Chapter 21

After handing the Mutant Flower to the NPC Alchemist, Hiro, Liberty, and Jacob received several new notifications in their system.

[You obtained Swish Swish Potion Recipe.]

[To brew a Swish Swish Potion, gather the following ingredients and follow the recipe:]

[10 units of Void Cap]

[5 drop(s) of Mermaid Tears]

[3 note(s) of Druid Lullaby]

[3 Ancient Sword Remnant(s)]

[3 Fairy Blessing(s)]

[1. Squeeze 5 drop(s) Mermaid Tears into a cauldron and add 10 unit(s) of Void Cap one by one until it turns into a smooth emulsion. Add 3 Ancient Sword Remnant(s) all at once, then take them out and put them back in.]

[2. Fill another cauldron with water and add the mixture. Bring it to a boil as fast as you can until it changes colors before very gently adding 3 note(s) of Druid Lullaby.]

[3. Rapidly heat the mixture until it’s hot and mix in 3 Fairy Blessing(s). Let everything cool down to room temperature.]

[4. Swish Swish Potion is ready. Immediately use the potion to bathe in before its color changes to brown.]

Hiro carefully read the recipe.

The part that interested him the most was how its effect could only work once for every avatar.

[Swish Swish Potion – Gives 5 additional permanent points to STR, AGI, INT, VIT, DEX, and LUCK.]

“Hiro, what’s this? I don’t get it at all,” Liberty complained while scratching the tip of her nose.

Only one answer crossed Hiro’s mind.

“We have a new mission.”

…

After explaining their new mission to Liberty and Jacob, Hiro invited the two of them to hunt for more monsters. This time, they aimed to find the ingredients required in the recipe, and as always, Liberty and Jacob followed Hiro’s invitation without a word of refusal.

Though, it was mainly because they had no other things to do.

Even though it sounded simple to Liberty and Jacob, Hiro felt that this search for ingredients would take quite a long time. After all, these ingredients were included in the category of items with a low drop rate.

Thus, after wandering the forest area around Beginner Town for about an hour, Hiro finally found a monster with the drop he was looking for.

[Void Cap]

Ding!

[You have unlocked a New monster information.]

[Void Soul (Level 21)]

[Race: Demon]

“Gotcha!”

The monster’s form was a floating cloud of black smoke with a round hat on it.

Hiro swiftly ran and slashed at the monster, but all of a sudden, it suddenly vanished and went into the ground below it. The monster was considerably weak despite being level 21, but it was the shy type; it really liked to hide underground before finally peeking out.

Hiro, Liberty, and Jacob had to be very careful in estimating when the monster would come back up to the surface after hiding underground for three seconds.

BANG!

SPLAT!

With just an attack, the monster that just peeked out of the ground like a whack-a-mole target was defeated.

“Hahaha, this is fun!” Liberty happily exclaimed.

“Let’s see who can beat the most monsters!” Jacob’s fighting spirit was ignited and his confidence was getting even higher.

Prior to this, Hiro had helped Liberty and Jacob distribute bonus points to their basic stats per their need according to their job classes. This helped the two become stronger, and in turn more dependable.

And thus, their “race” began.

Hiro smiled in satisfaction when he received his first Void Cap. However, obtaining 10 units for all three of them was more difficult than they initially expected. Killing the Void Souls was easy as it only required one attack, but it took them about four hours of continuous hunting to finally gather a total of 30 units of Void Caps.

Unfortunately, it took them so long to get all 30 that they stopped competing mid-way and just focused on killing Void Souls as fast as possible.

After the three were finally done with the first ingredient, they rested in the forest area for a bit. In the meantime, Hiro looked for the monster that had the next drop item he was looking for.

The next ingredient had an obvious clue in its name, [Mermaid]. From that keyword, Hiro decided to head to the only waters on the map.

A wide lake in the middle of a forest. He once went through the area, so it was already recorded in his GPS system.

[Mermaid Tears] could be obtained by defeating a dugong-like monster, a beast-type monster with a funny-looking fat oval body.

“They’re so cute!” Liberty exclaimed with bright eyes.

Before any of them could say anything, the girl ran toward the “cute” monsters to take a closer look. However, the girl’s assessment instantly changed when the dugongs were enraged by her arrival, disturbing their habitat’s peace.

The three fought against the tens of dugong-like monsters by the lake. Due to their large size, these monsters were classified as high-level monsters.

To gather a total of 15 drops of Mermaid Tears, they had to spend a little over two hours killing the aggressive dugong-like monsters.

The fight against the dugongs made Liberty and Jacob use a lot of Health Potions. As for Hiro, he had Bloodsteal, so he was fine since he kept swinging his greatsword.

The mission to gather the ingredients to make the Swish Swish Potions frustrated Liberty and Jacob quite easily. The fewer the number required, the more difficult it was to obtain the respective ingredients. Even after the three spent the entire day, they still had not gathered all the ingredients required.

They were already very exhausted at this point, so they needed to rest.

There was no way Hiro was going to force them to continue. Even he felt the fatigue. He agreed to Liberty and Jacob’s request to rest and continue the hunt tomorrow.

Hence, they parted ways and promised to gather at the west gate of Beginner the next morning at 7 AM server time.

“See you tomorrow, bro!”

“Don’t be late, Hiro!”

After the three separated, Hiro finally had some alone time. Before he logged out, he took some time to open the non-fungible quest he hadn’t touched since that morning.

[Are you sure you want to open the Non-Fungible Quest?]

“Yes, open it!”

Plop!

A thick golden metallic envelope suddenly appeared and floated in front of Hiro. A seal in the shape of a lion head was on the envelope, reminding him of the lion head he saw at the gate of the hall when he first arrived in the game.

[NFQ: Your bloodline information is needed to open the seal.]

[The quest will be generated based on your race.]

“???”

Hiro pricked the tip of his thumb with his blade until it bled. However, he accidentally cut his finger too deep.

“Hiss!” He grimaced in pain.

When the blood finally came out, Hiro stuck his finger to the seal on the envelope. At the same time, the blood on the seal moved into the envelope.

It absorbed his blood.

Hiro then patiently waited to see what would happen next.

[Your blood race has been identified.]

[You are a Demon half-blood.]

All of a sudden, the gold color on the envelope became more concentrated and turned into a shiny black color as if it got cursed. The next second, the seal shaped like a lion head cracked and the envelope opened on its own.

Ding!

[You obtained The Underworld Quest (NFQ).]

[Quest Rules: Don’t stop, don’t surrender, and don’t die!]

[Once you have activated the quest, there is no way back.]

[Prepare yourself to enter the cursed dungeon and defeat the boss.]

[Alone.]

After Hiro opened the envelope, those notifications popped up one by one. A short, but concise instruction.

Even so, he chose not to do the quest immediately.

Hiro didn’t want to fail. He only had one chance to do the quest, so he had to prepare himself properly before entering. Fortunately, there was no need to hurry as the quest had no time limit.

‘I’ll do it after the Swish Swish Potion.’