After the births, Team Prox was heading to a new location. An edge of the universe farming planet with very little combat. But… The monsters would be over three hundred, the scenes new, and the adventure hopefully challenging. The plan was to travel via my airship, with it packed tightly, and stay in a well defended camp while not actively farming.
On the other side of the planet, we were going to be scoping out a potential raid. The target was none other than an ally of the Justicars, a Dastardly Master’s minor outpost. They were cocky in the fact no medium guilds would hit the second biggest alliance and confident the target wasn’t worth Inquisitor intervention. Which either made it a really good trap or an oversight.
I grimaced trying to think of where I left my briefing report when I saw Nicole returning with a stack of papers and a plate of sliced melon.
“You know I’d have gotten this myself,” I said with a loving smile. She bent down to kiss my lips. “You spoil me.”
“No, you spoil me. A baby today. Mysti and I will be staying behind. We came to a firm conclusion after tussling with the decision in a back and forth. I’ll be running the city, Mysti will manage our children, and I’ll help when I can. Zoey will protect you…” Nicole said letting the sentence hang.
I sighed, knowing I’d miss them while on campaign. My meek smile resulted in a soothing touch from Nicole. I said, “I’ll miss my amazing wife and most excellent healer. On a different note, is Zoey still reaping souls?”
The damn woman had been sneakily collecting the dead into her staff. No wonder Frooska hated creating the vile weapon. It didn’t take long to discover what she was up to. There was eventually a letter from some ranking Justicar that the missing members arriving on Thur were going to be investigated. My cooperation would be appreciated. I sent a formal reply asking why they were coming to Thur and what made them think I was involved. Shocker, they never replied while Ptera and Zoey managed to skirt the investigation. That was when they came clean on their attempts to get their necromancy weapons from legendary to divine.
“How close is she?” I asked, watching the morning sun’s glow as it rose over the horizon. The city was stirring below me, the billowing smoke from chimneys increasing. This was my longest home ever besides purgatory. And yet, I longed to leave it for Vin every sunrise.
“Well, the Justicars stopped sending potential recruits months ago. I’m still surprised you’re letting her reap souls Warg is donating,” Nicole said, groaning as she struggled to seat herself. I hopped out of the chair to help her sit. She smiled lovingly. “I miss instant pregnancies.”
“It’s not donating when you pay for it. I got him another army of bats. Sure, they’re bats. But the orb would have solved a lot of our problems,” I said with a frown.
“You know Gryff, you don’t have to be the good guy. You can bend your deal.”
I shook my head before chomping into the melon. “I don’t care if I screw Warg in the long run. Short term I need him as an ally. The TruthSayers will be the third rising power. They have climbed into the top twenty five recently and are now officially on the Inquisitor ally list. I bet the Justicar’s are shitting bricks.”
“Why? Because they are still losing key locations or because they’re coming closer to third place every day? They have to do something,” Nicole said, handing me the reports.
My fingers shifted to the balance sheet. It was always my least favorite of the bunch. “We borrowed,” I said with a wince.
“Ptera knows we're good for it. We have a city to run that is new, hard to tax a bunch of people who work for you only to repay them with their own tax money. The big issue for us has been gear costs. When you start to want your army in blue orbs or higher you hit paywalls.
“Walls steeper than we or our soldiers can afford. We can only sell pet goblins so many times. Or a wind spell. Most of the guys have taken orbs to the recycler. Actually not a bad long term strategy for valuation, but it means no money now.
“Hence why we’ve been planning, training, and prepping for tomorrow,” Nicole said in a firm tone.
“Well, yeah. I just hate owing anyone anything. Cut back on -”
“Gryff, the city is operating at a positive when its army is in the field. Take the field while being the hero. No more leveling here on Thur, that would solve all our problems, I hope. We need an outpost on a nice combat planet or to jump our way up the ladder with strategic hit and runs.
