DD 203 Ch 7

We were taking a lunch break after several more failed attempts at the boss. The fight was complex.

Though we had nearly gotten the boss down at some point, when he hit low life, he summoned nearly every skeleton still in their grave at the same time. The pary had wiped, and since then, we hadn't been able to get back to that phase, only instilling more frustration in the rest of the raid.

"Do you think we should head to a different area of the raid?"

I looked around at what had become an officer's meeting after our most recent wipe. The other officers of the group were Harley, Penny, Des, Candice, and myself. Each of us represented healers and support, the tanks, the ranged DPS, and the melee DPS.

Candice was added in for her understanding of the fights in general. Not to mention she could flex between ranged and support.

"We've gotten pretty consistent," Penny said her sword laid across her lap as she did some simple maintenance on it. "It's just when we get the parrot and the tiger together, people just seem to go down hard."

Harley held her hands up. "There's nothing the support can do. The parrot tends to drop everyone's health low enough that when that tiger pounces, there just isn't enough time to save whoever it is." Harley shook her head, the little bell tied into her ponytail jingling with the gesture.

"I know this wing is supposed to be the easiest, but how does this boss compare?" Harley asked.

"It's likely up there, at least in the top third of the raid bosses for difficulty," I said.

Des twirled her hair. "Candice might have some insight, but I think she would have the same opinion. We should move on to another boss, which means heading over to another wing."

I grimaced. Even though we would be able to jog back in maybe 20 minutes, since there were no monsters in the way, and after the first and second boss shortcuts opened up to help us get back, it would still be admitting defeat.

"Don't look like that," Des nudged me. "This is how raids work. You die a lot, and when you're done dying, you move on to something else."

Harley and Penny nodded in agreement, and finally, I let out a breath. "Well, we made a group of officers so that I wouldn't be the only person making the decisions, so be it. We'll head over to one of the other quadrants of the raid. Maybe we should pick the other three-boss wing, and save the six-boss wing for later."

The raid was a fairly simple design, though there were plenty of twists and turns. It was shaped somewhat like a trident, with the wings that had gone to the left and to the right being shorter than the one in the center. That extended far away from the entrance and had twice as many bosses as either of the other wings. It was down that route that you would find the final boss, and the last three bosses were considered the hardest.

"All right, we killed the rest of the raid. We'll go over to the other wing. What's that one called again?" I glanced at the others.

“It’s called the Path of Sands in the guide book." Candice said

I grumbled, not loving the idea of fighting elemental monsters, because that's what it sounded like. Either way we had little left to do here and I got moving, everyone from the officer group scattering and getting their own parties back tracking to the entrance to the raid.

"Are you doing okay?" Penny asked, coming up beside me as we moved back through the raid, hurrying to the other wing.

"Yeah, I'm fine," I tried to brush it away. "It just sucks to walk away from a boss."

Penny nodded sticking with me. "Yeah, but we only have one day here. So it's important for us to try and get as much gear as possible. Think about it that way. Because once we've been in here three or four times, hopefully we'll have enough gear that we can kill that boss. I really think getting the healers kitted out and a little more power on the damage dealers, we'll be able to do that one smoothly."

I chuckled. "Not more gear for the tanks?" I asked.

Penny shrugged. "A lot of people think that way. That tanks should get first priority because they are a single point of potential improvement for the raid. However," Penny gestured to the whole group, "I take less damage if everything dies faster. And if we upgrade a healer, not only does it help me survive the boss, but it helps all of the damage dealers as well. But yes, I would like all of the gear," Penny grinned.

"Thankfully we don't have many melee DPS," I said. "No one else is using plate or two-handed melee weapons."

Penny once again grinned. "Don't you know we tanks designed it that way? So we could get all of the gear." Penny seemed to be in a good mood, despite having to walk away from the boss.

"Do the wipes or any of the other stuff bother you?" I asked her. Tanks were always taking damage in the dungeon. Maybe she had a secret to help the whole raid.

"Pain is temporary," Penny said. "Getting cut by a boss hurts no less than my sore muscles after a day of training. The only difference is this is a different type of training. This training gives me shiny loot at the end of it. Almost like shopping, but paying with pain."

