Dark Fantasy Guide for the Summoner - Chapter 17

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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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Episode 17.
Woodman Colony II
In PorOP, hunting is the easiest way to raise your Level.
Kill monsters any way you want, and your Level goes up.
The difference from other games? The time available for hunting is brutally limited.
It’s good to focus on hunting, but get too absorbed and you won’t have time to explore.
“Kaindle.”
“What?”
“How long do we have to keep doing this?”
“A week.”
“A, a week……?”
A week.
That’s the time I’ve set aside for grinding at Woodman Colony.
It wasn’t a random number—there was solid reasoning behind it. Seed farming, specifically.
Each Woodman drops roughly five hundred Seeds.
So to earn a million Seeds, I’d need to kill around two thousand Woodmen…….
Divide that by seven, and you get the rough daily quota.
‘About three hundred a day.’
Once I’d set the target, I spent the early hours of the day stomping through the colony, killing Woodmen indiscriminately.
This kind of repetitive hunting would’ve been tedious in a game, but in reality, it wasn’t quite so soul-crushing.
“Kazen, Kazen!”
“Ahhh! Kaindle!”
Cunning ones lurking in ambush, unusually powerful specimens, oversized individuals, creatures active even at midnight…….
No two battles followed the same rhythm—each one brought its own small or large crisis.
Not life-threatening, exactly, but I felt like I was constantly treading on thin ice.
We had no Potions on hand.
“Ow.”
“What’s wrong? Are you hurt?”
“I, I scraped myself on a branch.”
“Use the Disinfectant. Wrap it with a Bandage too.”
“It’s just a light scratch……?”
“……Just do it.”
This is the era we live in.
Leave even a minor wound untreated and you risk tetanus, or if you’re unlucky, sepsis.
I’ve actually lost key allies before to what started as abrasions left alone.
“How many is this now……?”
“That last one makes one-fifty-five.”
“Wh, we’re already halfway there……?”
The complaint in her voice suggested she thought the hunting pace was too fast.
‘She’s just being dramatic…….’
I was carefully monitoring both their Stress levels and adjusting the tempo accordingly.
Push too hard and trigger an Insanity Debuff, and that’s the end of it—they’re useless as party members until we get back to the Royal Capital for treatment.
[Your Level has increased.]
[Your ally Kazen’s Level has increased.]
[Your ally Cria’s Level has increased.]
For water, I used Blue Leaf. For food, we ate through what we’d packed on the train first.
Sometimes when we found tree fruits, we’d make do with those.
Being in the early area, we occasionally spotted forest beasts, but using them as food was impractical.
‘Properly preparing meat requires the Butchering, Dismantling, and Cooking skills.’
I sensed the skills might manifest after a few attempts, but with the daily quota already so tight, I had no room for experimentation.
‘Eating like this could lead to Malnutrition eventually…….’
A week should be fine, though.
Probably.
[The monster Blade Weasel’s Level has increased.]
The best part was that we were almost never ambushed while camping.
I had the Blade Weasel to thank for that—being nocturnal, it stood watch.
The trade-off was that it couldn’t be used in daytime combat, but the security of uninterrupted sleep was well worth the sacrifice.
[Your ally Kazen’s Level has increased.]
[Your ally Cria’s Level has increased.]
Both of them were leveling up fast—their growth curve was noticeably steeper than mine or the Blade Weasel’s.
‘I should reach about level twenty without much trouble.’
Most days went smoothly enough, but that didn’t mean there were no problems.
‘Mental fatigue.’
Physical exhaustion could be shaken off quickly, but mental resilience didn’t bounce back so easily.
Still, I had no choice—this was a place where you had to maintain vigilance at all times, no matter what.
“I’m sorry! I missed!”
The more hunts we did, the more I noticed our movements and reaction times dulling.
Kazen, who used to kill at least one creature—sometimes three—in a surprise attack, had started missing more and more often. Even Cria’s speed at finding enemies had slowed.
Truth be told, it wasn’t just the two siblings. I was struggling too.
