Caeileera

‘What the…’ Rennie began, but Lilyth silenced her with a hand on the shoulder.

She then pointed towards one of the segments to our right and then tapped her cheek twice, scratched her chin, tapped the chin three more times and then shrugged.

Seeing my confusion she repeated the set of gestures.

Tap tap scratch tap tap tap shrug

Two, maybe three enemies?

To confirm I showed her first two fingers, shrugged and then three fingers.

Lilyth nodded.

We really need a more formalised set of gestures.

Lilyth then pointed first at me, Aki and to the left of the wall segment, then at herself and Ren and to the right.

Makes sense, I thought and gave her a thumbs-up.

Ren and Aki simply nodded and we began approaching the hiding spot of the enemy weapons at the ready. We were maybe halfway there when a piercing shriek that felt like it would split my head sounded from the direction we were heading towards.

They know we are here.

Four shapes darted out from behind that wall segment. A brief thought of “so much for Lilyth's hearing” crossed my mind, but I quickly quashed it. For one, this really was not the time; and two… until that moment I heard absolutely nothing, so me bitching about how someone got the number of monsters I would not be otherwise even aware of wrong would be… well… a dick move. Lilyth once tried to explain to me how her hearing exactly worked, and what I understand was that thanks to her being able to use her entire body, what was uncovered anyway, to hear she was much more sensitive to sounds. Or something. Which is probably why the shriek made her look far more uncomfortable than any of us were.

The monster began to try to flank us, which allowed me to get a good look at them. They looked vaguely goblinoid with their green skin and aquamarine hair, but that's where the resemblances ended. The creatures’ mouths were filled to the brim with sharp teeth, and they also had yellow black-slitted eyes that gave them this reptilian quality. Their limbs, sharp-clawed arms and digitigrade legs were also wrong, being spindly and long, far longer than any limbs had business being.

What the fuck are those things?

‘I think those are shrieklins!’ Ren shouted, answering my silent questions.

‘Killing first, taxonomy later!’ Lilyth barked.

What do taxes have to do with anything?

Lilyth

The shrieklins or whatever were aptly named. I was sensitive to sounds before I got a body with much keener hearing than my old flesh bag. More concerning was that it apparently was their means of communication. I wasn’t sure if the others noticed it, but I was ninety per cent sure that only one of the monsters shrieked, meaning it was giving a signal to the others. Something else was bothering me about it though, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. One thing I really regretted was that I didn’t manage to get any sword training while I was at the estate. It has been a while since I actually used the thing but I couldn’t imagine facing those creatures with my knives. So… with minor trepidation, I tried activating [The Swiftness of the Wind] and to my pleasant surprise, it worked. I raised my sword and dashed towards one of the monsters, it tried taking a swipe at me, but it was too slow, so I dove below its extended arm and with a sidewise cut sunk the Blade of the Black Rose deep into its stomach. Sensing one of its buddies trying to jump me from behind, I ripped the sword out and tried turning around but didn’t manage to before the creature's claws raked me on my unprotected shoulder. I hissed from pain. The creature’s success was short-lived, however, as an arrow pierced its throat spraying me with the shrieklin’s blood.

Two down.

I took stock of the situation. One of the monsters was charging Aki, she fired off a [Lesser Abyssal Bolt] at it, but it jumped to the side and kept on charging. My wife then lunged towards it, weaved under its arms, cut off one of them and sunk her other falchion into its chest.

Three. No wonder this place was listed as easy.

Then what was bothering me reared its ugly head. I heard faint movement coming from behind us. Looked over there and eight more of the ugly bastards trying to sneak up on us.

‘Watch out!’ I yelled and started running towards my companions.

The shrieklins, realising they’ve been made, let out a series of piercing howls that caused me to stumble forward from pain.

Shit! Shit! Shit!

