CH 175

"And that's why, I'm thinking of splitting the party since the members have increased."

"I see, please continue."

After seeing off Cecilia, Lulu and Celestine, I found the right opportunity to hold a meeting with Rika and Karua, who were finally free.

In the guild room, the first team, Hannah, Sierra and I, and the second team, Rika and Karua are sitting in the guild room like round table formation currently.

"Although the addition of new blood has increased the number of members to 12, the extreme level difference between us still persists. So the first step is to bring everyone to Lv 40."

I conveyed the main gist of this discussion.

The level of the new members in <Eden> is no higher than 5 while the 2nd team consisting of Rika and Karua Lv is 20 which has a big gap compared to our first team members who have Lv5. Or rather, it's just too wide.

A job's low phase ranks up to a tree of 3rd order and they only begin to show their brilliance from Lv40 onwards. Beside, the official prerequisites to enter in the intermediate dungeon is also Lv40+. Therefore, Lv40 is a kind of watershed.

Even when I was playing it as a game, I basically focused on raising the level of characters up to Lv40 first. After all, the difficulty level spiked up from the intermediate dungeon and the need for different jobs became incessantly higher.

The rule in the <Dungeon Activity> is that a party can have up to 5 members.

However, as a hypothesis, a party leader would generally want to have a vanguard, magician, healer, tank, buffer/debuffer, scout, etc. at least to respond against any situation.

Although an almighty job like mine can work as a substitute for either of them, it still falls short of the actual job. Hence, just a 5 member party can't cover every shortcoming.

Then why can you only have a 5 member party but not 6? Or so questions answered from the development team were,

The party system is fixed.

You might think it sounds right but in fact is quite redundant when it comes to <Dungeon Activity>.

After all, we are talking about a divine game with an unprecedented number of jobs that a fixed party setting doesn't really do justice to it.

Though the developer message regarding this was "The players finally have a multitude of jobs to choose from, so why not just change one each time you dive into the dungeon?".

Very touching (painful), that tears involuntarily come out.

Hence, the capture of a dungeon is unusually hard with a fixed party.

Needless to say, even I fell into this trap in the beginning when I began the game without knowing anything as I only level up the characters I was using at that time and unsurprisingly, the dungeon exploration of intermediate dungeons was awfully hard.

I don't even remember how many times my party was wiped out clean. By the time I broke through the intermediate dungeon, I was a second year student.

(T/N : author didn't suggest if 2nd year of high school or middle school)

I was just a young bud at that time.

It's from then I realized that raising all jobs uniformly is the most efficient way. Besides, I also prefer this method even now because it's so much fun.

"Therefore, I'm planning to break up our first party to help in raising the second party and new members. Basically, forming two parties. Not to say the freshman classes will begin soon in the truest sense and our chance of gathering together like this will decrease, so we will be moving with this composition for the time being."

I want every member to enjoy the dungeon. The thrilling life of an academy is like a page from youth that makes my heart burst with excitement.

"Understood. Can I ask one thing?"

"Ask whatever you want."

"I think Rika and Karua can also dive into the beginner-upper grade dungeon if one of us joins them after they clear the <Ghost Cave> dungeon. So instead of 2, let's divide into three."

I pondered about Sierra's suggestion.

I was thinking of forming a 5, 5 and remaining a 2 member party, while Sierra's opinion is to form a party of 5, 4 and 3 members respectively.

It is indeed more efficient this way.

However, since I was preoccupied with having two parties only, the essential party item <Item bag (Capacity : large)> falls short for one more party, but I'll just organize one later.

Though, the grade might be a bit inferior.

"I don't mind. What's your opinion on this, Rika, Karua?"

"No problem."

"Hmm. The number of juniors is increasing... "

"Alright. I will teach everything I know. Remember not to slack off. And same goes for us, it would be a shame if we were overtaken by the newcomers."

"I will work hard!"

"That's right. We must also work hard."

Rika and Karua are sufficiently motivated. Nice going.

"But please spare me from the <Ghost Cave> dungeon."

"Then, it’ll only be me and Hannah who are tagging along. It would have been a breeze if Lana was here but unfortunately, she's absent today. Oh well, can't be helped."

Rika and Karua were hunting night goblins but it seems they failed in getting any specific attribute equipment in the end.

I thought about purchasing them but they are expensive. Moreover, exploding mobs for attribute equipment among the normal equipment is highly impossible. So it's just a waste.

It would have been better if we could help but that fat ball ghost is disgustingly strong. After all, it possesses ghost-like characteristics. Not to say about the flock attacks.

It may sounds like it's a easy prey since we were able to defeat it quite easily in a well balanced manner, but in fact, the fat ball ghost’s true ability lies in its <Fusion> ability in which it's performance will just continue to rise bit by bit and the end result is complete destruction if we fail to stop it.

An obscenely strong boss. It wouldn't be an exaggeration to rank it as the strongest among all beginner bosses.

We may have powered up but it's still unknown if Hannah and I can stop it from activating <Fusion>. After all, there are a total of 32 small ghosts.

I wished Lana was here now.

"How about we shelf it aside for the time being and aim for the <Battle Wolves of the Shallow Forest> dungeon?"

"Hmm, it’s feasible. It's still afternoon and we have precisely 5 members, we can do a few rounds, at the least."

"Very well. Rika, Karua. We will be driving into the <Battle Wolves of the Shallow Forest> dungeon. Our goal is to raise your levels, so quickly prepare for your first exploration."

"Roger!"

"Hmm. Got it... "

Designating a fat ball ghost as a tough to deal with target without Lana, we swiftly changed our target to battle the wolves.

Wait for us, <Battle Wolves>! We’re coming to play with you!

(Battle wolves : Howl!?)

Update schedule from now on will be Monday/Wednesday/Friday once again.