I Never Run Out of Mana

140. His Loot Drops

The sound of jewels spilling out was music to my ears.

It brought me joy far beyond that of obtaining bloodstones.

Within the pile were jewels, accessories and skill books as well as weapons and armors.

Now, if those artifacts were equal or greater in stats than the equipment I was wearing, I would be able to taste the bitterness of the incredibly low success rate the jewels have for enhancement.

What was important right now was to decide which of us got what equipment.

Jong Ho and I had the same expression as we looked at the pile of loot.

It was the equivalent of children looking at their own cotton candies being made in front of them.

Hoping for my expectations to become a reality, I used Eye of Insight.

The information on the artifacts were revealed to me, but the thing that I was completely enthralled by were the jewels.

It was important to use them up first.

I urgently called Karin.

“Karin.”

“Kel?”

“Jong Ho hyung and I cannot touch these items yet, you know?”

“Keru.”

“So can you organize them?”

“Keru. I’m doing this only because we’re family.”

“But why is this goblin constantly going on about family all of a sudden?”

“Dunno. Aren’t we family though? We share meals together.”

“I mean, that’s true….. Still, it bothers me. I’m aware, but calling us his family? I don’t think he needs to keep saying that.”

“Just let him be. It’s cute.”

“Well…. Okay.”

“Kerurururu. As I had hoped for, family understands one another. Right, family?”

“Okay. I understand, so could you hurry. You can see it in Jong Ho hyung-nim’s eyes. See how impatient he is?”

“Keheh. I get it. I’ll be done quick.”

Karin moved quickly, as if he was very excited.

His small hands easily hefted up the giant artifacts.

The Awakened cannot lift weapons or armor if they lack the stats to equip them in the first place.

Forget equipping them, as this meant they couldn’t even pick up the loot.

However, it seemed that for a monster like Karin, that rule did not apply.

This meant that he could lift equipments regardless of what stat requirements they carried with ease.

I began to carefully look through the equipment that Karin was sorting out.

As I did, I made sure to note those that would be particularly useful on Jong Ho.

There were a few items in view that made me grin with anticipation.

Jong Ho merely watched my expression.

He must be predicting what the results were from my expressions.

From how pleased I was, he probably guessed that at least a few useful items did drop.

Karin, who wiped his sweat away after finishing the sorting process, spoke.

“Kehel. All done. Is this what you wanted?”

“Yep. Good work, Karin. I’ll get the fire started so that you can have your steak.”

“Kerut. No, family eats together. That’s what I saw at Min-Cheol’s house.”

“…..”

“See, I told you? Despite being annoying at times, he’s really hard to dislike.”

“I see now. Please wait for just a bit, Karin.”

“Kel. Don’t worry about me and check the drops. I noticed that Jong Ho was drooling at them before.”

“Ahem… Did anything good drop, Min-Cheol?”

“Yes, though it seems you already expected it so?”

“I got it all from staring at your expressions.”

“Firstly, I’ll identify the items that I think would be useful to you.”

“This identifying procedure always makes me tense….”

“You weren’t like this back on Earth though.”

“Back then…. The situation wasn’t this dire back then.”

“True. First, the ring over there.”

“This?”

“Yes.”

Jong Ho only picked up the items I pointed out with the utmost caution.

After all, if he accidentally picked up the wrong items, it would bind to him and become useless to me.

Jong Ho’s weapons and armor were sufficient enough already, but it was true that I neglected on getting him decent accessories.

It was because of a lack of time to prepare due to the deadline that required us to go into the demonic realm.

“Hyung-nim, what are the attributes on the accessories you have equipped at the moment?”

“Balrock’s ring…… The ring of revival that mother gave me is gone…… Other than that, nothing much of note, really.”

“I should’ve also taken better care of you in that department as well.”

“I really didn’t think much of it too, so don’t worry. But what are the attributes on this new ring?”

“It doesn’t have special effects like the Balrock’s ring, but it does raise your stats up, so try it on first.”

“Ok.”

Jong Ho took off the ring that he was wearing and replaced it with the new ring that I had pointed out.

To check out his status window, he stared into thin air.

I wished that I could see his status window as well, but this was something that you couldn’t show to others.

Only the Awakened could see their own status windows.

Jong Ho’s expression changed to that of a small smirk.

The ring that I had given him was one that raised the mana stat.

“It’s a mana ring?”

“Yes. There’s nothing as important as defense. And to keep your defenses up, you need to keep casting defensive spells. You know firsthand from fighting against the Demon King and Ladin.”

“Wew. Thanks for calling it a fight. It was more of a one-sided defeat though.”

“Well, it won’t be like that anymore. For now, I think you should be equipping that.”

“Hm… Right. It’s true that I do need mana.”

“You don’t seem that happy with it though? Did you want something specifically? Seems I’m on right on the money. Tell me what you want.”

“No. It’s true that you need mana to use shields and defensive skills.”

“Hey, why are you acting like that? Both of us can’t lie to save our hides. I can tell right now that you aren’t being honest, so go ahead and tell me what’s up.”