“Smash some Justicar skulls in, and come home with the loot. At the very least adventure to the point you get some levels and return to fill our coffers,” Nicole said in an encouraging tone.
A closing door had me shifting to see Zoey. Her long black hair flowed down her back. She wore casual black robes and waddled using her necromancy staff as a walking stick. Her red eyes were glowing with happiness.
“Yes! About fucking time. These little stinkers are getting evicted today,” Zoey said looking at her belly with a playful smile. “Stop kicking mom's belly.” Her eyes went back to me. “Sorry I’m late for the morning family meeting. I was ingesting another thousand floors of souls into the staff. About half way there sadly. Even after months of -”
“Come my love. Plop into my lap,” I said patting her thigh. “As charming as it is to hear how your weapon is fed by the wicked getting a tortuous justice, we have other matters to discuss. Like your belly.”
She snickered and said, “I’m so huge. I probably need you to catch me anyway. So… war tomorrow. Creator above, this week is going to be the best! I hate being poor. We’ve seen numerous necro orbs but lack the funds.”
“We’ve been stuck helping the dwarves get levels so we can compete in proper dungeons. Your time will come. Did you see Dib is a sergeant now? A level 413 of his own flying scout unit. Bounced back from his divorce nicely,” I said happily.
“That little bearfrii impresses me. He swapped around trying to learn what worked best for him. He ended up a healer, wouldn’t have expected that. Desmond is a full fire mage but with Ossa’s belly swollen and not due for another year, I’m not shocked he asked to stay behind,” Nicole said sourly.
Zoey riffled through the reports, turning page after page. She frowned as she kept going and I felt the need to pause her before she could react.
“Garataur and Frooska are not ready. Shala and Barq are joining us as lightning with water. Harmony will be our pilot and Kata our air mage. The rest are new recruits wanting to adventure with us or freed slaves,” I said and she went to quibble. My finger hit her lips. “My children and then I’ll tear the master universe apart, buying you worthy orbs as we go.
“Just have a little patience. These seven months of growth have been amazing for the Awesome Adjective Annihilators.”
She nodded, handing me the paperwork before heading to extend a hand to Nicole. The two of them cornered Mysti before she could escape for another rest. I smiled proudly, following them off the balcony. It was time to be a dad again. While that was intimidating, I knew they would be good moms and the children well cared for.
What really irked me was tomorrow, what would the fated adventure on a combat planet bring? There was only one way to find out.
CHAPTER 2
I went over my gear for the fifth time while aboard the airship. The entirety of the vessel was packed minus my suite.
The fact that my familiar had upgraded once about a month ago was no surprise. I used it for even short trips. The level up had done wonders to the size and capabilities.
Harmony loved the fact the blimp was faster. Me, it was all about the number of troops we could carry.
While the suite had stayed about the same, that all new smell returned. Cargo had added a new large section while allowing ramps on the side for direct loading up high. That single fact made loading and unloading easier. The biggest part that I’d loved about the upgrade was the personnel quarters for the average soldier.
The ship went twice as wide now and added tw
o new decks. If we jammed in, we could hold fifteen thousand. Our current forces were fairly cozy on this adventure, to the point my suite stayed mine.
This far into the gaming universe I took some precautions. For instance, all of us were wearing gliders.
Yup, if some asshole despawned our airship, we were ready. Plus using gliders was a great battle tactic; not new, used plenty of times, and still viable. My mage robes were custom fit, gave a nice core mana regen, and were on tight. I’d custom crafted them myself in a mage tower we installed a few months ago. Stitching may not be the manliest thing but I needed something to do when I got back from slaughtering mobs.
Under the plain tan robes with black trim, I wore light leathers for physical protection. In my left hand rested Nicole’s legendary healing staff, brought for the revive mechanism; not so I could heal. My right hand was empty, ready to spawn a spear. Around my waist was my sword in its sheath.
