Item Synthesis (2)

What if there were a staff that could ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠strengthen both fire- and wind-attribute skills at once—two elements with a natural affinity for each other?

Efficiency would climb. So would the price.

Before that, though, there was one thing Jin-soo had to confirm. The blessing skill Item Level Lock lost its power the moment an item left his hands. For all he knew, a synthesized item might do the same.

I hope it holds.

Jin-soo drew out two healer staves. One bore an option that increased skill-casting speed; the other, an option that increased mana recovery speed.

Low-level, both of them. But if those options stick together, the price jumps.

They were the same kind of item, and their option skills did not conflict, so the chance of success sat above ninety-five percent.

Let's make it.

Jin-soo fused the two staves.

A brilliant flare of light burst forth, and the pair collapsed into a single staff.

The options fused cleanly.

Now he had to see whether those options would still trigger once the item left his hands.

"Sua!"

Jin-soo called for Shin Sua.

"Huh? What is it?"

Out of mana, she had been cracking orc skulls with her staff in earnest. At his call she turned, puzzled.

"Come here a second."

"Okay."

Wiping the blood from her cheek, Shin Sua came over with a bright, untroubled smile.

"Check whether the options on this actually apply, will you?"

"Options?"

She stowed the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠staff she had been holding and took the one he held out. The instant her hand closed around it—

"Huh?"

A puzzled sound escaped her.

"What's wrong?"

"My mana recovery speed just tanked."

She answered with a frown.

"So the options didn't apply?"

"Maybe? ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠I'll check."

Shin Sua slipped the staff Jin-soo had given her into her inventory.

"The options work just fine, though?"

"They do?"

His face brightened.

"Yeah, but the efficiency's awful. Is it because the item level's low?"

"What's the item level?"

"Level 235."

"What options are on it?"

"Increased skill-casting speed, and increased mana recovery speed. Why are you asking me?"

"Something I needed to confirm."

"So you're done?"

"Yeah. Go back to hunting."

"Okay."

She pulled her original staff from her inventory and ran off to start cracking orc skulls again.

As expected. The levels from the Item Level Lock blessing don't carry over.

The synthesized item's options, however, were intact.

Play this right, and I could rake in points by the handful.

After the Item Level Lock blessing had come to him, Jin-soo had wondered whether he might raise the level of low-grade items and sell them off, earning points as if he were duplicating them. But any level created by the blessing reverted the moment an item left his hands, and so the trick had been worthless.

Item Synthesis is different.

Options on an item made one through Item Synthesis worked perfectly even in another person's hands.

Take an item that would be better with one more option, synthesize it with a cheap piece that already has the option you need, and sell the result. That could be real money.

There was no set limit on uses. So long as his mana held, he could activate Item Synthesis without end. More importantly, this could become a weapon.

Another card I can play as a term of trade—when I recruit the highest-ranked Players, or when I receive Skill Sharing.

Accept his offer, and a Player could strengthen both their primary skill and their primary gear. Once that became known, the top Players would come running, each trying to arrive first.

The ones with ill intent will come sniffing around, too.

There would certainly be those who tried to suppress Jin-soo and turn his power to their own profit.

Those bastards, I only need to punish thoroughly.

Fear of maggots was no reason to leave the jars of sauce unmade. And a long road still remained before the upper floors of the Tower.

If I simply keep growing as I am...

By the time he climbed that high, he would stand far stronger than he had been before his Regression.

The orc horde swarming in from every side grew thinner, then thinner still, until at last it stopped altogether.

"Kuuwaaaargh!"

Left alone, the Orc Grand Chieftain roared out his rage and fought with violent desperation. It meant nothing.

With a volley of sickening cracks, the summons snapped his arms and legs and pinned him fast.

Jin-soo waited, unruffled. Two hours and twenty-two minutes had passed since the mission began.

It's time.

Exactly twenty-two seconds later, his blade sheared through the Orc Grand Chieftain's neck.

No Impossible Feat. And nothing worth much among the skill books, either.

All he had gained was a pile of warrior skill books—self-buffs for warriors, an intimidation skill, and the like.

Well. It happens.

He hadn't expected much to begin with, so the disappointment was no great thing either. If anything, he was fortunate. In the course of the clear, a blessing had grown even once, and he hadn't expected that.

"Let's head up."

"Got it."

They had hunted for little more than two hours, and they had been resting before the clear. Exhaustion was hardly a concern.

Jin-soo and Shin Sua selected Yes.

Light flared, brilliant and sudden, and the two of them were carried to Tower Floor 151.

"We're running this as a time attack."

"I know."

Shin Sua already knew that Jin-soo ascended every floor before a full day had passed.

"Leo. Kkami."

The moment their names were called, they did what they were meant to do.

"Nyaaaang!"

