Zajcica

The pink paladin was reassured in the fact that only one enemy remained. It would only take about two more turns to finish off her final enemy, or she could attempt to make a break for and just be finished with this combat all together. Nah, it would just be best to stick with it and get the rewards for finishing it off. It's not like she was actually in danger or anything, it was just the matter of killing it off and heading back to town. She wondered how far away from town she was actually, probably pretty far from the main settlement.

She went to take another hit at the wasp, but missed awfully. The insect saw the weakness she had just opened up and pierced directly though her back as he swing went wide. Another critical hit meant no thorns to deal damage. How much more annoying can combat get?

Yuki
Level: 4 | HP:  79/80 | Energy: 0/8

Stats
DMG: 3 | EVA: 0 | MIT: 27 | ACC: +2 | Thorns: 18

Giant Wasp 1 -1/75 -18 thorns
Giant Wasp 2 36/75 -3 DMG
Giant Wasp 3 -2/75(Dead)
Giant Wasp 4 -5/75(Dead)

Giant Wasps (75HP, 20DMG)

Thinning them out to two made it easier to keep track of them for sure. The two attempted to regroup and  fight together the best they could manage but it wouldn't last them long. They both charged her, ready to strike and end her life. It wasn't clear between the two of them that they would easily end up like the other two that thought they could just easily off her with their stingers. They attempted to pierce her armor, but only one got through and paid the ultimate price for it. It collapsed on the ground and exploded into data bits in front of her. Yuki just chuckled to herself.

Her blade reflected the moonlight and shined brightly as it lunged through the air, meeting it's miserable opponent for more damage. She was just scratching it over and over at this point. It would kill it sooner or later if thorns didn't do the job for her.

Yuki
Level: 4 | HP:  79/80 | Energy: 0/8

Stats
DMG: 3 | EVA: 0 | MIT: 27 | ACC: +2 | Thorns: 18

Giant Wasp 1 -1/75 -18 thorns
Giant Wasp 2 36/75 -3 DMG
Giant Wasp 3 -2/75(Dead)
Giant Wasp 4 -5/75(Dead)

Giant Wasps (75HP, 20DMG)

The wasps surrounded her once more, the theme of pack mentality really was strong with these mobs. They all rushed her again, stabbing their giant stingers into her chest again. Only on of the stingers pierced through and unfortunately for that mob, it would be its last mistake. The stupid bug fell to the ground and exploded into the bits of data. A grin peeled across her face as her enemies began to thin out. Two more to go.

She could finish this easily in just a few more rounds of combat if her enemies would only hit her any time soon without blocking her thorns with stupid critical attacks, or else she would stand here and stab them to death with her sword continuing to be annoyed with the mobs ability to actually hit anything. Speaking of, her blade made another nick in the wasps defenses, bringing the health bar down slightly more.

Yuki
Level: 4 | HP:  79/80 | Energy: 0/8

Stats
DMG: 3 | EVA: 0 | MIT: 27 | ACC: +2 | Thorns: 18

Giant Wasp 1 17/75
Giant Wasp 2 39/75 -3 DMG
Giant Wasp 3 -2/75(Dead)
Giant Wasp 4 -5/75 -18 thorns

Giant Wasps (75HP, 20DMG)

The wasps regrouped together to make their next assault on the pink paladin. She let her defense down a little bit in hopes to ensure they landed the attacks they made on her. Maybe a little bit too much as one of them hit a critical on her and did not activate her thorns. One of them missed and the last one did get a regular hit on her. Thankfully that meant that her thorns was able to deal some damage. Two of them looked weak enough to finish off in a single hit, but that relied on them actually hitting her, not the other way around.

She readied her white blade to slash through the wasp once more. The blade met its digital flesh and left another mark in it. By now it was littered with the scratches that she had already given it. Hopefully soon she would be able to deal more damage. She did have that spear in her inventory, perhaps it would be better than her current sword. She would have to try it next time, but she didn't have any skill in spears, unfortunately.

