Damn Necromancer - Chapter 21

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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The Spendthrift Necromancer (21)
Achievement Shop
‘There was something like this?’
Lee Seo-yoon had hunted many enemies in her time.
But she’d never seen a message related to this before.
‘The one who opened the horizon…….’
It might be connected to that.
Then again…….
Come to think of it, this was the first time she’d achieved an EX-rank achievement.
If that was the connection, then having this pop up now wasn’t really all that strange.
If it’s a shop, does it open like the status window?
‘Achievement Shop.’
[Achievement Shop opened!]
[Grade: Bronze]
[Achievement Points Held: 30]
[Product List]
[1. Limit Break Elixir]
[Achievement Points Required: 100]
[2. ???]
[3. ???]
.
.
There seemed to be plenty of items, but she couldn’t see the details.
In the end, only one product was visible right now.
[Limit Break Elixir]
[Increases Level Potential by ’50’.]
‘What?’
Huh?
What am I looking at right now?
Kim Min-woo rubbed his eyes hard.
The contents before his eyes were simply too incredible to believe.
Yet the message remained unchanged.
“……Insane!”
―Master, why the sudden outburst?
“Cedric! This is huge! Huge! I just landed a massive catch!”
―……A catch?
“Yeah, you bastard! Now I can finally break through level 200!”
―……Can’t most people do that?
Unfortunately, the undead couldn’t share in his jubilation at all.
‘This is why talented people are like that.’
Not that he didn’t understand.
Most Awakened could reach level 300 as a baseline once they awakened.
Of course, being able to reach a level and actually achieving it were entirely different matters.
As Awakened grew stronger, monsters grew correspondingly more formidable with each tier.
To gain meaningful experience, you still had to hunt monsters of similar level.
But past a certain threshold, even same-level monsters became nearly impossible to hunt.
‘That’s usually when people give up on leveling.’
Between 151 and 250.
The so-called Stagnation Zone—C-rank territory—was that cursed range.
From C-rank Gates onward, even parties had to risk their lives.
Before that, the mindset had been more carefree—maybe I’ll try this Gate to make some money, you know?
But from here on, the default thinking shifted—will I make it back alive today, at least?
In any case.
Cedric seemed unable to grasp the concept that leveling stopped at 200.
‘Surprisingly, that’s possible.’
A miraculous genius who couldn’t even reach 300—a level that even neighborhood F-rank Awakened could achieve.
Kim Min-woo was a remarkable example.
‘I spent six years looking for a way through…….’
And never found one.
That’s why he had to fight the Dragon Lord at level 200.
And now, he’d found the way!
‘With Achievement Points alone…….’
He could raise his level cap.
Better still, the value was fixed at ’50’, so he didn’t need to pray like he did when drinking elixirs.
‘It’s an incredible effect.’
A level wasn’t merely a function of four stat points.
It was interlocked with countless other elements—equipment, skill books, and more.
And as a necromancer, his summons’ level caps would rise alongside his own.
‘My ceiling is so much higher now.’
Far higher than he’d ever imagined.
The real question now was how to earn Achievement Points. Kim Min-woo recalled the message he’d seen earlier.
● You have hunted Lee Seo-yoon, one of the Secondary Villains!
● The story has begun to branch differently!
‘A secondary villain, then.’
From what he’d seen, they wouldn’t just hand out Achievement Points for killing any random villain.
He’d need to hunt the ones with genuine narrative weight.
Hunting Main Villains.
That would be the first method to raise his score.
‘But hunting them now is going to be brutal.’
He knew of plenty of characters in this game who qualified as Main Villains.
The problem was…….
Unless fortunate coincidences piled up like today, they were nearly impossible to hunt.
They were all formidable.
Most spawned randomly. He’d need to raise his level much higher than it was now before he could take them down.
‘Are there other ways to earn points……? By changing the story itself?’
A Secondary Villain had died.
The story shifted, and he earned points.
Killing enemies probably wasn’t the only way to gain points.
‘What if I influence someone important?’
The most Main Character-level figures in this game.
Those were the playable protagonist-tier characters available to users.