Leo unleashed a wide-area taunt roar and drew the monsters in.

"Kkaak! Kkaak!"

Kkami climbed high into the sky, searching for the boss.

Let's get moving.

Jin-soo cast buffs over his summons and prepared to hunt in earnest.

Jin-soo and Shin Sua climbed the Tower at a blistering pace.

Forest, desert, grassland, swamp, ice, snow—terrain of every kind.

Monsters of every variety rose to meet them in every environment. Not one could stand in their way.

Ordinary Players often saw their combat power rise and fall with the terrain and the kind of monster they faced. In a dense forest, obstacles made it difficult for archers and mages to bring their skill to bear. In a desert, cold-attribute skills lost their edge; amid ice, snow, or swamp, fire-attribute skills weakened. Open grassland dulled an assassin's stealth and ambush. Even tanks and warriors struggled to perform anywhere that wasn't solid earth—swamp, ice, snow. Monsters, meanwhile, frequently grew stronger under the influence of their native environment, leaving Players at an inherent disadvantage.

Jin-soo, however, was ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠not so green as to be rattled by the variables of terrain. His main force consisted of summons largely untouched by their surroundings, so heat, cold, and damp posed no real problem. And because he himself could draw on the skills of multiple classes, he shifted his combat style and primary attribute to suit each ground as he hunted.

Holding to a pace of twenty-two hours, twenty-two minutes, and twenty-two seconds, the two of them climbed at a staggering speed and reached Tower Floor 199.

"That was over in a flash."

Shin Sua sounded genuinely amazed. It had been the same when they reached Floor 100 and Tower Floor 150, and still the speed was absurd. It didn't even bear comparison to the ordeal of climbing from Floor 1 to Floor 50 with the party she had first fallen in with. After his summons had multiplied, especially, they could climb quickly and still be guaranteed ample sleep.

My life changed the moment I met Jin-soo.

Had she never met him, she would likely still be stuck on Floor 50—ignored by her old party, treated as nothing more than a pack mule.

"We're going to keep climbing at this speed."

"I know."

Shin Sua answered with a smile. Climbing quickly didn't slow their leveling or diminish their rewards, so she had no cause for complaint. If anything, she always felt sorry toward him. He yielded every elixir to her, and she was all but receiving experience and achievements for free.

If it weren't for Jin-soo, my level and stats wouldn't even be a tenth of what they are.

A cold reckoning said the gap between before and after meeting him was so vast that catching up to even a hundredth would have been fortunate—let alone a tenth. On top of that, she had changed class from warrior to healer and gained a wealth of excellent skills. From Shin Sua's perspective, meeting Jin-soo had been an extraordinary stroke of luck.

Then again, the same could be said from his side.

"Let's go, then."

"Yeah."

Jin-soo and Shin Sua selected Yes.

In that instant, a brilliant flare of light wrapped around them both.

A survival mission, once again.

Sure enough. A desert, just the same.

Tower Floor 149 had been a snowfield lashed by blizzards. Tower Floor 199 was the exact opposite.

I have to hunt Sand Worms.

The clear condition for Tower Floor 199's survival mission was to last a week amid the onslaught of every kind of desert monster. Jin-soo had no intention of settling for that. Sand Worms were the monsters that had shown him hell before his Regression. Bursting without warning from beneath the sand to launch their ambushes, their assaults could not be stopped by anything short of Sanctuary.

A Sand Worm ought to be serviceable as a summon, at least.

Classed among colossal monsters, a Sand Worm possessed a bulk that rivaled a Bone Dragon's.

Even so. It's still nothing more than a giant worm.

Only their size was comparable. As monsters, they were not in the same league as a Bone Dragon. Enormous bulk, and the ability to burrow and travel swiftly underground—those were advantages. But in attack, defense, and skills alike, a Sand Worm fell short of a Bone Dragon in every respect.

The Army Summon squad is far too weak. I'll have to fill it out with Sand Worms if nothing else.

To say they paled beside a Bone Dragon was not to call them worthless. A Sand Worm's colossal body was itself its most powerful weapon. The higher one climbed in the Tower, the more often size and martial might stood in inverse proportion. On the middle and lower floors, by contrast, the larger a monster, the more likely it was to be strong.

That enormous body is a powerful weapon in its own right.

Crushing strength, a ponderous frame, and tremendous weight—simply grinding lesser creatures beneath that bulk was enough to sweep away any middling trash mob in an instant.

I need to kill as many as I can.

Before his Regression, Jin-soo had encountered only a single Sand Worm.

Back then, even one was hell.

Now, circumstances had changed. Once he cleared the mission on Tower Floor 199, he would not meet colossal monsters on the scale of a Sand Worm for some time. He had to slay as many as he could here and make them into Army Summons.