Aster Loka

Chapter 144

Levi ended up leaving Elmire with Ward, since the two gremlins liked working together anyway, but since Peter was going to stay with their group Cassandra argued that they didn't need two ogres.

Levi readily agreed to take Drok with him and Gordon. That left the recruitment team with Greg and Slayer, Henry, Crimson, Ward and Elmire, Crackle, and Becca, while Levi and Gordon took the rest. It would probably be better this way anyway. With Drok to act as main tank, Cen as off-tank and cro...

Chapter 143

[Edited May 27th: adjusted the calculations on leveling dungeons to better match actual projections.] 

Levi initiated almost two hundred people over the course of the convention, not all of whom were even attendees. Once word started to spread, it snowballed fast. He succeeded in making contact with local Awakened, individuals like Drakonias who already had classes but were mostly unsure of what had happened or how it all worked. Once armed with clear steps to share, these...

Chapter 142 (Laurence; Levi)

Laurence was in a bit of a tight spot. 

Not officially, not technically. Everything had been going off without a hitch. He’d negotiated with a dozen players across the country, collected ludicrous amounts of crafting supplies from Levi’s list - and a few that weren’t on the list, but he knew would be appreciated - and spent an equally ludicrous amount of money from Levi’s family savings account.

No, the trading wasn’t the problem.

His level w...

Chapter 141 (Irene; Levi)

“Irene! Hey, heeeey, Medic lady! Over here!”

Irene turned, her eyes landing immediately on the nametag hovering above the head of a young man rushing toward her.

Drakonias: Level 6
(Fighter/Ranger)

She hesitated a moment, smiled and started toward him. “Drakonias?”

“That’s me! Wow, I didn’t think I’d meet anyone else Awakened here. Don’t suppose you’re local?”

“My husband and I live in Alturas, but we’re spending a fe...

Chapter 140 (Various)

[Edited 5/14: changed Leana to Riana; just realized I have way too many L named characters already.]

Riana was unreasonably excited to finally be back to an anime con again. After three years of circumstances conspiring against her, she'd accumulated four full sets of carefully crafted character-appropriate armor she was dying to show off. There wasn't anything quite like the feeling of a year's planning and preparation finally paying off, or, in this case, almost four...

Chapter 139

It didn’t take long to reach their destination the next morning, leaving most of the minions behind at the first dungeon they reached that was close to the venue with instructions to hold the entry room but not advance further. Levi hoped to have some new recruits to Awaken before the day was out, and it wouldn’t be any use if the dungeon was already cleared.

Levi never visited an anime convention before. If he’d ever been any type of 'nerd' it would be statistics, not brightly-co...

Chapter 138

As they continued south, Levi split off some of their minions into two side groups to clear dungeons on their own, with orders to catch back up with the main group as soon as they were done. Since their days-long trip on their own had been largely unproductive, he was sure to only send them to dungeons he could pinpoint with Mana Ping before sending them out.

They were barely a half hour past the second dungeon when Gordon came to an abrupt halt.

“What’s wrong?”

“I�...

Chapter 137

Levi stood a bit straighter, watching tensely as Peter ran forward, closing in on the slime. Henry sprinted back into the fight ahead of him. Peter swapped weapons as he ran, switching out his crossbow for his scythe. He charged into melee range, screaming wordlessly, scythe raised to strike, then slashing down, glowing with Destructive orange light.

The slime took notice. Immediately it turned its attacks back on Peter.

Skarm took a step forward, ready to leap in if necessary. 2022-05-10 15:41:00 +0000 UTC View Post

Chapter 136

At first, Levi thought the boss was a Nature Essence, but it was far too small for that. Only about as big as Becca, if she were curled up in a ball. Not that he’d ever seen her do something like that; she always sat square, with her feet tucked under her, shoulders hunched, head tilted to one side as she watched everything through slitted eyes.

No, it could only be a Spitting Slime. If they weren’t so slow, he’d consider taming it just to have another ranged attacker on the team,...

