of Luribel’s Polis area and back into the bleak, white wilderness. They definitely weren’t the type of mob absolute beginners like us could normally handle, but I had a plan.

What immediately struck me as we left Luribel behind was how quiet the outside was. Too quiet. Even at night, you could expect to have a few mobs coming after you, but we were completely alone.

“Why do you think there aren’t any mobs coming our way?”

“Now that you bring it up, that is weird. Maybe the White Death is just wary of yer gun, and is observing what’s going on.”

“So we are constantly being observed by whatever that thing is?”

“Pretty much. It’s not like we have much of an alternative, so let it watch. By the time it knows enough, we’ll be way out of here.”

After wandering for a while, enough time for the sun to fully set, we finally spotted the first Wisp.

“(Over there at eight o’clock!)” I whispered.

Just ahead of us, maybe twenty or so meters, there was a small floating being covered in a translucent cloak. It carried a staff, which it used to cast its magic. Judging from the faint, slight orange of the cloak, this was a Fire Wisp. However, I could tell from its white eyes that this was no ordinary Wisp, as it too was infected by the White Death.

“(Alright, let’s proceed with the plan!)”

Yzara seemed to be ready, so I pulled out the Debuggun. Here’s what the screen showed.

<Mob: Fire Wisp (Lv. 27)

HP: 56/56

MP: 200

Skills: Shadow Strike, Flame

Status conditions: Infected (‡Þ‽ß$&¶&‼)>

Level 27… will we be okay?

It was quite a high level, much like the Dire Wolves had been. Normally, we wouldn’t be able to handle it, but I trusted my plan.

Without further ado, I fired my first shot of the Resetting Beam, returning the Wisp to its spawn state and removing the infection. It seemed momentarily confused, but it quickly returned to its usual patrol behavior.

“(First phase is completed. Fire away!)”

I kept the Wisp locked on my scope, while the Demon Queen got her staff ready, and cast her offensive spell.

“Light Strike!”

An orb of light flew from her staff and hit the Wisp. Despite the direct hit, the Wisp shrugged off the attack. It had Yzara on its radar now. I immediately drew out the Debuggun and locked the Wisp on the screen. I could see that her hits had dealt less than 5% of its max HP, which wasn’t great. This was where my absolutely foolproof plan came into plan.

Or so I thought.

As the Wisp approached Yzara, I attempted to fire another bullet—not to reset its state, but to change it. This was another of those features of the Debuggun that hung around for debugging purposes. It could also change a mob’s state, like attacking, running away, etc.

At least, that’s what I wanted to do.

When I pulled the trigger, no energy bullet came out. Instead, the screen flashed red momentarily, and the words <No charge. Please wait 30 seconds.>

“Wait, what?”

I was so shocked, it took me a few moments for my brain to boot back up.

This thing has a charge?! Why did they add that in?!

“What are ya waiting’ for? Just zap this guy already!”

“I-I can’t!”

“Ya can’t?!”

“I had no idea this thing had a charge!”

“Oh, ya useless piece of—”

Yzara’s words were cut off by the very angry Wisp that was right in front of us. In the darkness of night, the slight orange glow of its staff shone as bright was a lighthouse—

“Dodge!” I screamed when I realized he was about to fire.

We leapt to the side as the fireball hit in the place we had been mere moments later. The bleached grass caught on fire, illuminating the dark night; there was no way we could hide in the shadows now. Yzara and I ran straight back to Luribel, with the Wisp in hot pursuit.

“This was yer idea!” She complained when we met along the way.

“I know! Sorry! It’ll be fine in just a few seconds!”

“If only I had Profane Magic, I could stop it in its tracks…”

“Wouldn’t you be able to just control it if you had your class back?”

“Good point—Woah!”

From the corner of my eye, I saw a bluish blob streaking through the air. I turned to see Yzara lunging to the side to dodge a Shadow Strike, the basic Profane Magic attack.

Guess the Wisp is targeting her because she has Holy Magic…!

“Ya stupid mob, attacking your master with Profane Magic! What an insult!” She said, as she readied another attack. “Take this! Light Strike!”

Another ball of light shot from her staff, not missing its target. The Wisp took it head on, and I could see it did some damage, but we’d be fried before Yzara ever took it out.

“Geez, when is that ready?” Yzara complained, almost screaming.

“Five seconds left! Four! Three, two, one. I’m firing!”

Right as the timer reached zero, I fired. The Wisp immediately froze in place for a few seconds, stopping its pursuit. That was just enough time for Yzara to meet back up with me and for us to put enough distance from it so it lost its aggro.

“(Phew, that was close—ouch! What did you hit me with your staff for?!)”

“(It’s to get all that uselessness out of ya! Ya’ve that magic item, and ya don’t even know how it works?!)”

She was right, but this meant that we couldn’t just go around shooting aimlessly. We had to be strategic about its usage.

“(Okay, change of plans. Let’s wait a bit for the timer to be over, and then we hit it again. Then I change its state, and we hide again.)”

“(That sounds so tedious…)”

“(Do you have any better ideas? We’re beating a level 27 mob here!)” Oops, talked about levels again. “(Anyway, the timer’s expired. Let’s go!)”

Yzara fired her Light Strike. Just before the Wisp could aggro again, I changed its state back to patrolling. It immediately stopped its pursuit and completely ignored us.

Rinse and repeat. That’s how this epic battle went. Eventually, her final Light Strikes hit, and the Wisp evaporated into a thin mist.

“Finally that’s over!” Yzara said as she approached the scene of the crime.

“Let’s see if we got any good loot.”

When mobs were defeated, they sometimes dropped loot in the form of Magic Crystals and Divine Canisters containing an item. In this case, it only dropped two. An orange tetrahedron crystal and a short, crooked wooden staff.

“There’s a Fire Magic Crystal and a Wisp Staff,” Yzara said. “Well, at least ya’ll be able to use this when ya get yer own magic.”

These Magic Crystals could be used to learn the entry classes associated with that magic type, to gain EXP related to that magic type, or be used in some crafting recipes.

Meanwhile, the Wisp Staff was a staff that worked much like the Priestess Staff I got Yzara. It gave a very small boost to all types of magic other than Holy Magic.

“I suppose I can learn Fire Magic now… but aren’t Wisps practically immune to elemental magic?”

“That’s right. So yer still useless.” She rolled her eyes at me. This Demon Queen was really starting to get on my nerves.

“Let’s keep the Fire Magic Crystal for later,” I said, annoyed, as I stuffed it in the Hero’s Bag. “Let’s get going and get your magic leveled up already. Hopefully, the actual prize we’re hoping for will drop.”