The World's First Monk (OCs, Isekai, LitRPG, Fantasy)

[Sahqoreyth]

Chapter 27: How to Form a Raid and Power Level Your Classmates



Galdurian Arc Warden Academy Dueling Grounds - Primus

​

Tisara Morvain looked up from her desk, as the small magic communication mirror her family had given her to stay in touch started chiming. They weren't the largest noble family, and had barely been able to send her to the academy. The mirror had been a significant investment, which was why she hadn't broken it.

Both she and her room had what certain Monks might call a 'goth vibe', and the finely crafted bronze mirror clashed with it. Hard. But keeping it with her books at least kept it out of sight, and made it look like she studied far more than she did. She glanced at the clock, confirmed her roommates would still be in class for a while, and answered.

"Hi, mother. How is everyone?"

"Excited! We heard you're in the Ternion Tournament! They just posted the brackets on some new magitech screen in the shopping district, on that big restaurant, the one that sells the Pizza. Who's this Drake Long that's fighting your entire year?"

"Oh…y'know, just the Hero that apparently led that Wallow Dungeon Raid. Nobody important." She shook her head at her mother.




"Well how am I supposed to know!? It's not like he's been immortalized in song!" Tisara just crossed her arms and stared at her mother. The older woman pinched her brow. "He's been immortalized in song, hasn't he."

Tisara nodded, and smirked. "He's the one behind the Pizza revolution too. Seems like you guys missed the Everfeast."

Her mother nodded. "Your Father and I were working, and so were your siblings. Money has been…tight, after negotiating your tuition with the main branch of the family. But we'll survive. The prize money from the Ternion Tournament is a lot right? Any chance you'll win?"

Tisara chuckled. "None, whatsoever. I'm just hoping to gain a level or two without risking my life. Drake Long will probably knock me out immediately."

Her mother's eyes turned sly. "He's a Hero right? Handsome? Is there any way you could get him to…?"

Tisara sighed. "No…Princess Valcrest snared him before anyone else had the chance. Apparently it's a whole…epic…monogamous…romance."




"That's okay dear, I'm sure you'll find someone worthy. Do you remember what I told you when you left?"

Tisara gave her a humorless smile. "I try to forget, every single day."

Her mother continued, despite her daughter's sass, "I don't care who you marry, so long as they're rich."

Tisara sighed. "Y'know, sometimes I wish you were like those Bigoted noble parents…"

Her mother chuckled. "No…you don't. Your grandmother would've beaten you by now." Tisara gave her a look, and her mother chuckled. "Don't worry, I was a good girl. As far as she knew. But your Uncles…" She whistled. "They earned it, several times with their antics."

"I'll have to ask them about it when I see them. My match is first Mother, I need to get going."

"Good luck dear! We love you!" She heard a rumble from her father's deeper voice in the background, and assumed he'd said the same thing. She repeated the words, and then departed for the field.




Within ten minutes, she was facing down the handsome Monk Hero, who arrived at the last minute, and seemed tired. But he still smirked at her, as a message popped up in her peripheral vision. She opened the message, eyes widening as she saw who'd sent it. It said the following.

Hello there. I'm too high level to have a fair fight with you, so if you're up for it, I'd like to invite you to my party, so you can take advantage of both Experience Buffs, and level up even further. Just shout 'I accept', and I'll invite you. If you decline, I'll just Duel you normally.

Thank you for reading,

Drake Long​

She looked up, missing whatever the ref said, but Drake's voice carried louder, and his Charisma was probably higher. "These matches where I'm massively higher level than my peers…will act as a chance for each of you to prove you can make it, in my Raiding Party. This is your recruitment interview! So show me your best!"

The referee looked confused, but Tisara was smirking darkly. "Go easy on her, Black." Drake said, as he manifested a clone, and the black cloaked Drake nodded, before stepping towards the Dark Knight. Tisara took her stance, activated her damage reduction tanking aura, and charged forward. Only to slide to a stop as the ref blew their whistle.

"Drake Long! You were just told of the restriction on your Magic Item. Recall the clone, or be disqualified!" The boos drowned the poor ref out, but Drake held up his hands.