Yuki
Level: 4 | HP:  78/80 | Energy: 0/8

Stats
DMG: 3 | EVA: 0 | MIT: 27 | ACC: +2 | Thorns: 18

Giant Wasp 1 17/75 -18 thorns
Giant Wasp 2 42/75 -3 DMG
Giant Wasp 3 -2/75(Dead)
Giant Wasp 4 13/75

Giant Wasps (75HP, 20DMG)

The three remaining wasps surrounded her again. A pattern was beginning to form in Yuki's memory. They attacked at the same time, as they have done several times over and over again. Two of their stingers were unable to get past Yuki's armor, but one of them did and he paid the price for being stupid enough to attack her again. Even stupider if it were to try to hit her again, as it would be the end of it's digital existence. To be fair, though, it probably would just explode into data and reform as a new mob later. She wished it would just hit her again and die already so she could go back to the city.

She tried to make another attack as the wasps came in to attack her, but she couldn't find a good chance to land a definite hit on any of them. Unnecessarily long combat annoyed her, but it was getting close to being over so she would hold off.

(Yuki attacked the second wasp)

Yuki
Level: 4 | HP:  79/80 | Energy: 0/8

Stats
DMG: 3 | EVA: 0 | MIT: 27 | ACC: +2 | Thorns: 18

Giant Wasp 1 35/75 
Giant Wasp 2 45/75
Giant Wasp 3 -2/75(Dead)
Giant Wasp 4 13/75 -18 thorns

Giant Wasps (75HP, 20DMG)

One down, three to go. It wouldn't be much longer now, she just had to keep fighting. She readied herself for their next attacks taking her defensive stance as they charged at her. The stingers they used to jab her wouldn't pierce through her armor, meaning they didn't do any damage to her, except for the one that landed a critical attack on her. Critical attacks don't proc thorns unfortunately, which continued to annoy her. She had heard that there was a special type of thorns that could activate if an enemy lands a critical. She would have to look into that type of enhancement because this was getting outrageous.

Her blade slashed through the air and into one of the wasps flesh, leaving another tiny gash in its body. Barely any damage as usual, but she could hardly be upset. This is the type of build that she was making and it would mean relying on thorns.

Yuki
Level: 4 | HP:  78/80 | Energy: 0/8

Stats
DMG: 3 | EVA: 0 | MIT: 27 | ACC: +2 | Thorns: 18

Giant Wasp 1 35/75 
Giant Wasp 2 45/75 -3 DMG
Giant Wasp 3 -2/75(Dead)
Giant Wasp 4 31/75 

Giant Wasps (75HP, 20DMG)

The group of wasps continued their aggravated assault on the pink paladin. Their stingers reached out kill her, most of them actually hit, but still Yuki only takes a single point of damage from each one of them. Even though she took damage from three of the enemies, only a single one of them took damage from her thorns. Stupid critical hits. Luckily, one died to her thorns and exploded into data, just more strings of binary.

She slashed her sword at the wasp but missed awfully. Her blade wasn't even close to making contact with it. She backed off again to get her bearing, hoping to make sure that her next attack would hit home, even if it wasn't going to a lot of damage. It wouldn't take any more than a few more successful proc of thorns to finish this combat and she could be finished with questing for today.

Yuki
Level: 4 | HP:  77/80 | Energy: 0/8

Stats
DMG: 3 | EVA: 0 | MIT: 27 | ACC: +2 | Thorns: 18

Giant Wasp 1 35/75 
Giant Wasp 2 48/75 
Giant Wasp 3 -2/75 -18 thorns
Giant Wasp 4 31/75 

Giant Wasps (75HP, 20DMG)

Yuki took a step back to get all the enemies around her in her view. She tried again to activate a sword art again to no avail. Her energy reserves were still way too low because she continued to attack ever time she had a chance. It was getting annoying that she couldn't do any more damage than the base amount with a regular attack. Tanking sucked in that regard. She couldn't do anything by herself except let enemies hit her to deal damage and wait for them to die.

