Chương 28: Completing Quests

Damion hit the ground hard from Ethan shoving him down. Immediately, Damion tried to get up, managing to get halfway to his knees when Ethan shoved him down again. This time, as he was on his way down, Damion saw a swift blur swoop down and snatch a Fire Scorpion corpse from the pile before streaking off towards the Benault Forest.

"What the hell was that," Damion asked as Ethan finally let him up.

"Not sure, I didn't get a good look, maybe a Snow Hawk," Ethan replied.

"Why do you think it was a Snow Hawk if you didn't get a good look?"

"They like to eat Fire Scorpions," Ethan answered with a shrug.

"Will it come back?"

"Depends on how hungry it is I suppose."

"Should we bury the Fire Scorpion corpses or leave them for the bird?"

"Bury them," Ethan answered.

"We don't want the Snow Hawk, or whatever it was, to start thinking this is a good place to find a free meal." Damion resumed pushing the Fire Scorpion corpses with the shovel Ethan had borrowed from Mr. Galen into the large hole they had dug. Once all the monster corpses were in the hole he began to fill in the hole.

"Did we kill enough of the Fire Scorpions for Mr. Galen to be able to recover his farm?"

"Not even close."

"What do you mean?"

"Fire Scorpions live underground and only come up to hunt for food. We might have cleared out a small area of his back field, but there are probably young and eggs down in the burrows that will emerge in a few days or a week."

"What about the fields in front of the house?" Damion asked.

"There aren't too many burrows there, but you have to clear them all out and wall the area off. Otherwise, the Fire Scorpions will just come back."

"How come a mage with water magic doesn't take the mission and just flood all the burrows?" Damion asked thinking of how Ms. Teft could probably drown all the Fire Scorpions in a matter of minutes.

"The mission pays well enough for F and E Rankers like you and me, but we are knights. Mages get paid way more. Though if Mr. Galen upped the reward he might get mages to come out and give it a go."

"What about the Snow Hawk? Should we go after it, or wait for it to come for another snack and kill it?"

"It isn't harming people, plus it probably keeps the more mature Fire Scorpions in check."

"Back to Bufort then?"

"Sounds good to me," Ethan answered.

"You want to drive back?"

"Absolutely," Damion answered quickly and started to collect the Fire Scorpion stingers. If you stumble upon this tale on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it. Damion headed to the front of the house and the PTV, while Ethan went and bid Mr. Galen farewell while returning the shovel. Soon enough, the pair, with their pockets full of their trophies set off. Driving the PTV, other than a joystick instead of a steering wheel, handled quite similarly to cars on Earth.

It did not take long for Damion to get the hang of it and soon they were well on their way.

"Do I just channel my mana into the stick to charge the PTV up?" Damion asked as they drove down the road. They were already about halfway back to Bufort and Damion figured it was about time they started charging the PTV. Damion did not want to spend a lot of time at the rental shop when they got to Bufort if he could help it.

"Yeah, just channel your mana in. If you get tired, let me know and I'll take over." Damion did as Ethan instructed and began channeling his mana into the joystick like he did his sword. With the amount of mana he had, Damion doubted he would come close to exhausting his mana, but he did not tell Ethan that. After about fifteen minutes of channeling his mana into the PTV, Damion began feeling resistance as he pushed his mana into the joystick.

Damion was not sure what was happening, so he stopped channeling his mana and turned to Ethan.

"I'm starting to feel resistance while channeling my mana into the stick."

"Already?" Ethan asked, surprised at how quickly Damion managed to charge ground car.

"Usually, it takes at least an hour to charge a PTV up."

"The resistance means the PTV is charged?" Damion asked to confirm. He really thought it would make more sense for them to include a simple magic battery reader so people could tell how much of a charge it had.

"Yep, here let me take over," Ethan said as he reached for the stick. Damion released the stick, and Ethan took hold of it before the PTV could start slowing down. Now that Ethan was driving, Damion decided to check the system. He killed enough Fire Scorpions that he should have completed the quest, but he had not received any notifications from the Magic System. This confused Damion, but he figured it was only the second ever quest he had completed, so maybe he just missed something.

As soon as Damion called up the system menu he was greeted with the notification he had been expecting. Ding {Quest Completed} [Quest: Kill Ferocious Beasts or Demonic Beasts – Status: Complete – Reward: 100 Experience, 1 Store Credits] He now had 200 experience and 2 store credits, however before Damion could ask the system anything he received more notifications.

Ding {Quest Completed} [Quest: Kill Ferocious Beasts or Demonic Beasts – Status: Complete – Reward: 100 Experience, 1 Store Credits] Ding {New Quest Available} [Quest: Kill Ferocious Beasts or Demonic Beasts] [Description: As a licensed Adventurer it is your duty to protect and strive to improve the lives of those weaker than yourself.] [Reward: 100 Experience, 1 Store Credit] Ding {New Quest Available} [Quest: Kill E Rank Ferocious Beasts or Demonic Beasts]] [Description: You have gained experience in real combat. Use the lessons you have learned to fight stronger beasts.] [Reward: 100 Experience, 2 Store Credit] Damion was happy to see that not only did he completed his quest a second time, but also received it a third time and a new quest as well. What Damion did not understand was why he only completed the quest twice.

He had killed thirty Fire Scorpions, that should have been enough to complete the quest three times. To answer his question, Damion pulled up the quest status. [Quest Status] [Kill Ferocious Beasts or Demonic Beasts - 5/20 (Repeatable)] [Quest Status] [Kill E Rank Ferocious Beasts or Demonic Beasts - 0/10 (Repeatable)] Seeing that he was at 5/20 for the quest, Damion did some quick math and realized that the difficulty of the quest went up by five kills after each time he completed it.

The first only took 10, the second 15 and now the third needed him to kill 20 to complete the quest. Damion supposed this was understandable. As he grew stronger and stronger the quest would become too easy. By increasing the number of Ferocious Beasts he had to kill it would prevent him from gaining a large amount of Store Credits by slaughtering weak beasts when he grew stronger. When Damion saw his new quest was for E Rank beasts, he guessed that when he completed it, he would get a new quest for D Rank beasts.

Damion was glad he would continue to get more and more difficult quests to complete as he grew, but he did wish the rewards were a bit better. Just one extra Store Credit, what was the system thinking.

'System,' Damion called out in his mind to it.

'Why didn't I get the quest notifications right away?'