I could tell from just looking at his expression that he wanted something else.

Was it because the ring had no special effect attached to it?

Or perhaps he wanted a different stat on his ring?

My query didn’t last long, as Jong Ho stuttered before speaking up.

“No. I really like this ring. However…..”

“I knew it. There really was something.”

“I want to… change my weapon.”

“Your weapon?”

“Yeah. It is a weapon that gives me the most amount of mana stats, but…..”

“You’re saying that you lack physical attack skills, and the staff or wand have a short reach and isn’t suited for melee combat, right?”

“Yep…. That’s right.”

“I think I understand what you mean. For now though, we have to get your accessories sorted out. I think those bracelets in front of Karin will suit you as well.”

“Does this also raise my mana?”

“Yes. If you want to change your weapon, you’ll have to find a way to make up for all the mana stats you’ll be losing out due to the change, right?”

“That’s right.”

“If you wear these two and the necklace over there, you should be able to obtain more magic stat points than what you were getting from your wand.”

“Oho…. Okay. I’m hoping for a warrior class type weapon with the stats of a magic weapon……”

“Should I summon the blacksmith? It’s the demonic realm here, hyung-nim.”

“No, I’m just saying.”

Just like that, Jong Ho put on the accessories on his hands and neck.

Due to the equipment being merely of decent quality, he didn’t get that much of a stat gain.

The mana stat he gained from the accessories were better than the wand, but it wasn’t as good as the staff.

After equipping the accessory, his eyes lit up with life.

His expression seemed to ask for his new weapon.

“Since the accessories don’t have special abilities attached to them, it doesn’t seem like something that you should keep. But you should still use it until something better drops.”

“Yep, yep. So about the weapon? The sword?”

“It’s not a sword you’d like…..”

“Don’t play it down and hurry up!”

“It’s over there. Pijan’s Lightning Sword.”

There were 3 swords at the location where Karin had gathered the weapons together.

Each varied in size and shape, and their attributes matched their variety.

Since they were all weapons that bound on touch, the attributes on the swords were far beyond what the average Awakened could even dream of.

Jong Ho headed to the sky blue sword that I pointed out.

“Is this it?”

“Yes. That thin sword is the one.”

Jong Ho picked up Pijan’s Lightning Sword as soon as I told him.

It was a sky blue sword with the cutting edge of the sword being only 5cm.

The shape was simple, but because it had a special effect attached to it, it seemed quite useful.

Checking the attributes of the weapon, he became lively once more.

-Pijan’s Lightning Sword-

*Strength +1000

*7% of total strength increased.

*One-handed.

*Deals electric based damage.

*After absorbing a certain amount of magical energy, deals an empowered double damage attack. (30 second duration.)

“I can deal electric based attacks……”

“Yes. Looks like a type of enchantment?”

“Enchant? Can I use it, even if I’m a warrior class?”

“Why not try giving it a swing? It seems that the electric enchant is inherently built into the weapon.”

“Hm……”

“Oho?”

Swinging his sword at thin air, an effect that seemed as if an electric spell was casted followed.

Enchants were a way to add in magical attacks onto a physical damage based weapons.

It wasn’t used in high level dungeons where the mobs had high resistance against magical attacks, but it was used commonly in low level dungeons.

However, this was the demonic realm.

Almost all the monsters here have resistances.

That’s why the effect wasn’t that useful.

“Looks pretty. Not very practical though.”

“I really like the attributes on it though? I can think of it as worth half your Butcher’s Sword.”

“Yes. I was somewhat surprised as well. Must be quite the high ranking weapon.”

“Yeah. However, what about the special effect on it.….”

“I know it well, since I’ve used that special effect lots before.”

“Hm? You’ve used this sword before?”

“No. However…..”

I quietly touched the Louver’s Bracelet on my wrist.

It was one of the three items that completed a set, and could only be obtained by defeating reaper Louver.

No attributes were attached to it, but the one special effect on it was identical to Jong Ho’s sword.

It was a special effect that changed absorbed magical energy into an offensive capability.

However, that sword’s special ability was far superior to that of my bracelet.

Unlike the bracelet, which empowered one magical spell cast, the special ability on the sword lasted for 30 seconds and empowered any attack that was made with the sword.

It was a weapon that served well in filling the lack of strength stats that Jong Ho had.

And this was the demonic realm.

The magical energy that the sword wanted was found everywhere in the demonic realm, and the monsters that were found commonplace around this realm were saturated with the magical energies.

There wasn’t a better place than here for the conditions requiring the item to activate its special ability.

Jong Ho, who had been staring at the sword intensely, spoke.

“An enhanced attack….”

“It won’t affect the skills from the Balrock’s ring, but it will work on the skills and attacks you use.”

“Okay. I’ll confirm the effects in a bit. Is there anything you get from this?”

“Yes. There really isn’t an artifact that I could use.”

“What…. It doesn’t match the expression you had when you looked at the loot though? I thought something amazing had dropped and had my hopes up.”

“There isn’t any artifacts for me…… but there is something else.”

“Oh! Really? What is it?”

“You’ll know when you see it.”