Caeileera

Just as I lopped off the head of the last of the monsters with my glaive, Lilyth shouted her warning. I turned around and seeing what was behind us, instinctively unfurled my wings and used them to leap backwards from the approaching shrieklins. As I flew I fired [Rock Spikes], felling two of the creatures. Ren, also backing away, fired off another arrow, but it lodged itself between the ribs of one of the monsters, throwing it off, but not killing it. That was enough for Aki, who finished it off with a [Lesser Abyssal Bolt]. She then, her falchions at the ready, dove in between the monsters, cutting her way through them. I expected Lilyth to join her, but when I looked towards my jelly I saw her on her knees holding her head clearly in pain.

Ah.

The shrieks of the other group were almost unbearable for me, can’t imagine what it was for her.

‘Cover Aki!’ I ordered Ren and dove towards Lilyth, casting [Soothe Pain] the moment I was within arms reach.

‘Thanks!’ my wife shouted in clear relief and scrambled to her feet.

I saw her point one of her hands at a monster as she ran to help Aki, but nothing happened, which was confirmed by the quiet “fuck” I heard from Lilyth. My wife also proved too fast for Ren to account for, as one of her arrows lodged herself in her left shoulder.

Ooops.

To her credit, Lilyth did her best to minimise the effects of it on her charge and quickly joined Aki in fighting the monsters. I could see her wince from pain occasionally, but she pushed through it, and between the two of them, all the monsters were soon lying dead or dying on the floor. Only then, Lilyth ripped the arrow out from her shoulder with a grunt, walked over to Ren and gave it to her with a weak:

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‘Yours, I believe.’

‘Sorrysorrysorrysorry,’ Ren apologised profusely.

‘No worries,’ Lilyth said and sat down against one of the wall segments.

I moved on to help her but she pointed towards Aki who was panting and holding a wound at her side. I could also see other wounds on her body, some of which looked pretty bad too.

Shit! Get your head in order, Caei.

I hurried over to Aki, began with [Soothe Pain] and then started healing her wounds. It drained quite a bit of my mana, but soon my blue-haired cutie was all good.

‘Thank you,’ she said and gave me a hug.

Aki then took out a mana potion from her satchel and handed it over to me.

We don’t have many of those, do we?

Still, I accepted it and drank it, following it up with mine, which almost brought me back to a full tank.

Still, no more attack spells for me.

I went over to Lilyth, but I could see she relocated to a wall segment away from the scene of carnage, and that there was an empty health potion bottle next to her. An unopened mana potion was standing next to it, with a clear implication I should take it. After stowing it in my bag, I sat down next to her and soon the other two joined us.

‘If that is easy, I can’t imagine what hard looks like,’ Lilyth said.

‘You have it as “easy”?’ Aki asked in disbelief. ‘It’s “Very Hard” for me.’

‘Same,’ I confirmed.

‘“Hard”,’ Ren said, to everyone’s surprise. ‘Probably because I know [Silent Step]. I can technically sneak through here, I guess?’

‘Makes sense,’ Lilyth agreed. ‘I’m higher level, also know [Silent Step], and can hear those things. Though whatever assigned that difficulty level didn’t account for how debilitating those screeches would be.’

Her eyes went blank as she checked something.

‘Yeah. It was updated to “Hard”,’ she said. ‘Wonder why…”

‘You just said…’ I began but Lilyth shook her head.

‘No. Here’s a thing, Caei. We are all given individual difficulty ratings here that update in real-time. I have never seen that happen before.’

Neither have I, come to think of it.

‘So you are saying something is watching us?’ Ren asked.

‘Only explanation I can think of.’

‘It also wants us to work together,’ Aki said. ‘I think. Why give us individual ratings otherwise? We made relatively short work of these together. Alone though…’

‘Work together or die alone, fuckos,’ Lilyth laughed mirthlessly. ‘At least, you lot. I have decent chances of making it through here on my own.’

I punched her in the arm.

‘Not funny,’ I said.

