"Again, it doesn't have an ego. It's just a construct. A mount," Hera said as they walked down a corridor that appeared when they all got their rewards. This should be the dungeon's exit.
"It's still a dragon, you have a freaking dragon, and it's bound to you," Adriel replied.
"Yeah, but it's only worth it to move around with it in the water. If I'm moving on the ground, I should still have Nimbus," Hera continued, but she had to stop for a moment to let everyone pass; the Leviathan's Crest was a bit too big for the next leg of the passage. Even Mylo's staff was too tall. Because of that, both of them let everyone walk by before going with the weapons, "Either way. I'm sorry. I know you are upset because of everything I got here."
"I'm not upset. I'm jealous; there is a difference. I'm not holding anything against you; I just really wanted something too," Adriel grumbled.
"Tell you what. Next time something really bad happens in my life and I don't get a reward soon after. I'll give you a call, and we can run a dungeon to see if you can get some nice rewards," Hera suggested.
"Oh, I want in on that one too," Alex perked up.
"Me too," Shane nodded.
"Same," Mylo smiled.
"Even I want a piece of that pie," Helena said with a smirk but the way she said it caused everyone to laugh.
"How did you turn southern? Aren't you supposed to be British?" Blue said between laughs.
"I've been here for a long time. It was about time I lost some of my accent," Helena shrugged, also having fun with the situation.
Both Blue and Bonnie agreed to sell Hera the weapons. Blue asked for 20 million gold, which, even if she didn't have on hand after all the dungeon runs during the last few months, she would likely get, thanks to the percentage of profits they received from the Kobold Road. That wasn't necessarily a value that Blue would need, but they agreed that she could buy something on the same level of power with that money. Bonnie asked for a lower value, but Hera refused and promised the same. The researcher didn't have that much money, and she didn't have the passive income from a deal with the guild, which made the value much more significant to her. With that money, she could live with her mom for several years without having to worry about anything. Not to mention she still had the patent for hair spell circles that Helena, Quinn, and her applied for just before they got stuck without a way to go home.
They finally arrived outside the dungeon, back at the cave, where they found the entrance. As soon as they left that tunnel, Blue looked around and stopped.
"Ok, I'm not crazy. This is not Luna's cave."
"What?" Bonnie asked.
"The shape of the place is different. Luna's was deeper and more… uniform. This one is more wide than deep, and it has that part," the controller pointed to the left corner where a part of the wall was closer to the entrance, making a deformation in the structure, "Correct me if I'm wrong, but all those changes couldn't happen because of time, could they?"
Hera looked around, "No, I don't think so. And that odd orange thing is not here, so it couldn't have an effect."
"Also, this is not the location on the map where we were. Look here," Shane was looking at her tablet with an overlay of the map of the dungeon and of the room. Some spots were blank on both maps, but Luna's cave was still visible on both. It was supposed to be right in front of the doorway they took to get here.
"Ok… I think we need to get there. There is something that's bothering me," Blue said.
"What?"
"Helena said she saw something falling, and I think that was Luna. Or her remains. She also said that there was something underwater by the doorway, and I want to see if I can figure out what it is," Blue explained.
"Don't you want to go back home?" Alex asked.
"I mean, can we? Nimbus won't be back for a few days; how are we supposed to move around this place?" Blue turned to the assassin.
Only now everyone realized the issue with the situation. As they discussed what they could do. Hera stepped to the back of the cave to add the new members to her court. She didn't have any idea about how to move around now, and carrying both of these weapons as they reached civilization would bring too much attention to them. They were not exactly inconspicuous, and she didn't want that. She would already have enough of it when arriving at Boothudurn.
'Daskka, Any chance I can increase the court?'
The Herald shook her head, 'No, mum. I'm sorry.'
'That's ok. So everyone, come here. I want to talk to all of you,' the Empress summoned the entire court, 'I know this will sound mean, but I will ask. Is there anyone who thinks they should be the ones to go? I don't want anyone pointing fingers at someone else. Just say it if you feel you are no longer able to help.'