Chapter 135

Nature Dungeon: Level 2

This one was located in a parking lot, which had been blocked off with caution cones and hazard signs.

The blocked off area was quite large, and not centered around the barely-visible dungeon, but it was obvious that the locals had at least noticed something amiss.

The building nearby had a large dent along its side, the scrape leading up to it covered with clear evidence of vehicle paint.

"Did it snatch the driver right out of ...

Chapter 134

Levi pinged the area, receiving a number of faint signals, none strong enough to be a dungeon. Probably other Awakened in the city. He was momentarily impressed that so many had managed to gain access to the system and level enough to show up, but considering the population density of the place it would almost be more surprising to find no one.

In his past lifetime, he'd never have guessed that so many people were aware of the system this early. He'd never have guessed there were whole ...

Chapter 133

They had a website.  

Cassandra showed him her custom-printed shirts for all of them, with the URL printed across the back in bold silver lettering, then showed him the site itself when he asked.

It… looked good. Professional. Utterly unlike the Doom Raiders’ amateur efforts. This looked like it had cost thousands of dollars and a professional designer. The sleek header managed to incorporate representative iconography while remaining clean, the content was well ...

Chapter 132

The time passed surprisingly quickly, with Levi splitting his time between training Gordon or Peter, talking with Irene, and answering Cassandra’s occasional questions for her efforts online. Mostly on camera.

She insisted he introduce each of his minions, talk about their stats, the pros and cons of each class, explain the details of each type of elixir, and a hundred more questions and answers, recording them all. She’d sworn off leveling personally for the time being, since it wa...

Chapter 131

“Since we’re going to travel on foot, we all need to be able to stamina drag if we don’t want anyone left behind. We can’t rely on cars any more.”

Gordon shook his head and sighed. “You don’t need to be so dramatic about it. I know, you want me to learn to use stamina and mana properly. Please, explain what in the world I’m supposed to actually do.”

Levi grinned. “Start running and don’t stop. Keep an eye on your stamina, and when it starts to drop p...

Chapter 130 (Laurence)

Laurence Haynes wasn’t good at lying. He would consider himself very good at deceiving - by omission, by selective truths, by insinuation and implication - but straight out stating a falsehood made him twitchy and anxious. He worked hard to conceal his tells, but when directly confronted he couldn’t maintain the deception with any degree of poise.

So when it came to flagrantly misleading the man who’d done more for him in a few short weeks than basically anyone else he’d ever me...

Chapter 129

Levi again looked over the lists Laurence had given him. They were a tangible reassurance against his nebulous concerns of how much would be impossible to accomplish, the overwhelmed feeling that had followed him from the start beginning to fade.

The quantity of crafting supplies Laurence had located... this should be enough to keep him going for over a week without stopping. He'd be able to level crafting at an unprecedented speed. Destruction tokens in particular were dramatically und...

Chapter 128

[Aster here, with a quick note: I have performed a minor retcon on Conduit - after comparing the posted text with my original story notes, I realized I'd accidentally broken the universe, so it has been adjusted to better align with what it was originally intended to be. '10% of Tamer’s experience is instead echoed to all active minions' (rather than 'additional'). That is all, on with the story!]

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"Are you ready to talk inventory?" Laurence approac...

Chapter 127

“Gordon… how many weapons do you have stashed in your trunk?”

Despite Cassandra's rushing, they still had two days before they needed to worry about reaching the convention, so they were taking their time with packing. And, in Gordon's case, clearing out his car.

Gordon shrugged. “You keep giving them to me.”

Levi held up a crossbow. “For you to use, not stuff in a stash and forget about.”

“You forgot about them too.”

Levi shrugged off ...

Chapter 126

[Aster here, with a slightly delayed but fresh and shiny chapter for y'all. :) One quick personal note before we get on with things:
As a result of the power outage last week, some of the madness scheduled for last week has been rescheduled, so it looks like this week is going to be... another difficult one. I will do my utmost to continue to provide the usual five chapters a week, though there may once again be delays or odd posting times. At this point, I'm starting to wonder if this...