Chapter 343 - Start of the 2nd event (Patreon)

The 2nd event - The Siege of Aether Keep will start in 1 hour!

In 1 hour, everyone will be transferred to the Aether Keep, all difficulties together.

You will be facing a gradually increasing number of enemies trying to destroy Aether Keep. The numbers as well as the strength of the attackers will grow during the duration of the event. You will have 5 hours to prepare defenses and then 5 hours to defend Aether Keep.

Participants will be rewarded according to their performance during the defense.

Note: You can leave the event at any time you want.

Note: Cooperation with natives from Aether Keep and with participants of the tournament is required and fighting among defenders, be it tutorial attendees or natives, can decrease your points.

Note: You can use [Restriction] for this event.

Well, the event seems interesting. The only thing I dislike is the part about not fighting other participants, but it says that there can be a punishment. So maybe a bit of infighting is allowed?

It also makes me wonder what or who the attackers will be and how Aether Keep will look.

There is nothing about the inability to restore mana or stamina, so I like that much more and I also wonder if I should put [Restriction] on myself. Placing one could increase my rewards, but not placing one could allow me to do much more while defending the place, which could work out better in the end.

The question is how difficult the second event is. If it's easy and I placed no [Restriction], it could end up being overkill and make me earn less points.

If it's difficult and I placed one, I could regret it, unable to do much more during the defense.

Well, I leave it up to a bit under 1h older Nat. He can decide a few seconds before the event starts.

Closing the window, I open another one and put three items for the auction. All of them quickly made and apparently, according to the assholes who give me funny names, with the performance of mid rare.

So this time I set the starting price for each of them at 300 shards and set the time of the auction to 30 minutes. Let's see how it will do.

As before the 1st event, I create a small orb inside my body and start filling it with my mana, trying to smuggle it in again.

Entering the house, I find everyone already inside, all over the living room. The most notable is Biscuit who is facing Noodle in a staring contest.

The white snake feels a bit stronger now, so maybe one of our animal overlords had a breakthrough in his training and is trying to fight for the position of Absolute?

Well, in the end, it doesn't matter. Biscuit doesn't even release any mana, just looks at Noodle with his usual silly expression. The one that makes him look like he is smiling with his tongue slightly sticking out.

Even that is enough and Noodle lowers his head and then leaves in a clear sign of defeat.

(Asshole,) sounds proudly through everyone’s mind as Biscuit announces his victory.

That makes the introverted snake lower his head even more and burrow under the blankets on the couch.

It might seem harsh, but Biscuit is cute so he can do anything he wants.

"Yoo, can you lend me the axe for the event?" Maya asks shamelessly as the fight between two animal overlords is over.

"One thousand shards per hour."

She blinks a few times staring at me.

"You can´t afford to buy it so subscriptions might be a good idea. Even if damaged, it's an arcane item. It has the performance of a mid to upper epic item and sometimes even a bit higher."

"I heard you are offering an epic item if someone helps you make a good pizza in a few days. We are teammates, right? You can be nice to me too."

I shake my head, "The pizza is for my precious minion. She deserves it."

Still remembering Vega asking me about my food and with the token that allows me to summon her for a day, there is no way I wouldn't prepare a nice welcome for her. Yes, the 5th floor wasn’t that long ago and it's only been a few days since I saw her, but this is too nice of an opportunity during a somewhat safe tournament.

Maybe I could send her fighting against Easy or Normal difficulty people. I wonder how my minion would do.

"Can I also become your minion?" Maya tries again.

I ignore her suggestion and pick up Biscuit from the floor only to put him on my lap where I grab his pink tongue that sticks out and pull it gently.

Shaking his head, he woofs at me and calls me an asshole.

In exchange, I pull his whiskers and whisper, "I will introduce you to someone in a few days."

(Asshole?)

"No, it isn't an asshole like me." I boop his nose.

(Food?)

"No."

(Food food?)

"Hell no. It's a friend."

(Friend?)

"Yes."

He tilts his head as if thinking and then looks at me.

(Food!)

Goddamnit Biscuit, at least you be normal.

"Any plans for the 2nd event?" I ask Maya.

"Tess is talking to Gareth. Dennis, Aaron, and Sophie did set up a telepathic conversation web or something, so we are waiting," Maya answers.

"I heard Gareth complained about Sophie’s web?" I turn to Izzy, who is still trying to make Noodle come out from under the blankets.

"Soph kept talking about how bad their web is and they refused to fix it. So she created her own with Dennis and Aaron and then started taking over parts of the other web when they complained about it," Izzy sounds somewhat proud.

That makes me wonder. Should I try to create a third web and take over group 4's web as well as Gareth and their little alliance's web?

"Soph can be spiteful if she wants to. One guy told her to keep her mouth shut and let them work when she tried to help with their web," Maya giggles. She seems to be enjoying the situation a lot.

I get a notification and ignore Maya to check it out.

Congratulations, all of the items you put into the auction were sold off for 1500 shards. After the system takes 10%, you will receive 1350 shards!

Congratulations, you are currently the 1st in the crafter rankings of the tournament shop.

Rankings:

1st - Fuckyouintentbitch

2nd - Miwa

3rd - Adam

4th - Jonathan

5th - Athena

Okay, 1st. The asking price I set was 300 for each of the 3 items, so how the heck did they all get sold for around 500 each? They were only rare items and apparently ugly even with some decent performance. There is something very suspicious here going on. I need to up my prices for sure.

