Just as Ryan suspected, though the bullets from Gregor's sniper-cannon seemed to do some damage, they weren't able to pierce through the boss' skull. All that happened was that some of its black blood was seeping into its thick, heavy fabric skin. But that was fine for now; as long as some damage could be dealt to it, it should be easy enough to take care of it once Maximus really faced it. His stats were more than double what they were when him and Ryan first fought this area boss, and with the extra size that came with those doubled stats, it should be possible to take the boss down fairly easily even without Gregor and Jester's support.
However, that was in the context of a simple fight against just the boss. That was not the situation they were currently in. There were still dozens of other monsters roaming around, and while they were being practically mowed down by Maximus and Gregor, it was still a lot more dangerous than usual.
"Jester, you have de-buff spells, right?" he asked, and Jester quickly nodded in response, "When I give you the signal, can you either weaken the boss monster's defence or slow down his movements?"
Jester threw Ryan a thumbs-up, and then continued marching around the area, when another message popped up in front of Ryan. At first, he thought that Jester already activated the spell, but rather, it was one of the harlequin's other skills.
[Jester's Excitement has passed the threshold. Activating First Act effects]
-[First Act: Entourage's movement speed increases by 10% - Enemies' movement speed decreases by 5%]
-[Second Act: ???]
-[Third Act: ???]
-[Fourth Act: ???]
-[Fifth Act: ???]
The moment this message appeared in front of Ryan, he could see something else pop up in his line of sight. Mana was flowing out from Jester, attaching itself to the other spirits, and to Ryan himself as well. He was pretty sure that it wasn't visible to anyone but himself, but small... Jester-like additions were added to each of the spirits through the harlequin's mana. They were basically just things that Ryan would imagine some medieval clown tacking onto their outfits, simple details, nothing more. For Ryan, the mana was stuck to his face, creating a mask around his eyes. Meanwhile, Maximus and Gregor had slight frills attached to their bodies. It was all just a little more court-jester-y than before.
Was this just something that the skill created while 'handing out' the effect? If so, then why wasn't anything placed onto the monsters? Or maybe it had something to do with one of the other acts. Either way, it was a little distracting, seeing the light of those blue flames right in front of his eyes. He pushed his hands through it and just waved the mana away, and that seemed to at least remove it from his face temporarily. And even with it gone, he was able to feel the skill's effects. Every minute movement of his body simply happened much faster than it did before. 10% movement speed was definitely a huge improvement; but if it required something like this, then there was no way it was realistic to depend on this in every fight.
Rather, if it happened, it should probably just be seen as a nice add-on, "But what the hell would the fifth act need?" Ryan looked at Jester with an awkward smile, not sure what to expect. Considering Jester's standards, where even meeting with a Great Spirit hadn't excited Jester enough to let Ryan pass the quest without Gaia's help.
The effect of Jester's skill could be seen the most on Maximus. He had already been running around and trying to jump at them, cutting off the mascots' limbs or heads with every swing of his greatsword. At this point, he was mostly carrying around the shield that was strapped to his arm so that he could catch himself on the ground more easily. But despite that fast-paced, almost reckless movement, Maximus never lost the same sort of 'noble' feeling that he always gave off when Ryan watched him fight.
With the monsters slowed down and Maximus sped up, the knight was able to take down a large amount of the monsters that could become an issue while he went to focus on the boss monster. All in all, the boss monster was also pretty useful in whittling down the numbers; while passing through the crowd, it swung the bag that was hanging off the shoulder at the mascots, either tearing off their heads with that initial impact, or finishing the job once the mascots staggered for a moment. Of course, this was pretty damn useful at the end of the day, since it not only slowed the mascot down more but also helped get rid of the crowd, but all this movement made it harder for Gregor to get a good shot in. Even so, he continued on, even if each shot took a bit longer to line up.
At some point, the boss had made it to the front of the group of monsters, so Ryan gave Gregor another instruction, "Shoot a grenade, and aim it at the ground in front of the boss monster the moment you can see its legs clearly."
