Leveling Up through Eating

Minhyuk was taken aback when he saw the reaction of his two friends. Khan immediately came back to his senses as he directed what they would do next.

“We’ve easily broken through one difficult area. Let’s hurry along!”

They hurriedly moved while Minhyuk analyzed their dungeon plan.

‘Looking at the power of Deep (Burst) it seems like I can take on more monsters. So if I started to use Gryphon’s Cry from 500-m away from this point then the monsters will definitely come running and the area will be crowded with them. If I did it that way then I think we can break through this area faster, right?’

Minhyuk had asked his friends for ingredients so he believed that he had to help them achieve the maximum effect to the best of his abilities.

Meanwhile, the area suddenly felt hot as steam and flames suddenly sprung up.

“This is also one of the hardest areas. The Lava River.”

Shwaaaa!

They could see a river of lava in front of them that was releasing an endless amount of hot steam.

“Black Swan was not able to break through the 30 minute mark because of this area.”

“Then, what are we going to do?”

“The only thing that we can do is drink a cooling potion or use ice magic.”

Then, Khan and Locke started throwing the cooling potion in front of them one by one.

Clang━

Fwiiiiiiish!

Clang━

Fwiiiiiiish!

They constantly threw cooling potions in the piping hot lava in front of them! As a result, steam also rose constantly.

“If we throw the cooling potions non-stop then it will be able to freeze an area where we can step on. This way we can move on……”

“Isn’t that too inefficient?”

Locke and Khan nodded their heads in agreement when they heard Minhyuk’s question.

‘Minhyukie, he…… He’s definitely not just someone who only knows how to eat……’

Although he was obsessed with food, Minhyuk still knew how to analyze his surroundings and find the best way for him to solve his problems.

“But we don’t have any magic. Of course the cooling potion is also expensive at 1 platinum each but we have no other choice.”

“Hmm……”

Minhyuk rubbed his chin in thought. He pondered for a moment before reaching out behind him. His eyes were sparkling as if he had finally conceived a brilliant idea. His hand slowly gripped the handle of his frying pan…

“……Why’s that?”

“Look closely. See what this hyung’s going to do.”

Minhyuk approached the lava as he enlarged his frying pan.

[Frying Pan Gigantification.]

[You can adjust the size of your frying pan depending on the mana that you will input.]

He made the frying pan so large that it looked like it was a ship. Then…… He placed it on top of the lava.

Fwiiiiish!

Steam was quickly released as soon as the bottom of the frying pan met with the gurgling lava. However, the durability of the frying pan was endless and it would reset again in 24 hours. In addition, Minhyuk’s frying pan was sturdier and harder than regular frying pans.

Then, he threw a cooling potion inside the frying pan.

Crack, crack!

Frost quickly formed on top of the frying pan. After seeing that his plan was working well, Minhyuk climbed on top of the frying pan.

“Oppa got a car, so I’m picking you up~ Kids, get in!”

“……”

“……”

Khan and Locke speechlessly climbed on top of the frying pan.

Then, Minhyuk handed a rope to Kongie, who he had summoned earlier. Kongie flew up until he reached a height that was high enough that the heat of the lava would not affect him. He quickly went to the other side of the river and tied the rope to a sturdy rock. Khan, Locke and Minhyuk were finally able to arrive safely on the other side by pulling on the rope that Kongie had tied.

“We’ve already…… shortened our time by 13 minutes……”

Khan mumbled to himself as if he couldn’t believe the fact that they had easily shortened the time by that much. Time Attack Dungeon challengers could check their progress real-time just by looking at the top left corner of their vision.

Currently, they had already entered the dungeon for only 34 minutes. And it was even during the time where Minhyuk was still trying to adapt and understand the dungeon.

Not long after, they had reached the final boss’ room. The room where the Dullahan King was located.

Bang!

As usual, the huge Dullahan King that was three times larger than the regular Dullahan had dropped from the sky in front of them.

Bang!

[Apologize with your death, foolish humans!]

Powerful sword lights flew from all directions as the Dullahan King swung his sword strongly.

Minhyuk quickly dodged the incoming swords.

‘I heard that the Dullahan King has a higher and more ridiculous level of defense compared to its attack so that’s why they were having a hard time with him. And there’s also that sword.’

Minhyuk’s eyes narrowed as he looked at the greatsword that the Dullahan King was wielding. Generally, it would be hard for anyone to swing such a huge greatsword easily if they did not have the Greatsword Mastery Passive Skill that Minhyuk had.

‘Right. I should try that.’

He still had a skill that he hasn’t tried yet as of now. And that was Splitting Sword, Rain (Soar).

Dash!

Minhyuk followed closely behind Khan.

“That’s right. You should stay behind me! Haa!”

