Chapter 159: More
Getting up and stretching, Lake looked around and remembered where he was. He then got up and put all his armor on and walked out into the hallway. Finding the door he was pretty sure would lead out into the lobby, Lake went through it and went to find the clerk he had been working with yesterday.
He didn't have to say anything to him because as soon as their eyes met the clerk came up to him and said. "Are you having a hard time sleeping?" Lake understood the man thought he had yet to sleep because it had only been a few hours so he said. "I've rested."
"Well it will probably be another two hours before we are done processing everything you sold to us so feel free to leave and come back if you would like. I'm sure you have stuff you need to do in town."
"I was actually planning on taking another mission." Lake had a limited amount of time to make money so he wanted to do as much as possible. "In that case your gold will be waiting for you when you get back."
"Would you mind taking this as well?" Lake had the money from the fortress in his bag still so he needed to make some space if he planned to use it today. It was full to the brim so he would have a hard time getting anything out of it without stopping to do so. After he had handed all the money in his bag to the clerk, Lake lined up behind the few that were actually here this late to get his next mission.
There hadn't been any new missions posted that were worth a lot so Lake just planned to take the highest paying mission which was a 190 mission that paid 33,600. Like the last two it was more bandits but there were less and each was slightly weaker than the ones from the fortress he had just cleared out.
That was fine he had other stuff he could do today if he ran out of missions that were worth doing. He still wanted to unlock Bandit today before he went back to the guild but that needed some luck so he couldn't just head out and do it. He would need a cart to come by and it seemed most of them were avoiding this area because of all the bandits.
That being said there were still some so he might get lucky today and come across one. Once it was his turn at the counter, Lake pointed to the mission he wanted and the clerk handed him a map to where the bandits were.
Find and kill the Nomadic Bandits near Qwenton.
Difficulty 190
1,400 Per head
Estimated number of bandits 24
The fact these guys didn't have a set base meant he would probably find them while he looked for carts to rob since they would be doing the same thing but first he needed to get to Qwenton village. The map said it was far but Lake was too fast to worry about that.
...
The sun was starting to rise as Lake arrived at the village. Looking around Lake found it to be very similar to corn town but there was no one here. He wasn't that surprised because he knew the Temple of Light had evacuated all the small villages like this one because they were unable to protect the citizens from the Demon Worshipers.
It felt a little spooky to be walking around the empty village so Lake looked at the map where all the surrounding roads were drawn and started to head out of the village. These roads were where the bandits had been spotted so if he did a few loops he was sure he would see something that would lead him to them.
...
After the first pass through he hadn't seen anything obvious but he was sure they were close. He guessed there was a chance they had moved on since they were called the nomadic bandits but the newest information on them was from just a few days ago. Since he had already checked the roads Lake guessed he might as well start checking the woods and fields that were around the roads.
They had spent a good amount of time here so he was pretty sure he would find where they had been sleeping if he spent enough time looking.
...
He did find signs of life in the form of old fires where they had probably stopped to cook food but nothing that said they had spent a lot of time there. Lake found it a little odd that there didn't seem to be any signs of them sleeping and he figured they must be using hammocks or something to sleep in the trees.
After he had thought that he had started to check in the trees that were around him and after a while he started to find a few signs he was right. It was just things like where someone had grabbed onto a tree branch with a bloody hand but it was still something.
That being said, with them not leaving obvious tracks he could follow the only way he was going to find them was if he stumbled into them so he might as well stop looking for tracks and just move through the woods as quickly as possible to cover more ground.
...
After a while he found something that told him he was close, a recently put out fire, and it made him think he knew where to find them. If they had just left they had probably done it to get to work which would mean they should be by a road. He didn't know exactly where he was but these patches of forest between the roads were not that big so he should be able to see the edge of the forest from the top of a tree.
Once he got back onto the road he would be able to tell where he was on the map because he had already been on it once. Lake quickly jumped to the top of a tree and held on just long enough to see which direction he should go. Running towards the road he had seen Lake turned on Mana Vision and just like he expected he saw people standing in the woods on either side of the road.
He was happy to find them like this and not when they were just in the woods because if they knew what they were doing and there was a cart coming through here soon he could take over for them once they were dead. He started to think what he would do if the cart showed up during the battle but he quickly remembered that he could kill them all in less than a minute.
Not wanting to waste any time Lake activated Mute and appeared behind the closest bandit and jabbed his hand into their chest. Knowing he had dealt a fatal wound he went towards the next Bandit only for his attack to get interupted. The Sight had kicked in after his first attack and it had made him aware enough to notice a small blur coming towards him.
As he dodged it Lake saw that it was an arrow that had been aimed at him by someone on the other side of the road. Looking to where it had come from, Lake saw someone on the other side of the road with a bow and he could see their arms moving. They were slow but the fact they were even fast enough to counter attack in the short amount of time he had stood still to attack was impressive.
It meant they probably had maxed Agility and Perception or they had been lucky enough to get some really good skills that let them perform above what should be possible for a normal person. Sadly for them it wouldn't be enough because he didn't have to stand still to attack. Rushing straight at them, Lake watched as they slowly knocked an arrow and pulled back the bow string to fire.
It seemed he had been right about them having maxed agility because it seemed they were moving about half of his speed but the arrow they were going to fire would be faster than him like the last one. They wouldn't be able to get the bow aimed at him though. Circling around them Lake started to close the distance and was about to slice into their neck when he saw it.
Three more people who were moving around half his speed. When Lake saw this he couldn't help but think the scouts hadn't done a very good job but that made sense with how hard it had been to find these guys, and people as strong as these four would be able to stay hidden even if the other bandits had been found.
He wouldn't be surprised if these four hadn't been accounted for in the original estimate that had been on the mission board. He didn't have the time to check now though, with four of them attacking him he could get hit even with how slow they all were. He was just happy not all of them were using bows.
He didn't think he would be able to close the distance without opening himself up to an attack if he was being shot at from four different angles. That being said this gave him the opportunity to use a skill he had been wanting to use since he had seen it.
Barrier (G) Lv.1
Create a shield from your mana that scales off of your Dexterity.
Cost: 10 mana
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