After that, we sat there for a moment in silence until Ren whooped.

‘Level two!’

‘Did I give you a lot of experience points?’ Lilyth joked.

‘Uh… no… why would you…’ she got red-faced and flustered.

‘She’s joking,’ I explained.

‘Oh…’ Ren said. ‘Can you punch her for me?’

‘My pleasure,’ I answered and we all broke out laughing.

Once we calmed down, I quickly checked my stats.

Basic Details

Name

Caeileera

Race

Sanguine

Gender

Female

Age

25

Level

10 (87% progress)

Perk Points

0

Patron Deity

Akh'ret

Title

-

Almost there.

Aki clearly had the same idea as she also let out a triumphant shout.

‘Level nine!’

She then took out the rune she got from Nyx and learned the [Water Bolt] spell.

‘Damn, I wish I was as high a level as you guys,’ Ren said.

‘You’ll get there,’ Lilyth said with a warm smile. ‘Catching that adventuring bug, eh?’

‘I think so,’ Ren smiled back. ‘I don’t know… I feel better after levelling. Stronger.’

‘Yeah, it does that to you,’ I agreed. ‘You should hit level three as soon as we find the exit, I think.’

‘Oh… yes!’ Ren whooped again.

‘In general, I think we all will be several levels higher once we actually leave,’ Lilyth said. ‘Maybe we’ll catch up to Sav some.’

‘Family that levels together stays together,’ Aki joked, making us all laugh again.

‘Rennie,’ Lilyth began after we all caught our breaths,’ You said you recognised these things. Notifications confirmed they were what you thought they were.’

‘Shrieklins...,’ Ren said with some disgust. ‘They are… what happens to goblins when they go feral. A few generations down the line they adapt into… predators.’

Lilyth raised her eyebrow at that.

‘I know the answer is likely “Magic”, but I think I am legally obligated to point out that evolution doesn't work this fast.’

‘It’s the mechanics behind the system, yes,’ I confirmed. ‘As you have experienced, levelling affects our bodies a bit. So it is possible to… direct those changes. Some of the Lower Sanguine subvariants you’ve faced in the Tower are created like that.’

Lilyth nodded.

‘I suppose it’s how I became a Shadow Kitsune. And I guess it answers one piece of the puzzle about the fight against Löwe.’

‘Oh… right…’ Aki nodded. ‘He turned himself into… a half-Sanguine? Something like that?’

‘Yeah,’ I nodded. ‘Probably. I have no idea what he did there. Would be funny if it was what Gaar’rinver and his creepy friends were after.’

‘Or terrifying, since they could be working together here,’ Lilyth pointed out.

‘True dat. We’ll probably learn when find him.’

‘And speaking of danger, we really need to get you some armour, hon,’ Lilyth turned Aki. ‘Probably some leather?’

‘Maybe something sexy,’ I joked.

‘Good idea. Though probably it won’t be as sexy as Lilyth walking around with her boobs out in the Tower of Trials.’ Aki said, with a smirk.

‘Oh, yeah,’ I remembered. ‘ That was an amazing way to meet someone.’

‘I think you skipped that bit in your stories,’ Ren said. ‘Do tell it, please.’

‘Not much to say,’ Lilyth shrugged. ‘Remember when I told you about me taking a fireball to the chest?’

Rennie nodded.

‘This was Löwe’s doing. Nearly killed me too. After that, I didn’t change immediately because I had to wade through blood-stained water and I didn’t want to ruin yet another set of clothes immediately.’

‘You left out the part about how this happened during the first half of the fight, so you fought Löwe topless after he transformed,’ Aki said with a lecherous smile.

‘Alas, the power of boobah did not compel him,’ Lilyth sighed. ‘Still, I know two people who were not immune.’

‘Probably would work on me too,’ Ren whispered dreamily.

‘We can check that,’ I said seductively and raised my top.

‘Your wish is our command,’ my companions said all at once and we all guffawed.