Infinite Realm

Looking at the severed corpse that lay on the floor, every member on the team immediately sighed out with relief, with Yato and Lu Zhen directly falling to the ground.

"I almost thought I'd be dead back then." Yato exclaimed as he breathed out.

"Yeah. This dungeon is indeed worthy of being the hardest for current players. This is just the first dungeon BOSS and we're this wrecked. Without Sato and Xue Yan, we would have died long ago." Lu Zhen added.

"I didn't do much, Sato pretty much did all the work while I just assisted him." Xue Yan shook her head.

"You at least did more than us so you ought to be praised still." Fudo said.

Sato didn't join the conversation but began to contemplate on the battle.

Just as Lu Zhen had said, Gatekeeper Baka was the first BOSS of the dungeon and by referring to the map as well as their experience as gamers, it was by no chance the main BOSS or anything like that. Most like, it was the easiest BOSS-level target in the dungeon yet it brought them this much trouble.

True that Sato seemed to have dealt with it without so much as a scar but the Gatekeeper has actually managed to reach his level of strength while still being level 15. As far as Sato knew, this was ludicrous and supposedly impossible but the monster had managed to change this fact.

'Or is this a result of having a high-level player enter the dungeon? The system must have reorganised the stats of the BOSS to be able to cause me harm. Otherwise, if I were level 14 or 15, it wouldn't have been this strong.' Sato thought.

Apart from the absurd level of strength possessed by the monster, there was also the fact that the overall strength of the team was too weak for this dungeon. The team was too dependent on Sato and Xue Yan, both for firepower and tanking. Even Lu Zhen and Fudo, who were much stronger than Seiichi, Yato, and Katsuo, weren't worth a fart to the Gatekeeper if not for Sato keeping it busy. If Sato and Xue Yan weren't part of the battle, the other 5 would have died within 10 seconds of the start of the fight. Even if Xue Yan was included in the fight, since the team was lacking an appropriate tank, they would still end up dead, just only lasting longer; at least for 15 seconds.

It was the issue that made Sato pause in contemplation as he realised that h might have underestimated the dungeon too much.

'At least this is just a scouting mission. We don't plan on completing the dungeon yet, otherwise, that goal of mine would be ridiculous.'

While Sato was stuck in his own world, Seiichihad already gone to loot the corpse of the Gatekeeper. He had initially tried the Dark Priests first but realised that unlike their counterparts from before, these guys didn't offer anything

[[ System notification :

Do you wish to receive your rewards now or once you've exited the dungeon?

Yes/No

Note : Immediate acceptance of the reward would potentially affect the strength of the monsters as well as the difficulty of the dungeon. ]]

Seiichi paused his actions as he glanced over at Sato.

"You guys decide for yourselves. It doesn't really matter. This is a test-run and we're deemed to die anyway." Sato said.

"But maintaining the difficulty as it is now would help us go further, right?" Lu Zhen asked.

"I can't say for sure." Sato shook his head as he stared at the Gatekeeper's corpse.

"Overall, you guys are too weak and if nothing changes, we might not even go so far. But accepting the rewards now means you will get an increase in level, that's for sure. But that also means that the overall strength of the monsters would increase to match up to you. In summary, the situation night not change much."

"I see." Lu Zhen replied.

"I'm taking mine now." Katsuo announced as everyone turned towards him.

"As an MT, I'm supposed to be holding the monsters' aggro but I barely had any performance against the BOSS." Katsuo tightened his fist.

He then continued, "Also, as Sato said, this is a test-run. In the main thing,we would be facing the monsters with our new strength do I believe we shod do so starting now. We can get used to them that way. Facing a level 12 monster as a level 11 player isn't exactly the same as facing a level 13 monster as a level 12 player. We'd all need to adapt to our newfound strength and who else better to use than our targets."

"He makes a point there." Seiichi nudged his glasses.

"Haha. You really think so?" Katsuo awkwardly laughed as he scratched his head.

"I vote that we take our rewards now. It's better that way." Seiichi added.

Sato then faced the others to see their take on the decision and he saw all of them nod.

"Alright. You know what to do then."

As soon as Seiichi confiemed the decision, golden lights suddenly lit up in the dim hall as Yato, Katsuo, Lu Zhen, Seiichi, and Fudo were bathed in them. In summary, pretty much everybody apart from Xue Yan and Sato had levelled up at least once.

For Yato and Katsuo, being the lowest levelled in the team, their gain was much larger than the others. They levelled up twice reaching level 13 in one straight dash before Yato's experience bar slowly came to a halt at the 75% checkpoint while Katsuo made it up to level 14's 2% checkpoint. This was mostly because the two had handled the Dark Priests with Lu Zhen assisting them. At the same time, they had participated in taking down the Gatekeeper with Katsuo delivering the last hit.

As for Fudo and Lu Zhen, who were previously both level 13, they made it to level 14 with Fudo stopping at the 87% checkpoint while Lu Zhen at the 95% checkpoint.

Seiichi, on the other hand, had not only helped in facing the Gatekeeper but his damage count was actually the third highest on the team; just below Sato and Xue Yan which was inevitable. This had to do with his accurate shots that always aimed for a weak spot when facing the Gatekeeper. This was very evident from the fact that he had managed to target its injured region more than twice, despite the Gatekeeper trying to protect that part of its body. As a result of this achievement of his, he had managed to go all the way from level 12 to level 14, with his experience stopping at the 0% mark.

One of the reasons for the large growth in strength was mostly due to the 10% increase in rewards that was available in the dungeon for a while after Sato had unlocked it. It was for this reason that Sato had selected the [Temple of Vasiliás] dungeon instead of regular dungeons.

"Eh?!?? I'm still the weakest?" Yato cried out as he heard the rest mention their new level.

"Don't worry about it. You will soon reach level 14 so just work hard." Lu Zhen patted him on the shoulder with a smile that looked more like a smirk.

"Get your hands off me if you don't want to lose an arm." Yato twitched his lips.

"Haha." Lu Zhen immediately retreated as he couldn't hold himself back from laughing any longer.

At the same time, Seiichi continued to loot the BOSS while Sato glanced at his experience bar. Compared to the rest, he had made the least progress after the fight. Even Xue Yan had considerably better growth than he did. The number of experience points he gained wasn't even worth 1%. At this rate, he would be wasting his time here while the others -both his teammates and rivals- would get stronger.

'I guess I have no choice then.'