Khan’s fists were glowing white as he punched the Dullahan King’s body.

Punch, punch, punch, punch, punch, punch!

But because of the high defensive power of the Dullahan King, his attacks looked like it did not have that much of an effect. Locke also tried to attack him with his axe. However, just like what they had expected, there was not that much damage on the Dullahan King.

At that moment, the scarlet ash floated around Minhyuk’s body again. Then, they slowly gathered and went inside Minhyuk’s sword. 

Right now, he had a x2 increase of attack power against undead monsters. In addition, he also had a monstrously high stat compared to users of the same level. His current level was at 290 but in reality his strength was comparable to Khan’s strength. Since he would be using Rain (Soar), there would be an additional 110% attack power on his strike. And he also had Barraca’s Greatsword that had at least 700 attack power in addition to Kongie’s Pet Summon buff.

Minhyuk stayed behind Khan as he unleashed Rain (Soar).

Shwaaaaaaaaaaaak!

Wind gathered around his sword as he slashed towards the Dullahan King.

A scarlet sword light that resembled a half-moon flew at a fast pace towards the Dullahan King. Minhyuk had already pinpointed the area where his sword would strike the Dullahan King.

“……Wow. Isn’t that so cool?”

“OMG……”

The bright red sword stopped Khan and Locke in their tracks. And at that exact same moment,  the Dullahan King’s wrist that was holding a greatsword was cut off cleanly by the red sword. Khan and Locke were both dumbfounded, no matter how much they tried they couldn’t even deal a lot of damage on it but the sword cleanly cut off its wrist.

Slash!

And it did not end there. After cleanly cutting off the wrist, the sword light moved as it rampaged all over the body of the Dullahan King.

Clang!

The next moment, the greatsword with the intact hand and wrist of the Dullahan King fell down as black blood spurted out of its chest.

[Keuaaaaaack! I won’t let you go!]

The Dullahan King screeched in pain as a black energy exploded out from its body.

[The Dullahan King’s Wrath.]

[Dullahan’s have been summoned.]

Keedidididik━

Keedidididik━

The summoned Dullahans slowly climbed up from the ground.

Khan and Locke were left speechless at this turn of events. Was it because of Minhyuk’s skills or was it the power and strength of his sword that he was able to cut off something that they could not easily cut off? It was something that they could not understand at all.

Then, Minhyuk looked at their dazed expressions. He shook his head helplessly and took command of the attack. He quickly shouted at them…

“Move, now!”

The three of them rushed straight towards the Dullahan King.

***

Plenty of users were commenting about the Time Attack Dungeon on Athenae’s Official Homepage.

[bxk31: Honestly, there are a lot of people who are saying that our country is a mess these days. But isn’t this too much of a difference?]

[Coyote: Agree, agree. The difference is too big. Once the servers in the world are integrated will we go down?]

[DamnLegend!: Legend Guild is nothing.]

[Ord: ……? Upstairs, what do you mean by Legend Guild is nothing? Currently, the large domestic guilds are joining hands together as they send their top rankers to make a 3-party team and challenge the dungeons but they are still in the 30th rank. But Legend Guild which is currently at 14th place is already doing well enough. After all, they’re doing it on their own.]

[LidManse!: So what? It’s still 14th place.]

[Ord: ……I concede.]

Right now, the key figures of Athenae as well as all of the team leaders were gathered together in a single meeting room.

President Kang Taehoon sighed as he looked at the comments made by the users in the official homepage. Everyone remained silent because they knew the meaning of that sigh.

“I don’t feel like working today.”

He said wryly as he looked at everyone in the meeting room.

Athenae was a virtual reality game that was created in South Korea. However, the users of South Korea were struggling. And the best of the best was only at 14th place.

His words expressed his bitter feelings about this outcome.

“It’s not too long before the Athenae Olympics too……”

Athenae Olympics was an event which the whole world would participate in. The people of the company behind Athenae had created it with all their hearts and soul. It was literally like an Olympics. After all, Athenae was no longer just a game. If their rankers won gold medals then, they would definitely cheer and shed hot tears of joy. However, the outcome of this dungeon had made them question whether Korea would still be able to win at least one gold medal.

Then, at that moment……

“Huh…… Huuuuh……? W, what’s this?”

It was the voice of the Customer Center’s Team Leader. He was currently checking the current rankings of the Time Attack Dungeon when he noticed something.

“Team Leader Lee.”

Team Leader Park Minggyu spoke coldly towards him. The serious and solemn atmosphere had been broken by Lee because he was looking at his mobile phone. However, Team Leader Lee took no heed of the frost in his voice as he shakily stood up from his seat.

“Th, this. Pre, President-nim!”

“……?”

