Umbra Frontier Online – A Casual Playthrough of the Umbra Witch

"Come on, girl. Over here~"

"Woof!"

Sanae and I have started playing with Lily as the quest required. And although Lily is a golem puppy, she's still a cute pupper and a good girl who loves to cuddle.

"There you go. You love it when I touch it here, don't you?"

"Woof woof!"

"Hey, Yoru. It's my turn now. Let me pat her too." Sanae pulled on my arm, wanting to cuddle with Lily too.

"A few more minutes. You had fun with her when I was preparing food for Mavis, didn't you?"

"That was that. This is now. And I want to cuddle with her, so give her here."

"Noo! Later!"

"Hey! Don't you run away from me, Yoru!"

"Woof!"

Sanae started chasing me around the house while I was carrying Lily in my arms. We made sure not to get in the way of Mavis who is working on the cores we got for her in the corner. 

Eventually, Sanae caught up and tackled me to the ground, whereby she snatched Lily from my hands and began cuddling with her.

"You're so cute, Lily. I wished you were real."

"Woof!" Lily happily licked Sanae's face with her golem tongue, bringing joy to Sanae who found it adorable.

Dammit. They look happy together.

I decided to let them be for the time being and moved towards Mavis's side to see how she's carrying out her research and analysis.

She first cracked open the core with a small hammer, revealing some sort of incomprehensible scribbled text engraved on the inside of the core which she took out a small magnifying glass to carefully read and study it. Afterwards, she took a small, worn-out notebook out and flipped the pages, as if to translate the text on the core with the content in her notebook.

"Mm... Mm..." She made that sound, nodding her head as if understanding something before researching on another core using another tool.

The process repeats from there with slightly different variations in the procedure. At some point after watching, it became blatantly obvious that Mavis's research methods were pre-programmed by the devs and purposely made vague so that the players wouldn't be able to follow the process.

Smart... but also lame...

Back to Lily and Sanae, I returned. Joining them in their fun as I started playing with them.

Or to be more exact, I played with Sanae while she played with Lily.

"Eep! Yoru...? What are you doing?" Sanae let out a small screech when I went behind her and caressed her tummy.

"It's payback for what you did earlier." I answered and began squeezing her plump body.

"Ara Ara~ What a soft body you have. Your tummy is all squishy. What about your thighs?" I then moved my right hand down to touch them, as Sanae softly moaned.

"Yoru... Stop... Your hands are tickling me. Ahh~"

"Woof!"

"Hey now... Don't neglect Lily, Akatsuki. She looks like she wants you to play with her more."

"I-I can't do that. Not when you're— ah~! —making me feel weird..."

Her reaction, her embarrassed red face, and the sensation of her character's body which feels just as real as her real one. All of it is just making me want to tease her more. In which case, I can't blame Sanae for doing the same to me earlier.

 But more importantly...

"Now you know my pain, don't you?"

"More like pleasure. Aah~!"

Sanae seemed to have not learned her lesson, so I carried on with the teasing caress. However, as I continued to feel her to my delight, I was beginning to think that Sanae may be liking it instead of being opposed to it.

"Sanae, are you actually enjoying it?"

"No, I'm— Aahnn~!"

"Woof! Woof!"

"Even Lily seems to think otherwise."

"And how could you possibly know th— Mmm~♡"

"I am fluent in dog."

"Liar!"

"Woof! Woof!"

"Ah, wait! Lily! Don't lick me there!"

Lily began to join in to have her own fun after Sanae had stopped playing with her because of me. Licking and rubbing her golem body on the parts of Sanae's body where it is ticklish for her.

"Good girl. Let's work together, shall we?"

"Woof!"

And thus, Lily joined my team as we tagged-team Sanae in a tickling/caressing attack.

"Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha! Stop it! Stop it! Hahahahaha— Aahnnn~ Not there!!!"

"Show no mercy, girl. Give her all of your love!"

"Woof!"

And thus, this joy of ours lasted for a while longer until Mavis was finally done with her research and spoke to us.

"Dear adventurers, thank you so much for taking care of Lily while I was busy. I hope she didn't trouble you at all, did she?"

"Nope. Absolutely not. Right, Akatsuki?" I turned to Sanae, who was panting heavily, catching her breath after the play Lily and I did on her.

"Y-Yeah... No problems... at all." She answered, then dropped to the ground. Making me genuinely concerned as I thought I might have overdone it.

"Hey, are you alrigh—" I was about to ask her while giving her a hand.

