Reset: DPS to Support?!

"U-Ugh..." Groaning in annoyance at the incoming attack that was moving straight to his face, Ethaniel tried all his might to move towards the side, however—with the decrease in movement speed due to the hail, he was unable to make it in time.

Ting...

Thus, with a clank of its ice around itself, the elemental seemed to be chuckling at the sight of its glacial ice bolt hitting the target and in turn, the health of the target—Ethaniel, lowered greatly into the yellow zone.

"Bah... Did he just took me for half my health?" Ethaniel's body shook upon being struck by the icy attack as he turned to the rising notifications in front of him. "I'll be dead if I get hit again..."

[ The effects of the hail have taken place! ]

[ The hail atmosphere that you feel has decreased your movement speed by 20% and cold resistance by 30%. Not only that, your water resistance has been lowered by 100%. ]

...

"The damage is just too much for us to handle since our defence in water is below the negatives of a hundred..." Shinto sighed as he moved his staff over to Ethaniel. Soon after, a mark of umbra was casted upon him, slowly raising his health back into the green.

"You think?" Ethaniel scoffed as his eyes averted to his health bar, noting that it was in the suitable levels to survive another attack from the elemental. Moments after, Ethaniel charged forward to the enemy with his sword in hand whilst shining down a pillar of light onto them. "But whatever... Just keep healing me and we're bound to kill this guy."

As the skill shone down upon the elemental, they remained still as it channelled out another energy around itself. Quickly, the hail around Ethaniel and Shinto fell down much harder than before, swiftly eating at their health as time went on.

"E-Eek... The hail's doing damage!" Kon cried out as he tried to dodge the hail, though it was proved futile.

"Tch..." Shinto clicked his tongue as he scrutinized the chuckling elemental in front of him. "Even with two attacks from him, the elemental's health is still in the green. Though... It was called for..."

With a level disadvantage of forty and no suitable equipment for the current area, it meant that the disparity of dealing normal damage to enemies of higher-ranked fell off greatly.

"Hah... This is annoying," Ethaniel frowned. "Can we get normal enemies to fight for once?"

"I don't have healing skills all day long to keep up with this storm... We have to finish this or we might need to run," Shinto stated helplessly as he casted out [ Divinity Point ] to the elemental, quickly allowing him to regain back his loss of health. Though, the health regained soon return back to its original number due to the hail. "Then there's the Chill Debuff where we'll all die if we stay out here too long..."

"W-What do we do then?" Kon uttered out. "My Orbal Shadow's damage dealt almost nonexistent damage..."

"Hah... You humans..." Reru scoffed at the worrisome sight of Shinto and Kon. "You're struggling with this monster?"

"Hey... How about you just shut up and help us already?!" Ethaniel clicked his tongue whilst barely dodging a block of glacial ice that protruded out from the ground. "Do you want us to die or something?!"

"I wanted to see whether your worries were warranted for or you were just overthinking," Reru stated as he leapt forward whilst protruding out a slime sword from his body. In the next moment, the sword swung in an arc as it gashed at the body of the elemental. "But it seems that it was both."

As the sword collided with the body of the monster, the ice around it shook greatly as its body was sent over to a pine tree in the distance.

"...obviously it was warranted for?" Ethaniel frowned. "I don't see you needing any equipment!"

"Look at Erith if you want to argue about that," Reru seemed to be rolling his eyes as he jumped forward to the elemental. In turn, he continued to strike at the monster consecutively—thus lowering its health down into the red. "Anyways... This is nothing."

Stating out nonchalantly, the elemental turned into grey ash.

[ Hail Elemental has been defeated! ]

[ You have levelled up to level 34! ]

[ Kon has levelled up to level 27! ]

[ Kon has levelled up to level 28! ]

[ Your Shadow Stats has been increased by 1. ]

[ The hail has passed. The area has returned back to normal. ]

"Hah..." Shinto let out a sigh of relief as he saw that the elemental that the group was struggling at was instantly destroyed by Reru. "This is just..."

"O-Oh... So it was that easy if you're that high of a level?" Kon muttered out.

"..." Shinto felt slightly conflicted at the scene before him. Though he was happy that his worries with the monster's level were solved with Reru's, however, he felt a difficult feeling from being incredibly carried by him and his level raising up just like that. "Is this how people feel when they get carried hard?"

"Sigh. What can we do? We're basically unable to do anything..." Ethaniel shook his head helplessly.

Within the game, fighting an enemy way above one's level had no penalty besides being extremely underprepared in terms of equipment and stats. Thus, if they were to defeat them, said player would receive the same amount of experience as a player of the same level would.

However, in the case of parties with a player or NPC of the higher level, the experience distribution would be based on contribution within a battle instead of a split in order to balance things out in the case of someone carrying another through the fight.

With Reru's full-on participation and ridding away 97% of the elemental's health, it meant that the experience distributed to Ethaniel, Shinto and Kon were on the far lower side. Meanwhile, for Rustly, he only gained a very small amount due to his presence barely on the field. But, even at that point, the group still managed to raise their level up.

"What? You're all not even gonna appreciate that I helped you?" Reru frowned.

"...at the last minute," Ethaniel clicked his tongue.

"Like I said. I wanted to see whether your worries were warranted or not," Reru leapt forward through the forest as he stated it. "But in any case, let's continue moving. You'll die either way if we wait for the cold to take you away."

"I want this place out of this place already..." Kon whimpered as the group continued through the forest.

...

As the snow befell upon the area, on the mountainous path of a snowy mountain, a blonde-haired woman as well as an auburn one made way through it whilst wearing full jackets that seem to shield them from the cold.

"B-Brr.. I-Is this the place?" Despite wearing full-on jackets, the auburn-haired woman shivered. "This place is way too cold from what you told me..."

"Way too cold? Man... You really need to up yourself with the environment. This is nothing!" The blonde-haired woman replied nonchalantly. "But yeah. This is the place."

"Huh... Wearn't we supposed to find a village or something?" The girl still shivered. "How did we end up at the peak of a mountain?

"Ah- Well..." The woman uttered out. "U-Um... U-Um..."

"We're lost aren't we?" The girl glared at the blondie.

"N-No!" she let out a cough. "We're in the Fal's kingdom mountainous heights! The village should be somewhere around here!"

"...in the middle of nowhere?" The auburn-haired girl tilted her head.

"Not the middle of nowhere, I'm serious!" The blonde-haired woman cried out. "There should be a cavern or something that leads into the village. So we just need to search far and wide for it!"

"Mhm... If you say so," she chuckled in reply. "But, seriously though. I think there might be a hail storm soon... We should better find shelter or we might die again..."

"Another hail?! What's up with this place?"

"Well... We are in an area far from any city of the Fal Kingdom... " The auburn-haired girl muttered out. "I guess this must be the reason why..."

"A place deserted due to the unlivable conditions of the environments..." The blonde-haired woman sighed. "I guess that's why this village must be living in the caverns, huh?"

"Is there even a village like you said there was?" she questioned. "We've been going about this for days and well, no luck. How many times did we die?"

"Eh... I'm sure there's a village! My sources tell me so," The blonde-haired woman nodded her head. "But it would have been so much helpful if Shinto was here... He would've made this journey a lot easier."

"Mm... Well, not to worry~ I'm sure he's having fun somewhere else, like how we are we're having right now!" The auburn-haired woman chuckled.

"We're having fun?" she glared at the woman beside her whilst walking ahead of the path. "It's only fun when we're not dying-" As she was about to continue her sentence, her eyes widened in shock. "Hey... Hey! I think we found it! Hikari! Over there!"