There were few things Naea liked less than being separated from Grant. He was the type to get himself into far more trouble than he could handle on his own, and never seemed to stop and try a new angle if his first didn’t work. There was a charm in the fact that he managed to brute force his ideas to fruition, but it was lost on Naea because she was the one who had to pick up the slack.

For example, right now. It had been a few hours since Grant had entered the Elite dungeon and their connection was muted. In that time, Naea had been doing her best to follow the task Grant left her. “Help Nolan protect his daughters,” he had said. A noose around her neck, more like. The little one, Sarah, wasn’t a bother. If there wasn’t a Trial Wave ongoing, Naea might even have enjoyed spending time with the girl.

It was the awkward Wolf Aspect one that Naea couldn’t handle right now.

She had no compunction to discover the ins-and-outs of the relationship drama which continued to unfold with each passing fight. The populace of Londimin had found shelter, and at the front of that battle line was Nolan. Which meant, so was Lucy. It was an interesting quirk of fate that the rebellious wolf girl they had met in the woods happened to be the daughter of the only helpful person in Londimin, but that’s all it was. Naea knew the System didn’t matchmake like that.

Which was a big part of the reason she didn’t care about the missing mother at the heart of their drama. Maisie was a nice name, at least. Naea focused not on the bickering between father and daughter, but instead on doing what she could in this unending tide of monsters. Her Chibizashi swung nearly constantly, though even that got boring quickly. During one of the rare breaks he took, Naea decided to shake things up and bother Nolan.

It was all just no fun without Grant, but she could make her own, maybe.

“Is there anything I can do, Nolan?” She asked, hoping he would say no. Of course, the man was frustratingly prepared and gave her directions to a shelter they hadn’t been able to clear yet. Londimin had a few expensive raid shelters which had protections that Grant hadn’t managed to mess up when he threw his tantrum.

“There are people there who need help.” Nolan finished, as though that mattered to Naea. It was something to do, that was enough. Boredom combined the spark of disorder flared in Naea’s chest as she got an idea.

“Come with me?” Directing the question to Lucy, who was basically just staring daggers at her father, seemed to shake both of them. As Lucy clambered to agree, Nolan’s voice rose over the top of her acceptance.

“Absolutely not!” He shouted. I folded my arms. There was a veritable war going on around us. Nolan had only placed his large two handed sword to the side for a moment’s rest to reorganise the defence. Without Dao wielders to fight back, the powerful monsters were taking a pound of flesh with each push. Naea tapped the wounded and gave them a burst of healing mana to fuel their recovery. She couldn’t give more, as she didn’t know how long she would need to last.

Holding back their second strongest fighter was short-sighted and selfish. “Does it make you more correct if you’re louder?” Naea asked, meeting Nolan’s gaze until he looked away with a blink. “Lucy is the most capable of coming with me. Do you think the people in that shelter are likely to trust me when I tell them to follow?” Naea left out that Lucy was looking more likely to tear Nolan’s head off than a monster’s if he kept holding her back.

When the trial wave had started, the girl had basically crashed through a wall into Nolan’s apartment. Sarah had hugged the large wolf with a giggle, and the revelation of the sisters' shared secret had caused a rift. Now he was being stubborn, ignoring his daughter and stifling her when people needed help. Naea could understand being scared, but this?

“I let Grant go alone into a dungeon that might be too strong for him. You can send your daughter to help people.” The fairy gestured her head, no longer waiting for an answer. “Pick up your sword and get back to fighting, Nolan. We’ll save your town.” There was more venom in her words than she normally gave out, but people were dying. Grant might be-

“Thank you,” a surprisingly timid voice came from Naea’s left. She had started off and got trapped in her own thoughts. “He’s just scared of losing me like he did our mum.” Naea contained the groan. How had she not seen this coming? Of course she was going to get the entire backstory now.

“Where did you lose her?” Naea asked. It seemed a silly thing to lose, a mother and wife, but what did she know about keeping humans where they were meant to be? She considered the fact that Grant disappeared more often than she knew his whereabouts and shook her head.

Stolen story; please report.

“When the Shift happened.” The pair of them had passed the defensive boundary now. Their conversation was interrupted on occasion by a stray monster, but with the pair of them together, any that came close were easily dispatched. “She was working in a different part of the city and then the world tore itself apart.”

Naea tackled a nearby ogre in the side of the head. The massive lug moaned in pain and stumbled, falling to its knee from the blow. The wolf girl slashed out along its neck with her nails, extended to sharp claws by her magic. The two were a good team, leaving the dangerous monster behind within seconds. “Ah, so she could still be alive out there,” Naea nodded.

“She is alive!” Lucy snapped. “Sorry, it’s just Dad doesn’t even care that she could be out there somewhere.” Naea didn’t have the greatest understanding of humans, but she doubted that was true based on what she did know. She didn’t say anything immediately, letting the statement sit between them as they cleared the front of the shelter of monsters.

