Starting from Zero

Chapter 30

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Book 3, Chapter 30

Revived Dark Dragon Lord Set

I ran to Clark"s shop with muchenthusiasm, only to find the guy is not home. Where did he wander off to in thebusiest night hours?

I went to the clothes shop instead. He got to be there.

And yes I did find him. The dude is having a good timewith his wife! When he saw me, he pushed me out of the door while lookingreally embarra.s.sed.

    "Why are you here?"

    "I got business, obviously! Someonekidnapped my wife! Can I borrow some useful equipment? I gonna infiltrate acity."

    "You mad??" Clark shouted in shock. "Doyou even know how powerful the city guards are?"

    "They are above 800 right? That"s why I came toyou."

    Clark considered for a moment. "Fine. I do havesomething that will allow you to regain full strength of your Artifact armors, temporarily.You can only use it once per day, and it lasts for only 10 minutes. You MUSTtake your gear off before that time limit, or your armors will break beyondrepair. The worst part is it costs 10 levels to use, whether you follow thattime limit or not. You sure about that?"

    "10 levels in 10 minutes? That"s sounds harsh. ButI got no choice. I"m quick at grinding anyway, I can get 10 levels within a day!"

I can"t let Rose wait in there for too long, that"s for sure!

"Tell me howto do it!"

"Follow me then."

    Clark led me back to hisshop and collected my armors. "How is your Thousand Blood going?"

    I took out my note. "783 for now, 217 more to go."

    "Wait a sec."

He hunted in a closet and tookout a bottle and another note. "I collected some for you. Check ifthere are any repet.i.tions."

"You did? Thanks mate!" I browsed through thetwo papers. "79 rep. That means you got 210 of them. still 7 more to go!"

I mixed up the two bottles. "What next?"

"A moment."

Clark took out a knife which is givingout a blue shimmering. "Lucky you. This undead blood of mine values a tonon the market! It makes stuff resistant to dark."

    He cut his finger anddripped some blood into the bottle, then he handed the knife to me. "YourDivine Demon blood can reduce the weight of forged product, increasing yourspeed. With these rare materials, maybe I can repair your outfit earlier thanplanned."

    "Do you mean the blood of rare creatures are allvaluable?"

    "That"s right. Look at your companions. Phoenix"s blood is fused with revivingenergy, it makes your gear repair itself as long as it"s not totally broken. Dragonblood makes it exceptionally st.u.r.dy. Shinryuu blood is resistant tospells and increases your own spell power. The blood essence of your spiritmutant will make it resonate with other pieces, you can easily retrieve yourlost piece unless you lose all of them. Finally, a Nightmare"s blood maysometimes stun the enemy."

    "That"s brilliant! Why didn"t you tell me earlier?I"ll mix their blood too."

    "Huh, you didn"t? I thought you would take theirblood first!"

    "Well I didn"t know they can be of so much help. Iwouldn"t cut my companions just for less than 10 types of blood."

    Icalled my companions up. That makes it exactly a thousand. Aha, all done!

    Then I followed Clark out of the city to dig holes. Thereason is simple: we need Lucky"s plasma flame to forge the armors. Clark"sfurnace will break apart for sure, while burning several holes in the groundwon"t be too much of an issue.

    And I discovered Lucky"s new ability too. He digs wayfaster than an excavator! After only 10 minutes, we already have a 3-meter-deepswimming pool shaped crater in front of us.

Clark began to prepare his toolsand cooling waters while I collected the rest of the materials off mycompanions--dragon tooth, phoenix feathers and stuff.

We threw everything into the pit once we"re done. Luckystood beside the pit, drew a deep breath, and unleashed his signature purpleplasma fire. I think I can electric arcs moving around the area. But it"s toobright to see what"s going on inside.

    Lucky kept on for a full minute beforethe flame began to shrink, then gave out, after which Lucky just fainted again.I un-summoned him to let him rest. Sorry friend.

    However Clark gave me the bad news. "This isn"tgood. We don"t have enough heat! The materials are gonna be wasted!"

    "What??"

Now I"m the one feelingfaint! I ran to the edge of the pit and saw my Dark Dragon Lord set emitting aweak red color. They started to melt but this isn"t enough!

Before I gave up hope, Phiona jumped into the pit.

"Inferno RAAAGE!"

A giant purple fireball appeared under us. Clarkexclaimed: "Ahh the flames of a Phoenix! I almost forgot that."