My straps for my glider were on tight and my waist pouch was filled with potions. My five orbs were mostly the same. I removed the smokescreen for a purple area of effect heal. If I had the staff I might as well add an orb to chip in.
My checks complete, I found there was little else for me to do besides be patient and wait for the rest of my army to assemble on the airship. It’s not like there wasn’t a tinge of guilt I could angst over.
Oh wait, there was. I was leaving behind three healthy girls and one boy. Nicole was doting on our son, who she named Archer. Misty had a daughter we named Saffron. Zoey had twin girls named Caity and Beyona. Each of them were adorable little angels.
Nicole bawled at my departure, Misty was forced to pull her away. I assured them I would be home soon. Zoey had the opposite reaction. She was so over being pregnant that she did a dance when she was healed. She did have tender words to our children before joining me for war, but… she certainly wasn't a crying mess.
A snapping finger caught my attention. I shifted to see Harmony ready to snap again. “Yes?” I asked.
“Permission to liftoff?” Harmony said, snickering at the fact she caught me zoned out. The single tailed kitsune was in fire mage gear, her face stern like those around me. I turned until I found the dvaren I was looking for.
“Groz, confirm that we are ready,” I said sternly.
“Ready to go, Sir,” the gruff dvaren replied with a terse nod.
“Okay. Take us up to portal altitude,” I ordered.
The airship shot into the air at an extreme rate. If someone knocked us out of the sky, height was everything for our gliders. Our ascent quickly put us out of range from potential danger and there was a collective sigh released. When we stopped climbing all eyes looked at me and I smirked. No one knew where we were going besides Nicole, Zoey, and I.
I hadn’t been sorta paranoid, I’d been completely paranoid. Maybe it was the fact that I knew I was a dense idiot at times. There was a reason I had waited until the last moment to tell my pilot where we were going.
“Bacru,” I said in a stern gruff voice.
Harmony’s face frowned. She went into her pilot index chart and said, “I don’t know it.”
I dug into my belt line and handed her a new pilot’s charting guide. That book was disgustingly expensive and yet, worth every coin.
“Why?” Harmony asked, clearly confused by my choice.
I folded my arms and answered, “Everyone knows my pilot is Princess Harmony. You’re not only famous, but even if you weren’t, you’re an eye catching babe which also garners attention. Everyone will know a little diving into your past that you’re a student of X aviation school with a limited planetary portal knowledge of -”
“Right, good call. Okay I need... like ten minutes, then we’ll jump,” Harmony said, wagging a finger while her eyes flickered excitedly over the text. She returned to the captain’s wheel and executed a thirty degree turn while mumbling to herself. “Oh, it's close. Only an hour jump. It's right in the combat zone…”
“Yup, stick us into the portal then we hold a briefing in here,” I said, pulling out a two foot long map.
There was a side table I walked over to lay out my plans. While my leaders gathered, Harmony left for a different table to study the astronomy plotting to get us to Bacru. I used the time for everyone to gather to collect my thoughts. Groz was the first to be ready for my briefing. The dvaren general had three battalion colonels shadowing him and a set of dvaren runners not far behind. All my melee fighters were tucked into my dvaren companies. It was odd seeing orcs, ogres, and trolls in formations with dvarens but these were different times.
Dib was running my aerial scouts so he got a place at the table. It was going to be hard to cycle them in to get levels but over the last few months we had found a decent way to ensure they contributed while they rotated perimeters.
Jason, a human, was running my ground scout unit. From Best Texas, yup, that was a planetary expansion name. He’d been some hardcore military guy that fell to the horde invasion early in the war. Cut off from any chance of escape he was extracted to the master verse and sold to be a security guard. Worked well for him for a bit until the whole Gryff the Harbinger from Prox thing got him sold to me for cheap.
Nicole normally ran my mages, leaving me needing to fill the role. Barq and Shala were too battle focused on the micro to manage the macro. They still attended the briefings mainly for their input that I valued more than command factors.