My body felt stiff when I moved, oddly unresponsive.
By the morning of the sixth day.
“Kazen. Wake up.”
“Ugh… just one more minute…”
“Enemies.”
That terse warning jolted him upright instantly.
“…”
He looked rough. Genuinely rough.
Kazen, who’d once carried a certain refinement about him, now looked like nothing so much as a vagrant no matter which way you viewed him.
‘I’m hardly one to talk.’
My own appearance was probably no better than his.
We hadn’t properly bathed in days—just hunting and rest, hunting and rest. Of course we looked like this.
But there was progress. My level was now nineteen; Kazen and Cria had reached eighteen, and the Blade Weasel had hit twenty.
‘Damn, it’s slow.’
Six days to reach this pace actually was phenomenally fast by any reasonable standard, but experiencing it firsthand, living it in my body, made it feel sluggish.
Then again, when PorOP was just a game, time moved dozens of times faster than it did in reality.
‘Seeds… I should have about eight hundred thousand by now?’
I wouldn’t know the exact count until I visited a shop, but I couldn’t be far off.
At this pace, I’d likely hit one million Seeds by today, or worst case by tomorrow morning.
“Ugghhh…”
The zombie-like sounds Kazen was making told me his mental reserves were hitting a wall.
[Stress: 67]
Dangerously close.
‘I don’t have a choice.’
Originally I’d wanted to secure a full one million Seeds—or even a comfortable 1.2 million—but losing a companion to greed would defeat the entire purpose.
I’d count the lost Seeds as time gained instead, and I opened my mouth.
“We’re done hunting for today.”
“Huh? That’s… alright?”
“It is. You all worked hard.”
“Ah!”
Kazen’s expression brightened instantly.
Cria hadn’t shown it openly, but she seemed relieved too.
“So are we moving to a different region then? Or starting proper exploration?”
Was he insane?
In the Eternal Forest, where was there a safer map than the Woodman Colony?
“…Yeah. Something like that.”
I figured it was better not to tell him that harsh truth while he was riding high on this sudden enthusiasm.
“From now on, we’ll avoid combat as much as possible. If we can’t avoid it, so be it.”
Though in truth, in the Woodman Colony we shouldn’t have to fight much at all.
Woodmen are sluggish creatures.
They aren’t non-aggressive monsters, but you won’t get attacked first unless you get right up close to them.
‘Same goes for when we camp.’
They’re mostly docile at night.
There were occasionally active individuals, so I couldn’t let my guard down completely, but it wasn’t a frequent occurrence.
‘Though I never did figure out why.’
Since this is PorOP, there might be some hidden setting or mechanic I’m unaware of…
In any case, the Woodman Colony was just a map you passed through early on.
It wasn’t a region of particular importance.
“Cria. Think you can keep scouting the area?”
“I can.”
“Good. If you find anything unusual besides enemies, let me know.”
“Something unusual? What specifically?”
“Fireflies that glow red. Lizards with two tails. Squirrels with white fur. And…….”
I rattled off the characteristics of the major discoveries found in the Woodman Colony.
Over the remaining two days, I’d focus on securing the Exploration Rate with the Exploration Crystal.
* * *
[Discovery registered to Exploration Crystal.]
⁝
[Current Exploration Rate: 17.3%]
* * *
“How many explorations is this for you, Kaindle?”
“…….”
I took a drink from my waterskin before answering Kazen’s question.
“Same as you two.”
“Pardon?”
“This is my first time, too.”
“Really? But… how is it that we’re first-timers……?”
“Wouldn’t it be stranger if you did know?”
“I, I suppose that’s true……?”
Why was he so surprised, honestly.
Ask a hundred people. They’d all give you the same answer.
“Well, that aside, I have to say it’s surprising to hear this is your first exploration, Kaindle. Frankly, if it was just me and Cria, we wouldn’t have lasted a day—we’d have died.”
“…….”
More precisely, we wouldn’t have made it into the forest at all.