Park Si-woo, Han Si-ah, Namkoong Min, Seo Ye-rim. Normally, there’d be no reason for all four to share the same stage.
But things were different now.
The message that had appeared when he started Stage 6.
[All Main Characters in the game now inhabit a single world!]
The Main Characters existed in this world.
Just like Seo Ye-rim.
‘If I influence them…….’
I might be able to earn points.
The reason he hadn’t earned points from Seo Ye-rim was likely because he hadn’t brought about a ‘significant’ change in her.
At the end of the day, he’d just taught her some sword technique—nothing that constituted a decisive shift.
Lee Seo-yoon, by contrast, was a Secondary Villain, yet her death had wiped away an entire pre-existing storyline.
That’s why the impact was so large despite her secondary role.
Among the four, the easiest to influence was Park Si-woo, who had a one-star difficulty rating.
As Kim Min-woo returned to when he was still unawakened, time had rewound considerably.
‘He should be at the orphanage by now.’
Hanbit Orphanage.
That was the name of the place.
‘And he’ll still be unawakened.’
The time period when users could directly play as Park Si-woo lay further in the future.
Since he would awaken then, he must be unawakened now.
Kim Min-woo knew Park Si-woo’s Awakening conditions.
Moreover, he’d seen messages about how humanity’s potential had improved.
‘If I could awaken this kid not as an S-Rank, but as something higher……?’
He was already a sword genius.
If he became SS-Rank or SSS-Rank?
Could the story possibly remain unchanged no matter what?
‘There’s no way it wouldn’t have an impact.’
If that happened, he’d earn far more points than he had from hunting Lee Seo-yoon.
It was easy to approach, and the awakening itself wouldn’t be difficult to attempt.
There was no reason not to.
‘If I don’t get the points, so what…’
I could just create some guild and use him as a lackey.
Since he’s naturally gifted, he’d level up explosively just with decent equipment support.
Someday I’ll find a use for him.
‘Once I get out, I should pay him a visit.’
But first, I need to handle the equipment.
I looted Lee Seo-yoon’s corpse.
Assassin-class gear tumbled out.
Being B-ranked and a promising prospect, the equipment quality was surprisingly solid.
Unfortunately, due to job restrictions, I couldn’t use any of it—I’d have to auction it off.
I could fetch around thirty billion won for it.
And then there was this.
“Oh, jackpot.”
An exceptionally fine item.
[Dark Tracker’s Ring]
[Grade: Unique]
[Required Level: 51 or above]
[Effect 1. All Stats +15]
[Effect 2. Use Body Heat Tracking (C) by expending Mana.]
[Effect 3. Critical Hit Damage +10%.]
“Now that’s a luxury accessory.”
No job restrictions, and the level requirement was remarkably low for its performance—the kind of piece you couldn’t obtain from standard Gates.
‘Chain Quest cleared.’
The sort of reward you’d only get by discovering hidden conditions, activating a Chain Quest, and completing it all the way through.
“Most people can’t even buy this kind of thing.”
Of course they couldn’t.
Awakeners either hold onto pieces like this until retirement or keep using them—why would you sell during your growth phase?
That was likely why she kept it equipped despite her high level.
Accessories were scarce to begin with, making builds difficult to assemble. And for an assassin, critical damage increases were one of the most synergistic combinations imaginable.
Not to mention the universal stat boost.
I stowed Lee Seo-yoon’s corpse and equipment in my Subspace Ring.
Now it was time to clear the Gate.
I felt a thrill of anticipation.
Meeting Lee Seo-yoon had let me level up ten ranks—something I hadn’t expected.
I was currently level 40.
Just eleven more levels, and I’d reach 51.
The threshold where I could absorb the next Elixir and Skill Book—where my overall power would jump to an entirely different tier.
“Let’s go.”
Cedric and his skeleton squad nodded.
* * *
I swept through the Gate’s monsters and ground my levels higher.
[Your level has increased!]
[You have reached level 51.]
I hit level 51 before even reaching the boss chamber.
I pulled out the Lower Grade Elixirs.
