Chapter 22: This Thing's Funny
Once everyone saw the little green monsters, Zack went forth to lure one of them over. These monsters' levels were in the 20s so they had to do a little probing before diving into battle.
Maria didn't understand what Zack was doing, but she readied herself to rush forward. Seeing her act this way, Lizzy came over to ensure her that everything was okay.
"No need to tense up like that Mary!"
"H-huh? But, Zack, he's..."
"Don't worry~ as a Thief he's already got the [Stealth] skill, it makes him invisible to those monsters and other players who aren't in the party!"
"Oh! That's convenient! I wish I had that! Where can I learn it?" Maria immediately asked when she heard about such a convenient skill. She thought that if she had such a skill, then the blunders like being surrounded by packs of monsters wouldn't happen so often!
"Uhh...Mary, that's kinda impossible..."
"Why?"
Seeing her clueless friend, Lizzy felt a little bad about bursting her bubble.
"Well, Mary...that's because it's a Class-Exclusive Skill. As a Dark Priestess, you can't learn a skill from the Thief class," Amanda answered.
"Heh? Aww...no fair..."
Lizzy gave her friend a reproachful look. Her face look read, 'why'd you go and do that?', to which Amanda only shrugged in response.
Before Mary could continue wallow in her sadness, Zack had come back with a singular goblin chasing after him.
"He~ey! I got one!!" Zack shouted.
Before anyone could make a move, Maria had already rushed forward with a flap of her wings. Despite only playing for only 2 days now, the girl had become very adept at using her wings, like it was now second nature to her.
Maria dashed straight towards the goblin while she in the air half a meter or so above the ground. Flying felt really nice so she began to involuntarily smirk. Once she got within attack range, Maria swung her demonic axe right on top of the goblin's head.
It was a gruesome sight. The axe cleaved right into the middle of the goblin's head and green blood began gushing out of the wound.
-1,040! (Fatal Strike! x8 DMG)
Maria tilted her head when she saw the new, blood red colored damage number. Normal a critical strike would be yellow in color while a normal attack would be white. This new color was new to her.
"M-Mary! Wait up!"
"Don't forget out strategy!!"
Maria's friends couldn't believe how fast she had rushed forward. They had clearly seen her AGI stat, and with such a low stat it should have affected her Movement Speed, but apparently that didn't affect her Flight Speed.
This was something that Maria had figured out during her trip to the Teleportation Building with Lizzy. Calamity gave her -5 stats in AGI, so she felt herself moving considerably slower. She felt royally annoyed when she saw other players moving past her super-fast while she was walking as slow as a snail.
Lizzy had to even slow down and match her snail-like pace. It was only when she began to flap her wings in annoyance and move a couple of centimeters above ground that she felt herself moving faster again.
Apparently, Flight Speed wasn't affected by any of the negatives in a stat due to equipment. Maria still hadn't figured out what affected her Flight Speed, but she was nevertheless happy that she didn't have to walk at a snail's pace anymore.
It did take up a bit of her SP, but with the half-SP effect from her weapon, her regeneration was more than enough to cover her expenditure. So when she wasn't in battle, she could perpetually stay afloat for as long as she wanted.
"Hmhm~"
When her friends rushed up to support her, they could all hear the girl humming happily as she swung her axe at the poor goblin...
Large quantities of green colored blood flew through the air as the goblin screeched miserably in pain.
SQQUEEEEE
SCREEEEE
Hearing the screeches, Maria stopped her assault and laughed at it while turning to her friends.
"Hihihi~ this thing's a little funny~" before she began attacking the little guy again.
The rest of the party immediately halted their steps.
"Oh my god..."
"M-Mary's too innocent...she's literally taking this as a game, but she doesn't understand that what she's doing...is a little scary..." Amanda whispered, but with a strange smile.
"S-sis...y-you're making that smile..."
"Shut it. Well, shouldn't you guys go and help her? Quickly end this beau-keheum, appalling scene."
"..."
"..."
Milly, Lizzy, and Zack rushed forward to quickly end the scene of their friend happily laughing as she cleaved away at a miserable goblin.
[25,600 exp gained (4x multiplier)]
"Ohh! That's a lot of exp points! Two more of these things and I can level up!" Maria happily said.
SQQUUUUUEEE
KWWEEEEEE
The party suddenly heard a noise approach them from afar. When they turned to look at the noise, it was the rest of the goblin pack that they had spotted earlier.
The noise coming from the now dead goblin wasn't only a screech of pain and agony, but more like a signal for backup and now that backup had arrived in the form of 3 goblin warriors, 1 goblin mage, and 1 goblin scout.
It was a standard party composition that players used. A Mage acting as the Nuke, A Thief as the scout and DPS, and 3 other Tanks or DPS, well 4 in this case since Maria and the rest had just taken down 1 goblin warrior earlier.
"Yay! More!" Maria quipped up happily.
"W-wait Mary! That's not a 'yay', but more like an 'oh no'!!" Milly immediately replied.
"They're weak! We can do this!" Maria's eyes changed to red and all the goblins in her vision began to spontaneously burst into black flames.
SCREEEE
SCREEEE
Sounds of pain and agony were immediately raised by the goblins. Mary wasn't lucky and didn't trigger the additional effect of [Gehenna's Eye] on any of the goblins, but it did cause them to stop their charge and it took away a large portion of their HP bars.
"Let's go!"
Once again Maria led the charge and she quickly approached the front most goblin warrior and swung her axe at it. Everyone else didn't stop in place like earlier. They had also followed after Maria right when she shot forward.
Since they couldn't seem to control this impulsive friend of theirs, the party just decided to go along with her whims.
Lizzy and Milly did as they had planned earlier, attracting the aggro of the other monster's that Maria wasn't attacking, Zack was just about to offer Maria a helping hand, but then remembered that there was still a goblin mage waiting at the back.
He rushed at the mage-class goblin and began unloading his skills at the fella.
Maria swung her axe and vaulted the goblin warrior she was facing into the air.
"Oh!"
She quickly gave chase and rose into the air just above it and activated her weapon skill [Calamity Cleave].
Her axe began to glow with a demonic light and she swung it down at the airborne goblin and smashed it back into the ground.
"Ohoho~ that was so cool!"
[Skill acquired: Arc Swing Lv.1]
"Hm?"