They dove around her jabbing at her avatar in attempt to kill her. None of them landed a decisive hit on her, so no thorns but she was able to strike one of them with her sword with barely any damage. Hopefully they would get some damage on her next round so that her thorns could proc and this combat could not drag on.

Yuki
Level: 4 | HP:  80/80 | Energy: 0/8

Stats
DMG: 3 | EVA: 0 | MIT: 27 | ACC: +2 | Thorns: 18

Giant Wasp 1 35/75 
Giant Wasp 2 48/75 3 DMG
Giant Wasp 3 16/75 
Giant Wasp 4 31/75 

Giant Wasps (75HP, 20DMG)

Yuki smiled back at Mari. It was clear that she had been relying a lot on her equipment, but so was Mari in the same regard. It wasn't really fair to consider herself weak just because she relied on something that wasn't her own skill. Soon she would become strong and not just take aggro for Mari, soon she could become equal to Mari and aid her with tougher quests. It wouldn't be long before she was tanking for real.

"I promise that next time we quest, I'll take it more seriously and not just rush into battle without some strategy." She explained. "I hope we get back to questing soon, Mari-chan."

Mari's comment about her being a strong woman made her smile even wider. She waved a goodbye, watching her ginger haired friend walk through the boss room teleporter. She herself would be heading back to city on this floor to rest. She turned and exited the way she came.

The giant wasps surrounded her again making some kind of formation. If they could feel aggravation, they probably would have felt just as annoyed as Yuki did looking for materials. They all bum rushed her, ready to kill. The stingers jab at her metal chest plate, doing no more than one damage per hit, for each hit was that was successful. She slashed through one of the wasps as the attacked, leaving a red cut that was meant to mock a cut like in the real world.

It was good that way landing actual hits on her and not getting critical strikes ever time they hit her like the wolves were. If this were the wolves, they would have been dead already. That being said, combat was going more smoothly than her last encounter for being on a higher floor. Perhaps the wolves had an increased chance to hit critical attacks was all.

Yuki
Level: 4 | HP:  78/80 | Energy: 0/8

Stats
DMG: 3 | EVA: 0 | MIT: 27 | ACC: +2 | Thorns: 18

Giant Wasp 1 35/75 3 DMG
Giant Wasp 2 51/75 -18 thorns
Giant Wasp 3 16/75 -18 thorns
Giant Wasp 4 31/75 

Giant Wasps (75HP, 20DMG)

The battle continued. Most of the enemies were below half of their health by now and Yuki still sat at full health. One of them seemed to be keeping most of it health thus far, so it probably would be best for her to target it with her attacks next. The first one came in quick, her blade slashed though it effortlessly. Its health ticked for almost nothing compared to what her thorns was capable of. All of the enemies attacked together, but even still none of them landed a decisive hit against her, meaning her thorns wasn't going to do anything.

After this battle, she would make her way back to the town. She knew it was going to take some time to finish these mobs off, so she didn't want to risk getting caught up in another fight. She prepared herself for the next waves of attacks, sword at the ready.

Yuki
Level: 4 | HP:  80/80 | Energy: 0/8

Stats
DMG: 3 | EVA: 0 | MIT: 27 | ACC: +2 | Thorns: 18

Giant Wasp 1 38/75 3 DMG
Giant Wasp 2 69/75
Giant Wasp 3 34/75 
Giant Wasp 4 31/75 

Giant Wasps (75HP, 20DMG)

These enemies were good at surrounding a single target and making them regret the pack mentality, but unfortunately for them, Yuki was just too tough. She could take any of the damage they dealt to her and return it all tenfold. It made fighting random mobs almost effortless compared to some of the boss monsters that she took on. Granted those guys didn't stand any more of a chance that these guys did. 