"People, people! Please! Our referee is just doing their job. But, sir, you told me that only one of me should be fighting. And you never said I couldn't use the item, just that it was restricted."




The referee paused, as the crowd murmured angrily, but eventually he nodded. "My apologies. You are following the rules as written. Please continue."

With that, black cloak began essentially boxing with a greatsword, as Tisara did her best to keep up with the fast physical striker. Drake could see she was tiring quickly though. Mentally, Drake instructed black cloak to be less competent, attack slower, take more hits, etcetera.

Almost immediately, he saw her experience gain dramatically increase. The crowd watched in disbelief, as even at thirty five, leveling this fast was unheard of. As Tisara managed to strike down black cloak, purple was there next, to take his place. The Dark Knight didn't even pause, she just kept swinging, and Drake watched her in turn, her skills, when she used them, what they did, etcetera. This would determine who he invited, but so far, it seemed Tisara understood her rotation and could competently manage her cooldowns.




Tisara didn't notice at first, but as she gained experience, her focus tunneled, and the bodily high from dinging, and then continuing to gain experience at a ridiculous rate, was seriously hyping her up. She took less time to finish purple as she used her damaging class skills to wreathe her blade in magic, and as she did, she dinged again, the 'kill' giving her a quarter of what actually beating Drake would. This brought her to thirty seven and a half. The crowd cheered, while many of the older spectators, teachers and alumni alike, murmured quietly to each other.

Over the next five minutes, she took out two more clones, and managed to hit forty. At that point, the ref announced the one minute warning, and Drake stepped onto the field. "You've gained quite a lot of experience. Ready for the real thing?" He called to Tisara.

"Bring it!" She answered, charging forward.

The Monk became a blur, and Tisara's eyes bulged as Drake hammered the center of her bodily energy, right in the stomach, not with a fist, but only two fingers. It felt like his fist, though. The next thing she knew, she couldn't breathe for a few seconds, and was on the ground, disarmed and disoriented.




She sat up slowly just in time to process the referee's words. "…goes to Drake Long!"

As she looked up, the handsome Monk was already there, offering her a hand up. His punch had knocked both the air and adrenaline from her, leaving her drained, so she took the hand and managed to stand, even though her armor felt even heavier than usual.

"Are you alright?" He asked

Tisara nodded sheepishly. "I thought I'd be able to take more than one hit from you, though…"

Drake chuckled. "I hit pretty hard. That's kind of what Monks do. You should visit the Tower, and pick an advanced Class."

Tisara nodded. At forty, there were now skills she was missing out on by not choosing. "I'll do that. Your Class's knight, Sethis, he chose Blood, didn't he?"

Drake nodded. From what he understood, not unlike Death Knights in World of Warcraft, Dark Knights could choose a type of magic to specialize in that affected every single one of their other skills. He wasn't privy to the whole list, as some classes were more private or obscure than others, but Blood, Frost, and Shadow magic were options he was aware of. "He's saving up for a change. His new skills are situational, and he doesn't care for them. Said he wants to go with Frost or Shadow."

"Well. If we're partying up, have him go Frost. I'm choosing Shadow." Tisara stated plainly, as she sheathed her weapon, and started walking off.

"I'll let him know." Drake answered, walking back to his part of the field.




What followed next was essentially the same series of events. He'd face one of his First Year peers, message them, they'd eagerly accept his invite, and take full advantage of the double experience buffs. Oddly enough, the Headmaster, who was among the teachers watching from their magically constructed seats floating above the field, seemed oddly pleased, which was fine by Drake. The old elf was abrasive, but he'd put up with a lot of new, rapid changes forced upon him by his Gods. Drake also suspected this lopsided bracket full of First Years was meant to level them up the whole time.

Despite their best efforts, only the tanks who'd raided the Wallow managed to survive more than a single punch from the Monk, and to their frustration, he hadn't needed many more than that to bring their health down. Ki Block was turning out to be quite a damaging skill, and with the limit on how many times he could jab his opponent's Ki points removed, and how fast his Monk fists were, he could deliver rather effective bursts of damage.

