Vallenna Ameriah Sanguinia, or rather, Val, as she privately preferred, was not having a very good day.

It had all started with a far too early morning, being hounded by their press relations team lead, before having to paste over another incident from D, or Diram Wrathsbane. The huge, bawdy demon just couldn't seem to keep it together, which was actually rather unusual for his clan, even if a few members of demon-kind did behave in a rather crude manner. After paying the news team for their damages, and silence, she had then had to corral the rest of the team into some semblance of order, considering they were deep in the wilderness of this Blood Star's forsaken world. She was really starting to get tired of having to go to all these pre-arranged places to fly the flag, as it were, representing the best of the younger generation as well as the best of their peoples. And it would still be years and years before they could put this tired farce to bed, though it didn't weigh nearly as heavily on the others, particularly the boys, and that is what they were, as it weighed on her. Except for Tyrael, of course, though his stoic indifference to everything could be just as much of a problem as D's wild bender's or Andryn's monumental booze habit.

They had arrived on this world almost a week ago and gotten no help, in terms of information or good PR, from that weak lickspittle of a governor. The woman had only met with them once, and she was rather nervous the whole time, if her constant fidgeting and side-eyed glances were anything to go by. Val had heard of some weird disputes with a trade union or group of trade unions, but she honestly couldn't care less. Babysitting some low-level functionary in some backwater polity was very, very far from the top of her to-do list, and trying to sort out whatever scheme likely had the governor over a barrel was well outside their purview.

She shook herself free of the wayward thoughts as Blue Wave approached her and said, "We're almost ready, Vallenna. We just have to get Ryn sober enough to get moving."

"Give him some Flame Dust, if necessary," Val replied with a sigh.

"He could get addicted to it, if we're not careful…" Blue replied with a note of concern in her voice.

"He knew what he was signing up for when he joined this group," Val snapped back. "If he can't leave the booze alone for even one day, he'll have to deal with some consequences."

"Very well, I'll see that he's ready," Blue said before turning and moving off.

Val sighed again, though she made sure her face remained stoic, before turning to pack her camping house. She had an extremely fine portable home that was made to be stored within a necklace, and she caused the whole thing to fold up and teleport within the gem on the pendant with just a gesture and a thought. She looked around after securing her own resting spot, noting the others starting to pack up their various abodes. Somewhat surprisingly, out of their whole group, Tyrael was the one who slept the roughest, often just using a tarp to cover the spot where he set up his hammock, while Blue Wave practically had a portable palace, far outshining even Val's own portable house.

The press corp was, of course, as with every day, up before any of them, ready to take pictures and hours upon hours of footage of their every move. She had known exactly what it would mean when she had signed up for the program and, as much as she talked about how they all had a choice, the combination of pressures from various groups, including her own family, sort of made that not wholly the truth. Still, for all the headaches and annoyance the group brought, especially with her somehow having wound up the de-facto leader and group chaperone, it brought a plethora of amazing opportunities.

She was brought out of her thoughts by some grumbled cursing rumbling over from the other side of the camp, the sound a clear indicator that Blue Wave had gotten something into Andryn. Hopefully it was Flame Dust and not anything else, but that didn't really bear thinking about any longer than absolutely necessary. She turned and made her way to the center of camp, making sure to walk slowly and steadily and appear in total control, before signaling for the others to gather up. The plan for the day was pretty simple, as it had been for the last few days; find a brand new dungeon and pioneer it, showing off their strength and skill.

The not-so-simple part of the plan was they had basically no idea where this supposed new dungeon was and, worse yet, it was buried in this chain of rugged mountains somewhere. It didn't help that keeping the other eight members of her group in line, and keeping the gaggle of reporters that followed them everywhere happy and interested, was like herding two groups of cats, both groups having attention deficit disorders. Just standing there after giving the commands to get ready and get moving was a fifteen-plus minute ordeal, which was absolutely ludicrous considering everyone there had some kind of storage power or item or backup system that kept their tent or mobile house tucked away. It should have been far less than a minute to have everything packed and moving, but she supposed a fifteen hundred percent increase from what should have been was setting a record for this group.

Once they were all gathered up, and had pretended to have their meeting morning where most of her group ignored her and most of the reporters asked questions they already knew the answers to, they finally set out. Their scout, as usual, was Whispering Storm, a Qilin who utilized the bow and ranged attacks to great effect and was the only one of them that really had any scouting or tracking knowledge. She often took the lead as the group blundered through the wilderness, though Val privately suspected it was much more to get away from the rest of them being unbearable loudmouths than any real desire to scout. Three of the four boys were the worst of it, with Andryn's drinking, Cal's loud bragging about shit he didn't even accomplish himself, and D's desire to fight everything and anything, including the reporters, it was never dull. Or quiet.

Reading on Amazon or a pirate site? This novel is from Royal Road. Support the author by reading it there.

Of the other girls, Blue Wave was nearly as bad herself, though it was more because she enjoyed a wide variety of recreational substances, and was never afraid of trying something new. Surprisingly enough, or maybe unsurprisingly, she was the most aware of the dangers of such things and the least likely of them to get addicted or develop a truly egregious habit. It helped that she was their resident Alchemist, with quite a talent for it, having gotten it to the peak of Journeyman in just a few years.

The other three girls were much less problematic…at least, in the wilds. Alexandria, who was their resident phoenix and the only dedicated caster of the group, walked just ahead of Val. She maintained a relatively cool exterior while on the trail, but once they were back in town would be partying at every high-end joint and noble's house she could weasel her way into. At least that was much easier to keep contained, and even put a positive spin on, versus the rest of this group of nuisances. Whispering Storm was even less a problem, other than her absolute refusal to speak to the press or do any PR work and, considering that was the primary reason their group had been thrown together, it proved a big headache for Val, but wasn't a direct issue. The last member of their group was Victoria, a young angel with an attitude the size of the mountain range they were currently traipsing through and a small group of snobbish servants that didn't help anything at all.