The robot nodded while taking another swig of liquor. Ryan had just put the bottle down next to him so that Gregor could take as much of it as he needed, whenever he needed it.
"Maximus!" Ryan exclaimed, holding his hands at the sides of his mouth, "Attack the boss the moment the dust settles!"
The knight just glanced over at Ryan to acknowledge him, taking out one more mascot before Gregor started setting up the grenade-launcher. The barrel folded open, and Gregor quickly placed one of the prepared tubes inside, carefully twisting it into place. He pulled back, and then pulled the lever. With a loud thump, the grenade was shot out and flew through the air. Exploding on impact right in front of the feet of the area boss, it seemed to do quite a bit of damage, managing to slow the giant mascot down even more.
Maximus immediately started running toward the explosion, timing it right to jump at the area boss once he was able to see it again.
Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on Royal Road.
As he moved, he carefully entered the flame combat stance, and Granfell lit up as fire enveloped its edges. Maximus cut into the mascot's arm before it could even react, and its arm and the bag it was holding onto fell down onto the ground together. As black blood flowed down from it, the knight cut through the back of the mascot's legs. Already injured because of the grenade, the boss' legs broke under its weight. It fell onto its face before it could even counter-attack, only able to slightly twist its body and stare at Maximus as the spirit jumped onto its head.
Through one of the deeper gashes in its skull created by Gregor's bullets, Maximus stabbed down into the mascot's skull and practically cooked its brain.
[You have killed the Level 10 -Mascot Boss-]
"... Huh. That was a lot easier than I thought it would be..." Ryan muttered, waving away the system window. It was harder than the other mascots, obviously, but it was still easier than taking down a regular mascot when they first came here a couple weeks ago, "Sorry about that, Jester, I didn't even have the shot to let you know."
Before the mascot's body even properly started falling apart, Maximus already moved on and started cutting down the other mascots. Really, the rest of the crowd wasn't anything difficult to take care of, it just took a little longer to kill the rest of them. And as the last of the mascot monsters fell to one of Gregor's bullets, something else happened.
Fireworks filled the sky. For a moment, Ryan thought that Jester used that spell again to try and get any stragglers, but he was still marching around the fountain like he had been before. No, this was something else.
Looking up above him, Ryan saw something new. Regular monsters gave the coins, the boss monsters gave statues, and now... he was given some kind of certificate that just floated down from the sky, levitating right above the fountain.
He pulled it down and took a look, reading it out loud, "This 'Perfect Completion' certificate is awarded to Ryan Aglecard for perfect completion of the Mascots' Plaza... Huh."
Frankly, he did the absolute least here... but it probably counted as Ryan's own completion because, at a technical level from the system's point of view, the spirits probably counted as something like Ryan's skill or ability. It felt a bit iffy, but it really wasn't the most important thing right now. Rather, he hadn't heard of this 'perfect completion' thing yet. He should ask Runar about that later.
Either way, he should stop by the gift shop and hand it in with all the coins, maybe it was worth some points. But for now, it was time to gather all the coins in the first place. Ryan placed his fingers onto his lips and whistled, letting Gaia know that everything was over. The golem quickly came over, looking around as if firstly trying to make sure that everyone was alright. Once she realized that it was so, she moved as if she was letting out a relieved sigh, though of course incapable of doing so.
Once Maximus came back, Ryan switched the effect of the unsealing skill from the knight to the golem, so that her and her sub-golems could help collect the coins a bit more effectively. Silvia had specifically altered the straps of the backpack to account for this exact moment, so that Gaia could keep wearing it no matter the size, at least for now.
