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Evan D. Sherden, Meets the Legend (1)
As mid-September passed by, the dungeon city’s excitement developed into a level comparable to a fever. Evan thought that everyone was busy getting ready for the festival.
Thanks to the attack on the 45th floor by the dream team formed by the different battle guilds, they had finally made some progress. The attacking team of the Paradise Wandering Guild and the Thunderbirds Guild had safely attacked the 45th floor without any casualties.
The Heat Shield Guild, which specialized in nurturing shield guards, was unable to attack the dungeon by itself, but eventually mobilized themselves as mercenaries to attack the 45th floor alongside almost all the guilds, and they would also be included on the list of guilds that attacked the 45th floor.
“And finally, today, Sis Maybell said that she succeeded in attacking the Phoenix Guild.”
“The Master picked Paradise Wandering, Thunderbird, and Phoenix as the three main guilds in eight years, and it’s the same now, let alone eight years later,” Shine muttered over the window in the mansion hallway, sticking his tongue out at the dimly visible city lights.
For nearly a week already, this city had not slept. This insomnia was probably going to last until the festival was over.
“Everyone in the city is excited. Shine, don’t let yourself be swept away by the atmosphere.”
“I know that too, Master. This is the most dangerous time. All we have to do is look straight ahead every time,” Belois put in.
“I just needed to confirm that,” Shine muttered, sticking his tongue out at Belois, who was staring daggers at him.
“Shine, Lua. You can come in now. The pre-work is all finished.”
“Yes, Master.” When Evan’s words sounded from inside the room, Shine and Belois exchanged glances once more and opened the door.
Then there was the figure of Evan lying on the bed wearing his pajamas, wearing the necklace of Miraseul, Snow Mountain Spirit earrings, leather gloves, and even the boots. There was also Raihan with an esoteric expression by the bedside.
“Young Master, can I be honest with you now?”
“Don’t.”
“It’s really stupid.”
“Don’t do it.” Evan replied while pouting his lips at Shine’s words and called them to his bedside too. The three, including Raihan, were standing side by side looking down at Evan, and it seemed that all of them were performing some kind of ritual of sacrifice.
“Now the preparations are over. I’ll go to sleep now. If anything goes wrong, you have to wake me up right away. Understand?”
“This… Are you really going to do it, Master?”
“Yes. I have to do it,” Evan nodded with a serious expression.
“The situation is serious, but I heard more disturbing things from my father. Now, there is no mana drop for quite a few things and I have enough physical strength, so I can’t hesitate anymore. It’s time to start my next project.”
“I’ve never seen anyone who claims to be such an insomniac on their own anyway,” Shine mumbled, thinking it was absurd. “Now you’re going to be crushing slimes while sleeping.”
From now on, the essence of what Evan wanted to do was to practice slime training even while sleeping.
“All data has already been gathered. The experiment is done and the verification is perfect! I have no choice but to do it now!”
“Young Master, this is the night. If you make a loud noise and let someone else see this, you won’t be able to explain it to them.”
At Raihan’s words, Evan barely calmed down and collapsed. Shine was still wearing a salty expression, and Belois, who was noticing him, quietly hit him in the ribs.
“Let’s start, Raihan.”
“Here you are. Once the curse is neutralized… Obviously it will be fine. I want to believe that it will be okay.”
What Raihan handed to Evan was a curse that he neutralized with God’s Holy Magic, as he had just explained. It was a nightcap with a sleepwalking curse that made you repeat only one action.
Originally, this hat was a reward for a quest. He could get it as a reward after he solved the quest and received it from a middle-aged man who only wore a nightcap every day.
Of course, it was a trap quest. According to the man’s request, it was no use bringing medicine that was only effective for a good night’s sleep. One couldn’t bring in a priest, let alone a warlock.
‘Then, the player, who was so tired of not breaking the quest no matter what he did, struck him with his fist and solved the quest for the first time, seeing the man falling asleep on the floor with his nightcap removed.’
The way to clear a quest that was considered impregnable before discovering the solution was really simple!
However, there was a possibility that you would not be able to receive the quest reward depending on your closeness with the man, at least the first few times. Another trap was that one had to act only after hearing the man’s request. As soon as you received the quest from the man who was blindly struck, you would be caught by the soldiers.
So what about Evan? Evan gave money and bought the hat from the man. There was nothing in the world that shouldn’t be bought with money. It would be a win-win scenario from the man’s point of view because he would receive money, and his insomnia would also be solved.
‘But it means that there is only the curse in this nightcap as the reward of the quest.’
Still, there are only so many nightcap items that appeared in Yo-Ma Great War 3. So many players had broken the quest for the sole purpose of decorating the character. Of course, it was a cursed item, so once worn, it wouldn’t be taken off easily. It had to go through purification first.