Honestly, just thinking about the others and what they were currently up to started to form a slight headache, and she quickly pulsed her early Silver healing skill to bring it back under control. The morning was just getting started and they would have a very long day today, as she was sure they were finally getting close to their destination. They had been encountering more beasts the further up into the range they hiked, and they had encountered quite a few last evening, it having taken them quite some time to secure a safe campsite. Storm had already notified them of a big group of beasts just ahead, Val sighing as the boys rushed ahead, along with Blue Wave, eager to get into trouble. It was the one negative of Tyrael as well, for all his stoic equanimity; he loved a good fight like nobody's business and would always charge into battle without a second thought.

Val couldn't let a single iota of her frustration or exhaustion show, however, and moved forward quickly in the others' wake, finding them just smashing into a large group of the big cats they had been fighting. They were some kind of lynx with two tails, each with a venomous stinger, and had thick fur that was more like dense metallic bristles than typical feline fur. The damn things weren't that strong but they were fast as hell, leaping around between what trees there were and the scrub that littered the ground, always looking for an angle to bring their tails into play and get a shot of venom in one of Val's group.

Val was a bit of a speedster herself, which meant she was often softening enemies like this up for the rest of the group, along with Storm hitting them with precise shots to the limbs. The rest of the group was built much more around power, other than Tyrael, who leaned far more into the use of the blade than even the other sword wielders. His dedication showed, as he was the only one of them that had gotten a weaponskill to Expert, which made him a very dangerous opponent, particularly for the dumb beasts they were so often battling. The entire rest of the group was brute power in physical form, other than Alexandria, who was brute power in magical form. The phoenix could help Val and Storm with pinning enemies down and crippling them, but she went for big, flashy, overwhelming spells that took forever to cast and were slow-moving, but hit like ten freight trains.

The fight was bloody work, as it always was, but the group of nine took out the few dozen beasts in only about fifteen minutes, Victoria's servants moving in to help clean and dress the kills. In truth, they didn't really need anything from the bodies, even the beast cores, but Val insisted on them maintaining the proper practices, which also served as good PR. It wouldn't look great on camera if they just left piles of corpses laying around without trying to get anything out of them, and they always had to be pandering to the cameras.

Val eventually got them moving again, Storm back to scouting while the boys loudly bragged about the fight they just had. She had to struggle a bit to keep from rolling her eyes, which might be safe, but she had learned that lesson at the start of this whole show three years ago, when she rolled her eyes and scoffed at something one of the others did and it was printed on a news site in a far from flattering light. She had already had good control, but now she kept as stoic and in control as possible, not letting the slightest hint of anything other than perfect calm show.

The morning crawled by, with Val throwing occasional glances towards the sun with just her eyes, as always waiting for it to be evening so she could have a minute's peace. It still wasn't quite lunch time, and they were walking across the shoulder of a mountain, a thick section of rock with a few openings into the mountain, when the first incident occurred. Storm hadn't spotted anything unusual, and they couldn't very well venture down into every cave they passed. Plus, it really looked like the dungeon they were hunting was at the peak located ahead, meaning they had one more mountain to trek. That lack of thoroughness on their part wasn't necessarily something bad or unusual, but it did lead to them being taken by surprise, Val barely managing to suppress the frustrated eyeroll.

As they were crossing the shoulder of rock, with Storm in the lead and the reporters trailing behind, a large slab of rock leaning against the mountainside about twenty feet behind Storm's position suddenly exploded. Weapons were immediately in hands, with the members of the group either taking defensive stances or charging forward, depending on their predilections. Val held a hand up to signal everyone to stop, not that the whole group listened to her, of course. There was a figure in the dust and rubble that was quite humanoid and she didn't want some kind of friendly fire incident with all the press watching…again.

"I told you it was an exit," said a voice.

"Not until I made it an exit," said the person Val could see in the dust, twisting to speak back into the opening.

The person then straightened and moved forward, getting out from the swiftly dissipating cloud and saying, "Ah, sunlight at last! Those tunnels really sucked."

A second person came out behind the first, moving into the open air, and Val was a bit taken aback. The first woman looked human and was slightly tall, given her species, with hair like a lightless sea and cold, piercing blue and silver eyes. She wore some fairly robust armor, though Val noted the quality was distinctly less than what she and her companions were geared in. The second person was even more impressive, some kind of wolf or lupine that had achieved humanization. The second woman had dark, gorgeous red hair, incredibly cute wolf ears atop her head, and a shockingly beautiful face that stole Val's breath. She was also wearing some fairly mediocre gear, other than the claw weapons she had equipped, which Val noticed immediately. After all, she was a fellow claw-user and was immediately drawn to the well-crafted arms, startling a little when she realized they were a set of soulbound weapons. She Identified the two girls out of habit more than anything, curious what they result would be.

Elizabeth Bell, Level 220 Human Brawler

Blood Bell, Level 220 Red Wolf Queen

The two girls noticed the group then, whether it was from her skill or just because the boys were making so much noise that the dead would have been alerted, she wasn't sure. The human turned to look at the boys, and Blue Wave, running towards them, though they didn't show any visible signs of either fright or awe. The human even cocked her head as she scanned them, one of her brows quirking slightly, before she turned to do a quick scan of the area. The red wolf queen had also scanned the area and was now giving the approaching group a dubious look that almost felt…a bit patronizing?