Since Nicole was at home I had to slot a powerful mage as the general for the ranged forces. There were only 717 mages in my force for this expedition. That still meant I needed someone to corral all those elitists into one unified force, well, maybe two but they were about to find that out.
Zoey was ruled out because she was going to be my death dealing babe who had my back along with Kata my naga. I needed a guarding force and people I could trust to protect me while I fought. Neither could do that if they were managing line troops.
Nicole picked Gemini to lead the mages and I’d been hesitant on the decision. Gemini was something different. She’d come clean during a lengthy interview, she was an Inquisitor officer who was transferred. She asked to leave her old guild she fought with for eons so she could join my side. In all the things for people of the master verse to believe in, one of them was the prophecy of my coming. It was a long shot she’d survive as a line officer to see the day where I’d arrive, but, arrive I did.
Gemini was sent with a letter of recommendation by Machew himself. As a gracious offer of goodwill he sent her to work with me and on his honor vouched for her authenticity. He even wrote he had spies in my camp, his debt to Gemini was paid when he said she was the real deal. I decided to take his word as honest for now. It was asking a lot to trust Machew and the Inquisitors since they were supposed to be a target of mine.
Nicole had used a truth orb during a lengthy interview with Gemini. The attractive women had sharp features, a dimpled smile, and was from a species called the celestials. The race had a horn on their head like a unicorn and the rest was very human. She was regal in her pose, strict with her commands, and revered among the mages. She and Nicole got along amazingly. She and I were different, I respected her skill but she was a big unknown to me. Only Nicole's faith in her allowed her at my table. I tended to never see Gemini as she would run expeditions on opposite rotations.
It was hard to find good help, honest help. Sure we vetted the others in the room, but our full army was over ten thousand. That is a lot of folks to question for every little nuisance.
I felt a tap on my shoulder. Zoey was warning me I was on the spot. Yup. Well, shit. I’d zoned out thinking about Gemini and now everyone was looking at me. I cleared my throat.
“I selected Bacru for a couple of reasons. It’s a good starting point for us. The weather is nice, the planet is mild savannah and pretty green where we are going. It is relatively tame with only two big dungeons for a group our size.
“The first dungeon is called Th
e Scorpion Queen. We enter, clear a few hundred mummies and then survive six growing waves of the queen's minions. There is not much thought process to this dungeon. Go in, set a defense, and farm,” I said firmly.
Barq held his hand up to say, “Downsides?”
“Well, the choke point is great for defending from both directions. A larger enemy force can use the entrance or the exit to pen us in. This -”
“If I may Gryff,” Gemini said, digging into her bag. She set a fresh roll of paper on the table. She drew out the outline I had seen already. She talked while she worked. “I get the secrecy, a mental image helps commanders tremendously. There is a book called the Army Dungeon Guide of Mediocrity. We used it as doctrine training for our soon to be generals and still new ones. This dungeon is in there. So…”
She finished drawing the basic layout of the dungeon, passing the parchment around with a smile. I knew Nicole liked her for a reason. This kind of expertise would be awesome to have around.
“Perfect. I’ll buy some books for this room,” I said, placing my finger to a point on the map. “The other dungeon is the Cavern of the Goddess, located a few hours' march to the west. There are a bunch of tunnels on their way down. Most are expansive with ample room to maneuver. We will have to fight at key intersections, and then try to find which way to go.
“Each intersection is a progressively tougher foe, either by level, defenses, and, or by what you fight. The cavern ends in water. So expect the typical amphibian defenders like fighting frogs, and nagas.
“Nothing respawns while you're in the dungeon, so if we get turned around we will find the proverbial goddess with enough time. She is a mermaid boss fight where you have to slay her in the water or an island. You get wet regardless and thankfully the weather is warm.”
“Why these?” Barq said. My little friend was using something to stand on. I shifted to see a folded out resting stool.
I grunted, glancing at Gemini to let her draw the second dungeon. She shook her head telling me enough to keep going.
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