Despite having played PorOP thousands of times over, I’d never heard the names Kazen or Cria before.
“That’s why I was certain you must be a veteran Delver.”
“Would a veteran Delver go around looking like this? Besides, you should have a rough idea what real Delvers are like from your original party.”
“Hm?”
“Your old party.”
“Ah…….”
Kazen replied with a slightly bitter expression.
“……That’s true.”
“Were you close?”
“Not particularly. It was more of a contractual arrangement from the start.”
“What kind of contract?”
“Hm?”
Kazen seemed taken aback.
He looked like he’d let something slip.
“That is…….”
“You don’t have to say if you don’t want to.”
Best to back off in situations like this.
Pressing would only damage Trust anyway.
Just like the status window showed—if the relationship deepened, he’d tell me of his own accord.
“……Thank you.”
“In any case, it’s quite an honor to be compared with an active Delver when I’m just a mere peddler. I’m more of a theory enthusiast than anything.”
That wasn’t a lie.
You couldn’t call playing a game real practical experience.
“Where did you come by that theoretical knowledge?”
I offered the excuse I’d prepared ahead of time.
“From books.”
“Books?”
“Yes. You can often find books about the Eternal Forest in libraries.”
“Libraries!”
Kazen’s eyes widened.
“Which library was it? The Natallin Royal Library? Or the Meliham University Library? Ah! Wait, if it’s about the forest, surely it must have been the Gulson Magical Library?”
The names of famous libraries in the Royal Capital tumbled out one after another. Of course, given my current status, I had no chance of even entering any of them.
‘What exactly is this guy?’
The university library and the magical library I could understand, but the Royal Library—that was a place even people of considerable renown couldn’t easily access.
Was he actually nobility and not a bastard? Or was he just making things up?
“……You wouldn’t know it anyway. I saw it at a nameless antiquarian bookshop.”
“An antiquarian bookshop?”
“That’s right. There are often treasures hidden in such places.”
This is true enough.
Antiquarian bookshops, pawn brokers, curiosity dealers—places where I can occasionally find books containing valuable information sold cheap. Whenever I return to the Royal Capital with time to spare, I visit them.
“Oh… I would very much like to visit such a bookshop myself.”
“Then let’s stop by one together when we return to the Royal Capital.”
“Wonderful!”
[Kazen’s Affinity has increased.]
Easy mark.
In any case, with today, we’ve reached the seventh day. If my plan holds, it’s time to start thinking about leaving the Woodman Colony.
‘Things have gone smoothly so far.’
Since I called off combat, we’ve barely fought, and I’ve collected a decent number of useful discoveries.
The Exploration Crystal’s Exploration Rate has climbed past twenty percent to nearly thirty.
But…
‘Something feels off about this.’
A creeping unease I couldn’t quite name had settled over me.
PorOP was always like this.
The moment a player dropped their guard, it hurled something catastrophic at them. It’s why I refused to relax until I’d completely left this region.
“Kaindle.”
I stopped at Cria’s voice.
“What is it?”
“There’s something strange ahead.”
A familiar sort of exchange.
Whenever she spotted something worth investigating or an enemy, she called for me this way.
But.
“Strange how?”
I noticed her voice had gone tense.
“…There’s a tree with black bark. Very tall and wide. But it has no leaves at all.”
Damn.
A curse nearly escaped my lips.
“Fruit?”
“Huh…?”
“There should be fruit on it. How many are hanging from the branches?”
“J-just a moment.”
Cria fell silent.
I waited, my anxiety climbing.
One. Please let it be one.
“…Two.”
“Hell.”
Cria flinched at my tone and glanced nervously toward me, but I had no time to manage her feelings now.
I immediately elevated my guard to maximum and spoke.
“Kazen. Cria. Enemies ahead. Get ready.”
“What? But didn’t you say we would avoid all combat from here on?”
“That’s right. Combat we can avoid.”
This fight, however, was unavoidable.
So sharpen your wits, both of you.
One mistake, and we could all die here.

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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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