CH 21

“Hiyaa!”

Taking Luce’s attack, the Patchwork Bear fell to pieces.

【You have gained 43 experience points.】

The xp is properly coming in now.

I seal their movements with [Shadow Stomp] and fend off their attacks, while Luce keeps dealing damage with Iron Piercer.

We got into the groove already.

“We did it! Elma-san, I went from 【Lv：16】 to 【Lv：19】!”

Luce’s level is also rising steadily.

As soon as she hits 【Lv：21】, we will commence our main objective, the ‘Hunt for the Golden Rana’.

“Good, we need another similar monster to….”

“Ah ah, look at this! Look! Look!”

Luce rummaged through the remains of the Patchwork Bear and finally pulled out a shield with a cute bear face on its surface.

“Here! Here it is! There was an item drop!”

Luce held up the bear shield and pranced around with intermittent squeals.

“Ah, oh…. I see.”

“See? See? It’s a good thing you brought me with you, see?”

Luce said with sparkling eyes.

We were doing this to raise her level and not for item drops though….

Well, it has some value, so I won’t say it’s unwelcome.

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〈Bear Shield〉《Recommended Level: 10》

【Defense:＋12】

【Market Value: 200 000 gold】

A cute circular bear shield.

Compared to its performance, its Recommended Level is low.

――――――――――――――――――――

Although it has a low drop rate because it’s intended for lower level people, the Market Value is also less than one would expect.

Nonetheless, 200 000 gold is indeed nice at this point.

It’s indeed nice, but I would rather if we didn’t use up all our luck right now and kept it for later instead.

“Will you be using it, Elma-san?”

“….no. Thanks for the offer, but my current shield have better stats.”

“It’s a tiny shield, so maybe you can use it differently! Didn’t you say that your current shield is somewhat hard to use because it has a high Recommended Level? How about it? You should keep it with you if nothing else….!”

She is pushing it like crazy….

W-well, she is also right.

Since it would be easier to move, I may be able to use it in a different way.

However, the number one problem is that I don’t want to appear in front of people with it.

I may end up called Bear Knight that way.

In the sense of it having a low drop rate it’s a rare item, so there is no problem with that.

….well, as a counterbalance, the spawn rate of the Patchwork Bear is high, so if you really want it, you can stick to hunting them all you want.

“….thank you. I’m not sure I will be using it, but I’ll accept it.”

“Yeah! Yeah! It’s better like this! Ehehe….I was useful!”

If that keeps her motivated, then it’s fine.

In Magic World, there was a superstition that if you get a rare drop you didn’t aim for, then you won’t be able to get the one you really wanted, but if I brought that up now, it would only discourage her.

After that we kept exploring and took down our third Patchwork Bear.

【You have gained 43 experience points.】

【Your level has increased from 23 to 24.】

【You have gained 1 Skill point.】

My level also went up by one.

And with this, Luce should’ve reached the 【Lv：21】 we were aiming for.

“A-amazing… No matter what I did before, my level wasn’t going up, but now it happened so easily….”

Luce opened her Status and left her mouth open from the shock.

“Excellent, with that our preparations are done. Now we can move on straight to our main-”

“Aaaah!!”

Luce let out a loud yell and started fishing for something in the remains of the Patchwork Bear.

I kept an eye out while wondering what was that yell for, but then she held up another circular bear shield.

“It dropped again! A second Bear Shield!”

I just kept silently staring at the bear caricature painted on the shield’s surface.

This is strange.

No matter how you slice it, that’s not an item with a drop rate that would easily allow two to drop right after the other….

“Huh, did I misremember its drop rate or something? I don’t think so, but…..”

This is not the time to be thinking of superstitions right now anymore.

Most likely Luce’s initial Luck value was particularly high.

To begin with, the Clown Class had a tendency to roll high Luck values in exchange for generally lower other stats.

If she managed to roll an outlier value even counting that, then the effect of [Beckoning Kitty] raising that value by 500% becomes particularly big, which would explain this kind of unlikely event happening.

Even so, this is still weird.

In that case, why didn’t Luce have such an effect on drop rates while in Klein’s party?

There is the fact that a lack of information about monsters and Dungeons where an increased drop rate would be best utilised would certainly make it hard to efficiently make use of [Beckoning Kitty] to earn money.

And yet, it should’ve had a patently obvious effect anyway.

“…ah, it was a freshly made party, so they didn’t know there was a difference.”

Especially with a lack of information, they could only see the good side of more successful parties.

When they saw another party that was able to advance more efficiently, then they must’ve thought it was because they had someone holding them back.

Thinking like that was not uncommon even in Magic World.

By investing the first 【5】 Skill points into the [Great Fortune] Skill Tree, you get a Special Skill called [Four-leaf Clover].

At 【15】 points in [Great Fortune], the [Four-leaf Clover] evolves into [Beckoning Kitty].

The [Four-leaf Clover]’s effect is raising its owner’s Luck by 200%.

In other words, Klein and the others were used to a higher drop rate from the beginning.

Without prior knowledge, it’s common to try and experiment with various things in this level range, so they might not even notice if the drop rate has changed on them.

Especially since they don’t even know what drops at what odds from monsters.

“Hey, hey, Elma-san! Won’t you rather keep this Bear Shield as a spare instead of selling it? Hm?”

“….Luce, I’m really thankful that you teamed up with me.”

“I didn’t know that you wanted a Bear Shield this much. We should keep at it and gather up ten of them today!”

….but I didn’t really want a Bear Shield at all.

Also, Luce’s level has caught up to the Patchwork Bear’s.

The level up rate will fall off sharply after this.

That means we don’t really have any reason to keep hunting Patchwork Bears.

“Here comes the main part, Luce. We will advance a bit further into the Angel’s Toybox…..and hunt for our current main objective, the Golden Rana.”

TN: Rana is frog in spanish.