DD 302 Ch 25

This was it we finally made it down to the 53rd floor that we were looking for, after a brief stop in the Orcai library.

The Gale Mites, as they were called in the Orcai system, were dog-sized insects that moved around with the powers of the wind, flinging little domes of pressure with their limbs for a significant boost in damage.

The dungeon floor was rocky rolling hills that had been scrubbed of any soil by harsh winds. Exactly the environment I would expect for these monsters.

“Alright.” Penny said, bracing herself for another foray into the monsters, with bigger packs curtesy of the new floor. The frost knight rushed the mites, putting a small layer of frost on them and getting their attention enough that they all darted toward us.

“Felin, you're up,” I said, nodding to the Nekorian, whose body crackled blue before she shouted and released her own blast of ice. Though hers was more violent as a head sized ball of ice slammed into the ground and exploded among the Gale Mites, peppering them with frost and slowing them even further.

Des started slinging waves of darkness while I dove in, spraying daggers left and right with [Dark Blades] that shot fans of knives and wounded the Mites. Though my DoT didn’t do enough damage before things died. Des was doing most of the work while Penny continued to frost them and keep them at arm’s length. Between her and Felin, the mites might as well have slowed to a crawl compared to their previous speed.

The guide we read said several things about them. One, they were fast and hard-hitting, but we could solve for speed. Generally monsters came in a large variety but they were balanced between their speed, number, durability and how much damage they dealt. We wanted something that came in large number and was relatively fragile for farming, which meant they were going to be high damage and very fast. Two, they were a rather untouched area, meaning we could farm levels to our heart’s content without competition or having to watch our backs.

I slipped between Penny and the mites, my blades weaving into the monsters, stacking a little more speed. I had the realization that if I was going to be much help I needed to lean into [Liminal Speed]. 

Des was going to keep outperforming me unless I switched tactics. Between attacking and unleashing her AoE fire and darkness on those that I had already put my DoTs on, she flashed me a grin.

“Maybe you should pick up Penny’s frost while you’re at it,” she taunted, spitting her attacks back and forth over the new monsters. Even as many of them were popping into small bursts black smoke before I could deal much damage.

I shifted my focus to some that had aggroed behind Charlotte and gave Bun-bun a hand. Charlotte’s familiar charged into a group and knocked several mites away long enough for me to turn and catch them, dumping all my abilities and stacking even more speed.

“Artic Wave!” Felin called out, casting. Frost bloomed under the mites as she attacked with glee, supercharging her spells with her trial ability. [Boundless Mana] gave her a massive manapool, and allowed her to overdraft her abilities. The ability exploded, wiping out the mites within its range.

“Why did we give it to the kitty first again?” Des complained.

“She’s the one who killed the whale first.” I said.

“I think I could have killed it if I had given it a shot,” Des corrected.

I resisted rolling me eyes, she had given it multiple tries. “Sure.” I humored her pride.

“Careful, we keep aggroing more.” Penny called out, even as we moved around the Gale Mites were nearly endless as they kept swarming from every direction.

One of the mites came precariously close to Penny, but she spun and cleaved it in two. She was more than capable of taking care of herself. In fact, all of them were. I was proud of how well our group had grown in these two and a half years.

When it came to stacking up the rest of the adventuring community we’d be near the top. Though the generation before us had rallied and begun pushing again, it was clear we were going to catch up to the likes of the Harem Queen, The Verdant and the Renards.

We’d already surpassed Penny’s father who was considered elite, but not quite at the top of humanity and we weren’t even out of Haylon college yet. At some level, we were beyond it, yet our teacher was Crimson and she had plenty yet to still teach us.

Hours passed as we hacked our way through the swarms. This place really had been abandoned. That let us farm the entire place up and down without rest. Still, the dungeon never ran out of monsters, just spawning more far enough away from us that they refreshed by the time we moved to a new area of the floor.

After a solid day of grinding, I leaned back with a sigh of pure satisfaction at our camp. It was tucked neatly against the wall of this floor and propped up on a hill.