I raised an eyebrow at her, wondering what her pain tolerance must be like. She must have seen something else, because she blushed furiously, her red cheeks standing out, framed by her blue hair.

"That was weird. I didn't mean it to be weird," She hurried to correct the misunderstand she imagined.

I laughed and stopped her from continuing to ramble. "It's fine. It wasn't weird. I just haven't quite thought of it in the same way. You know, training is something we all do to ourselves and push ourselves through. Yet somehow the damage we take in a fight feels different. Sharper. And more painful."

"Well then," Penny smiled, "you should think of it as training. You are a training maniac from everything we've seen."

I glanced towards the healers, who are the real problem of the group. "What about them?"

"You have to remember the healers haven't done nearly as much physical training as you or I. Nor have they taken as much damage during the dungeon. This is something they're going to have to get used to if they want to dive deeper.

“My father once told me that sometimes getting healers to stick around was the hardest part of holding a group together.” Penny ran a hand through her hair, the bright blue hair was eye catching.

I nodded along, everything she said fit my own experiences thus far.

“The problem is that they're in such high demand that so many of them feel like they can walk away and find a group that will protect them better. Instead, the real gems amongst the healers are those that can bear the pain, grit their teeth, and stick to the fight. By the time this is all through, we might even lose one or two, but that's just the natural order of things. As a tank, I get along with the healers, swimmingly being up front to protect them."

I chuckled, "Maybe I should have the tanks talk to the healers. That is, if Harley struggles at all."

Penny rolled her eyes. "My cousin and her seem to get along wonderfully.” There was a slight edge to those words.

“Do you have a problem with Harley?" I asked, it would go poorly for people to start holding grudges.

"Only that she's corrupting my cousin."

I raised an eyebrow at Penny. "After everything you write, I don't think you're pure enough to comment on Meredith's corruption." We hadn’t really had a conversation about it yet, but I was aware of what she was writing.

Penny sputtered at the mention of 74 wives. "What? No. It's not like I've..." She struggled with what to say.

"It's not like you what?" I pressed while she was off balance.

"It's not like I've actually done all of that." Her face was now bright red, flushing all the way from the tips of her ears down to her collar.

"I don't think you've actually done that," I said to her. "It would be pretty hard to organize lining up 74 ladies and going down one by the other." I couldn’t help but crack a smile.

Penelope sputtered at that. "You don't actually read it, do you?" She hesitated.

"Do you want me to?" I asked, seriously considering it if she said yes.

"No, no. It's just a hobby," Penny said quickly waving her hands in front of her to fend me off.

"Alright then. I won't read it, but enough of the ladies talk about it that I understand the gist." More than that. Des had asked me to reenact a few scenes, apparently Penny was quite the creative writer.

Penny's blush couldn't grow any further, and she took the first opportunity to step away and talk to one of the other raid members. It was almost like watching someone pull their parachute.

I chuckled at seeing her embarrassment. She was cute, but I was full up on ladies.

My focus shifted back to moving through the empty hallways towards the new wing of the raid. The embarrassed Penny was quickly replaced by Elysara, who slid up next to me with a raised brow.

"Not you too," I said, with a mock gasp.

Elysara had switched out her abilities, and currently had a pair of fox ears above her head, and her hands were some sort of tiger paws. It was all probably to make her faster, she kept up with our rushed walk without even breathing hard.

"Leading is hard, isn't it?" She smirked.

I held up my hands in my defense, "Much harder than anyone ever told me. I was fairly certain that getting to leader just meant I got to boss people around. Now suddenly, I actually have to do something," I said with a gasp.

The princess laughed. "Most of the time, I think being a leader is just being able to listen to others long enough to get out of your own way.”

“It would be great if you could tell the rest of the class that, too." I shot back.

Elysara shrugged. "Being able to listen is also part of it, and this is why I am very happy not to be leading the raid. I don’t want to listen to everyone else, I want to be a part of something."

I couldn't really blame her. So far the excitement of leading the raid had begun to wear off, and instead I was now being filled with a sense of duty and a whole host of problems that I needed to solve.

From making sure that people didn’t get weary of dying to making sure we all made enough progress to keep people’s spirits high and thirsting for adventure.

