The next day, after successfully decimating the furry denizens of the wolf dungeon, Anika found herself launching shot after shot downrange toward frustratingly annoying targets on the archery field. She much preferred practicing inside in the training room, not out here where anyone could watch and other people practiced as well. The punishment of improvement: having to practice with other people.

  Anika sighed as the Pireta on duty called to retrieve arrows, happy to finally be finished with the shooting phase of her day. Now she just needed to find the energy to collect her arrows from the targets. Her back protested as she raised an arm to tug her arrows out of the target… what few had stuck… before starting the task of searching through the grass for the arrows that had strayed from the target.

  Vok had decided she should start working on moving targets, thus her upgrade from the nice stagnant board with targeting circles to the outdoor range. Her targets now consisted of several smaller wooden discs attached to sticks powered by some manner of magical enchantment. Someday, she would inquire how that magic mechanism worked… when she had a few free brain cells to spare.

  Anika began the search for her other arrows, the blue and white fletching of her practice arrows standing out reasonably well in the dark green grass. But bending down to pick them up felt like so much work after relying on Lily to retrieve her arrows so far. Lily had wanted to go practice in the Aether training room rather than accompany Anika to the archery field this morning.

  The previous day, Anika had leveled up in the dungeon, learning that she gained absolutely zero cool new abilities at level 9, just the normal stat points. She had allotted her ‘choose your own adventure’ stat point to Vitality, still focused on survivability over Potency despite Leka’s lecture about not depending on Philip to kill the mobs and Vok’s command to put all her points in Potency. Thankfully, he had yet to inquire after her stat assignments.

  They had stayed in the dungeon a bit later than intended. After Anika leveled up, Leka said they should head back, but Lily demanded they stay until she leveled too. Anika hadn’t exactly argued, as she knew they needed to gain as much experience as possible, though her body had screamed with exhaustion by that point. Thankfully, it only took three additional packs of wolves for Lily to join Anika at level 9. They killed almost 100 wolves in the dungeon yesterday in addition to the Packmother mini-boss.

  After getting back from the dungeon, she and Lily had both practiced magic until Anika finally stumbled bleary-eyed into bed, her capybara asleep before they made it back to the room. This morning, Anika still felt the exhaustion from the previous day lingering, and with no coffee, Anika might as well be borrowing the orange cat brain cell based on her level of function.

  Before heading to the dining hall for lunch, Anika picked up Lily from the Aether training room.

  “Tulor is a good teacher! Today he helped me pick up more little things so now I can pick up sand better so next time I need to throw sand in the wolf’s eyes I can do it better than last time and then Leka will be happy with me and won’t yell at me for not helping more and…”

  Anika grunted affirmative noises occasionally as her capybara rambled in great detail about what she had learned. Lily had decided on her own to ask for more explicit training on how to use her magic in combat effectively, though Leka’s lecture the previous day had some influence on that decision. Anika wasn’t sure that using her sand attack more effectively was quite what Leka had in mind, but she supposed if it worked for a rat it would work for a capybara.

  They arrived in the dining hall at the height of the lunch hour, and Anika quickly realized that she would not find a nice quiet table alone today. After serving food on their plates, with Lily assisting by using her telekinetic powers to hold the plates aloft, her eyes located Philip in the crowd and she quickly led the capybara to his table. She would much rather dine with a known quantity than an enthusiastic acolyte who wanted to spend the entire lunch chattering. Luckily, one of Philip’s best qualities was that he knew how to focus on food.

  Just as predicted, after an initial smile, wave, and mirthful greeting, Philip dug into his meal like a farmer tilling the land. He systematically shoveled food from his plate to his mouth with admirable efficiency, barely breathing between bites of his pasta. Anika likewise made her way through her plate with tired efficiency as Lily enthusiastically consumed her salad of mixed greens, jiri, and other fruit. They almost escaped lunch unscathed when Panu sauntered over to the table and plopped down next to Philip.