“Look at him,” Des said. “So happy in the dungeon.” said Des, who lounged in the camp we had made. All of us were taking a well deserved rest.

The Gale Mite floor was mostly wind-hewn rock, rough stone mounds rising and falling throughout the area, which made for great visibility. But even then, we didn’t dare skip our traps around the perimeter. Better safe than sorry.

“You know, we could have just teleported back,” Felin said, poking at her food.

“And miss the chance to camp outdoors? I think not,” Charlotte said. As strange as it sounded, I really found myself missing camping in the dungeon with all of our classes and the PR tour. I didn't want to leave the dungeon, even for the comforts of home.

Bun-bun made a grunt in agreement while I bent down to finish the last of the traps.

“It really is nice,” I said, taking a deep breath through my nose. “Nothing quite like being in the dungeon.”

Though being in the dungeon nowadays was a little different, and I was reminded of that when my CID chirped. I checked my inventory as the stone Lady Frey had given me began to put off a considerable amount of heat.

“Hold on,” I said, fishing it out, only to grip it tight as Lady Frey, lounging in some far-off office, blinked and leaned forward to smile at me.

“Well, isn’t my favorite Incubus,” she smiled like she wanted something.

“What is it? I’m just getting back into the dungeon to level again.”

Lady Frey pursed her lips. “Well, we may have to pause that temporarily. I have a job for you.”

“All right… I suppose I’m doing a job.” I closed my eyes and suppressed a groan.

Lady Frey smiled wider. “You could always say no,” she said, leaning forward. “Sometimes I desperately hope my subordinates do. And I’m sure if they did, they would learn an incredibly valuable lesson as to why that is a horrible idea.”

“I’m sure they would. Isn’t it a little harsh to want that though?” I asked.

“It’s always a little more fun to teach the lesson the hard way rather than repeat it a million times. People never listen. You probably understand.”

“I can’t say I do,” I admitted. “But the concept’s reasonable. Please, Lady, I don’t wish to waste your time. What is it you need of me?” I would’ve believed the pout from the giant succubus if I didn’t know better. Demons were tricky to deal with.

“As you are aware,” Lady Frey said, “there’s a bit of a rebalancing happening, particularly in regards to incubi. So I wish for you to kill one of your potential competitors. I hope that isn’t a problem.” She said it pointedly.

I deadpanned. She only wanted me to kill someone?

“Why would that be a problem? It’s just killing someone.” Her eyes searched mine, testing me. And then I realized that, for all Lady Frey had interrogated me on various things, my role as an assassin had never been one of them.

I smirked. This was perfect. “Just tell me where they are, and it’ll be done.”

Even communicating through the stone, I could feel her searching my gaze. “Wonderful. I had not expected such passion in this sort of endeavor from you, Ken.”

“Ah, you see. That’s where I realize you’re missing part of the facts. Because I come from a family of hired killers. Assassins.” I decided not to keep her on edge for too long.

“Truly?” Lady Frey paused, blinking several times.

“Can she see me?” Des asked, standing next to me.

“Probably.” I said, somewhat unsure how they worked.

“Hey, Lady Frey! Yeah, if you don’t know, Ken and his whole family are kind of a big assassiny deal,” Des said, leaning toward the stone. “People used to pay them to kill corrupt adventurers. They were the people who kept the powerful in check.”

“Oh my… Des.” Lady Frey chuckled. “And I can see her, but she cannot see me. I had no idea I picked up such a diamond in the rough.” The way she said it almost sounded like she was reading the phrase out of a guidebook. For all I knew, she was.

“Here, Ken, this is a good place to find your target.” Through the vision she held up a map. I quickly realized it was a map of the dungeon.

And to my horror, my own position was well-marked on it. The demon she wanted me to kill wasn’t far away.

“I assume if you’re giving me his present location, you want me to kill him quickly?” I asked, doing my best not to let her ability to track me show any surprise.

“Oh, well, that’s up to you. Finding him later might be difficult, though. It’s not often we get a read on their location. Especially one so clear.” Lady Frey waved her hand through the air as if it wasn’t that big of a deal. However, it was clearly an act.