Kang Taehoon looked at him suspiciously. He was not acting like his usual self and was shaking wildly.

“P, please check the rankings now!”

“……?”

Kang Taehoon tilted his head in confusion. His words during the meeting were already very uncomfortable for everyone in this room. It was not that much of a big deal anyway so he just smiled bitterly as he took his phone out to check the current ranking of the Time Attack Dungeon.

“……!”

President Kang Taehoon pulled his mobile phone closely towards his face once more. He couldn’t believe what he had just seen. He was too shocked that he couldn’t help but jump to his feet. At the exact same moment, gasps of shock rang loudly in the meeting room.

Team Leader Park Minggyu also checked his mobile phone with a bit of trepidation.

[America’s Black Swan Team: 43 minutes 38 seconds. Rank: 1st.]

[South Korea’s Legend Team: 47 minutes 24 seconds. Rank: 2nd.]

“C, crazy……!”

Even he couldn’t believe the rankings on his mobile phone. Just a few moments had passed ever since they saw the Legend Team staying firmly on the 14th place because they couldn’t go past the one hour threshold. However, right now, Legend Team climbed so suddenly to 2nd place and was still chasing for the top spot.

“Th, the comments are going crazy!”

And along with those words, they could hear a loud commotion from the outside.

“Waaaaaaaaaah!”

“Legend, let’s gooooo!”

“Pull yourself together! Super powers!”

They heard voices of the regular employees outside loud and clear.

Kang Taehoon’s face twitched as he struggled to maintain his aloofness. But deep inside, he could feel something hot bursting from his chest. If it weren’t for his position, he would also want to scream as loud as them. He closed his eyes for a moment to calm his heart but he still couldn’t stop  his mouth from twitching in joy.

It’s not over yet. South Korea can still be the game powerhouse.

“Turn on the screen.”

“Yes!”

The people in the meeting room moved quickly to set up the monitor. As soon as they turned it on, they could see that they were only starting their second attack.

“……They changed it.”

Kang Taehoon caught what Team Leader Park murmured to himself.

“What is it?”

“The member. They took Genie out and put User Minhyuk in.”

“The Food God?”

“Yes.”

“Just with the addition of one Food God, their strength changed that much?”

“Let me open his status window for you.”

All of the team leaders present couldn’t help but turn speechless when they saw the status window on the screen.

“H, his strength and his level looks ridiculously monstrous.”

“OMG. What kind of Holy Power and Dexterity is that……”

Everyone was once again left speechless. 

Then, Department Head Kim Dae-il suddenly spoke.

“Isn’t this a complete balance breaker? Isn’t this enough for other users to complain? Even if his class is a God class isn’t this still too much?”

“……”

The others nodded their heads when they heard his words except for Team Leader Park. Team Leader Park was the only one who shook his head.

“The Food God is not a balance breaker.”

Team Leader Park contradicted him confidently as he stood up from his seat. The scene in the monitor showed Minhyuk using Gryphon’s Cry as he dragged the aggro of the mob monsters and killed them all at once.

“That’s not a balance breaker?”

However, Team Leader Park’s expression still remained the same.

“Food God is a non-combatant job class.”

“That’s right. That’s why it’s so weird. He’s a non-combatant, but he’s that strong?”

“Yes. That’s right. He is ridiculously strong. But before we go to that part let me ask you. Does he currently have an ‘Attack Skill’ related to the Food God Class?”

“……Huh, there’s none?”

The people all around him looked around for the answer but it was President Kang Taehoon who answered.

“There’s none.”

“……”

“However, please look at this. Generally, stats for people around Lv300 are usually only at 400. But User Minhyuk broke through that by eating a lot of medicine, training a lot and clearing quests. That’s why he is much stronger than what we had expected. Are you telling me that this is a balance breaker? Anyone who eats medicines like he was eating a normal meal would be as strong as that.”

“……”

Department Head Kim Dae-il was left speechless.

The strength of this user was gained through his own perseverance and power and not through his job class’ special privilege.

And Team Leader Park also added……

“If you look closely at him, you can also see that all of his artifacts are incredible. He has Barraca’s Greatsword, Armor of Immortality and the Legendary Frying Pan. And his attack skill is also Ellie’s Swordsmanship. Do you still think that this is a special privilege of the Food God job class?”

“……No.”

Team Leader Park nodded his head.

“That’s right. Balance breaker? This is not a planned balance breaker. This is all thanks to the user’s perseverance. We don’t call this a balance breaker. Isn’t that what you used to say?”

Team Leader Park took a deep breath as he looked around and said.

“That user is really cool.”

***

TL’s corner!

I can feel that Team Leader Park has switched to his doting father mode. Yayy! Go Team Leader Park, defend our Minhyukie!

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