He also found he could apply Ki Block to other skills. It made Dragon Palm's stun effect last longer, and his Flurry of Blows follow up attack now did quite a lot of damage. He hadn't needed his other skills so far, as they wouldn't do much against opponents in heavy armor, and most tank classes had skills that could divert, nullify, or even absorb elemental attacks. It seemed his skills that used Ki were harder for them to block, which was useful to know. Any monsters with similar tank builds would have the same problem. Probably.




In the end, he'd chosen his ten picks for their forty man Raid Party, and according to Vincent, each of his pick's fellow party members had already expressed an interest in joining. Joining Sethis, Bjorn, the Valentis twins, Thalondor, and Orlok, was a sturdy Battle Master Half Elf named Rion Denor, whose mastery of efficient tactics and skill usage had impressed Drake more than the others. He'd also managed to KO his way through the entire rainbow of Drakes, just in time for the one minute warning. Borge, the Boarkin Guardian Fighter of Wu Kong's Class Eight also managed to impress him, though he relied a bit too much on his artifact weapon, it was easy to see why. It was incredibly versatile.

As Drake continued to One Punch Monk his way through the tanks of his year, the last two worried him. Robert Eisenmensch was exactly what Drake had expected, as he took the field. Handsome, High Human, and obscenely wealthy. The Holy Knight had to have an Alternate Job as some sort of Artificer offshoot, for as he accepted Drake's invite, the clever nepo baby announced to all watching, "I created this armor myself! It's not quite Artifact Tier yet…but it is powerful! More than enough for a Raid."

Robert hit a metallic sphere on his chest, and Drake smirked as it started glowing bright blue with energy his eyes told him was just electricity. Red and gold heavy armor spread out to cover his body, shielding him in what was, to Drake's eyes, a passable recreation of the Iron Man suit in the style of Arcadia's knight armor. After punching so many tanks, Drake was starting to realize they all shared a similar style, one he'd noted that the Triarchy's military also wore, albeit in different colors.

The armor lit up with magic as it powered on, and as the helmet encased his face, two light blue eyes burned to life on the golden faceplate. He took a fighting stance, opened his palms, and began charging them with what Drake saw was an elegant blend of magitech, and magic circles designed to, if he understood what he was seeing, enhance Robert's skills.

Drake barely noticed the ref shout to start the match, and it was only once Eisenmensch fired off an all too familiar energy pulse from his palms that Drake grinned, and dodged with a swirling step. He knew just from proximity that there was too much heat and power in those blasts to deflect them by hand. It was a good thing his gauntlets could strike targets at a distance. Yet, as Robert continued to fire focused magic pulses, Drake found his gauntlets were still taking electrical damage, which surged into black cloak, and KO'd him quickly.

Purple Drake changed tactics, matching the barrage with Ki Blasts, and that finally made the knight cease his barrage. It had taken him two seconds to determine Drake could fire his blasts longer than he could. Thus, he switched to melee, and though Drake really should've expected it, he was still caught off guard as Eisenmensch rocketed forward with blasts from his boots, and the magic enchanting his fist armor activated, rapidly and significantly increasing their melee damage. Drake now understood why he had no weapon. His fists were the weapon.




"Nice fists…" Purple grunted in pain, as he caught them on his gauntlets, and began taking damage from the rapidly heating metal. "Seems I'm starting a trend…"

Robert quipped right back. "I saw you fighting in the Wallow…I was halfway through making a sword, when I realized…I could save a lot of energy, time, and materials by just punching!" He broke the grapple, struck again, but once again, purple cloak caught the fists. "I was also able to crank the damage bonus higher than a sword could withstand! Like this!" The gauntlets flared with magic again, light blue and rapidly, they lit up the area, and blew away purple cloak Drake in the same move.

Robert managed to punch all the way to red, by the time the one minute warning hit. Despite his armor, Drake had been hammering him through his clones throughout the fight too. Eisenmensch learned in those last few seconds the same thing that Drake had. Just being able to perceive one's opponent moving faster, didn't mean you could block them. Two Ki Block strikes to his abdomen and faceplate sent the Holy Knight onto his ass.

Drake, however, was grinning wide. Robert clearly worshiped Galdurath, instead of Laurelin, but it seemed the God of Knowledge's holy followers were still every bit as potent as his wife's.