While the other three spirits, Maximus, Jester, and Gregor, relaxed after the battle, Gaia and Ryan went out and collected all the drops. Since this time around, the boss' bag stayed intact, they put all the coins inside. It probably didn't count as the mascot's body, but more of a part of the dungeon itself. Or it could be some kind of extra drop, even if a burlap sack wasn't exactly the most luxurious item. Ryan would try taking it out of the dungeon later, and if it didn't disappear, he'd bring it by Runar and see if it could be used for anything. But for now, it was used for its original purpose; carrying around a bunch of plastic coins and a small gorilla statue.
While they were collecting all this, Ryan also took the time to finally sort through all the system messages he had ignored until now.
[Gregor has levelled up!]
[Gregor has levelled up!]
[The -Artillerist's Drunken Stupor- Skill has levelled up!]
[Jester has levelled up!]
[Jester has levelled up!]
[Jester has levelled up!]
[The -Harlequin's Act- Skill has levelled up!]
[The -Harlequin's Act- Skill has levelled up!]
[Jester has levelled up!]
[The -Harlequin's Excitement- Skill has levelled up!]
[Jester has levelled up!]
[You have levelled up!]
"Holy fucking-" he stared at the windows. Jester levelled up five whole times? And even Ryan levelled up again. This was a record as far as the spirits were concerned, but then again, this wasn't exactly a normal circumstance. After checking and jotting down the status increases for the two spirits, Ryan excitedly checked out his own status.
His eyes only settled on one stat, which had finally reached a particular threshold.
-[Dexterity - 2(+0.09)]
Ryan was now an official 'superhuman', at least when it came to his dexterity. This was a pretty nice surprise that he hadn't quite expected to reach when coming here today.
"Alright, let's get going, everyone," Ryan said with a big grin on his face as he attached Gregor's machines back to Gaia's backpack and then, at least for now, unsummoned Gregor and Jester. Maximus and Gaia stayed outside, since Gaia still carried things and Maximus wanted to be there in case of an emergency. This was still a dungeon, at the end of the day.
With the map in hand, Ryan navigated toward the closest gift-shop. Like normal, the inside was in complete shatters, so Ryan just quickly stepped up to the chest in the corner. He emptied out the sack and threw in any coins that were in Gaia's backpack and placed them inside together with the point-card.
Once he opened the chest again, he pulled out the card. 1461 points. He specifically looked at the small symbol for the 'Mascot Plaza' area that showed he had beaten the boss, but it was unchanged from last time. Instead of going straight to the counter, though, Ryan put the card back inside the chest and placed that certificate inside together with it. He wanted to check on exactly what kind of changes the certificate itself would cause.
When he opened the chest again, the certificate was gone, and the card had only two differences. First, the certificate was worth a whopping 250 points. And second, the symbol that was unchanged just a moment ago, signifying the mascot plaza, was now 'holographic', showing a rainbow sheen when held at an angle.
Would there be a change if he 'perfectly completed' all of the zones in the dungeon?
"Well, whatever," Ryan walked up to the counter and rang the bell. The clown quickly jumped up from behind the counter, and Ryan shook his hand to reveal the spirits' items.
Two new were being displayed.
Jester - Random Mask Voucher - 150 Points
Jester - Random Suit Voucher - 200 Points
"A mask and a suit, huh?" Ryan muttered, quickly buying one of each to start out with. He would see what they would give later, but for now, he had to see what else he could buy. Maybe he should buy one more of each of these for Jester to bring him closer to the others... He also levelled up a ton today, so it was worth it to invest in him a bit.
But as Ryan's eyes wandered over the shelf. He had overlooked it amongst all the vouchers, but there was actually one more thing that was added.
Special Reward Voucher - 500 Points
Despite the cost, Ryan didn't have to think long about it. This could be a pretty useful reward. He got the voucher and the golden card was given to him. With a curious smile, he ripped the card, wondering what it could be.
A small stone landed in his hand. It looked familiar, and instantly, the hairs on Ryan's entire body stood on end as he realized what this was, and a message appeared in front of his eyes.
[You have found a Fragment of Violette (3/5)]
Check out the Patreon! Read up to 15 Chapters ahead!
Join the Discord!