But Sanae grabbed my hand and bit it instead as she then looked up into my eyes, pouting, and said, "You big dummy."

Cute.

"Umm, dear adventurers?" Mavis then called out to us, as we had rudely ignored her mid-conversation.

"Oh. Sorry." I apologised to the NPC. "So was there anything you've learned from your research?"

"Why yes, actually! Those Meth cores you've brought for me really helped me understand their self-sustainability. It was all due to the ancient runes engraved inside of their cores."

She's talking about those scribbles, right?

"I see. So then if you were to put one of those cores into Lily, she would become self-sustainable, right?" I asked, to which Mavis shook her head.

"No. I can't do that. These cores also have specific orders and instructions written in them along with their self-sustainability programme. What's more, they were corrupted by Fa— by an Umbra Lord to transform the golems into Meths." Mavis explained, dropping a small hint of lore as she did.

"Transform? What do you mean by that?" Sanae asked her, just as I was about to.

Mavis made a grimace expression on her face, looking like she was feeling shame before explaining.

"Those Meths... They were once guardians of this village originally known as Emeths. Created by my grandfather to safeguard Akahram and its people from any threats."

"Your grandfather, huh? Does that mean you are..."

"Yes. This village, Akahram, was once a place I called home. My family was from a line of alchemists who lived here and studied the art of alchemy for centuries. Grandfather in particular was an exceptional alchemist who excels in golem-crafting. Thus, created the Emeths to protect the village he was born and grew up in. The villagers praised his name everyday for his contributions. That is until, one day, he created his ultimate masterpiece: My Father..."

"Wait, what?" I exclaimed, astounded by what I just heard.

"Your father is a golem!?" Sanae exclaimed as well, having the same reaction as I do.

"No. My father is human. The golem I called my 'Father' was created after his death when I was a child, as it was modelled after him."

"Ok... I'm confused."

"Me too."

"Well... As an alchemist, golem-crafting wasn't the only thing we did. Potion-crafting, artifact-crafting and item-enchantment are what we do as well. So while heading out early in the morning one day to gather materials for his potion-crafting, my father met his demise at the hands of a monster that easily overpowered the Emeth he had for escort. When his escort Emeth returned with his body before losing its functions as well, it was already too late. My father had already passed, and my family and I were devastated by his death. My mother went crazy afterwards and drowned herself in the river. Her body was found the next morning, already cold. As a result, only Grandfather and I were left in our family."

Holy shit! That's dark. It's appropriate for this world's setting, but geezus... that's a lot of backstory to take in.

"The loss of my parents affected me more than it did my grandfather. Because of that, he created a unique Emeth for the sake of my well-being. That Emeth being one I called 'Father'. As for my 'Mother', he didn't have the time to complete it so it was never made." Mavis continued.

"What happened to regular therapy?" I asked out loud.

"Yeah, I was wondering that too." Sanae added.

"I was happy at that time..."

Oh. She's going to just continue then.

"...Even though it wasn't my real father, I was happy to see him again." Mavis smiled, reminiscing about her past.

But, her expression then turned grim as she carried on.

"However, one day, an evil fairy showed up in my grandfather's workshop and turned 'Father' into a sentient living creature. But, it wasn't human. It became a horrifying monster that corrupted all of the Emeths in the village, turning them hostile towards the people they were supposed to protect, which forced us all out of Akahram or we would have been killed. Then, the darkness took over the land and 'Father' became one of the Umbra Lords with the fairy as his support."

"Wait, so does that mean the evil fairy you talked about creates Umbra Lords, or was your 'Father' made to become an Umbra Lord after he drove you all out?" I asked curiously.

"I do not know. But ever since that day, the villagers who once praised my grandfather, all turned to insulting him and shaming his name as an alchemist. Grandfather passed away not long after, with his reputation dishonoured as the man who created an Umbra Lord." Mavis paused for a second after that, as if remembering the moment she spoke of with a sad look on her face.

"I wanted to clear his name..." She added next. "That's why I became an alchemist and came back to this village in hopes to restore it and bring honour back to my grandfather's name. But... I did not learn my grandfather's trades. I was young back then and was only a beginner alchemist, so I didn't have the skills to learn then. My father... My real father did, but you know what happened to him. I had to teach myself everything that I have learned today."

"So you're self-taught? Not bad."

"Indeed. That's pretty amazing."

Not that we know how hard it is for one to study alchemy...

Sanae and I listened to Mavis's backstory till the end. But the big question is, what's next?

