Hero or Villain, Both

I couldn't help raising a brow when she heard this before knitting my brows to look at her.

"What do you mean by that? Why would it be my fault that things are going wrong in this place?" I asked in a confused voice.

"You really don't know?" Fae raised a brow to look at me as she asked this.

Seeing this, I couldn't help giving a slow shake of my head.

Why would I know what was happening here?

After a moment of silence, she said, "It's all because of your talent. It's just too much for this place, which is why the spirits went into overdrive in summoning those monsters."

"Huh?" I couldn't help being stunned by what she said.

With a shake of her head, Fae turned back to look at the four spirits around her before she started to explain, "This place was built as a training ground for the future generation of elves, but it isn't as if every single elf is as talented as you. It wouldn't make sense to throw something impossible at them since they wouldn't actually gain anything."

I had to give a slow nod of agreement in response to this.

After all, it certainly wouldn't make sense to use something impossible to train someone.

She went on to explain how there was a magic array that was set up to gauge the talent of those that came into this training ground. Based on the talent that was gauged, the level of monsters was set.

As I listened, I couldn't help thinking of the difficulty scaling of a dungeon.

The way that she described it, it really seemed like this was how difficulty scaling worked.

After all, the monsters would become stronger when the one in the dungeon became stronger.

It was how games made sure that players wouldn't become too overpowered.

Though when it came to me…

"You're too much for the magic array, so that's why these guys have been working hard to push out all those powerful monsters. The ones that were attacking you along the way were actually supposed to be final bosses and usually there are only one or two of them."

What she was describing was the normal situation of this training dungeon.

It was also the scenario that I was familiar with as well.

"Then what are you going to do about this? It isn't as if I can remain in this place if this keeps happening." I said with a bitter smile.

"Oh it's not a problem anymore. When we came in, I already adjusted the magic array and now it has excluded you from its detection range. It doesn't matter if you stay here, it won't spawn any monsters for you." Fae said with a wave of her hand.

But that made the bitter smile on my face fill with even more bitterness.

The way that she said this, it seemed like she was just completely giving up on me.

Or it was better to say that I was being banned from this EXP dungeon.

It was hard for me not to feel bitter about being treated like this.

Seeing the look on my face, Fae shook her head with a smile, "It's not as if I'm completely giving up on you. Instead of wasting your time fighting all of those monsters, it's easier if I just give you the final reward."

"Huh?"

As I was caught off guard by her words, Fae already turned around to look at the spirits and said, "Help me bring that out."

The spirits didn't waste any time heading to the shrine at the center of this temple.

This shrine had a bit of a strange design, but I knew why it was designed like that.

It was because this shrine actually contained the corpse of the high elf ancestor.

It was also the very core of this EXP dungeon.

Once they were above the shrine, the spirits gathered together as if they were combining their power. With the way that they came together like this, it was as if they were condensing something,

After a while, there was a drop that seemed to gather in the air there.

It was a drop of some kind of green liquid.

After they gathered this drop of green liquid, the spirits suddenly stopped what they were doing and floated over with it.

But looking at them closely, one would be able to tell that the spirits had spent quite a bit of energy condensing this drop of green liquid. After all, the spirits seemed smaller than before.

This drop of green liquid fell into Fae's hand before she turned around to show it to me.

As she held it up for me to see, she said, "This is a Spirit Elixir. It's a drop of concentrated spirit essence that requires a long time to gather. As well, it's only something that High Grade Spirits can create. But this thing is definitely better than any of the Spirit Shards that you gathered from those monsters."

I didn't say anything in response to this.

That was because I recognized the drop of green liquid that she was holding.

I knew about the Spirit Elixir as well since it was one of the things that I had come to get from this EXP dungeon. It was actually the hidden reward for clearing the dungeon perfectly.

But now I was able to get it without even having to fight the boss.

Receiving this reward for being banned from this place…

Well, it wasn't as if this was a bad deal.

"Alright, I'll take it and leave."

Fae shook her head before saying, "There's no need for you to leave, especially since it would seem strange if you did. Just go and help them take care of the rest of those monsters before heading back. Those few Spirit Shards can be considered your second reward. It's not as if they are weak either."

Since she was offering them…

"Alright, I will." I said with a nod.