My New Party Sets Forth

Level one is a breeze.

The instant we enter the Great Dungeon, we mow our way through with absolutely no issue. It was already easy with just Wyll and me, so with a full party, it doesn't even feel like we're facing monsters. It's more like we're out for a walk.

I thought figuring out how to work as a team would take some time, but surprisingly enough, everything just sort of slots into place. Wyll and Leila hang back, while Perri distracts the enemies and I go in for the kill.

The way Perri fights is interesting to watch, I never expected someone so small in stature to be able to swing such a large axe as wildly as she does. Sometimes when she swings it, she goes flying after it, but somehow she makes it work.

Before we know it, we're already at the end of level one.

"That was so quick!" Perri claps her hands excitedly. Then she shoots Leila and Wyll a dirty look, "No thanks to you guys."

"Are you injured?" Leila asks.

"Well, no, but—"

"Pity." And when Perri glares at Leila, she adds with a smirk, "Because I don't get to show off my skills yet, of course."

"We're moving on," I cut off their imminent argument. We put our hands on the floating and glowing orb as one and teleport to level two.

Just like level one, the monsters here are no trouble. Lycans and flame monkeys go down easy, and the occasional level one monsters go down easier. Wyll has more of a role to play here. Sometimes the enemies crowd us, so he slows them down. It takes a bit of getting used to as we have to get out of the way of his spell, but soon enough we make that work as well.

Our first proper test as a party comes in the form of the first mid-boss of level two: the flame gorilla.

Leila makes a face as she retreats behind us, "Look, Perri, you guys could practically be twins. Play nice now."

Perri whirls around and shouts, "What did you say—?"

"Perri, focus," I interrupt. She turns to me, betrayed, but I'm not done, "And Leila, shut up."

Perri shoots Leila a vindicated look, and Leila mimes zipping her mouth shut. Somehow this only seems to annoy Perri further.

I ignore them, "We'll do the usual, Wyll."

Wyll nods determinedly, "Got it!"

The flame gorilla begins its charge towards us, and Perri steps out to the front with her axe readied to defend against it. She doesn't need to, but I let her because it's good to have a backup plan if we fail.

Then, Wyll casts his Waterlog spell from the side, slowing the flame gorilla to a crawl, and I activate my Abyssflame before sending an Abbysflame Slash its way.

The difference is night and day. The swing to fire off the Abbysflame Slash used to take so long, and now it barely takes any time at all. There's still some resistance slowing me down, but it's nothing like it used to be.

The wave of black flame flies through the air and splashes directly against the flame gorilla. As the black flames envelop it, consuming it whole, Perri exclaims, "Thomas, that's amazing! What is that?"

I deactivate my Abyssflame and turn to see that both Leila and she are staring at the rapidly disappearing flames. I forgot these two haven't seen this yet.

"It's a new skill of mine," I answer vaguely, "It does really good damage, so when fighting stronger enemies, we should revolve our strategies around landing this attack on them."

Leila leans in close, "My, my, Thomas. How hard did you work to acquire something like that? The thought of Rex Cranz must haunt you constantly, huh? I imagine you want us to keep it a secret from him as well?"

She's sharp. "Yes," I say. If Rex finds out I have an ability like this, he'll prepare for it, which will lower my chances of victory.

"And now you want to unveil it in your duel with him, how dramatic of you," Leila snickers.

"It's not like that!" Perri protests on my behalf, "He just—"

"It doesn't matter," I cut in, "We're moving on."

Leila gives a lazy salute, "Yes, boss."

We move past where the flame gorilla came from, and as the forest-like area begins opening up, I am faced with a choice. Shall we just keep moving forward or shall we go after the lycan matron again? There is no benefit to the latter, they haven't put a bounty out for it today after all, but I want to challenge it again anyway.

I think I want to see the difference. Last time we barely walked away alive, and our victory was a close one. I want to see how this new party fares against that same enemy.

"Look for lycans. We're hunting for a lycan matron," I announce.

Wyll looks at me, surprised, "Again?"

"Yes," I don't elaborate.

We do the same thing Wyll and I did yesterday—go in the direction where more and more lycans appear. After a while, we find that we're only facing lycans, so when the crystals growing everywhere all turn red, I'm pretty confident that we've come the right way and that we're about to face a lycan matron.

Its grey snout pokes out from a copse of trees, and then the rest of its body slinks out, with its long claws and even longer fangs. It watches us carefully, even though the wild madness in its eyes gives me the impression that it wants to savage us right now.

Then, unlike last time, it throws up its snout and howls. There's no moon, so I don't know what its howling at, but it carries in the air, and I even hear a faint echo.

And then I hear the pattering of paws against the ground. They come from all around us, and through the foliage, I can see eyes shining in the shadows.

Lycans. Many of them.

Well now, this is new.