​

His final tanky opponent was Varian Rynn, and as he strode onto the field, Drake noted a few changes since their Wallow raid. He was no longer sword and board, but rather had become a Dual Weapon Fighter, who apparently still possessed tank skills, likely by way of skill tomes. The system, and the academy, still classified him as a tank. Warriors were one of the oldest classes, with the most branches, so Drake wasn't entirely surprised that someone as rich as Varian had been able to change his class, and afford the tanking skill tomes needed to still keep his role in his party.

Varian raised one of his new swords, an Artifact tier weapon he'd gotten from the Wallow's final chest, towards Drake. Apparently, and unsurprisingly, practicing with it had led to its current dual-sword form. "I don't need your E.X.P. rainbow. Fight me properly, Monk Hero!"

Drake winced. Varian was over seventy after the raid, but he'd hoped he'd gain at least one level. "That's a lot of experience to miss out on…are you sure, Varian?"

The heavy armored warrior roared, and charged towards him, swords drawn. So Drake obliged him.




With fighters like Varian, even his defensive Monk skills would be tested. Drake was also much more aware of just how squishy he was. The goblins had never really managed to land enough hits to highlight that weakness, but facing his peers, competent opponents all of them, had made him realize through his images that he might be more durable, but his Health Points were not. He set blue cloak where he'd been standing to just chill there and look pretty with his Waterbending aura active, while Drake closed the distance with Varian.

They were a blur of limbs, and Drake winced as the swords easily cut into him. Their clash was brief, but bloody, but Drake gave as good as he got. He also decided distance was the smart play. He summoned a Dragon Pillar between him and Varian and the massive eruption of stone and molten stone damaged the tanky fighter quite badly, then, Drake sent a stream of water pulled from the air around them into the newly raised magma spewing pillar. Steam filled the air, and though Varian leapt straight into the cooled pillar, shattering it and ending the steam, Drake had already expanded it to cut off his sight.

Between the Waterbending Aura and his Life Giving Fist, Drake hit Varian through the steam enough to recover quite a lot of health. Then, he gained more distance, just as the warrior decided to spin in place, using his Whirlwind skill to dissipate the steam cloud. He looked up to see Drake floating in the air, green Ki Lightning dancing around his body as he guided it, and then struck Varian.

To his credit, the warrior sliced at the lightning, but Drake was in full control of it. It coiled around his weapon, straight into his armor, where it effectively electrocuted Varian where he stood, both stunning and damaging him. The heavy mithril plated High Human fell to a knee, smoking, and unarmed as the referee called the match.




Once Varian was healed, he walked off without a word to the victorious, but tiring Monk. Everything his images felt, he eventually did too. So far though, getting bodied by Rion's Battle Master skills had hurt more than Eisenmensch's fists or Varian's swords.

With the tank portion of his ridiculous gauntlet now over, Drake wondered which of the damaging classes he'd face first. Healers rarely participated in tournaments like this, both because they lacked enough attack power to win, and on principle. It was universally agreed upon that their role was to heal the fighters, and keep everyone alive. Instructor Hollowbranch was currently in charge of this, though Drake spied several First Year healers helping her out, Rose among them.

"Drake Long's next opponent will be the current lowest ranked damage dealer in Year One! Wu Kong, please report to the field!"

Drake looked over, as his disciple flipped onto the field from the stands to applause. Florian's song had made him an overnight school celebrity, and of course, once they were both on the field, the crowd started singing the chorus to The Monk and the Monkey, and how they smelled kinda funky.




The cocky monkey grinned at Drake. "You look tired, Master." He cracked his knuckles.

Drake smirked. "Not too tired for you, Wu Kong." He fell into his Dragon Stance, and gestured for the Siminid to bring it, while simultaneously inviting Wu Kong to his party.

"I know how your Item works!" Wu Kong declared. "All I have to do is smash the rainbow, and you, and then I'll be the Monk advancing!"

Drake gave his Disciple a wide smirk. "I've been taking it easy on you, Monkey…but no more."

And with two Steps of the Wind, the Monks leapt into combat.