Chapter 88: Lords Of The Fifth Floor

Today's objective was to go as far as possible within the Fifth Floor. By testing ourselves against the strongest monsters the floor can offer, we would gauge our odds against the floor boss.

Before doing that, however, using my Gift to share skills around would boost our strength even further.

I had to start with [Enhanced Drop Chance] as this skill is universally useful for our pockets.

After the obvious one was out of the way, I had to consider everyone's build and current function in the party to figure out where I should strengthen them or which point should be reinforced.

It's easier to start this with myself since it also helps when passing down skills to others later.

Thanks to my Gift, I'm quite flexible regarding positions and functions, and I've been using that to support every space possible within the party.

By standing on a secondary line and taking care of the flanks, I can fall back to support the frontline with magic, help the backline in case we end up surrounded, or even charge forward to help the frontline in case we need to break through enemy formation.

Thanks to Anna's Gift, I don't have to spend as many points on strength to maintain myself as a good alternative for the frontlines, as such, I've been investing more into intelligence to help out with magic and strengthen my abilities as a supporter from the backline.

The only department missing on this equation for the build I'm going for is speed, which means I'm getting more levels from Mia's [Movement speed up]. I only went up to 12 on this skill, but since it's getting close to Mia's level, It's about time I start to plan what to do in the future.

It's a bit hard to do since the gacha results are unpredictable and might change everything, but it's necessary nonetheless.

The reason I refrained from going all-out on Mia's skill is that I was also eyeing a very expensive, but also incredibly powerful skill from another citizen, that is, Claire's level 15 [Fire Magic].

While my support might not be as precise as Beatrice and Ellie's, by abusing Claire's magic I can help differently by providing sheer firepower.

Next on the line... I decided to go with both Anna and Ellie as I was going to provide them with 6 levels on the [Movement speed up] each.

Anna doesn't lack strength or durability at all, so I'm hoping that with this she can reposition herself faster and also quickly tackle the next enemy, since it's useful for me if she keeps focusing on strength and defense, by providing her with speed I can fill this small gap.

As for Ellie... normally speed wouldn't be necessary for an archer on the backline who can calmly take aim and shoot their enemies. But well... she's a bit of a special case.

Her aim is impressive, and her shooting speed is already great, but I think that by further improving her speed she'll be able to hit enemies while moving at fast speeds just fine, and even if that's not the case, by giving her speed above what you'd expect of an archer, I increase her odds in close combat since she's also able to fight with her daggers.

Another person who benefits a lot from [Movement Speed Up] is Licia, so I increased hers by three levels.

I would love to give her more but I still had something else in store for her. My [Ice Magic] ended up leveling up naturally as I've been using quite a lot, and since I was a few levels above Licia, I decided to share it with her as it's one of her primary resources when fighting. With this, her Ice Magic reached level 8.

After that, it was time for our resident pyromancer and the sneaky witch, which might be the most difficult ones to decide.

For Beatrice, I decided to strengthen her [Fire Magic] by two levels since she seems to be focusing on other attributes for now, but I also gave her [Mana Shield] as she kind of lacks a lifeline.

We haven't had a situation where she needed something like this, but as the floors become more challenging, there might come a time when she needs it, so it's better to secure that front while it's still early.

She can also use it to protect us, and considering she focuses her points on intelligence, it might be a defense as strong as Anna's, though it comes at a hefty price mana-wise and so is not as reliable.

As for Claire... her kit is pretty focused, and she's been getting so many levels that it is a bit hard to see where I can help.

I have a few possibilities, but most use mana, which she probably won't divert from her fire magic, so, I ended up going with [Greater Might] to boos her strength further.

Last on the list was Mia.

I thought it would be a long time before I could help her out with her skills but due to the unique circumstances she's facing on the Fifth Floor, I actually have something that might help her out, if only momentarily.

By sharing my [Swordsmanship] levels with her, I'm sure she'll have an easier time handling the blades. She'll still need to train to become as good as possible at it, but this should show some effect from the get-go.

I think she was a bit shocked that I ended up helping her like this, but I still didn't manage to get even a kiss as a reward from my cute fiance. Though I'm pretty sure I heard a faint "thanks" coming from her...

Even though I've been saving quite a bit, due to the high levels of the skills, it was very expensive to share them around with everyone, and I ended up with just about 40 kingdom points left. It's still enough to share a low-level skill, but I'll keep them so that I can use them on the fly if need be.

I made sure to do this inside the kingdom so that the Merchant could gather as much data as possible, but since he didn't seem to have any comments, we packed up and went to the dungeon.

