The Constellations' Game [Laika]

After giving it some serious thought, I realized I had no history whatsoever of attempting anything even remotely similar to this.

Which meant that the only place left to look for an explanation was possession.

Fragments of knowledge I could never have known, yet somehow understood as if they were my own. It seemed that I had likely inherited part of the memories of this body—Raphaël Estère.

If that weren't the case, there was no way I could have so naturally understood the words of an elder whose age I couldn't even begin to guess. The information about the old man himself made that plain enough.

"So, to put it plainly once more... as of today, every one of you must set about creating a sturdy vessel—one capable of bearing your Ego."

The headmaster of this academy, and the teacher of this body, Raphaël Estère. There was no way I could have known about the old man called the Sage of Platinum—and yet I did.

"The most vital Lumen Purification Stone. Sapwood steeped in light. These two, above all else, must be prepared in ample quantity......"

Even the appearance of materials I'd never once laid eyes on, even during my beta days, surfaced in my mind the instant I heard their names.

"If you can craft a vessel in which light refined from Lumen Stone may linger for no less than two hours by Solar Time... then, as an Alchemist of Light, you will have proven the minimum of your aptitude."

It meant that what I had to do from this moment on was not difficult to grasp either.

"So long as you employ all the prescribed materials, the formula and the method are each your own to choose. Additional materials may also be used—so spread your wings freely."

Which meant this first quest was, in the end......

A quest that contained the creation process of a Synthesis Formula—the first unique skill of the Therapist class, Lumen Synthesis.

"The result itself... the light shall judge for itself, in due time......"

Still, though.

Receiving your class guide like this felt surprisingly, unexpectedly kind of them.

'They even went so far as to possess me inside an ancient NPC.'

Class main quests were, by design, meant to help players understand their class. But this Alchemist of Light class had been nothing but hostile from the very start, so I'd been bracing myself for whatever other bizarre quest it might throw at me.

Yet if things continued along this current flow, it had the feel of a perfectly standard, straight-and-narrow guide quest. Follow the quest line as written, and clearing it should pose no real problem at all.

'Yeah. This is the kind of breather quest you need once in a while.'

Too hasty a judgment, you say?

No.

Because the head of the Raphaël I currently inhabited already contained, complete and whole, the knowledge of how to craft a vessel for the Ego.

In other words, so long as I simply followed the memories injected into my head, I could clear this old man's quest with my hands tied behind my back.

'Heh heh.'

So this was it—the guide quest of that hidden class that had dumped me into a Level 40+ field out of nowhere, right?

Finally, time for me to coast a little, no?

.......

Damn it.

I wanted to fire back with some rebuttal or other—but there was nothing to refute. They were right.

The law of quest difficulty the Constellations were quoting right now was, in fact, the thing I had felt most viscerally in my bones throughout my entire beta playthrough.

Simply put: the higher the rarity of this hidden class I'd obtained, the Alchemist of Light, the higher the difficulty of its chain quests was bound to climb. There was no escaping it.

So what was the objective rarity of my class, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠you ask?

Whew... honestly? Unmeasurable.

I had played the beta across an eternity's worth of time and never once seen anything like it. That's how rare.

Which meant the Constellations' point was......

Even if the ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠quest's structure was friendly, its difficulty could never, ever be easy.

"Mmmm."

A deep, deep sigh seeped out from my core all on its own.

Hoooooh.

When you hit someone with cold hard facts out of nowhere like that, it hurts, you know?

I had actually been running my little hope-circuit, thinking that maybe—just maybe—an exception could exist.

Figures......

My Laika life was never going to cut me any slack.

And as if on cue, Ceria confirmed the Constellations' prophecy in short order.

"By the way, Raphaël. You're not... seriously planning to attempt Draco Synthesis, are you?"

What an ill-omened name. For some reason, it conjured the image of a certain deeply unlikable little fairy.

"Huh? What's that supposed to......"

"You declared it yourself, didn't you? That you would complete a Draco Synthesis Formula and present it for this term's assignment."

"Did I... say that?"

"Regardless, I truly look forward to it, Raphaël. If you succeed at that as your graduation project...! Then Mother and Father will finally have no choice but to acknowledge you."

Out of nowhere, a line straight out of a K-drama morning melodrama.

And then, several times more absurd than even the content of that line...... a brand-new quest message window bloomed before my eyes.

Drako? Dragon Vein?

Don't tell me—at Level 22, right now... they want me to fight dragon-kind???

What kind of nonsense is this?

Anyone with even a passing knowledge of Laika, seeing this quest, would say something like:

And with very high probability, they'd add this:

Those reactions were, after all, the perfectly reasonable ones.

But to all of them, I had only one possible answer.

How, exactly, is this a sub-quest?

In Laika, skill points were a considerably precious resource.

By system design, the only way to acquire skill points in Laika was through class main quests—and even then, you typically got a mere 1 to 2 points for clearing each chapter of a main quest line.

As a rule, the total a player could accumulate before 2nd Class Advancement hovered around 10 SP.

Which meant a single sub-quest dangling three skill points was, functionally speaking, a mandate. A reward so catastrophic to pass up that you couldn't even entertain the fantasy of skipping it.

‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠

There were even statistics showing that each skill point translated into combat power equivalent to three additional levels.

Which meant skipping this quest would leave me roughly ten levels in the red.

What's more, the very concept of skill points carried over intact through 2nd and 3rd Class Advancement—unless you switched to an entirely different class, of course.

And when you factored in that the value of a single level increased exponentially the higher you climbed, the three-SP reward became something whose worth simply couldn't be converted into any ordinary currency.

Which meant......

Truthfully, I had a rough estimate of the Drako's level myself.

How, you ask?

The quest's timeframe and the era I found myself in differed considerably, granted...... but the Dragon Vein Zone of southern Asterion was a hidden dungeon I had visited back in my beta days.

The Drako that spawned there were around Level 60.

And just as the Constellations said, dragon-kind appearing below 60 was impossible under Laika's worldbuilding rules—which made the Dragon Vein Zone, in effect, the lowest-difficulty dungeon in the entire game where dragon-kind appeared at all.

'Even so, hunting one at my current level would be a difficulty beyond insane......'

It had been a long time since I'd felt this helpless—so utterly at a loss that no amount of brainstorming produced an answer.

Drako weren't like the Lumen Ghosts, either—creatures with clear, exploitable weaknesses.

And yet I was certain a method existed. My reasoning, honestly, was simple.

[Difficulty: SS]

Because the system's assigned difficulty did not lie.

A quest with no possible way to clear it... would never have a difficulty rating at all.

And yet, come to think of it, something about it struck me as odd?

'Hold on. SS? Just SS?'

A quest requiring a Level 22 player to bring down dragon-kind in the 60s should, by all rights, have rated at least a Triple-S difficulty...... shouldn't it?

'Is there something I'm overlooking?'

Just as that thought was forming, a new system message suddenly blossomed before my eyes.

Uh......

Wasn't the synchronization already done?

Vuuuuuum—!

I'm sorry—what?

Seriously?

Level 105 made you a ranker in this world, didn't it?

Raphaël, you little... I was under the distinct impression you were nothing more than a snot-nosed academy cadet......

This is what an ancient human was?