Level Down 3 (Patreon)

Volume 1 Chapter 3 - Reset Marathon

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“Ara, Allen. Aren’t you a little late?”

“Yeah, I was running some errands while I’m at it, you see.”

As the sun went down and the adventurers finished their work and started making noise at bars to eat and drink, Allen returned to the Adventurers' Guild in Lilac City, to which he belonged.

Lilac is a city located in the southwest of Eliard Kingdom, which is said to be one of the top three countries in the Central Continent, the largest landmass in the world.

If we compare only the population, there are several cities in Eliard Kingdom that are larger than Lilac, but if we compare them in terms of economic scale, there are only two or three large cities other than the Royal Capital that are on par with it, that’s how big a city Lilac was.

Also, Lilac has four dungeons in its vicinity, and the Adventurers' Guild where Allen works as an employee is also the second largest after the Royal Capital.

Beyond the Guild counter, adventurers who have finished their work are lined up to meet their favorite receptionist, and at the bar in the back, adventurers who have received their rewards are wasting all the money they earned that day vigorously drinking alcohol and making noise.

The hall was filled with such adventurers and was chaotic, to the point that even walking was difficult for those who were not used to it. Allen looked at such a scene while feeling a little nostalgic.

Allen came in not through the front entrance where adventurers go in and out, but through the back entrance used by employees. Allen, who has already quit being an adventurer, doesn't use the front entrance.

Leaving that aside, the one who called out to Allen when he returned to the Guild was Matilda, a former receptionist.

She is a beautiful woman in her late twenties, about the same age as Allen, with shoulder-length light brown hair that is gently wavy and a straight nose.

She started working as a guild employee apprentice around the same time that Allen registered as an adventurer, so in a sense, they are like in the same generation.

When Allen was an adventurer, he often lined up at Matilda's reception because of this kind of familiarity, but he never thought until just recently that he would become a guild employee and become Matilda’s colleague.

“You’re late too, Matilda, what's wrong? The working hours should have ended by now.”

“Mine is this. There were a lot of people coming back from dungeons today.”

Matilda flapped the documents in her hand, showing them to Allen.

Those were important documents that neatly rewrote the number and condition of the materials the adventurers brought, and calculated their contribution points to the Guild.

Allen also didn't know this when he was an adventurer, but the documents that are used to hand over rewards to adventurers are temporary. They are collected from the receptionist, and guild employees in the back like Matilda make a clean copy of them and calculate their contribution to the Guild.

By the way, receptionists are not involved in this work at all. A receptionist’s job is to interact with adventurers, they don't evaluate them or anything like that.

As for why they do it like this, it is to quickly deal with the adventurers.

After all, if it takes a long time to create the documents and it ends up making adventurers wait, if they’re unlucky, the adventurers might become irritated and cause a commotion.

Or rather, even with this current method, there are people who occasionally cause problems, so it would definitely cause a commotion.

It’s for this reason that the calculation of the reward became the top priority, just hand the money to the adventurer, and the proper documents will be prepared later.

“That's a lot of work. Should I help?”

“It’s fine. Reviewing them will be hard later anyway.”

“I see, my bad. Aah, I'll leave today's quota here. There should be 176.”

Allen took the bag from his waist and placed it on the desk. Without even looking at the contents of the bag, Matilda put it on a scale to see how much it weighed, and smiled at Allen.

“You're still as diligent as ever. You don't have to count them, you know.”

“The quota is supposed to be 150 per day though. Then, I’m going home.”

“Thank you for your hard work. Be careful.”

“You too Matilda, don’t push yourself too hard.”

Raising one hand and saying those words, Allen left through the back door of the Guild.

Matilda watched his back profile until he disappeared, narrowed her brown eyes, and muttered with a slightly happy expression on her face.

“I wonder if something good happened to him. He looked like he did back then... Now then, I also have to try a little harder.”

Matilda straightened her stiff spine and went back to working on the documents in front of her.

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The next day, Allen came to the Slime Dungeon early in the morning. Of course, no one else seemed to be here except Allen, but seeing it the same as usual, Allen felt relieved.

Then, instead of rushing straight to the hidden room in the boss room, he ran around as fast as he could, stomping the slimes and collecting their magic stones.

Yesterday, Allen used the level-down trap and his level had dropped to 120.

It was sad for Allen to see his level that he had worked so hard to raise drop so quickly, but if he thought of it as an unavoidable sacrifice for his bright future, he was able to endure it.

Traps are reset in about 3 minutes, so the maximum amount of level that can be lowered in 1 hour is 20 levels. If he continues to do this for 6 hours, he can lower his level to 1, Allen calculated.

It was currently just past 6:30 in the morning, so if he continued to step on the level-down trap starting now, he should be able to return to level 1 around noon.