  “Hi Panu!” Lily attempted to jump on the table upon seeing the fire mage but failed, plopping back down and landing on her butt, her face somehow managing an anime-style look of embarrassment.

  Panu laughed and reached across the table to scratch Lily’s head, “Lily! I appreciate the enthusiastic hello!”

  “Hi Panu,” Philip hadn’t quite finished eating the bite of pastry in his mouth prior to speaking, so his voice garbled the phrase, causing Lily to giggle.

  Anika simply nodded a greeting at Panu, resisting the urge to facepalm at Philip’s impulsivity, not taking the extra half second to swallow before speaking. Not that she should expect more from the perpetually snacking Earth mage. She shuffled her plate and utensils, starting to stand up and extract herself from the social situation before becoming trapped in a conversation.

  “Awe, all I get is a nod?” Panu pouted at Anika before throwing an arm around Philip’s shoulders, “That’s no matter! Me and my new best friend here have an adventure in the dungeon to look forward to!”

  Anika immediately fell back into her seat, “Philip is going to go to the dungeons with you now?!” Her voice held only a small hint of the panic she felt about having to level without Philip’s power leveling abilities.

  “Well, he is for today! And I heard straight from Zali that she intends to bring him with us to the higher level dungeons so she can give him more appropriately tailored ‘on the job training’ so to speak. Given his level and all.”

  Lily finally caught on, “Philip and Epona are leaving us?” She sounded ready to cry.

  Philip nodded, “Zali says I need to go practice with her so I can get better at magic. She says I need to use it more when I fight.”

  Anika stared down at the smaller man, wracking her brain on how they were going to level alone without a tank. They had the capy pack, but that would not help much against larger enemies. And without Philip’s area of effect spells they would have significantly less success against the large packs of monsters even in the lower level dungeon. They might even have to farm lidoks exclusively. Anika shuddered.

  “Don’t you worry, Lily,” Panu patted the capybara again, “I’m sure they won’t leave you to level alone!”

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  “Zali says I can go with you tomorrow and until you are level 10. But today I have to go with Panu.” Philip said, clearly trying to sound reassuring. His own excitement for more training seeped in, however.

  Anika immediately breathed a sigh of relief. They wouldn’t lose Philip immediately, so she would have to take advantage of him tomorrow to get as much experience as possible. But handling the large groups of monsters without him and Epona would add a layer of difficulty to her leveling plans. She would have to spend more time strategizing to figure out the best way for her and Lily to keep leveling as quickly as possible. She knew that monopolizing all of Philip’s time in the dungeons harmed his own advancement, so she understood why Zali would want him to go off on his own. But she wanted to level together a little longer, at least!

  “We’ll be fine on our own, Lily. We can just go back to the first dungeon. You got really good at killing things there with my arrows, remember? And I’m sure Leka will find us someone else to party with too.”

  “Maybe they’ll send me in to help you ladies out sometime,” Panu wiggled his eyebrow seductively. “I suppose I could take a break from our lovely Princess to accompany you.”

  “Oh no, you definitely should just stay with her. She’ll tear Philip apart.”

  “Morigan can’t hurt me,” Philip said defensively.

  “Oh with her magic, she definitely can.” Anika remembered Panu telling her about Morigan’s out of control magic.

  Panu nodded, “Anika is right, the princess is a menace. I suppose I’ll have to stick with you buddy. It’ll take two of us to stand up to the Petty Petty Princess.”

  Anika could hear the capitals in Panu’s name for Morigan, and she laughed despite herself. She probably couldn’t explain to Panu why the nickname amused her, as it would definitely be lost in translation.

  “Enjoy your time with her. Lily and I have to get back to training.”

  —-----

  The remaining hours of the day passed with excruciatingly exhaustive training. Finally back in her room, Anika flopped sideways on her bed, knees hanging over the side so her shoes wouldn’t sully her bedding, and examined her stats.