“Attachment and detachment is free, but the core of that curse remains. I wonder if Young Master can use this and sleep properly.”
“What is sleepwalking? You move while you sleep. So it’s okay, I can still sleep.”
“Uh… I don’t think that’s it…” Shine carefully tried to refute again but was struck by Belois. He shut his mouth.
In fact, Evan also knew the problem with this nightcap and utilized Raihan’s divine magic and alchemy to modify its nature a lot. It had already solved many problems.
It felt more correct to say that it was a curse for sleeping habits, not for sleep.
“I periodically summon slimes, wriggling my thighs, clench my fists, and smash them and burst them… The ability to repeat this series of moves is because of this nightcap. Specifically, it’s a chemical reaction between me and the Miraseul necklace and nightcap.”
“You’re talking as if this is a really cool thing to do.”
“Of course it’s cool. It means that slime training never ends.” Evan now had a slime in one hand.
He was repeating the process of recalling four at a time and catching eight slimes at once. Nevertheless, the mana recovery rate was faster than the mana consumption rate thanks to the Miraseul necklace and the Snow Mountain Spirit earrings, so it proved to be no problem at all.
“If this project is successful, the speed of slime training will be twice as fast. I can reap twice the reward! That way, I feel like I’ll be able to live somehow in this tough world.”
“What? How will you become stronger than this?” Evan shook his head, ignoring the arguing Shine, and laid down then closed his eyes. Both his fists relaxed. He wore the weird array of items, but the atmosphere felt so serious that it somehow felt ominous.
Evan soon fell asleep. Even if they said different things, the three people who had the same heart to worry about Evan, watched over him.
In the case of Belois, it seemed a little selfish to do so, but the two men decided not to care about that.
“Ah!”
Suddenly, Shine exclaimed. The nightcap on Evan’s head began to glow.
The black and the white light came out of each other, and then they mixed together and turned gray. This was the trigger.
“…….”
“…….”
The first thing that moved was Evan’s thigh. Wriggle… Wriggle… His two fists were tightly clenched as if he was going to hit someone.
The last piece was the necklace of Miraseul. With a faint light, Evan summoned a slime into his hand. Was it because he had learned the timing of his body over the years? As soon as Evan’s fists opened, four slimes appeared on his palm, and two fists clenched almost at the same time.
It was successful.
“Are you sure he isn’t still awake?”
“The nightcap is shining. It means that he is definitely sleeping.”
The movement didn’t end in one shot. However, there were also no seizures, no excessive movements, and no slime that succeeded in fleeing. It was just as if Evan had been indulging in his regular training.
“Really great, great…”
“Yes. He is great. He is doing this very well.” Shine muttered this just because he was excited, Raihan was sincere in what he said. Belois simply narrowed her eyes at Shine.
Raihan shook his head and spoke,
“I know what you might think of this, but Shine… it’s really very revolutionary. Using the power of alchemy and divine magic to weaken the cursed item and adjust its detailed abilities, this is as difficult as creating artifacts.”
Of course, Raihan knew that on the outside, Evan’s behavior didn’t seem very smart, but he took note of it anyway. He had to admit that he admired what his master was doing. He looked up to Evan’s passion, and his ability to realize what seemed like a delusion was actually an achievable goal.
“Moreover… The appearance is a bit so-so, but looking at the results alone, no one will be able to ignore you. This constant practice made the present Master who he is. But I also made it possible for him to do it while sleeping. Can you expect the results?”
“I think that it itself is great… But, wouldn’t it be better to retrofit and equip better artifacts than to create this one? It feels like he is going through a difficult road every time.”
This was also a reasonable point, so Raihan chose to shut his mouth. Everyone knew that Evan always underestimated his abilities and that he tended to be a bit lost because of it.
However, there was someone who opposed this.
That was Belois, who had been ignoring their words and looking only at Evan.
“Master is always doing his best.”
“I thought you would say that.”
“No, it’s the truth. We just don’t understand him, but he always produces great results,” Belois spoke in a somber voice. “Madam told me. There are two ways to grow, internally and externally, but the latter has always made all human beings impoverished. And now, all the stuff that the Master is wearing is a way to grow the inside strength.”
Shine nodded at this because there was no way to deny it. From that point of view, it was clear that the training they were doing right now was, in the end, similar to what Evan was doing.
“Then I’ll take your word for it. No one is more focused on training themselves than Young Master. We should try harder, too.”
“Of course. But I’m not going to use that nightcap.”
The three members of the Dream Team organized their thoughts after seeing Evan’s successful ‘sleep training’.
With that in mind, Evan, who looked a bit silly thus far, didn’t neglect training while sleeping. Even if he was nobility, he was more hard-working than anyone else.
Evan wasn’t obsessed with artifacts because he was now actually accustomed to every Yo-Ma Great War poison, but unfortunately, they didn’t know this fact yet.