'Me,' Scythe was the first to speak.
'Me too,' Ooze moved forward.
'And me,' Armory said.
'Honestly, me too, but since you are swapping two weapons, I don't know if I should be considered,' Core said.
'I agree. Core shouldn't be a part of this. We have others who are bigger problems. I'm one of them,' Scythe added.
'Scythe…' Doing this was already hard, but Hera didn't want to hear her court talking about themselves like that even if it was technically what she asked.
'No. Hera, it's fine. Really. My skill doesn't do much, and having me as a lookout is redundant with Armory around. I'm not saying I didn't help, but I know for a fact I only pulled my weight when you asked for some sort of stealth mission. And now Edge is here. Who can do it just as well as I,' Scythe turned to the small knife.
This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.
'Are you sure? I can barely do anything in a fight,' Edge was pointing down.
'Yes, because you are our healer. The best situation is when Hera doesn't need you; the second best is when you can heal something that would've otherwise killed her,' Scythe continued.
'That's an awful way to put it, but you are not wrong,' Daskka nodded.
'That's why I should be the first to go. Besides, my skill is the least useful one. Aside from that thing with the Mantises, I don't think we ever saw it triggering,' Scythe finished her thought.
'It actually happened a few times. I noticed it, it would be like a second strike on the same target' Armory tried to argue.
'Was it enough to make up for Hera having one less warrior in the field?' Scythe asked the tiara. They didn't get an answer, but the silence spoke volumes, 'That's my point.'
'Ok, I agree with you. You will be one of them. Thank you for everything. And I'm sorry," Hera said, but she didn't get a reply, not a spoken one at least. She got feelings instead, gratitude, happiness, joy, pride, and wistfulness. Quickly rubbing her eyes, she turned to the tiara floating in front of her, "Right, Armory, let me say. I don't think I can be without you right now. If I find something else that can take your place is one thing, but I really need someone to be kind of like the general. Looking at the full picture and giving commands,' Hera said before turning to Ooze, 'And why you? You got that gift a while back, so your emotions are influencing me less than Cores.'
'Yes, but my attributes are not that great. And my skill is not that interesting. Core has multiple things he can do, I can only scream,' Ooze explained, and Hera felt it in his voice that he accepted this.
'Ok. If I'm being honest, you two were the ones I was thinking about. Thank you for everything. And hey, at least this is not goodbye forever,' Hera tried to smile, putting on a brave face.
'Yeah, you can call us on the Blade Graveyard. That you didn't use so far,' Scythe pointed out.
'To be fair, I've been in a dangerous situation ever since I got that skill. I had to save it for a good moment that never came. The cooldown is very long. And I didn't know if I could use that skill while fighting the big dragon. Can it be activated on the air?' Hera turned to Daskka.
'Yeah, it can. But the blades would fall, and take a moment to realize what was going on. It was a good call not to use it,' the Herald explained.
'Ok then. Ooze, Scythe. Thank you so much for everything.'
'Thank you, Empress,' Ooze replied.
'Without you, we would never exist. Thank you for letting us be a part of your life for a while,' Scythe had a happy voice despite everything.
Hera dismissed them permanently, and the shapes of the weapons broke apart into mist as if they were an illusion losing their form. Following that, she wiped a tear that was forming on the corner of her eye and pulled the Scimitar and the Battle Axe. Adding them to her court. She didn't use the Royal Seal to change their elements right now, knowing she might have a better opportunity to do so when inside her workshop. Also, the weapons already were pointed to a specific element, and she didn't want to change that.
