[To level up, consume monsters' body and drink human blood]
"What?! Yuck. I ain't doing that," Max reacted irrevocably to the vile levelling requirements.
"Eat monsters. Drink blood. I'll figure out how to level up a different way then," he resolved.
He looked around the empty cave and sighted the cores scattered all over the ground.
"But before that–", Max said transferring all the cores into his storage space.
Cores of such low ranks were hardly considered of any individual value, but with a thousand of them and plus an extra one, something cogent could be put together.
Perhaps, a weapon but far from the formidable variety. Let's say a silver sword or brass spear at best.
Max looked at his comm.
"An hour already," he commented after seeing how much time he had spent locked up.
"Better make up for the lost time," he said racing out of the cave and further into the dungeon.
At the end of the tunneled path was a cliff and beyond that he could hear noises.
He drew closer, noting that it was coming from below the cliff.
He gently slid down the sides of the towering rock mass and cautiously approached the band of beings causing a ruckus.
Just as he was about to get a closer view into the valley of monsters ahead, he felt an arm over his shoulder from behind.
Instinctively, he jolted in reflex but it wasn't an enemy before him but an old friend, Leo.
"Max. You are okay," Leo said with a sly smirk on his face aware that he starrled him a bit.
"Oh, it's just you," he whispered in relief. "Ya. You are okay too, right?"
"Ya, I think so."
"Chris. Have you seen him since you got here?"
"Nope but I sure wish so cause he's so awesome. So brave and powerful. I could only dream to compare to his might. Meanwhile, I'm a big fat loser who always got my head in my books and experiments and enjoy using fancy vocabularies and expressions."
"Are you okay?", Max asked weighing which was more dominating, confusion or concern.
"Couldn't be any better but Chris is way beyond better but without a doubt, the best."
He didn't quite know how to place his reaction, unsure of why serene, coordinated, nerdy Leo was yapping with such selinity and more importantly why Chris was the centre of praise in his conversation.
"....Okay. You sure?", he threw at him again.
He reassured but this time with some kind of contorted bloated expression on his face, like his face was about to burst. "Ofcourse I am."
"Not," a recognizable voice spoke up from the background. "Of course not," he re-stated.
As the figure approached, Max became even more at bay as to what was happening.
The figures before him were exactly alike. Leo and Leo were both standing right in front of him, further leaving Max in the dark.
Suddenly, the first Leo could hold it anymore. He dropped the contorted face and burst out loudly letting his suppressed laughter loose. "Hahaha!!!"
A faint light glistered all over him, morphing Leo-one into their familiar jokestar, Chris.
Without explanation, Max instantly understood what had just played out.
"Got you good. Didn't I?", Chris said and kept on chortling before explaining his little prank.
"Allow me to reintroduce myself to y'all. Introducing, the master of all touched forms, transcended illusionist and emperor of deception. Give it up for Chris Robins. At your service," he MC-ed as if being called out for a wrestling match accompanying his intro with the classic old drum roll.
"Ha ha. Very funny," Leo commended unenthusiastically, hanging an impressed smile on his face. "I'm guessing, Magic then," he threw a guess in statement form.
"Right as always. Nerd."
"Ya ya. Too bad. Mine is way cooler," he said with an easily explainable pause in his statement.
"Aren't you tell us?", Chris spoke.
"Nah. I'm waiting for someone other than the nerd to take a guess. Can't? Okay. My concepts are Science and Technology. Exactly what I wanted."
"Boo!! Boo!! Boring," Chris rained. "Something else."
Leo rolled his eyes and ignored Chris refusing to go into their occasional arguments.
"What did you get Max?," he asked, redirecting the attention of the conversation."
"Let me see. Hmmm, it's a secret."
"What!! Not an option, try again," Chris playfully retorted.
"Okay. Okay. Just messing around. But honestly, what could be better than a Flash God class and speed that makes light eat its dust," Max lied.
Letting others know about his null class and his Null zone reaction was a one way ticket to defeat, even if it were his closest friends.
"And you were just gonna hold this up on us," Chris reacted dazzled.
"That nice. Hey, do you wanna meet the others," Leo requested. "Over there," he directed Max towatds the region he heard some noises before.
"Chillax, it's just a mirage dome. Courtesy of yours truly," he praised himself.
Within the dome were numerous mages concealed but not protected. The majority of them expectedly bore cruddy skills and lower energy levels.
Some were even injured, but they were lucky enough to have someone who awoke a healer class among them.
It only made sense for them to form a group as numbers were their only chance against high rank beasts but Max wasn't interested in being part of a team.
It meant divided loot and even though he didn't need cores he still dreaded being part of a team.
"We're hiding out here for now till everyone's up and running and because of some clan at the edge of the valley. I wonder what they are doing in a dungeon but they sure don't look friendly. Could be monster hunters, most likely but better safe than sorry. Am I right?"
A young black haired guy with a bolstering figure approached Max. His name was Nev. A bully.
"Hey Max. I heard your skill is running away super duper fast. Like the coward you were born to be, this only proves it the more."
Max wasn't ready for this now. He didn't have Nev's time and decide to ignore Nev in total. Mostly because his attention was caught in what Chris explained about there being a monster hunting clan not too far away.
He slipped away and wanted to have a bit fun 'exploring' the clan and stealing some cores.