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Volume 8 Chapter 6 Part 4

Translator: Kell

So while it seems like Dwarf Dragons have this “no long-range attack” weakness, they actually have it perfectly covered. One could even say that they’re the ultimate musclehead monsters, solving everything with physical strength alone. The simplicity of its abilities makes it difficult to deal with.

Then, the enemy made its move. Using its incredible agility, the Dwarf Dragon swung its claws down with blinding speed.

I quickly tried to block it with my staff, but I was too late. The dragon’s claws hit my body, and was blocked by Magic Veil.

The attack took fifteen percent off my mana. That means I wouldn’t last seven shots.

Mana’s natural recovery is pretty much nothing, so it’s almost meaningless during a battle. There’s also no good mana recovery spells either.

Let’s try using a spell we don’t see too often.

“Drain Bullet”.

As I cast the spell, a small nail-like object came out of the tip of my staff and pierced the dragon. At the same time, my mana was restored.

As the name suggests, this is a spell that sucks up mana from the enemy it strikes. It reduces the enemy’s mana, and also inflicts damage. It can hit three birds with one stone, but of course there’s a reason I haven’t used this magic until now.

“I see… I can’t use this one.”

The reason why the seemingly useful Drain Bullet can’t be used in this case is simple—the amount of recovery is too small.

I didn’t even recover 0.1 percent of my mana. Even if I fired 150 shots to try to gain the 15% percent I would lose to an attack, it wouldn’t be enough.

As an attack, it’s also pretty mediocre. Its power is lower than that of offensive spells, and since the mana of monsters is an order of magnitude greater than that of humans, there is little point in reducing it. Honestly, I would say that it’s useless.

Then I can just use buffs, right? No. Skills that boost power fundamentally increase mana consumption. For the same amount of mana cost, it would be better to fire several shots of the unbuffed spell instead. The effects of absorption-type spells such as “Drain Bullet” are also enhanced, but they’re not very cost-effective.

One other thing about Drain Bullet: if I enhance it, the mana cost and the amount of mana sucked up are almost the same. It can be used as offensive magic without mana cost, but of course, it’s not useful for withstanding attacks.

This is why I had not used this magic until now. Also for a useless Skill, it requires a high level to learn it, so it wasn’t available to me until recently. If I had been able to use it before, I would have at least used it to replenish my mana when I needed it.

But there’s probably a way to make this Skill usable in a real battle. I say ‘probably’ because I’ve never done it.

In BBO, mana recovery itself wasn’t given much focus because you could just drink potions. I’ve never experimented with enhancing mana recovery, so I’m just winging it.

“Ether Hack.”

I cast my Awakened Skill and modified Drain Bullet’s effect. Drain Bullet is originally a spell with a range of a few dozens of meters, but having such a range is pointless.

Essentially with Ether Hack, the more you reduce unnecessary effects, the more you can increase others. In other words, the more range I reduce, the more power I get. I could reduce the range to the bare minimum… about sixty centimeters should be fine. It’s difficult to dodge the enemy’s attack anyway, so there’s no point in keeping distance. And if that’s the case, I might as well just try to take the enemy down in close quarters combat.

I also reduced the projectile speed by 90 percent. It would be difficult to hit a target in a normal fighting distance, but since the range is only 60 centimeters anyway, it would be enough.

I reduced its power to zero. The damage from Drain Bullet is just an added bonus; it doesn’t make any difference if I just remove it. It would be much better to increase the efficiency of its mana absorption and use the extra mana for Fire Bombs.

“Drain Bullet.”

I cast the modified Drain Bullet and checked its effectiveness. This time, I recovered about three percent of my mana.

Considering its original effectiveness, this is a drastic improvement, but for sacrificing everything but the mana absorption efficiency, it’s quite bad. No wonder it wasn’t used in BBO. If my gear and items were up to BBO standards, there’s no doubt that I would never have used this Skill ever.

Anyway, I managed to increase the amount of mana recovery to where it actually matters. The range is too short, but Dwarf Dragons are monsters that don’t have long-range means of attack, so they always keep close. As long as I’m prepared to engage in close combat, it won’t be difficult to land the spell.

“Drain Bullet. Drain Bullet. Drain Bullet.”

I replenished my mana while constantly taking the enemy’s attacks with Magic Veil. My mana was decreasing and increasing repeatedly, but overtime, it was gradually going down.

The power of the enemy’s attack varies from time to time, but it seems that four to five Drain Bullets are needed to recover from one attack. Since spellcasting speed is limited, recovery is not keeping up with consumption.

The current range of Drain Bullet, sixty centimeters, is the limit for a steady hit. Even then, I miss one in ten shots. I could abandon the idea of dodging altogether, but if the range is reduced any further, it might not reach, and the speed of my mana recovery will drop. But it’s possible to cover this weakness.