“A treasure? Where?”
Levi gestured uncertainly around at the dungeon. “Somewhere.” He started to search the walls and floors, looking for any flaw or crack that might conceal hidden treasure. He'd learned how very difficult they were to find unless you were looking straight at them.
It was taking hours to search the dungeon and each side detour thoroughly, but he persisted. He wasn't going to give up on it.
“Cen, Centoo, check the ceiling.”
They returned without finding anything, but he knew something was here. He could feel it.
He needed Flomper.
The Revive cooldown should be nearly over by now. He checked. Another few minutes.
Levi wandered back into the empty boss room—stalagmites of ice speared up in haphazard fashion, many broken in whatever grand fight had taken place here—then into the treasure room. He didn't think it was here, but... He went back into the boss room, then into the treasure room, then back again.
He stood in the doorway and looked up. The narrow slit between door and wall taunted him. Inaccessible.
“Cen, Centoo, I need you both.” The pair of centipedes hurried over. “I need to reach up in there, give me a boost.”
They spent a few minutes trying to figure out how to best form themselves into a staircase. Levi climbed up onto their backs carefully, his balance precarious until he got used to the unstable footing.
“A bit higher...” He reached into the crack, feeling around in the darkness for any sign of what he sought. Anything not normal.
There! A faint lump, jagged instead of ice-smooth. He clawed at it, but ice covered it completely. He needed heat. Or…
No one on his team had Fire abilities, but he did have an empowered manabow. He lined up the shot, shielded his eyes with one hand, and fired into the suspicious lump. Three shots shattered enough of the ice for him to wiggle the object free. It slipped from his hand, bounced off Cen's head, and flopped onto the floor. Levi jumped down and snatched it up.
Yes, another treasure map, curled up and mostly frozen. The warmth of his hand melted the ice and dampened the outer layers while the interior remained frozen. He took it into the treasure room to gently unroll it on the table, pausing frequently to let it thaw out so it wouldn’t crack.
Finally, he managed to finish opening the page. As was becoming habit, he mentally lined up the colored dots on the page with his mental map of North American dungeons. This map pointed to a location where he remembered no dungeon existing, a purple spot in a large gap.
Another dungeon that had been destroyed in the first timeline.
Satisfied that they'd claimed everything the Ice dungeon had to offer, Levi rolled up the map and tucked it away. A few minutes later his cooldown ended, and he revived Flomper. Her body slowly reconstituted around the half-melted bones he'd salvaged, the spell taking much longer than the reassembly of Cen and draining significantly more mana as it filled in gaps in her form.
You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.
If he ran out of mana or if anything disrupted the process before it could be completed, he'd have to wait another day to try again. Don't try major revivals in combat. Got it.
Once the repairs were completed, Flomper jumped up, looking around frantically, then squinted up at Levi with suspicion.
“Gordon's fine. He's back that way.”
Flomper immediately scampered off toward the entrance where they’d left Gordon. Levi followed, Cen, Centoo, and Skarm joining him.
Gordon was playing with his new frost spider, having it run around to test its speed and breath attack, while Flomper had resumed her usual perch on Gordon's shoulder. She watched the proceedings with her paws crossed and a scowl on her furry face.
“Someone looks unhappy,” Levi teased. “Eh, Flomper?”
Gordon shrugged, almost toppling Flomper and causing her to flail to recover her balance. “She's just not used to sharing attention yet. She'll be fine once she gets used to her new sister. Frosty, come on over here.”
“And you make fun of my minion names?”
“Fro-sty, the spider, is a very spiky girl!” Gordon sang out with a deep laugh. Frosty jumped up and ran along his body, over his shoulder and down his arm. He—no, she—clung to the underside of Gordon’s forearm, poking her many-eyed face out to peer up at Flomper distrustfully. Flomper, looked anywhere but down at the new acquisition and maintained her stiff “not-worth-noticing-you” pose.
“Is it normal for minions to initially hate each other, or is this a sign of some deep psychological problems we’re hiding?” Gordon asked, staring down at Frosty.
“I think it’s normal. An adjustment period until things settle—Skarm!”
Skarm had urged Centoo over next to Gordon and was poking at the giant spider hanging from Gordon's arm. Frosty skittered around uncertainly for a moment, then reared back and spat a mouthful of webbing into Skarm’s face before Levi could intervene, following it up with a gust of frost breath.
The spider’s attack knocked Skarm off-balance. He nearly toppled off Centoo, the centipede’s quick adjustment the only reason he was able to keep his perch.
“Frosty! These are friends,” Gordon scolded. “Don’t do that. Even if the gremlin was trying to pick a fight, you have to be the better spider and stay out of it.”
“And that goes for you, too,” Levi told Skarm firmly.
The gremlin turned to him, clawing at the webbing on his face and sputtering indignantly.
“You can be curious without poking. And your claws are sharp, you could hurt someone.”
Skarm huffed something under his breath, still struggling to de-web his face. Now he’d managed to get one of his hands stuck as well.
Frosty swayed back and forth from her perch beneath Gordon’s arm, looking as smug and self-satisfied as a spider could.
Levi shook his head at them and helped free Skarm from the entangling web. “You know we're all on the same team, right?”
Skarm squeaked indignantly and pointed at Frosty.
“I know you think she started it, but you do poke people a lot. I don't mind it, but if Frosty retaliates you can hardly blame her.”
Skarm crossed his arms, rubbing the last of the webbing off his shoulder and not meeting either Levi's or Frosty's eyes.
Frosty continued to sway back and forth on the underside of Gordon's arm, looking quite pleased with herself.
“That goes for you too,” Gordon reprimanded. “And you need to get down, my arm is getting tired.”
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