[Lower Grade Mana Pill]
[Grade: D]
[Required Level: 51 or above]
[Upon consumption, slightly increases Mana. (Applies up to 150 Base Stats)]
When the Elixir spoke of “Base Stats,” it meant the innate stat points before any title or equipment bonuses.
Base Stats meant what, exactly?
The starting stats I began with, plus whatever the Elixirs had raised.
Plus all the stat gains from leveling up.
All of those combined made up my Base Stats.
And if we’re being thorough, the stat gains from training or other natural progression would count too.
‘None of that applies to him.’
I’d never seen Kim Min-woo’s stats climb through training.
So it was best to just ignore that part.
In conclusion.
Each stat the elixir mentioned was currently at one hundred.
I just needed to raise each one by fifty.
That would be a total stat increase of two hundred.
Royal Road complete.
So I absorbed the first elixir.
[Lower Grade Mana Pill absorbed.]
[Remarkable! Your grotesque body has pierced an astronomical probability and completely absorbed the elixir’s full efficacy!]
[Magic rises by 2!]
“What?”
Two points in one go?
Kim Min-woo recoiled at a message he’d never seen before.
[You have obtained the title “Ultra Lucky Guy”!]
“……But why would they even give me a title for this?”
Titles were something you had to work pretty hard to earn, weren’t they?
To get a title from a message most people saw every day while eating — that was something else.
For the first time, I realized that even this body of mine had its advantages.
I checked the effects right away.
[New Title List]
[1. PK Specialist]
[You achieved victory against an Awakener with an overwhelming gap in power.]
[Effect: When facing an Awakener more than 200 levels above you, attack power increases by 10%.]
[2. Ultra Lucky Guy]
[You pierced an astronomical probability and manifested fortune.]
[Effect: Luck seems to have improved.]
‘Luck seems to have improved…… that’s rather vague.’
It was a pretty ambiguous effect.
Though having it was better than nothing.
So I absorbed all the elixirs.
“……The effect is tremendous?”
I was somewhat surprised.
The elixir had taken incredibly well to my body.
“To pull this off with just eight hundred…….”
You could see just how significant this was by comparing it to when I was level one.
Back then, I’d needed over a thousand elixirs.
I’d bought them from Choi Yu-na and even then worried they wouldn’t be enough, so I’d taken another two hundred or so from the house warehouse.
Now it seemed I could just put those back.
“My luck’s running good.”
Really, my luck was running good.
Min-woo smiled slightly and learned the skill book.
[Skeleton Mage Summon(E)+9]
[This skill has been enhanced to its limit.]
[Consumes 20 mana to summon 2 Level 1 Skeleton Mages (1+1).]
“Nice.”
Nine-star enhancement never failed to look beautiful. It did use twice the mana of a regular skeleton, but for a mage, it was more than worth it.
Time to swap out for the next set of equipment.
I unequipped my original gear and opened the status window.
[Name: Kim Min-woo (23)]
[Job: Necromancer]
[Level: 51]
[Active Skills (4/20): Death Road (EX), Cedric Summon (SSS), Skeleton Mage Summon (E)+9, Skeleton Summon (F)+9]
[Mana: 1,920/1,920]
[Titles: 15]
[Stats]
[Strength: 181(+18)] [Agility: 181(+18)] [Endurance: 152(+15)] [Magic: 175(+17)]
“This is insane.”
These weren’t the stats of a level fifty-one. And that was before even equipping the new gear.
The Dark Tracker’s Ring — newly equippable now that I’d reached level fifty-one.
Plus the rare set item I’d just bought from the auction house.
[Dark Tracker’s Ring equipped!]
[All stats increase by 15!]
[Equipping the Destruction Harvester Set!]
[Strength +15, Agility +15, Stamina +15, Mana +50 increased!]
[Drain is now active!]
My mana spiked another sixty-five points here, and layered on top of that came the effect of Indomitable Spirit, pushing it up by six more.
Mana stat: 263.
Pure mana alone: 2,630.
And if I factored in the mana consumption reduction from Death Road on top of all that…
“Rise, my little servants.”
[452 Skeletons have been summoned!]
[300 Skeleton Mages have been summoned!]
Over seven hundred strong rose to their feet. It was far more than enough to crush a single gorilla boss.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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