They surrounded her again, all attempting to make Yuki regret fighting them here. She didn't regret anything at all. This was so much more fun than farming materials and guaranteed that she would get payback. Col and maybe materials. Perhaps she would get lucky with another perfect weapon and get something better than she did when she took it to be appraised last time.

Her blade slashed through the same wasp and the others did their damage. Thorns wasn't enough to teach them the errors of their ways just yet.

Yuki
Level: 4 | HP:  78/80 | Energy: 0/8

Stats
DMG: 3 | EVA: 0 | MIT: 27 | ACC: +2 | Thorns: 18

Giant Wasp 1 41/75 3 DMG, -18 Thorns
Giant Wasp 2 69/75
Giant Wasp 3 34/75 -18 Thorns
Giant Wasp 4 31/75 

Giant Wasps (75HP, 20DMG)

Yuki shook her head loose of the dizziness that plagued her vision. It took her a few moments to get her head in the right place and make an understanding of what Mari was saying. She smiled to her companion.

"I'm a bit dizzy from all that being flung around, but I'll be okay." She said watching her hp regenerate back to full already. "I understand that I'm not the best fighter, but I'm still having fun with it while I know I'm safe. I've relied most entirely on my gear, but I'm sure most people at my level do."

She held her hand out to except the gift for the quest that Mari apparently had no use for. She read the item description and pocketed it for herself. She could absolutely use it later on a tough quest.

"Arigatou." She said with a bow. "Well, now that the quest is finished what do we do? Will you be heading out? If so I hope we get to quest more in the future. And if I have my shop set up later, you should come and visit!"

@Mari

Barely even scathed, Yuki knew she could easily take these mobs on and let her thorns destroy them slowly, just as she had done with the wolves on floor one. It was a simple enough strategy if the mobs could actually hit her to begin with. She had already damaged them pretty decently with her sword art, but  that used up the entirety of her energy, so she wouldn't be able to use anymore from here unless she chose not to attack. That wouldn't get her any where really, unless they missed for another ten attacks.

She chose her target as it lunged out at her. The blade slashed through it's body, causing it miss its own attack. Two of the others' stingers pierced through her quickly. Thorns damaged them for their stupidity and her health bar barely moved. It was always re assuring to see that no matter how much the enemy attacked her, that it was pretty much impossible for them to kill her no matter what they did.

Yuki
Level: 4 | HP:  78/80 | Energy: 0/8

Stats
DMG: 3 | EVA: 0 | MIT: 27 | ACC: +2 | Thorns: 18

Giant Wasp 1 62/75 3 DMG
Giant Wasp 2 69/75
Giant Wasp 3 52/75 -18 Thorns
Giant Wasp 4 31/75 -18 Thorns

Giant Wasps (75HP, 20DMG)

The wasps quickly surrounded the pink haired woman. She watched closely as they all approached her slowly, looking for an opening her defense. She showed no weakness to them. Her blade lit up in its beautiful pink gleam and soared in a circle around all her enemies. They all reeled back to the damage, and she was happy to see that her combat skills were better than her regular looting skills. A few critical popped up for her, and her mood was instantly flipped. Battling was so much more fun than collecting materials.

It didn't take long for the bugs to come after her, though. Her armor took most of the hits, but one go through and thorns did its due. She hoped this would not be a repeat of the wolves on floor one, but it was certain she would get some col and maybe some materials for combat.

Yuki
Level: 4 | HP:  79/80 | Energy: 0/8

Stats
DMG: 3 | EVA: 0 | MIT: 27 | ACC: +2 | Thorns: 18

Giant Wasp 1 65/75 (5x2)=10 DMG
Giant Wasp 2 69/75 (3x2)=6 DMG
Giant Wasp 3 69/75 (3x2)=6 DMG
Giant Wasp 4 49/75 (4x2)=8 DMG, -18 Thorns= 26 DMG

Rage Spike hits all targets.