Neither of the weapons had any skill changes when being added to the court. The only difference was the scaling.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Amber - Fire
Scimitar
Empress Attributes: 99
Scaling
Agility X 24.9 Strength X 19.9 Charisma X 14.9
Intelligence X 2.5 Endurance X 2.4 Luck X 2.4
Familiarity 39%
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Livy of Water
Two-Handed battle axe
Empress attributes: 99
Scaling:
Strength X 27.2 Endurance X 24.7 Luck X 22.2
Agility X 2.2 Intelligence X 2.2 Charisma X 2.2
Familiarity 20%
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The scaling of both weapons took a massive hit, but at least Livy would recover and even surpass her strength as she became a titled blade. If that worked like Hera was expecting. Daskka wasn't able to confirm if the Dragon would be enough without the weapon reaching 100% familiarity, which meant Hera would need to spend a good amount of time practicing with it before getting her new titled blade. The names were made to be short and give her an idea of what each of them would do. In a fight, she didn't want to waste time calling something like 'Alphonse Henry Esteban III' or some nonsensical thing like that. Hence her ideas. Amber, which sounded like an ember for the fire weapon, and Livy, short for Leviathan, for the water battle axe that she hoped to be her new titled blade in the near future.
Hera called Livy and Amber out and let everyone introduce themselves.
'Empress, it is an honor to serve you,' Amber bowed slightly, with a melodic feminine voice that Hera didn't expect.
'Yeah! This is awesome! I can talk! And Fly!' Livy's voice was also feminine but deeper, and there was an underline feral tone.
'Nice to meet you two. And thanks for joining. Just a couple of things first. Unless I say it specifically, nothing I ever say is an order. If you disagree with something, you can say so. Second, you can call me Hera if you like. And third, if you ever want to give your opinion about something, feel free to do so,' Hera said with a smile. It was odd. Changing court members always hurt, and that was true now, but she didn't feel as upset as she expected.
After some pleasantries, the Empress left her court to talk amongst themselves, getting to know the new kids while she went to check on her party. Adriel, Blue, Alex, and Bonnie were gone. Only Shane, Helena, and Mylo were still around.
"So, what did I miss?" Hera asked.
"Oh, hey. Are you finished?" Shane turned to the Empress.
"Yeah. I'm leaving Livy and Amber to talk with everyone so they can get used to everything. It's always weird to see their personalities taking shape."
"Really? How are they?" Helena was leaning over against the wall.
"Amber is… I want to say sophisticated. She sounds like one of those women in positions of power in movies. Not the main character, but the ones that give them advice and are a bit snobby. She also is more polite than most. A bit chivalrous, I guess. For now it's interesting but I see that getting old if she leans too hard on that side. Livy… she is just very excited. Everything seems new for her, and she is very happy to be here."
"And Livy is the one who might be a titled blade?" Shane asked.
"Yep. She is the battle axe."
"Can I ask a different question?" Mylo turned to her. He was sitting on the outside of the cave, with his legs dangling from the outside.
"Sure," Hera nodded.
"Back inside the dungeon. Why didn't you ask your relic about the fish?"
Hera stopped in her tracks after hearing that, "What?"
"Your relic. Since you didn't ask it anything, I assume there was a reason for it. And the snakes from your bracelet shouldn't survive the current," Mylo continued.
There was a pause where Hera just turned more and more white, realizing what happened.
"You forgot about that, didn't you?" Helena asked with a chuckle.
"I did."
"Don't beat yourself up. You are not the first, nor the last, person to forget something that could have helped during a dungeon," Shane smiled. Not realizing that this also meant Nimbus and Lurize were potentially destroyed for no reason.
"Okay. I can see your mind is going somewhere bad, sweetie. Let's focus on a different thing. Adriel is taking Bonnie to the doorway. Alex is going there too. Blue went to check something in the doorway we used to get here. When Adriel comes back, you or Mylo should go with him. I'm going to keep Shane company here since she needs to use enchantment to make us lighter."
"I didn't think of that before, but thanks to that spell, Adriel can move people. Slowly but he can. Each round trip takes about an hour. Nimbus would need only 20 minutes. So, if everything goes well, we can leave here soon," Shane looked to the sky, "But I think it will be nighttime by then, so we might see the two moons."
"Oh… Yeah, that would be nice," Hera nodded, trying to stop the thoughts that were currently going through her mind. She focused back on her surroundings, taking them one more time before they left. This should be it; they were finally going home.