"And how would you suggest I do this better? After all, you have little experience leading people." She was the future Empress of an entire world, not to mention filling in for her father when he ran off to fight the Naga.

Elysara let out a light chuckle. "I find the best way to do it is to surround yourself with competent people, and I think you're already well on the way to figuring that out." She glanced around at the officers I had built for continuing the raid.

I looked over them, too, nodding in agreement.

The other players were doing a fantastic job. It was my job just to polish them and make sure it all worked out.

"By the way, where are your sensors?" I glanced at the princess. “We've been running through this whole thing, and I was absolutely shocked to not have Neldra or any of the others breathing down my neck."

She pointed to Professor Sai. "She's in charge, and she's actually not low-level. Neldra is currently stationed up at the entrance to the raid, Tish had run through it beforehand to make sure no one was lingering. If anyone tried to enter, she would break their necks. At least, the way they explained it to me is that right now, my biggest danger is someone coming in, not what's inside the raid."

I could understand that. Right now, the raid itself didn't pose a risk. Again, it was something stupid like Prince Albar sending another set of assassins after her that would really put her life in jeopardy.

Of course, we all hoped the prince wasn't that stupid, especially because the UG was aware of the first attempt and would only back the elves further if he tried something else.

When we first brought the issue to his attention, he had been aghast that it had even gone as far as it had. He gave Elysara the full reassurance of the UG that it would never happen again.

So far, that remained to be seen.

However, I had faith that the president of the UG would follow through. So far, he had been nothing but helpful, and he deserved the benefit of the doubt.

Elysara must have sensed my worry. She stepped up to place a kiss on my cheek. "Don't you be all frowny on me. I am perfectly fine and the prince will never lay a hand on me," she said with the utmost confidence.

Then again, with her position amongst the elves, confidence was one of her greatest strengths.

"How are your people?" I turned the tables on her. "Over the summer there was a lot of strife. Has it improved?" I asked, having not really talked about her nation since she had returned.

Elysara shrugged. "Everyone is doing just fine. With my father being forced to return," she smirked, "hopefully he can get his shit together."

I gasped at the way she talked about her father, and she rolled her eyes playfully.

"The old man really needs to figure some of this out," she said. "While I might be next in line, it's still his problem. After all, it was on his watch that we had the rebel faction attempt to kill me." She puffed out her cheeks, clearly having not forgiven her father for the trouble last summer.

Not that it was directly his fault. But I knew there were plenty of people holding Elysara responsible for everything that happened in the elven kingdom. It only made sense for her to put the same level of rigor on her father.

"Aren't you being a little harsh?" I asked her.

"Not in the slightest." She was adamant that it was her father's responsibility to fix things among her people. "One of these days, the old man's going to retire. He better not leave me a mess to clean up."

I laughed. Elysara could do entirely what she wanted. She was, after all, the princess of the elves. And despite being far younger than her father, the time I had spent in the elven kingdom, she proved herself to be a fantastic future empress.

"Speaking of..." Elysara trailed off. "I have to ask, in the future, will you be spending your summers with me?" She blushed enough that her cheeks matched her rosy hair. Her ruby hair. "After all, my people would love to see their future empress's husband more often. Not to mention your presence would really help the tensions between elves and humans."

I kissed her on the cheek. "We will have to figure things out. Now that Des has the portal ability, we'll have to get her over to the elven kingdom."

Elysara jabbed me in the side with one of her thumbs. "Or you could work on your mana, and you could get the portal."

I chuckled. By the end of the school year, I expected all of my Adrel to have access to the portal ability. And with that, hopefully we will be able to travel between the elven and the human worlds more easily. And it would make spending time with Elysara simple and easy.

Her hand shifted from the paw of whatever monster she was mimicking, and she laced her hands in mine. The tan elven princess had a shy moment. She was pretending to be shy for a moment, pulling me closer.

I wrapped my arms around her hips, and pecked her on the cheek as we were still moving through the raid, and couldn't slow down to do further.

"Don't worry, Ellie. I am going to make you a very happy woman for as long as I can."

"Promises, promises. When we get back to the elven world, I'm going to make you sit on my throne," she said with a low purr coming from her throat, telling me exactly what she wanted to do with her throne.