It seemed the monsters had been drawn by the magic, or maybe the smell of humans. Naea wasn’t a traditional monster in that sense, so she wasn’t quite sure what it was that compelled them to kill as they did. Half of the species involved in the Trial Wave were peaceful most of the time, after all. Naea gestured to the beasts pounding on the solid, mana-guarded walls of the shelter.

Lucy said nothing, her clothes disappearing into her inventory at the same time that fur began to grow underneath. Her proportions shifted, starting with her torso and hips. Her legs shortened, bowing in the middle slightly, while her arms lengthened. The skin on her face peeled away and Naea found herself hoping it wasn’t painful. “Does that hurt? Because it looks like it really hurts.”

The wolf didn’t answer, claws digging into the floor. A growl filled the air, causing some of the more prey-based monsters to flinch and look. There was no getting out of the way as the wagon-sized wolf barreled through the mess. This was the main reason Naea had brought Lucy with her. Her time with the fledglings had not been for nothing, Naea had found that she quite enjoyed teaching. She especially enjoyed showing someone the path to their first Dao awakening.

Lucy was on the cusp, and just needed a little more rebellion in her life. Wolves were simple, after all. Naea’s connection to the System and time as a teacher had caused some things to just make sense to her now. Such as how one should act and feel to connect to a certain Dao. Nolan wanted his daughter to be safe, without letting her be strong. That same daughter wanted to be protected by her father, while not needing it. Both of them were adorable, but getting in each other’s way.

Halfway through her rampage, Naea called Lucy back. The distraction caused her to receive a nasty punch to the snout, and the rage filled howl that pierced the air was nearly perfect. Just one last step of resonance, Naea judged. Lucy’s wolven form began to tear into the monsters around her again. Naea nodded in satisfaction. Out of curiosity, she tapped the defences of the shelter with her finger.

After pulling herself out of the opposite wall and glaring at the powerful enchantments, she returned to her position as if nothing had happened. She hoped the Naea shaped implant in the building across the road wasn’t too noticeable. No wonder the other monsters were just milling around the front. A giant frog hopped by and spotted her, lashing its tongue her way with blinding speed.

Naea used Sparkstep to walk along its outstretched tongue in an instant, burying the blade of her sword up to its hilt in its brain. The nasty thing jolted about a few times, and Naea just rolled her eyes. Grant really had given her the babysitting job this time. With a quick burst of energy, Naea shot high into the air. The main command post was fine. Tumbling through the air, she could only sigh.

Grant had better bring her something nice from the dungeon or she would be really upset. A few juicy boss monsters, a nice Guidance Stone perhaps. Naea continued to imagine the possibilities as she destroyed monster after monster. She was gaining levels, but slowly due to the challenge before her. When the enemies were as simple to destroy as insects, the System didn’t reward nearly as much power. Then, there was the fact that without Grant nearby, every tiny bit of experience was worth less than it should be.

A whistling howl filled the air. Naea’s short, black hair stood on end as magic passed over her with violence and pain at its fore. People were running away from a specific direction, scattering outwards like a firework, so Naea rushed in the direction opposite to them. Unsurprisingly, there was a gnarled beast at the end of her path which dwarfed any of the others she had seen.

Dao had been evolving left and right among the people of Londimin. In the face of adversity, with enemies using the power themselves, it was never as easy for those able to fight to grasp the power and make it their own. Where it happened, the deaths began to stop and the equilibrium moved over to the defenders side. Naea arrived just in time to see a man she had healed earlier in the day being skewered on a thorny root before the root dragged his lifeless body underground.

Trial Wave Boss Monster - Wriggling Rafflesia - Level 65

The boss monster was a few levels higher than Naea, and where the fairy was specialised to be quick, the massive plant was specialised to be an asshole. Massive petals covered in steel spikes sat atop a squat stem. A crimson red base to the petal and the white of its thorns made them look like tongues with teeth. At the ground level, leaves covered the ground for a massive area. It was from within those grounded leaves that vines and roots sprouted to attack. It made Naea miss her Fairy Garden back home.

Londimin was a dive compared to Ascentown but you had to start somewhere, Naea supposed. Levelling the Chibizashi at the Trial Wave boss monster, wishing Julianna with her impressive firepower were here, Naea challenged the massive plant. There wasn’t much she could do for the town or for Grant, but she could do this, at least. Or so she thought.

The shock from within the Elite Dungeon was Naea’s downfall. The dulled and muted connection which Naea had been trying her best to ignore exploded with pain and fear and hate. Like being assaulted with a mental attack, Naea took brutal damage to one of her wings, unable to dodge. A sharp, thin twig punctured the thin membrane and tore the flimsy wing apart. Naea returned the high-pitched howl the Wriggling Rafflesia still gave off, not sure if it was her pain or Grant which she was feeling. It felt like-

It felt like Grant was dying.