Different from Lucky, Phiona"s flame is hardly bright. Thoughthe dim flame is just as powerful. I can feel it.

That said, I noticed Phionais panting pretty hard. This move is too draining!

    Night Shade moved to theedge, stood up on his hind legs and summoned a white lightning ball into thepit, causing a lot of flashes. He"s trying to heat up the pit using electricity.Now it looks enough to me! Phiona recovered her spirit as well. She lovesheat.

    "Just a little more power!" Clark shouted to us.

    Loong"er floated above the area and starteddeploying her matrix. A big magic ring appeared around the edge. Then she raised herhead towards the sky and roared.

"Thunder of the seventh heaven!"

    Blackclouds gathered, making the dark perimeter around the Lost City even darker. Alightning pillar the same thickness as the pit dropped itself into the ground, whilestimulating all the flames to erupt a dozen meters higher, scaring me and Clarkaway.

    After two minutes, I un-summoned Night Shade, whocollapsed first. Phiona left the area after another minute. That"s the best shecan hold even with the extra help. Loong"er got more stamina than I expected.It doesn"t look like she"s going to cut her heating spell any time soon.

    "We"re good!" Clark finally gave the signalto stop.

    The disappearance of the final flicker of fire revealeda now bottomless pit. The wall has been enlarged by several times, and I thinkit"s at least 50 meters deep, from where I"m standing. I peaked over the edge. Nope,there"s only lava in my sight.

Phiona dived into the lava pool. When she cameout she"s holding something in her talons. She brought some immense heat with hertoo. My face burns!

    Clark asked Phiona to drop the pieces onto the platform he placed and search for the remaining ones.

    Now it"s time for the professional blacksmith to starthis show. He wrapped some damp towels around his head, hands, with only hiseyes and nose exposed, and began his work. I copied him and covered myself up aswell. This looks like taking a sauna but I must say it feels way better.

    Phiona have already fished out all the parts. Now she"sback into the lava, bathing. Ouch. I"m a little envious of her for some reason.

    The repairing went on into the midnight, during which Ia.s.sisted Clark like an apprentice. It proved to be rewardful though. When we"refinished, the system told me my Blacksmith cla.s.s has leveled up to max (10) becauseI just helped repairing Artifact! I even got a reward out of it--a big diamondcalled [Heart of the Creator]. But it won"t show me any information even if I [Identify]"dit. Huh, weird.

    This diamond, however, reminded me that Phiona gave mea fire gem when we first met. So I handed it to Clark. "Can you get thisthing onto my gear too?"

    "For the-- How did you-- This is one of the rarestfire gems in the world, only a Phoenix--"

Then he glanced at Phiona, who just enjoyed herlava shower.

    "...Yeah right. "Kay, which piece do I get it into?"

    "Helmet!" I pointed at the helm between theeyebrows. "The gem is pretty shiny so I gotta make it stick out right?I"m not the type to hide my wealth."

    "Well it"s yours, so be it then."

    While Clark went to continue his work, I consideredabout the gem"s effect. It allows me to summon Flame Hornets. I"m level 263 (got two levels for killing that high level bounty hunter), which means I cansummon 526 of them. The hornets are only level 100 creatures but...that numberalone is enough to scare off people!

     When I"m stilldaydreaming about how I can order the hornets to sting people, Clark yelled:"All good. Do you try it on now?"

    "You bet I will!"

I began to suit up myselfwith some help from Clark. It took quite a while. There are too many parts!

"Alright. Move around and see if there"s anyproblem." Clark stepped back a bit and instructed.

"Got it!"

With much excitement, I tried to drawmy sword, only to find I can"t lift my arm. Then I tried to bend down, nope, Ican"t.

I tried walking. Argh! my legs feel like they"re stuck in solid concrete!

    "Um, Clark? I can"t move!"

    "Try harder!"

     I used up all mystrength and successfully moved...for one step.

    "Phew! Ca..Clark!... This...huff...Ar..Armor! Why...so heavy!"

    "So, it didn"t work." Clark sighed.

    "What do you mean? Didn"t we succeed? The systemtold me I got promoted for finishing the job!"

    "We only repaired the Artifact"s body. As I saidbefore, Artifacts have their own souls. We can repair the body all we want, butit"s useless once the soul is annihilated."

    "What should we do?" I panicked. "The set isn"t going to be broken forever right?"

    "Of course...We can fix that."

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