Giant Wasps (75HP, 20DMG)

Nothing was going her way now. The luck she had with destroying the Gemini had faded with her quest to find materials. It was obvious she wasn't going to find anything useful on this floor for now. If she wanted to find more material, she would have to go back down to floor one and retake the quest. This constant failure of finding absolutely nothing was only beginning to aggravate her more than anything. One last look, turning up to find nothing, again, and the pink paladin groaned. Time to head back to town.

She turned on her heel towards the town of floor six to be met by the buzzing of overgrown insects. She quickly switched back to her battle equipment seeing as they were ready to fight. There was four of them in total, the same type of enemy, so it was likely that they all had the same stats. Even so, she hadn't seen any mobs on this floor yet, and would be ready to run if she needed to.

Aggravation was swelling with her mood. She had felt so triumphant finishing the fight with the Gemini in just a minutes time, and now she was getting too easily annoyed that she couldn't find anything on this stupid floor. If she just went back to floor one and reacquired the material farming quest, she would find things so much easier than she would up here on floor six. Continued examination led to no payout. For as lush and abundant the brush of floor six was, it was pretty freaking void of anything other than useless branches and mobs. Quite a bit of wet moss too.

She could still spend a little more time up here on this floor, but then she would probably head to another floor to find a good quest that could get her some levels. Maybe she would message Mari again and ask her if she wanted to do some quests. It was always fun to hang out with Mari, even if she did seem to turn everything into a lesson for Yuki.

She was still pretty close to the safe zone. Perhaps if she took some time to venture a bit further away, she would have better luck finding any kind of materials. It was a little disheartening to find absolutely nothing after ten minutes of uninterrupted searching. Why was it so difficult to find materials when they're almost a necessity to the game. It seemed rather unfair that you couldn't multitask to find materials without taking a quest to find them specifically. 

She ventured further away from the safe zone, but still couldn't find any materials that she could use for crafting. The anger in her expression could be felt by anyone if they were to see it. Farming materials wasn't as calming or fun as she thought it would be. Still she would try for a little longer. If she couldn't find anything in the next ten minutes, she would be returning to the town where the Gemini had pulled her off.

The pink paladin continued searching through the bushes and large tangled roots that found their way out of the soil. Still nothing could be used for crafting. How was her luck this bad? Maybe she wasn't meant to be a crafter and rely on being solely a tank for the foreseeable future. Her mind was set on taking the cook profession though. She loved cooking and a rut of bad luck wouldn't stop her from realizing that skill while she spent her time alive in this game.

She wondered just how many people would hear about her store and how popular it could become. Not every player in the game was from Japan, so maybe those players might not find time to try the traditional food she could make, but she knew high level players relied on cooks to boost their skills. Maybe her best chance for business was with them.

Yuki sighed quietly to herself. She hadn't been as lucky as she was with her quest on the first floor. It should have been expected, though. The quest itself did boost the odds of finding useful material after all. It wasn't her luck that had given her those materials, more of just the system letting her find things, because that was what the quest expected from the player. She wondered what the normal odds of finding usable material was then. Probably somewhere around twenty percent or even lower.

She picked the brush apart and looked around the base of trees to find anything useful at all. Still her luck was drier than a well in the hottest summer. Would it just be best to head back to town and continue her search for quests to boost her level grinding further? A few more tries and she would start heading back to town. She had only been searching for materials for about five minutes total. That's not a whole lot of time to invest in material searching.

She stepped out into the dense forest, mobs roamed free enjoying their digital life without much of a meaning. They wouldn't be difficult to avoid like in most cases. It had seemed to her that mobs wouldn't really attack you unless they got exceptionally close, or if you engage them first.

Looking around the brush for anything useful was useless. She could tell already that without the help of the floor one quest it could be difficult to farm your own materials. However, farming your own materials didn't cost any money at all. You could buy them from merchants if you wanted, but she imagined that could get expensive pretty quick. It seemed like a better idea to just farm them for herself.

