Leveling Up

"Those resistances should fade away with time, and diseases can be cured with healing magic or medicine. Your stats aren't 0. You'd be dead if that was the case. They are too close to 0 they get rounded down to it. All you need for now is to eat and heal up for several weeks." Liam smiled as he gave her the guild card back. "I'll take a quest and you take care of the house." He turned toward Selena. "I'd like to take two quests. I'll finish them one after another."

"What are you looking for?" Selena started pulling papers.

"Quests that pay a lot or scale well."

"Can you help restrain a bull? They want to castrate it and it's getting violent in the western farms. They'll pay five gold coins." She pushed a quest paper toward him.

"No, I don't have any restraining skills. And isn't that a B-rank quest?" He glared at her.

"Clearing a goblin's nest unharmed and saving everyone inside is a feat only achieved by B-rank adventurers before." She looked at him with a smile.

"I don't want to push my luck." He stared at her, "Give me a G or an F rank quest."

"Then how about his? The southern potion shop is buying slime cores in bulk. They'll pay ten copper coins for a medium-sized core, you can submit as much as you want." She gave him an F-rank quest.

"Slimes? You must be joking; I don't want to waste my weapons. They are expensive. Their acid is quite hard to deal with and killing them while keeping the core intact requires magic." He pushed the quest back to her.

"What kind of quests do you want?" She asked again, "Anything that makes money has to be dangerous to some extent."

"Just take something safe. It doesn't need to earn a lot of money." Alice stared at him with a worried face. Most adventurers die young seeking wealth, especially the talented ones.

Liam smiled, "Got it, we'll take it slow for the time being." He picked a simple herb collecting quest hoping to hunt some stray monsters for extra cash. He then escorted Alice back home and went to finish the quest.

Time quickly flew by, days pushing days and weeks pushing weeks. A month had passed and a lot changed. Liam has been focusing only on taking quests for money, but he spent most of it on Alice's treatments and the house's repairs.

By focusing on physical training each day with Alice, Liam's body has started to slowly change into a lean and tuned structure so did her as she began to recover. He was a tall man standing at almost 6'2 feet tall with short spiky black hair pointing backward, and two coal black eyes with a tiny faint red light burning in them, the spark of destruction tuned to his power.

Just like Liam, Alice stood around 6 feet with a thin build and a medium chest, long black hair tied into a ponytail, and blue eyes that glow in the dark. By going to a wizard, Alice managed to change her name from Alva Ashborn to Alice Ashborn. She didn't really care about the family name, but her given one that was given to her by her dead mother, and she didn't want to change it.

****

Name: Alice Ashborn.

Race: Human.

Soul Record: Clear.

Level: 12

Strength: 13

Speed: 17

Mana: 20

Special Ability: [Bugendai Sozo: Level 14]

[Sword Arts: Level 9]

[Dagger Arts: Level 5]

[Martial Arts: Level 15]

[Hawk Eyes: Level 16]

[Barrier Magic: Level 13]

[Physical Enchantment: Level 15]

[Magic Enchantment: Level 16]

[Self-Regeneration: Level 19]

****

Name: Liam Leonard.

Race: Human.

Soul Record: Black.

Level: 19

Strength: 31

Speed: 32

Mana: 25

Special ability: [Hakai: Level 16]

[Dodge: Level 18]

[Sharpening: Level 21]

[Halberd Arts: Level 19]

[Scimitar Arts: Level 17]

[Horse Training: Level 9]

[Sneak: Level 12]

[Dagger Arts: Level 15]

[Spear Arts: Level 16]

[Fire Magic: Level 9]

[Wind Magic: Level 9]

[Disaster Infusion: Level 7]

[Martial Arts: Level 16]

[Self-Regeneration: 18]

*****

Liam has started wearing a black leather jacket and pants filled with belts so he stores his weapons, potions, and ropes to use when the need calls. And unlike him, Alice has opted for an almost skin-tight martial set of clothes and a large and white baggy coat and a robe to cover herself when not fighting. She only carried a long sword and the dagger he bought her at the start on her waist.

"Congratulations, both of you have reached C-rank and your cards are ready." She handed them both of their cards after they had the C letter engraved into them.

"We did it, Liam." Alice said with a smile, patting his back.

"Yeah, we both leveled a lot." Liam replied. It's time I go seek the skill [Disguise], the dungeon will be open next week.

"Should we take a break?" Alice looked at him.

"I don't know about that. There is something I want to take care of first." He hides his guild card.

"You two seem to really work well together." Selena stared at them with a grin. "How are your stats? Are they high?"

"I don't know. I didn't look at her but mine are decent." He replied with a smile.

"Mine as well. You believe how strong I got." Alice started at him with a grin, puffing her chest.

"Honestly, with how close you two are, I expected you to be looking at each other stats every day." Selena stared at them with a smug face.

"We aren't that close." Liam stared at her, "I want to see you naked. Can you show me?"

"Hell no!" Selena gasped.

"See? Stats are the same." Liam looked at Alice and she nodded.

"I did show him once when we first met, but that was like a medical inspection. I'll never do it again." She added. I do not want anyone to see the [Bugendai Sozo] Skill; I don't know if the heroes get reborn or something, but there is a reason why I came to this body. I can't risk anyone knowing who I am until I figure everything out.

Liam was thinking the same as her, but as he was the one that transmigrated himself. He wanted to keep his identity hidden until he felt it was time. That's the whole reason he's going to look for [Disguise]

Liam turned toward Selena, "I want a favor from you."

"What is it?"

"The Demonic Shrine Dungeon that'll open next week, I want to be on the expedition to explore and clear it." He said with a stern face.

"That's a B-rank dungeon with an A-rank boss! I can put you on the rear support team, but that's still dangerous. C-rank adventurers' death rates in that dungeon are always above 90%." She gasped.

"I still want to go. There are some materials that show up there that I want. I have to go no matter what." Liam insisted. That dungeon has a huge trick up its sleeve, it wants people to clear it, that is why it shows over and over again, and to hide its true intention, the boss uses [Disguise] to give everyone a false idea about its monsters.

Alice looked at him, she also knew of the dungeon's tricks. "I'll go with you. Whatever you want there, you'll die alone."

"It's too dangerous for you. You don't know what you're talking about." He glared at her.

"Those are my words. You're the one who doesn't know what he's dealing with. I'll go as well." She growled.

"Fine, but you'll get an earful if I had to save you there." He smiled.

"I'll do whatever you want if that happens." She replied with a grin.

"Then it's the same for me. Show me what you know." Liam giggled as he stared at Selena. "Get us both on the expedition."

"Just don't die. You've been getting us a lot of money by doing small quests; even I got a raise for catching you two." She sighed, giving them the quest's paper.