Penelope did her best to ignore the pit in her stomach as she heard the same arguments as the last time.
“The whole reason you did all the jobs was so that you could gear people out better and they’d be more prepared for this.” Jeru gave her a smile to try to cheer her up, but it did little to calm the turmoil in her mind.
I get it. Penelope sighed as she opened her menu to look at her stats. And I know that even I’m in a better place than I was last time.
Almost all of her gear had been crafted by Eldri. Considering her stats capped out at twenty until she beat the bosses on this floor, there wasn’t any reason to give herself Magic as a stat, so she’d stacked all the Speed she could to max that stat out, then put everything else into Recovery. It meant that she didn’t have a lot of resistances or increases to her spell damage, but she could completely recover all of her mana in just under fourteen minutes thanks to taking the Mage Blood passive at level seven. Being able to recover her mana that quickly helped them clear the squares faster, which had given Patrick more time back at camp to work on his own skills.
This time, there were walls in place on the outer barriers of every square surrounding the boss square. It gave them an extra layer of defense and would slow the monsters down significantly when the timer expired.
“Are you nervous?” Ula stopped next to Penelope and looked at the black barrier.
“We don’t know what’s on the other side of that barrier.” Penelope shook her head. “Both Eldri and I tried to use
“It’s alright to be scared.” Ula chuckled. “I know I am.” The older woman shrugged. “But you know the difference in power between us and the people counting on us up there.” She gestured at the ceiling. “So I have to have faith we can handle this.” A smile crossed her face. “Plus, we’ve got an extra Healer now.”
Penelope glanced over at where Emory Dixon was standing beside his aunt. Once they’d all hit level ten near the end of the seventh column, they’d let Emory swap in for one of the Buffers to get him enough experience to level to ten himself. With a third Healer, they had an even better chance of keeping everyone alive, but there was still something unsettling about the fight. Penelope pushed the images of her friends dying towards the red door in her mind and forced a smile.
“I guess it’s just nerves.” Penelope sighed. “We just need to hold the monsters here so they don’t get out.”
“We’ll slow them down; you just make sure to kill them.” Ula patted Penelope on the shoulder. “We’ve got two teams to take on one square. We’ve got this.”
“I know.” Penelope shook her hands to try to work out the nervous tingle. She was stronger this time than she was before and everyone had optimized gear even if it didn’t have resistances or bonuses to damage. But at this point, those extra bonuses were too small to make much of a difference anyway.
“Watch our backs!” Ula waved as she walked over to where Patrick was stationed.
They had split the party into three layers. Ula, Frederica, Nina, Oakley, and Patrick were in front. Penelope, Circe, and Judah were in the middle. Which left Marlow, Raelyn, Emory, Eldri, and Riva in the back. They were all spread out so they could cover the most area but still close enough that they could protect each other.
As the timer dropped into single digits, the others began chanting down the numbers.
10
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1!!!
The shadowy barrier fell, revealing the six large monsters inside the boss square.
“Two, three, five, six, nine, and ten.” Jeru rattled off where each one came from.
Thanks… Penelope’s heart sank as she registered the Scorb Demon was among the ones that they had to face this time. That had been the boss Ula had faced off against during the last main loop. While her friend had managed to kill the Demon, it had weakened her so much that Dawson had killed her. Penelope gritted her teeth. Not this time.
“Focus on the problem at hand.” Jeru cautioned her. “You’ve not faced the Armored Shadow, Depth Shadow, or Frider Demon, so you’ve got some new patterns to learn.”
Great, so all I haven’t seen is the boss from column seven. Penelope cast
The Armored Shadow looked like a larger version of the Shadow Knights, with the main exception being that it had a pair of large bat wings on its back. The boss from column two took to the air to head over the Tanks.
The ground shook as the Depth Shadow dropped into the ground. The mole-like Demon stood on two legs and was covered in a hard shell. Instead of hands, there was a pair of pincers at the end of its arms. Its horned head still resembled a mole's, complete with the tiny eyes and naked, pointed nose.
The last monster she hadn’t seen before hopped towards Oakley, slamming into his shield, then bashing it with a tongue that was longer than her body. The Frider Demon had the body of a frog, but with eight legs and was over six feet tall when it was sitting. Each leg grappled with the shield as Oakley created a wall of stone off the sides of his shield to keep the monster from yanking it out of his grasp.
It’s times like these I wish I could’ve gotten
The two people on either side of her nodded and set out to work on their individual tasks. Penelope focused on the wings of the flying Demons and in moments, both the Armored Shadow and Cabbit Demons were grounded.
Stone pelted her from behind as the Depth Shadow erupted out of the ground. The seven-foot-tall Demon swiped at the Healer group, only for its clawed hand to bounce off of the barrier Eldri had put around them.
“You’re not going back down!” Penelope cast
The Depth Shadow was lifted off the ground, ice forming on the joints of its armor as it was spun around in the air by the violent wind. Penelope waited until most of the Demon was frozen over, then slammed the boss into the stone floor. Its armor shattered like glass, revealing soft tissue underneath. She cast
DING!
Experience +7
Penelope turned around to see who needed her help next.
Oakley was still holding off the Frider Demon, but Frederica had cut off two of its legs and gouged out one of its eight eyes. The monster's tongue was lying a few feet away from the pair and while it still had a lot of life in it, there was no question about how that fight was going to end.
Ula and Nina were double-teaming the Scorb Demon. The monster’s barbed tail was gone, and it was bleeding from numerous cuts. It wasn’t going to be long before it gave everyone another experience notification.
Circe had the Armored Shadow pinned in place and was shooting arrows into joints to do damage where she could. Riva had the Cabbit Demon restrained with
Patrick was getting rammed by the Dragon Turtle and was slowly losing ground. The balding Tank wasn’t trying to hold his position, but he wasn’t letting the large, shelled monster get around him.
Patrick needs help first and by the time we handle that… A smile cracked Penelope’s face. I think the others might be done with their fights.
“See? Nothing to worry about?” Jeru offered her a high-five.
I’m not slapping your hand. Penelope chuckled. For starters, because I can’t actually do it. And secondly, because it’ll look weird for me to be high-fiving air.
“It’s the thought that counts.” Jeru smiled at her as a notification announced someone had finished off their monster. “Now finish this up so you can head down to the second floor!”
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