Tamer 11
BGM: Wuthering Waves 2.8A MSQ Part 11[Please Help with subscribe]
Chapter 11: Time Efficiency and Cost Efficiency
TL : Cnine
ED/PF :
Part 1
Today again, the goblin went after my onigiri, so I held it out to him and then snatched it back with a playful, “Actually—no, you’re not getting this.”
Because of that little trick, the goblins got annoyed, stormed off to the 2nd floor, and now exploring on their own and bringing me magic stones has become part of their daily routine.
「I’ll give a whole rice ball to whoever brings back the most.」
That should push them to compete even harder.
At first, I threw the magic stones away to avoid raising suspicion, but once my level is high enough that getting found out won’t matter, I can cash them in. Until then, I’ll just stash them somewhere in the dungeon.
Still… trying to come up with fun ways to mess with goblins to sharpen their brains was way harder than I expected.
Perhaps I ought to arm the goblins with wooden swords and have them attempt a mock duel…
But no—it would be meaningless.
Without a teacher, they’d just run around swinging the wooden swords like idiots.
◇◇◇
In the afternoon, I slapped on the Quadra Gob-Sli club and the Quintuple Gob Legs for some juicy 19x EXP efficiency.
Levelling up’s been great; my MP regeneration now beats the MP I burn on Monster Enhancement and Monster Recovery skills.
Thanks to that, I took down 207 goblins and earned 23,598 EXP.
I’m pretty sure even high-rank explorers can’t make that much in one day.
「Status」
===
Status
Name：Sakura Kikyo
Occupation： Monster Tamer
Lv：43 ↑6
HP：140 ↑26
MP：237 ↑33
SP：12
Skill
Monster Taming19 Monster Recovery7 Monster Enhancement7 Monster Fusion Monster Reborn：NEW
Tamed Monster
GoblinLv43 SlimeLｖ43 GoblinLv43 SlimeLv43
GoblinLv42 GoblinLv42 GoblinLv42 GoblinLv42
GoblinLv42 GoblinLv29 GoblinLv29 GoblinLv29
GoblinLv29 GoblinLv29 GoblinLv29 GoblinLv29
GoblinLv29 SlimeLv29 SlimeLv29
EXP to next level: 2496
===
When I hit level 40, I got the Monster Reborn skill.
Basically, if one of my monsters keeled over, I can pump MP into the corpse and—ding!—it’s back on its feet.
Really handy. Pretty much the holy grail for monster tamers. In theory, I could just keep reviving them and use them as disposable charging units against strong enemies.
Well, assuming that my MP bar isn’t empty, that is.
「Wait, 100 MP per revive? Seriously?」
Yeah, so much for zombie spam. Not happening.
So far, I’ve never botched my HP management, so none of my monsters have ever died. I take good care of my little lads.
Even after hitting mid-rank explorer, I’ve kept every single one alive. I’m basically the poster boy for responsible monster tamers.
※Author Disclaimer: Proper monster tamers do not yeet their monsters at enemies like medieval baseball bats.
「Still, looks like the internet wasn’t lying.」
After reaching mid-rank explorer, my stats went up a bit faster.
As a rookie, my HP went up by a measly two or three per level. After level 20, it got a bit better—three or four. Past 30, it finally started rising by four or five.
The same trend applied to MP as well.
But I couldn’t afford to relax.
I’m almost level 50 now, the point where people call you a high-rank explorer, but there are already well over five hundred of those in Japan alone.
And I’m a monster tamer.
On my own, I’m only about as strong as a frontline fighter in the level-30 range. If someone attacked me outside a dungeon, where I couldn’t even use my monsters… yeah, I’d be finished.
I’ll just keep going as usual—keep grinding levels in the dungeon, avoid updating my explorer card, and keep playing the ‘clueless beginner’ at the Dungeon Association.
「But man, the money situation’s rough…」
I’m living at my parents’ home, so I don’t need much cash, but to my parents, I’m basically their kid doing some low-paying rookie explorer job.
It was honestly kind of embarrassing.
「Three thousand yen a day… even if I grind every day, I won’t even hit 100K a month.」
No way a uni grad should be earning this little. If this keeps up, I’m screwed.
If I’m gonna keep hiding my real level until I hit 200-plus… how long’s that gonna take, seriously?
◇◇◇
When I got home, I sat down and did some thinking.
Right now, I tell the Association I’m killing around forty goblins a day. Meaning that I work from Monday to Saturday, so the “official” EXP comes out to: 40 × 6 × 6 = 1440 EXP.
Looking at the EXP progression, it was clear that without multipliers, I’d barely scrape level sixteen or seventeen through ordinary exploration.
「Which means that if I keep falsifying my reports, it’ll take an entire month just to claw my way up to level twenty...」
At this rate, I wouldn’t be able to act as an intermediate explorer for another three weeks.
A part-time job could pay me 200,000 yen easily if I worked properly, so nobody sane would spend a whole month slogging away as a rookie explorer earning half that.
In an age obsessed with time efficiency and cost-effectiveness, working as a rookie explorer for a month was practically the definition of terrible time and cost return.
Honestly, from a long-term perspective, levelling up first and sharpening my abilities before job-hunting was clearly the smarter, more efficient route. But society doesn’t see it that way.
「What’s with the muttering while you’re eating?」
「Come on now. Focus on your meal.」
「Huh? Ah… yes.」
It seems my thoughts had slipped out of my mouth.
If my father or mother heard everything, that’d be quite embarrassing.
「So, how is the explorer life? Are you earning anything yet?」
「About three thousand yen a day.」
「You’d be better off working a part-time job…」
「I do have my own reasoning. If I work as an explorer, level up, and then get a job, I’ll be able to perform much better, right?」
You still receive part of the stat increases outside the dungeon.
One-tenth of what you gain is added to your base stats. Still, unless you reach mid-rank, you can’t expect to make much of an impact.
「I do understand your logic, Kikyo. Honestly. But the time-efficiency is… well, questionable.」
「Mum’s with Dad on this. Wouldn’t a part-time job and normal job-hunting be better?」
「Really…? You think so?」
A century ago, the mindset might have been different, but nowadays everyone worships time efficiency and cost efficiency.
You know the saying, ‘More haste, less speed’?
That’s exactly what my whole plan embodies: taking the longer path because it leads to better results.
But if I dared to mention that, people would laugh right in my face, saying, “What age are you from, grandpa?” Modern Japan doesn’t have much patience for long-term thinking.
「If that’s the path you’ve chosen, Kikyo, we won’t meddle. And if the day comes when it just feels too much, you can walk away. No shame in that.」
「That’s right. Sticking with a miserable job just because you feel you have to? Awful for your health. Chase whatever you want, but don’t hurt yourself doing it.」
「Thanks.」
Honestly, my parents being this kind makes me feel even more guilty. They were… too soft.
And I can just picture the neighbourhood ladies gossiping behind their tea cups: "Oh my, your son’s become an explorer? Such a dreadful, bottom-tier profession. If he carries on like this, he’ll never marry. Better make him quit while you still can."
Now that I think about it, that’s some top-tier meddling.
If they were going to look down on me, I’d gladly drag their kids right down to the same rank and say, “Oh dear, they’re bottom-rank too, aren’t they?”
And yeah, I’m not taking responsibility for any of that.