Once inside we focused on going as deep as possible. I also wanted to test how well I could do as a support on the backline now, so I focused on that for the most part.

Sadly I ended up messing quite a bit... the sudden spike in levels that I got on [Fire Magic] made it really hard to keep it under control, even though I always kept in mind to use less mana than normal. I would always end up affecting a much bigger area than I had in mind.

Power-wise it's a bit addicting how I can melt a big group of monsters in a single attack, but for now, I decided to use it only in controlled situations and changed to [Ice Magic] for the most part.

He also hit like a truck, even if he didn't manage to hit any of us directly, he managed to put Anna on her knees while she defended against his attack.

While it seemed like they maintained a standstill for a few minutes, if not for Beatrice's support I don't know who would end up winning their power struggle.

Anna: "I think we are in a pinch..."

Indeed, if we went on like this, it could frankly go either way...

The problem is that Anna and I aren't managing to put enough pressure on this guy to become a burden for their mage, we only create kill chances every so often, leaving the mage enough room to protect everyone while still dealing with the rest of the party alongside the third [Lord]

Ah... the girls won't like this, but if we want to win, I think we'll have to go do it this way...

Miwen: "...Mia, you team up with Anna, together you can overpower him. Licia, Claire, put pressure on the mage. I'll take the fast boy."

Licia: "Alone? That's reckless!"

Miwen: "I'll be fine, trust me."

As much as she's against it, it seems like she also came to the same conclusion, so it's hard for her to refuse.

Claire can break through the mage's barrier with her magic, and when she's together with Licia, their teamwork gives enough leeway for Claire to use her magic at levels close to her full power. Once she breaks the mage barrier, Licia is competent enough to not let the chance go.

Meanwhile, Mia and Anna are the hardest hitters at the party, even if it's a challenge for Anna alone, I trust that together they can overcome that monster.

I could help them out with that, but it would leave one of them alone to disrupt us, and since I would end up becoming a burden for Licia and Claire, there's only one way to go about it, dangerous as it may be.

The important thing here wasn't for me to win against this monster, I needed to keep him busy long enough for them to finish their opponents.

It would also be good if I could manage to put enough pressure on him to distract the mage, as it would leave the girls in a better spot.

Thankfully it seems like his Gift is not clairvoyance after all. I started quickly attacking him from multiple directions, and on the last attack purposefully left an opening for him to exploit.

If he could predict the future, he would know that this was bait, and would either not attack, or would do so while having a countermeasure for the trap I laid.

The fact that he took the bait and lost his balance and momentum once I froze the ground without directing an attack toward him, made it pretty clear that he can't really see the future and can only notice what is directly targeted at him.

If I had been quick, maybe I could've ended him right there, but I was still cautious, which ended up giving the mage a single moment of opportunity to protect this monster.

I already knew it wasn't going to be easy, but even while taking all precautions it felt like everything was all for naught.

Still, I couldn't let such thoughts overtake me, right now, I held the advantage in momentum, if I managed to keep the pressure up, they were bound to make a mistake somewhere.

Even if that wasn't the case, the mage's mana was bound to end eventually, so right now we had the advantage as it seemed to become a battle of attrition.

I was a bit reckless while trying to maintain the pressure on him though, and almost got hit, thankfully Beatrice managed to save me by grabbing my torso with a water tentacle and pulling me back.

I'm not gonna lie, it felt a bit gross, as if my body was being defiled. I really hope she didn't control the water in any strange ways.

Still, it felt like we were so close to winning this, but at the same time, it felt like we were lacking a little something to put an end to it.

It was then that Ellie abandoned the backline and came close to me. She didn't pull out her daggers, instead, she kept a distance from the monster but focused on him alone instead of helping the others.

Using her speed to shoot from multiple directions, the pressure on this monster was elevated beyond belief, and the number of times the mage had to save his ass increase a lot as we kept coming close to landing a decisive hit.

Finally, we managed to do enough that Claire and Licia finished their opponent, and once Claire went toward the greyish monster, it was game over for him.

Anna used the quake of her sword to make him lose his balance while Mia grabbed her and took her away, leaving Claire with the perfect opportunity to use a kill shot.

Just to be safe this time, it seems like Beatrice also added some fire of her own.

Once it was one vs all, this monster that was struggling against me and Ellie didn't really stand a chance, and danger sense or not, he simply didn't have enough hands to keep us all at bay.

He tried to struggle until the very end, but it was to no avail, and as soon as he dropped a mana orb, we knew the battle was over.

This one was very complicated, but we emerged victorious and stronger from it, so it was time to make our way back before we ran out of mana or energy.