The quest has yet to mark completion and a new task has yet to appear in place of it. So we're probably assuming that this is the part where Mavis will give us our next objective for the Chain Quest.

"Dear adventurers, thank you for listening to my story and your help in my research. But if I may... Can I ask you for one final request?"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chain Quest: [The Ruined Village & The Alchemist Pt. 3]

Objective: Play with Lily while waiting for Mavis to be done. (Cleared!)

Reward: [10,000 gold], [50 Elixirs]

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

-Choose a path for the next Chain Questline- (Warning: Once a path has been chosen, it cannot be retracted.)

[The Ruined Village & The Alchemist Pt. 4]

OR

[The Ruined Village & The Alchemist Pt. EX]

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

And here it is! But wait, what is this?

"They're giving us a choice for the quest now???"

"It seemed so."

There are part 4 and part EX, which likely means "extra". Sanae and I looked at each other, immediately knew which choice we would pick and nodded. Then we turned to Mavis and replied, "Of course. What is your request?" while picking the latter option: Part EX!

After all, that option seemed more interesting than choosing part 4 of the questline. And so...

As soon as we picked that, Mavis bowed to us with gratitude before stating her request.

"Northwest from the village here, there is an old abandoned chapel. It was my grandfather's workshop where he made all of his creations and is now where 'Father' resides. My request, dear adventurers, is for you to... defeat the Umbra Lord of Marionettes for me. Please..."

Mavis lowered her head again with desperation in her voice, as a new quest window then popped up in our faces.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Chain Quest: [The Ruined Village & The Alchemist Pt. EX] acquired!

Objective(s): [Raid] Defeat the Umbra Lord of Marionettes (0/1)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Errrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr....."

I think we messed up.

I stared at the blue screen baffled by the new task we were given. I turned to look at Sanae then to see that she, too, was stunned by it as well with her jaw hanging wide open.

"Yoruto..." She suddenly called me using my real name. "Did we accidentally just start a Raid Quest?"

"I'm pretty sure we did." I looked at my quest screen, confirming that what I had read was true, as I hung my head in defeat after that.

"Why did we pick part EX...?"

"Well on the bright side, we'll likely be the first ever players to face a raid boss." Sanae said optimistically.

"Yeah, but it's not like we'll be able to beat one. We're only two people!" I shut her statement down.

"Technically, thirty-three including us." Sanae retorted, referring to Bane and her summons.

"As if they will be enough. Only Bane is the most suitable to fight with us. The rest will just be fodder for the boss."

""Hmmmmm..."" We pondered on what we should do now that we've gotten the quest.

"Should we go back to Arialight and find some players to help us out?" I suggested.

"That's fine and all, but I'm not sure how well we would with strangers in a team. Plus, I kind of want to reap the rewards for myself. Because from what I've learned about raids in the game, the boss rewards are distributed based on the number of players in the raid. Meaning more players give lesser reward, while fewer players give more reward."

"You greedy *****." I said blatantly to Sanae's face.

"Indeed I am!" Sanae puffed her chest out proudly at my insult, however.

Then, we laughed for a good minute.

"Alright. That's enough. We need to address the matter at hand." I then said, suddenly stopping my laughter.

"Agreed." Sanae stopped as well, expressing a deadpan look on her face.

Now what in the world should we do for this quest?

Having allies to help out in the raid is good and all. But just like Sanae, I, too, want to reap the rewards for myself. Especially after hearing about what Sanae informed me regarding raids in this game. However, the two of us are still unlikely to defeat a raid boss successfully.

"Therefore, the best path we should take is to have a small number of allies in our raid. Around five or six. A single party basically. So that the rewards wouldn't be so little as a result."

"Indeed. That is the best course of action we should take. However, those allies of ours must also be strong or we will face defeat for sure."

"Indeed. Our allies must be strong..." I looked down at Sanae when she said that.

"What?" She looked back at me, wondering about my stare.

"Akatsuki, you're only level 20." I said.

"And you're only level 25." She retorted.

As we understood that our current levels aren't good enough, we waved goodbye to Mavis and Lily and went outside to do one thing.

"Akatsuki, toggle your Night Walker skill off and bring Bane out. It's time to grind."

"Already done that, Yoru. You should do the same too if you haven't yet."

Our Night Walker skills have been toggled off.

Lampy is resting peacefully in my cleavage while Sanae's Lamp Bug is in her inventory.

Bane is out.

And I cast my skill.

"Multi-Mirror Make."

First, on myself.

"""Multi-Mirror Make!"""

Then, on Bane.