The tenth floor. The lowest floor of the Zuirya dungeon. A floor where almost no one hunts.
Even Jetblack isn’t here much.
According to records, only four parties have conquered the boss of this floor in the last three decades. I don’t really know if that’s a lot or few, but I guess it’s not many compared to how many conquered the ninth floor.
The monsters that appear here are called kijin. They are said to appear only in this dungeon.
Their most notable characteristics are their horns, but more so their eyes. Some have one eye, some have three. And some have two like humans.
There are variant species among them that have magic eyes, and they use them to perform various abilities.
These magic eyes can be trouble, and that’s the main reason why most people stay away from this floor. Because no one knows what effects these magic eyes have until they’re used.
“But they’re still sorted out to a certain extent. We should thank the adventurers of the past.”
Argo’s right. The guild has documents that state the number of eyes dictates the abilities somewhat.
One eye, status conditions.
Two eyes, emissions. So basically, attacks?
Three eyes, special abilities. Some have both the abilities of one-eyed and two-eyed kijin, and some have completely different things.
“And their physical abilities are high too. Apparently they’re on the same level as a lord despite not being bigger than a person.”
It will probably feel more like fighting people than monsters.
They use swords, spears, axes, shields, and bows. And some of them use magic weapons, although we can’t get them after defeating them.
When kijin die, they leave either horns, eyes, or magic stones, and their corpses disappear.
These materials are all valuable, but the magic stones are especially treasured, especially by the alchemist guild.
And yet, few people hunt them. That’s how dangerous they are.
“Should we look for the smallest groups possible?”
“That would be the safest option. We just have to pray that Sora’s Map is working. With Sora and Mia, we can target the one-eyed ones, but we can’t just keep picking them.”
It’s true that my Map hasn’t worked in every dungeon.
It hasn’t stopped working in Zuirya, but we won’t know if that’s also the case on the tenth floor until we get there.
“So we have to hunt fifty, right?”
“Yes, but we can also assume that’s because they’re just that hard to hunt. There’s also very few people hunting them despite the quota being low. Well, it could also be that the boss of the tenth floor is too strong.”
Says Chris, and Argo sighs.
That could very well be why so few people have cleared this dungeon. There’s also the fact that this dungeon has safety zones. If you decide you can’t beat a boss, you can always retreat.
I assume some people have retried it, but even safety zones can’t guarantee total safety. Well, they can if you’re in them, but if you don’t retreat in time, you could very well die.
I stop looking through the documents about the boss, and read about magic eyes again.
One-eyed monsters mostly use paralysis and curse, but also more annoying things like perception obstruction and fascination. Paralysis and curse cause similar effects at first, which is making it hard to move, so it’s hard to tell which one is being used.
Also, some things work immediately, but some gradually, and in the case of the latter, it’s even harder to know what it is.
Perception obstruction and fascinate are also similar. Perception obstruction makes the target not know who they’re fighting, and fascinate makes them attack whoever they see. The latter is worse, because someone affected by perception obstruction just has to fight whoever attacks them.
There are also levels to status ailments, so their severity can worsen if they’re cast several times on one target. The higher the severity, the more difficult it is to heal. For example, if someone is hit twice with paralysis, they have to take paralysis medicine twice.
Even a high quality antidote won’t work if it’s one dose.
Argo was saying we should target these because I have Appraisal and Mia and I have Recovery.
Appraisal is great because it can see what status ailment was inflicted, meaning we can just heal each time.
“The ones that they say fire emissions look like trouble. From what I’m reading, it’s less like magic and closer to Hikari’s Projectile Slash.”
That’s the impression I get too.
Guilford frowns as he reads intently.
I keep reading too, and see there are records of ignition and shock attacks. Like the moment they cross swords, people’s bodies go numb and stop moving.
I can predict magic attacks by reading the movement of magic energy, but if it’s like Hikari’s Projectile Slash, there’s no way to tell.
An attack that’s reliable when a friend uses it is a real pain when used by an enemy.
Our saving grace is that each individual only has one attack, I guess. The same goes for the one-eyed ones.
“…The real problem is the three-eyed.”
Says Rurika while looking at me for some reason.
And then everyone else follows her gaze to me.
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Thanks for the treat.