The rankings too, it's something so people with crafting classes can get some nice rewards too even if they won't do well during the events? Very interesting.

Around thirty minutes remain ‘till the start of the event when Brainiac and Lootenant return, led by our three boys. They are a rowdy crowd, but the moment Brainiac and Lootenant see me they shut up.

"What?" I ask the red-haired boy who is looking at me.

"How did you sense my attack? Only the most powerful natives managed to up until now." His behavior is slightly different from before too.

"No helping the party who attacks a single guy six versus one."

"Oh, come on! How the hell did you even fly? You were restricted to the 4th Floor level, you flew back then already? And what's your level? By the way, Adam wants to talk with you, he is a bit annoyed at the fact you killed him while fighting with Savant."

“Adam can go hide somewhere just like he did at the event.”

“Right? I complained to Gary but he didn’t seem to mind. Apparently, that’s just how Adam is.”

Min-Jae also joins in, “I warned you that you should look out for Nat during the event.”

To that, Brainiac gestures widely, “Who would trust that!? I know he is in Beyond, and he keeps gushing about mana in the Community. But then you meet him and he barely talks and just looks around likea cat observing us poor humans. No mana can be felt from him at all. Nothing against that, Noname,” He adds quickly, “Then you meet him during the event and he just does all this weird shit. In the end, it looks like he’s gonna start biting pieces off Savant before he dies. Out of the event he then releases some of his mana and 357 people from Easy difficulty pass out and 106 more from Normal vomit everything they ate in the past half a year and everyone with decent mana sensitivity from Hard difficulty gets scared shitless.”

Is… is he complimenting me?

“Noname,” Brainiac moves even closer, “people are already betting on the result of the duels. Most of the main bets are between you and Savant, plenty on Tacita. But I’m betting on you.”

“Launch,” I say.

“Huh?” Brainiac asks, confused.

In a better mood because of his ramble I say, “The moment you shoot your invisible projectiles you move a lot of mana that makes it super obvious when you will shoot them. Even reading the trajectory is possible. Then, the projectiles themselves are unstable and leak mana which makes them more apparent. I recommend using half of the mana you are using and focusing on making them more dense. If you’re fighting against humans you can make them a quarter of their size, they are too big.”

“Noname!” he shouts happily. “You have to train me! I can pay to trade you items worth a few hundred shards per lesson.”

Huh? He thinks that's enough?

“At least 1000 shards worth per hour-long lesson. And that’s heavily discounted already.” I answer. That much should make it worth it.

“Fuck man, that’s too much.”

“That’s unfortunate.”

Brainiac seems to be thinking, “I can get a few guys and we can split the cost. I bet after the 1st event there are plenty who would join in.”

“Four thousand shards worth for group lessons. Five thousand if it’s over 5 people. Ten thousand if it’s over 10 people.”

“What?”

What does he mean by what? There is no way I will get my energy sucked by a bunch of people when I don’t have to. Sure, I can endure for a bit, but only for the right price.

Now that I think about it, if I do well during the other events I might ask more. I wonder if there are actually people who would be willing to do that.

“Come on, Max, leave Noname alone,” Lootenant comes in, pulling the red-haired Brainiac away.

As Brainiac gets dragged away to the other room, he keeps shouting that I'm a scammer or whatever. It´s not my fault he's poor.

 ***

With less than ten minutes everyone else returns and Brainiac and Lootenant leave to rejoin their group.

While I continue to prod and poke Sophie's and the twins' web, Tess and others have some sort of important meeting I listen to only partially. I spend the remaining minutes thinking what [Restriction] I should set up, or if it is even necessary.

In ten seconds you will be moved to 2nd Event’s area!

The message finally sounds and the last countdown starts. 3, 2, 1,...

You will be transferred to the Aether Keep. You have three seconds to place [Restriction] if you wish to do so.

Everyone else disappears, and then me as well.

Entering the area of the second event I look around. All two thousand tutorial participants are spread out over a massive courtyard, surrounded by a tall wall.

On one side there is a mountain continuing up with windows carved into it. Most likely, the mountain's insides are filled with rooms and buildings. There are multiple walls like the one we are surrounded by.

The air here is slightly colder and the clouds look close enough that you can almost touch them.

I give myself time to examine the place. It's simple, yet has a powerful-feeling architecture, and there are rough but fascinating mana-powered inscriptions.

Interestingly, a thousand more humans are all around. In armors, in normal clothes. All of them running around and preparing defenses. A dozen well-dressed men with guards following them head toward the participants where they start explaining something.

Well, it seems like we won’t be defending this place alone.

Looking around I spot and check a few people.

Gareth (Hell, 4th)

Tess (Hell, 4th)

Grumpy (Hell, 4th)

Tacita (Hell, 5th)

And then there is also this guy.

Savant (Hell, 3rd)

I see. I think I know his reasoning as I did think similarly. The event has all of the tournament attendees participate and even calls for cooperation. It’s very logical to assume that the event will be somewhat made to reflect that fact.

Going without restriction would be overkill then and not worth it.

But, the system isn’t always logical.

The system is an asshole.

That’s why there is this text over my head when others look my way.

Noname (Hell, 6th)

And as far as I can see it’s the highest out of any Hell difficulty participant.

***

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