Chapter 269 - Contacting Helion

When she arrived at the bedroom, she saw the party resting on the beds.

Gesturing for Annie to leave, Shiro made sure that the room was secured before stretching her body.

"So how was the dungeon runs today?" She asked with a smile.

"Painful." Silvia replied while trying to hold back some tears. She had thought that only Shiro would be a slave driver but she was wrong. Lisandra was just as intense.

"Painful it may be but your levels have grown." Shiro chuckled softly.

Silvia managed to level up to 61 while Lyrica and Madison both levelled up to 57. As for Chen Yu, he had actually levelled up twice and reached level 59.

"We've levelled up but at what cost?" Madison asked.

"Our sanity." Silvia replied.

"Surely it couldn't have been that bad right? Maybe I should join you so that I can supervise." Shiro smiled.

Realising the consequences of having Shiro come with them, Silvia quickly shook her head.

"No need. Speaking of which, have you done what you needed to do?" She asked.

"Yes I have. Though Chen Yu, can you step out for a bit? This is some private girl talk." Shiro gestured to the door and smiled.

"Hais… I understand." Chen Yu sighed and forced his body up from the bed.

Watching Chen Yu leave the room, Shiro locked the door.

"I've found out some information about the previous owner of this body. Her name was Asakura Kuromi. She is part of the Asakura clan and her parents are both near the peak of tier 5. It seems like Kuromi's enemy may be at the peak of tier 5 as well or higher." Shiro said with a serious face.

"Wait what!?" They widened their eyes.

"So you're telling me, that not only are we against a country right now and two of the biggest factions in the world, but a tier 5 enemy and potentially two more tier 5 enemies since you took over their daughter's corpse?" Madison asked with a twitch of her lips.

"Yup."

"Why is it that you can bring in troubles by just finding out information." Madison sighed.

"I don't know. Maybe it's just the world making things fair since I'm powerful." Shiro shrugged with a smile.

"I guess so." Madison sighed.

"Well enough about that. I have some good stuff for you lot." Shiro grinned. 'Printing' out the martial art manuals, she handed one to each of them.

When Lyrica saw the manuals, she realised that Shiro must have taken them from the royal library since she recognised the manual in Madison's hands.

"Shiro, what about the security measures?" Lyrica asked.

"About that, I was given full access since I made a new friend." Shiro smiled.

"What do you mean by that?"

"You see, the thing that's powering the barriers and formations around the place is a spirit. She goes by the name of Iziuel and is the spirit of the great forest. Much like what happened to Nimue back in the Ospar mansion, she's being used as a battery for the elven race." Shiro sighed.

"Eh?! I didn't know that a spirit was being used as a battery!" Lyrica widened her eyes. From her memories, the only thing pertaining to the power source of the world tree was that it's something that's passed down from the past generation. Unless one was the ruler of the elven race, they weren't permitted to enter the world tree. For them to be using a spirit as the power source was news to Lyrica.

"Mn. I can't exactly save her just yet since I don't know where she is. Even if I did, taking her would do more harm than good right now. Not only would it alarm everyone, it would also expose the capital to enemies that are watching in the dark." Shiro shook her head.

"Then what are we going to do? Spirits are made of mana so I don't think it's good for her to be used as a battery for a long period of time." Madison asked with a frown.

"Nothing for now. I need to find a replacement power source first. You lot continue your dungeon clears tomorrow and try level up some more. There's not much we can do right now so just use it to power up." Shiro smiled lightly.

"What about you? What are you going to do?" Lyrica asked.

"I'm going to make a trip back to New York. I want to see if Helion can upgrade my armour a little since it'll become useless should I level up one more time." Shiro chuckled bitterly.

"Can't you just get another set of armour?" Madison tilted her head.

"Hou hou, then tell me if you can get another set like this."

Unequipping her Kaiser Wyvern set armour, she showed it to the party.

". . .Honestly, I'm not even surprised that you have such an absurd piece of armour." Madison sighed tiredly.

"So yeah, can you see why I said that I want to upgrade it rather than get something new?" Shiro smiled.

"Yup."

"Shiro, if you're going to upgrade an armour like this, won't you need expensive materials?" Lyrica asked.

"Yes I do. I have some on me but there's a small problem. They can only be used on weapon or armour that have reached the red grade and nothing less."

Taking out the Divine Metal and Heavenly Runes from her inventory, Shiro passed it over to the party. She had obtained these at the same time she obtained the Heavenly Constellation (Alurora). Back then, the 'young' light goddess had given these to her in hopes that she would give it to Lisandra.

That way, when she takes over Lisandra's body, she wouldn't be losing anything. Little did she know, Shiro was able to clear the quest without using these.

The moment she cleared the quest, these two were moved into her inventory as additional rewards.

"Hmm… yours is purple grade. Two grades away from red. I don't think you'll be able to find a blacksmith like that in New York." Lyrica frowned slightly.

"Well I had a small plan to help me achieve this. I need to get some materials first though." Shiro shrugged.

Upgrading to orange grade could be done with just technique. But red grade was different. Every item of the red grade would have received a 'name' along with a name skill. This was the defining feature of red grade. It wasn't something that could be achieved unless one was a grandmaster blacksmith.

"Hmmm… I want to help you get some materials from the royal armoury but despite being a royal, I have no power to speak of." Lyrica sighed. She had wanted to help Shiro but she doubted the elders would be so kind as to give precious materials away to someone they've only seen for a short while.

"Don't worry about it. Just focus on levelling up so that I won't have to worry as much would be a great help already." Shiro chuckled.

"Mn. I'll try." Lyrica nodded. Her eyes flared with the determination to try harder in tomorrow's dungeon.

Lisandra was the same. Seeing Lyrica so fired up, she couldn't be lazy as her rival now could she?

While the two were getting fired up for tomorrow, Silvia had decided to fall asleep quickly so that she could recover. There was no point asking either of them to take it easy so the best that she could do was to just prepare herself as much as she can.

Smiling at their rivalry, Shiro pulled out her phone and messaged Helion. It would be bad if she arrived in New York and it turns out that he had moved cities.

[Shiro: Heya, long time no talk. I was just wondering if you were free tomorrow or the day after tomorrow.]

[Helion: Ah good timing. I was planning to move cities tomorrow since both me and Aarim have upgraded to C class. I can delay it for a day if you're coming tomorrow.]

[Shiro: That's good news then. Congratulations on your class up.]

[Helion: Haha, thank you.]

[Shiro: Since you've classed up, I was wondering if you learned how to upgrade set equipment yet.]

[Helion: Upgrading Set Equipment? Sure I can do that. But I'll need materials though. Since I've only just levelled up and got a hidden blacksmithing class, I'm not too familiar with the process yet.]

[Shiro: What materials do you need?]

[Helion: Depends on what grade armour you want to upgrade it to.]

[Shiro: Can do you red grade?]

[Helion: PFT! Red grade!? I didn't think you had so much faith in me.]

[Shiro: So can you do it?]

[Helion: …]

Seeing that Helion didn't say anything for a long time, Shiro sighed disappointingly.

'Oh well. Red Grade isn't something that can be obtained easily after all.'

However, just as she made peace with the fact that she couldn't get it to red grade, she received another message.

[Helion: It depends. But if I had to give it a percentage, I'll say that I have a 35% percent chance of success.]