"Thank you," The archer said, her gaze sincere as she looked at Nael. "I'm Kira. The one trying not to die is Loran. Our healer is Lyra, and our spearman is Jax." She gestured to each of her companions in turn. "We owe you our lives."
Nael nodded, accepting the gratitude with a quiet demeanor. "The name's Nael. You're welcome." He glanced back toward the deeper tunnels. "What happened? Why did you engage a mini-boss like that?"
Kira gritted her teeth, a flash of frustration and shame crossing her face. "We weren't trying to. We were scouting the entrance to a deeper sector, thinking we could handle the regular Cave Weavers and speed up our leveling. But the monster was lying in wait, camouflaged against the ceiling. It ambushed us the moment we stepped into its territory. It took Loran down first with its bite. Jax got webbed trying to pull him back... and everything fell apart."
Nael could easily notice her trembling at the memory.
"We... We never stood a chance. And if you hadn't come..." She trailed off, not needing to finish the sentence.
"You can take all the loot for yourself. We don't deserve a share."
Nael considered it for a moment while appreciating her thoughtfulness.
'Hmm...' His backpack was already feeling significantly heavier with the Patriarch's loot. He recalled the strain on his shoulders during their hurried escape.
"No," he said, his decision practical. "I'll only take the Vial of Paralytic Venom and the eye. My pack is already full, and I can't carry the rest. Your party should take it. Sell it and use the credits to cover your healing costs."
His tone might have sounded generous, but it was the most logical.
Deadweight served no one.
He then looked at each of them, his expression serious. "My advice is to leave the dungeon for today. Your party is in no condition to continue. Loran needs proper healing, Jax can barely walk, and Lyra is... You get what I mean. Pushing further would be a death wish."
Kira looked at her injured friends, the fight finally draining from her to be replaced by weary acceptance. "You're right," she sighed, her shoulders slumping. "We got ahead of ourselves. We'll retreat for today."
Nael gave a single, curt nod.
"Good." Internally, he was relieved.
'Thank goodness she understood.'
He didn't have the capacity or the desire to babysit a crippled party any deeper into the dungeon. His own solo delve had been interrupted enough.
However, the outcome was big, and this was another good opportunity to sort out his rewards and level up.
"I am gonna level up too," He said to Kira as he closed his eyes. "Wake me up if anything happens."
"Ok," Kira nodded, increasing her vigilance.
'...She's a good person.' Nael thought as he fully closed his eyes and focused on his core.
Right now, he had 380 Essence, enough to reach level 3.
'Let's advance to level 2 first.'
Nael closed his eyes, shutting out the dim tunnel and the injured party. He focused inward, on the massive swirling pool of Raw Essence. The first step was to convert just enough to push him over the threshold.
The process was familiar now, though no less demanding. He concentrated, applying mental pressure to the volatile energy. Two minutes later, he felt a distinct shift as the first 20 Essence stabilized into refined power.
[ Refined Essence: 100/100 ]
[ Level Up Available! ]
Without hesitation, Nael willed the advancement.
A warm, strengthening wave flowed through him, slightly easing the deep ache in his muscles from the fight and the lingering mental fatigue. His senses sharpened a fraction, and he felt a faint expansion within his core. It was a subtle but undeniable increase in power.
[ Ding! ]
[...]
He acknowledged the system messages that followed, likely stat increases and a notification of his new level, but dismissed them without reading. There would be time for that later.
He had a more important task to focus on: refining the enormous 250 Essence needed for the next level.
'Hmm...'
Taking another deep breath, he plunged back into a deep, focused meditation, determined to process the entire windfall while he had this rare moment of relative safety.
"..."
On the outside, Kira watched the strange boy, her bow held loosely but ready.
He... He was an odd one.
His eyes, now closed, were an intense hazel that had held a startling calm even when he was hurling a flaming bottle at a giant spider.
His face was sharp and lean with a strong, angular jawline that seemed clenched even in rest. His dark brown hair was tousled from the fight and the hurried escape, giving him a slightly wild look that contrasted with his methodical actions.
'...But he looks... kind of handsome?' Kira thought as she kept staring at him. Then her eyes widened and she shook her head. But she still couldn't stop herself from thinking about him.
'...'
He'd appeared out of nowhere, taken command of a hopeless situation without a hint of panic, saved them with cleverness instead of brute force, refused most of the loot, given sound advice, and now was leveling up as calmly as if he were sitting in his own room.
He was unlike any Common-class Awakened she'd ever met.
There was a quiet, formidable competence to him that was both reassuring and deeply mysterious.
'...Just who is this guy?'
The thought circled in Kira's mind as she kept watch. He seemed familiar, but she couldn't quite place him amidst the adrenaline and panic of the last hour.
Then it clicked.
She had seen him at the Awakening Ceremony. He was the one with that strange, unheard-of class... Was it Inventor, no, no! Right! It was the [Investor].
She remembered the muted, almost pitying reaction from the crowd. She herself had felt a twinge of sympathy for the boy who'd gotten such a seemingly useless classification.
She never, in a thousand years, would have expected to be rescued by that same young man. The one she hadn't even given a second thought to after the ceremony concluded. He should have been irrelevant, a footnote, just another Common-class struggler.
Yet here he was, having just orchestrated the defeat of a mini-boss that had decimated her own, theoretically stronger, party. He hadn't done it with overwhelming power, but with sharp observation, quick thinking, and a willingness to risk his own resources.
The disconnect between her memory of the pitied graduate and the capable, decisive young man meditating in front of her was staggering. The class everyone had dismissed as a joke had just been the key to their survival. The irony was not lost on her.
Her gaze lingered on his focused face, the initial flicker of pity from the ceremony now completely replaced by a deep, burgeoning curiosity.
'Who was Nael, really? And what did an Investor actually do?'