“Are other people getting a read on my location?” I asked with perhaps more bite than necessary.

Lady Frey grinned. “Don’t you worry, Ken. I am doing my best to keep you my little secret. After all, it’s no fun if people run around trying to break my toys.” What she didn’t say, but absolutely meant, was that she was asking me to run around and break someone else’s.

“Of course, Mistress,” I said, giving the appropriate deference and bow.

“Simply splendid. You should do that more often.” She wiggled her fingers. “Well, now I have things to do. Do me a favor and keep the stone out. Since you said you were familiar with killing, I would love to see you in action.”

“It will be done.” I gave her a tight-lipped smile and a nod. Then I set the stone in my pocket rather than back in my CID. It was weird knowing she’d be watching, but I had more important things to worry about now.

“So now we’re going to go kill demons?” Des asked, apparently having already started on dinner while I’d been distracted.

“Seems like that’s the plan. Anyone have a problem with it?” I checked the group. Not that I expected any.

They all shook their heads. Penny was the only one to raise her hand. “We can at least eat before we do it, right?”

“Yes. And they aren’t far. So we’ll go swing by tonight, get the job done, and then come back for rest.” I said digging into dinner, I’d need the energy.

Des chuckled coldly. “You’re going to go kill some hapless demon like they’re a midnight snack.”

“Well, apparently he’s going to be a challenger for this whole incubus… Game of Thrones they’re playing.” Penny said.

“Ooh, I like that. That should be a TV show name,” Charlotte said casually, handing me my bowl of stew.

“It is a good TV show name,” I said, waving my hands dramatically. “It just hits you with political intrigue. Who knows, maybe one day we’ll have a tell-all: What It Was Like Becoming the Incubus King and Killing Your Competitors.”

“Maybe it’ll even be on Netflix,” I finished, and the whole group laughed.

We continued eating. I found myself startled by how casually we were all taking this new job to go kill an incubus.

“Now,” I began, “assuming it’s a party of five with fairly standard makeup. Two support, two DPS, and one tank.” I flipped a knife out of my CID and began scratching out a diagram on the ground. “We have two options. One, we catch them while they’re resting. Or two, we catch them while they’re fighting.”

The ladies nodded as we ate and planned an assassination.

“I’d prefer to do it while they’re resting,” Charlotte said. “Hitting them while they’re fighting just feels a little cowardly.”

I stared at her, blinking several times to ensure I heard correctly. “Killing them while they’re asleep is usually not considered the most honorable either.”

“Yeah, but that’s their fault if they don’t know how to set up traps and keep themselves safe at night.” Charlotte waved a dismissive hand.

Apparently I wasn’t the only one getting a little jaded going through the dungeon.

“Well… since Lady Frey is watching, would you all mind if I at least tried to show off?” I asked, glancing at the group.

Penny shrugged. “I can accept that. Know that I’m jumping in the second I think it is getting out of hand.”

“Let’s have Felin go with me on offense. Des, Penny, and Charlotte on defense,” I said.

“Worst-case scenario, between Charlotte and Des, with me keeping anything from being able to pound away on Charlotte, the two of them should be able to wear down nearly any group. Especially if the two of you can kill a healer.” Penny nodded along.

“You hear that, Felin? We’ll go for a healer. I need you to make it as hard as possible for the tank and their DPS to help their healer.” I smiled toward Felin.

I made a quick diagram, assuming they were fighting a monster: tank up front, DPS between the tank and the support in the back. I drew a line, knowing Felin could make walls of ice.

The Nekorian bobbed her head hard enough that her ears slapped. “Do you think demons have cream? They have cream in their stashes. I hope you let me get first dibs on demon cream.”

I stared at Felin, momentarily taken aback that we were talking about killing people and she was concerned about cream. “Sure, Felin. Why not? If they have cream, it’s all yours.”

“Yeah. The cream is mine.” Nekorian’s face split in a savage grin.