But unfortunately, Allen is a guild employee. The Guild has a quota of 150 slime magic stones that must be delivered on days other than holidays. And as his level goes down, his stats will of course also go down, so his stamina and speed will also drop, and the speed at which he can defeat slimes will slow down.

That's why Allen was planning to stock up on magic stones now while his level was still high. He would be killing slimes to raise his level, so he should be able to make it, he thought, but he’ll still do it to be absolutely sure.

That whole day, Allen devoted himself to defeating slimes, even eating meals while walking, and obtained over 600 slime magic stones.

He submitted 160 of them to the Guild with a nonchalant look on his face, and his one day of preparation came to an end.

Returning to his home, Allen realized that exterminating slimes, which normally was so unpleasant, wasn't a pain at all that day, and he smiled bitterly at that.

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And so, he finished his preparation.

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The next morning, Allen headed to the Slime Dungeon and headed to the hidden room in the boss room at full speed.

While feeling a little worried that the trap might have disappeared, Allen stepped into the center of the hidden room.

A red magic circle floated on the ground, and a ‘ding’ sound rang out in his head.

“Alright, Status.”

The level displayed there was 119.

“Good, good, good, all that’s left is to just repeat this.”

Allen waited patiently. If he defeated slimes during this waiting period, he wouldn't have to worry about today's quota, but the moment he defeated it, his level would rise, so he wouldn’t do it.

The Slime Dungeon itself wasn't completely dark, but it was dark enough to be on a level of dusk, so Allen couldn’t even read a book and just waited patiently for the time to pass.

Even while he was eating lunch, he continued to step on the trap every three minutes, and at around 11 o'clock, the boss, the huge slime, revived and he went up one level, but Allen wasn’t discouraged and continued leveling down.

And about 6 hours after the start...

“I did it. I finally did it.”

Allen smiled as if he was clenching his teeth and clenched his fists.

What was written on the status board displayed in front of Allen was the word level 1 and shabby stats. Allen finally dropped his level from 180 to 1.

“Ugh, as I thought, the weapon is heavy.”

When Allen pulled out his favorite sword that was strapped to his waist, his arm trembled as if he were holding a greatsword.

He was unable to swing the sword to his satisfaction even though he had been able to wield it easily just a few moments ago, but Allen couldn't help but feel happy about that fact.

“Then, shall we go?”

Allen placed his sword on the floor. It was an important partner that he always carried with him at any and every time for self-defense, even after he retired from being an adventurer and became a guild employee, but in the current situation, it would only become a hindrance, he thought.

Allen went outside the room and stomped on a slime. A ‘ding’ sound sounded in his head, telling him that he had leveled up.

“Status.”

Allen looked at his status board. His level became 2, and his status values increased by 7 across-the-board.

“No good. I’ll start over.”

Allen shook his head and returned to the hidden room.

Normally, an increase of 7 across-the-board would be an extraordinary number, but Allen had no intention of compromising even a bit.

Because he knew that every category could go up by 10 if he was thoughtless, there was no way he could compromise on any other value, he thought.

Allen returned to the hidden room and stepped on the level-down trap, and his level became 1 again.

And then, Allen quickly turned around and went to step on a slime, leveling up to level 2 again.

His stats went up by 3 across-the-board. Sighing, Allen returned to the hidden room again. To step on the level-down trap.

Allen single-mindedly repeated the task that can hardly be called a battle.

Although stepping on a slime to level up would uniformly increase the number of all his status values, the probability that all of them would increase by 10 was low. It might or might not happen once every twenty times.

But Allen didn't give up.

The idea that he might be able to recover from the hardships he had endured and go on a real adventure as an adventurer strengthened Allen's resolve.

When all of his stats went up by 10, Allen went to step on the level-up trap while dancing in joy.

Once he stepped on the level-up trap, his level would go up by 1, but all of his stats would only go up by 1.

But that was fine. Because the only reason Allen stepped on the level-up trap is to raise his level. This was to cut down the time when he would normally have to defeat multiple monsters.

He didn’t need to worry about all his stats going up by 1 at all, because he would immediately step on the level-down trap and return to the values he had before he leveled up.

Allen stepped on the level-down trap and defeated a slime. And every once in a while, he went to step on the level-up trap. He simply repeated it over and over again.

As a result, although it was gradual, Allen's level rose.

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And then, a month and a half later...

“I did it. I finally did it.”

Allen had raised his level to level 500, which was the upper limit for a normal human. Of course, all his stat increases were 10. In other words, all his stats values had increased by 4990.

The average basic stats of a level 1 adult were around 100, so Allen's current stats, that was, his attack power, defense power, vitality, magic power, intelligence, agility, and dexterity all exceeded 5000.

Most likely, the strongest man in human history was born here.

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