The jungle/forest was nothing like she had ever seen in Japan. It was pretty surreal to experience the environments in the game. They all felt so real and like there was a ton of time invested on making them as real as possible.

With the Gemini defeated and Yuki left alone outside of the safe zone, she decided it wouldn't be a terrible idea to farm for some materials while she was out here. Though the only time she had actually farmed for materials, the quest made them spawn more frequently than they do outside of it, so she expected to be difficult to find more materials. She walked up to the pond that surrounded the short battle to see if any material nodes littered the edge of the water. A few minutes of walking around brought up nothing. She sighed, remembering the luck that she had before getting three nodes in less than about 5 minutes.

She would probably have better luck in the field than this enclosed area, so she headed back the way the Gemini had led her though.She was sure she could find some if she took her time, but she didn't want to spend too long out here. Quests were on her mind.

The pink paladin was pretty surprised when she saw the king survive one of Mari's attacks. No one could strong enough to one-shot ever enemy they encounter, but it was still the first time she had seen something survive Mari's attacks. Nevertheless, it would be dead soon. Yuki steeled herself and tried to activate a sword art, but her energy reserves were too low. A simple attack would suffice for now.

Her blade coursed through the air, way too wide to hit anything. She couldn't believe she had just missed so awfully, like she wasn't even really aiming at anything. Her feet fell out from under her and she crashed into the ground with a loud thud. The elf kings boot met her stomach, sending her into the air. While she was suspended, the king swung his sword into her like a baseball bat. The pinkette dashed through the air and was launched through the another one of the buildings.

Curse her clumsiness.

@Mari

The Gemini laid on the ground breathing heavily from the damage he had taken. His appearance returned to the hooded figure that the Gemini really was. The pink paladin stood over her opponent and sheathed her sword. Her hand came down to him to help him off the ground.

"Gomen. I was just too strong for you. I wasn't really the challenge you might have been looking for. I was just a bully." She said, a bit upset with herself. She knew the outcome of the battle would be like this. Her armor was making her invincible in floors lower than 6.

"Maybe so, but a deal is a deal. I will bestow you a special skill, as I promised." He said. A prompt came across her HUD.

'You learned the skill Concentration!'

The Gemini took their leave passing by the paladin without saying another word. And now she was alone the forest. Her original intent was to find a quest to do, but I guess it would be a good time to check out some of the mobs on this floor, or just farm mats.

The sneak attack might have thrown Yuki off, but she wasn't defenseless. The fact that she had only taken one damage proved that point pretty easily, but now she wasn't going to be caught off guard by cheap tricks like that again. She readied her blade, shining bright even under just the moonlight, and charged her opponent with vigor.

The gemini charged her in return. Without a doubt, they were much faster than she was, but that wouldn't matter if they couldn't do enough damage to beat out her regen. Their copy blade slashed though her stomach leaving nothing but a small red cut across the her digital body. Thorns was enough to get her doppelganger down into the red. She quickly turned around and grabbed the collar of the Gemini's breastplate, forced them the other way and dropped them on their rear.

"Muda da!" She said as the blade shined a glorious pink color that rivaled the sheen of her own hair.  The blade pierced through the copies chest three quick times and with that the Gemini's health dropped to one.

<<The Gemini>>'s Stats:

• HP: 1/40 (-23HP)
• DMG: 20
• MIT: 7
• ACC: 2
• EVA: 0
• Critical Hits: 24 on a natural MD 9, 28 on a natural MD 10.
• <<Disguise>>: +1 ACC to <<The Gemini>>'s first attack.

Yuki Stats:
Level: 4 | HP:  79/80 | Energy: 5/8

Stats
DMG: 3 | EVA: 0 | MIT: 27 | ACC: +2 | Thorns: 18