All thirteen of the Elite Reward boxes were opened at once, and the golden light rose to a level that blinded everyone’s senses. Even Karl’s thermal vision couldn’t see anything.
Then, they were in a new setting, all of them together, sitting on the ground in front of a massive golden chest.
“Well, that is new. Perhaps it’s a group prize for the group fight?” Karl suggested.
“That’s not the most insane thought that I had when I saw it.” Lotus agreed.
The beasts had been forcibly relocated back into their spaces, and were currently trapped, as Remi found out when she tried to leave to go explore the huge metal box.
Lotus was practically vibrating with excitement, far beyond even the curiosity of Remi, so Tessa pushed her forward, letting the Nature Priestess be the one to open the giant box.
Of course, she had to climb it first, as she couldn’t reach the lid, but anyone else in the group would have had to do the same.
Once she got near the top, she found a good foothold on a larger decoration, and wedged the bottom of her staff into the joint to pry the lid up. However, it was not a multi-ton solid gold box, but a magic reward chest, and it opened with the slightest of effort, sending Lotus tumbling down into Tessa’s waiting arms.
“I knew you were going to fall off the box.” The War Cleric laughed.
They backed away, and the box unfolded into a large golden platform with a spinning prize wheel in the centre.
All of the sectors had question marks on them, making the Knights and most of Karl’s team glare at the random reward mechanism in annoyance.
Couldn’t it just tell them what they were getting? Or was there some sort of luck involved?
Luck was a very real factor, and they all carried Holy Stones and charms to increase their own, but it really came down to who had the most favour of the World Dragon.
“Is one of you particularly favoured among the Gods? I would guess one of the High Clerics?” The female Knight asked.
“Actually, the one with the World Dragon’s Luck is Karl. The rest of us were drawn into his nonsense.” Tessa explained.
The Knight nodded her head. “I can see how that would happen. He’s certainly not the average Elite, so there was bound to be something else favouring him.”
“It also means I get to take the blame when they don’t approve of the outcomes, so I guess I will be the one spinning the wheel.” Karl agreed.
The others laughed and motioned him forward, even Lotus, who Karl knew secretly really wanted to spin the wheel.
He didn’t torture the little cleric any longer, heading straight for the wheel, which felt warm in his hand when he grabbed one of the pegs to give it a spin.
There was an arrow shaped ticker at the bottom, marking the location of the winning prize, while the wheel itself extended far above Karl’s head.
“Alright, here we go.”
Karl gave the wheel a spin, and the ticker began rapidly clicking away as the pegs flew by. The bearings must have been well greased, Karl thought, as the wheel just kept spinning for most of a minute before slowing to a stop.
The clicking got slower and slower, headed for one of many anonymous spots on the wheel.
Then Lotus darted forward, and grabbed the wheel in an attempt to drag it to a stop. But that wasn’t happening, and the wheel simply carried her up into the air before coming to rest on a prize with one final click.
Lotus looked down, confused. That wasn’t how wheels worked. If you made them heavy on one side, the heavy side ended up on the bottom. She was one hundred percent certain of that.
[Prize Confirmed] appeared in the air between Karl and the rest of the group as he gently removed the cleric from the wheel and returned to the others.
[Shared Prize Awarded] Three Months’ Peak Rate Growth
There was a pause as everyone tried to understand what they were being given. What sort of reward was that? How did one even measure what three months worth of growth would be, and how would it even be awarded?
New knowledge of how to use his skills entered Karl’s mind as golden light began to glow from the box. It engulfed the group for a few seconds, and then faded again, but left everyone feeling energized and enlightened.
As the reward bonus settled in, a surprising realization came to Karl’s mind. He had what he needed to advance. He had a Royal Rank skill of his own, a Royal Rank pet, and more than enough stored energy to make the conversion. He even knew how to break the bottleneck smoothly.
How much of the three months that would have taken him on his own was a mystery, but one thing that he knew for certain was that Hawk was not happy.
He wasn’t far from advancing, and Karl had stolen his spot in line because the rewards only went to him and not to all of them.
They would get their share after Karl advanced, both in excess energy and in the improved spaces that would come as a result of his advancement, but those were minor details in the mind of Hawk.
Karl wasn’t the only one that was enjoying an advancement, though. Dana and Ophelia were both surging with power, and Lotus was glowing with a happy green light that had to mean she had made it to Commander Rank.
The Clergy were going to freak out when they met High Priestess Lotus, and it was going to be spectacular.
The effects slowly faded, and the group began to pay attention to more than what was going on with themselves.
“Dammit, I’m so close I can taste it.” Bob muttered as the last of the glowing light faded to nothingness.
“I take it you got caught at the bottleneck?” Karl asked.
Bob nodded and sighed. “I am missing something, and I can feel the lingering buildup of energy, but I don’t have something that I need to break the bottleneck and move on to Royal Rank.
I think it might just be practical experience with my new skills that will let me move on. Or perhaps I just don’t have a skill that’s quite good enough yet, and I need to master one of my stronger ones.
But either way, I think it’s just a matter of practice now.”
The five Knights all nodded in agreement. “We’re not quite that far yet, but I’m certainly close to the bottleneck, and about to start looking for a way to break it. With this sort of bump, we might not need to use the resource stack to break through.”
Karl was familiar with that. It was a combination that burnt out the Elite’s potential to get them past the bottleneck. Either they would be Royal Rank forever, or they might even shoot into the Monarch or Overlord Ranks and then stay there.
It would be a shame for Elites as talented as these ones to take that way out. They didn’t seem like the sorts that had built their foundation on resource abuse, so they should have the potential to get through the bottleneck on their own.