  Stats:

  Potency: 15

  Anima: 19

  Vitality: 20

  After another grueling session on the obstacle course that afternoon, her Vitality had increased by a point. It seemed like a lot of effort for one tiny stat point, but she couldn’t deny that the ability to run and resist status effects would increase her survivability in the dungeons, in addition to Vitality’s overall impact on her endurance and defense. She could actually tell now that her body could withstand more punishment in the way her chest breathed easier while working out and how she felt less pain when she did something silly like stub her toe.

  She tried to sit up, but her body screamed its exhaustion and she closed her eyes and groaned instead. Somehow, Leka managed to work her even harder despite her increased Vitality, sapping every last ounce of her energy.

  A capybara head instantly nuzzled her dangling, aching calf.

  ”Anika?! Are you okay? I can’t get on the bed! Pick me up!”

  ”But then I have to get up,” Anika groaned and rolled her body to the side, groping her arm toward the edge of the bed while trying to kick off her shoes without injuring her companion. Her feet didn’t want to co-operate. She grunted and left the shoes on her feet.

  ”I guess I can sleep on the floor…” Anika felt Lily move away from her leg as the capybara’s tone suggested she would be very upset if left to only the rug as a bed.

  ”I didn’t say I wouldn’t pick you up, I just don’t want to move. Leka is a horrific taskmaster. I lost count of how many laps I ran today.” Anika flung her arm over the side of the bed, grabbing for the capybara. Not finding success, she opened one eye and saw Lily in the center of the rug.

  ”C’mon, Lily! I wouldn’t leave you to sleep on the floor! Besides, I am going to have to get up to reach the light panel. I just want to lie here for a minute first.”

  Lily ran over to her hand and Anika hauled her up, glad she wasn’t larger than she could manage one handed… though a larger creature could have jumped on the bed on her own.

  “Hopefully you can levitate yourself onto the bed soon… or at least grow large enough to jump up yourself! Then you don’t have to wait on me to get comfy.”

  ”I can almost lift myself! Maybe in another level or two I will have enough magic to do it.”

  Anika grimaced thinking of what would happen next level. ”In another level or two we are going to be on our own without Philiip and Epona. I don’t know how we can possibly catch up to the rest of the heroes if we don’t have help leveling. You don’t have armor and I don’t know how to fight from close up. I don’t think we can kill the groups of monsters in the dungeons without being overrun.”

  Lily turned around a few times, like a puppy picking the right spot, before snuggling up against her abdomen. “I’m sure Leka will help you! They don’t send people to the dungeons alone. And we have my capybara monsters that can help!.”

  ”Yeah, but they don’t do much more than stand there… they are more sacrifices than they are competent party members.”

  ”But they’ll get better as I get to higher levels!”

  Anika froze momentarily from Lily’s proclamation. ”Wait. They do?! What do you mean? They just get bigger or something?”

  ”No, they get some of my abilities! I think they will be able to attack like me. I don’t know for sure but I know they will get better!”

  Anika’s mind raced, thinking about the possibilities of an army of capybaras with Lily’s power. The capybara meat shield strategy worked at lower levels, but Anika had a feeling it would become increasingly ineffective as they leveled and encountered monsters with more exotic abilities. Or just monsters with more intellect. Every game had their fair share of mindless monsters that worked on instinct, but usually at higher levels monsters had a chance to have the intelligence needed to strategize. If the Capy pack could use actual abilities, the possibilities opened up to use them as decoys, or amplify strategies that targeted weak spots like the eyes.

  “Once we get to level 10, we will need to have a chat about abilities and how we can use them without Philip around. We also should experiment to determine exactly how much instruction you need to give them for them to pull off complex tasks.”

  ”I just tell them what to do in their heads and they do it!”

  ”Right, but so far you’ve only really told them to stand somewhere or run randomly. If we wanted them to do a specific pattern or attack specific monsters with specific abilities, they may be less able to respond intelligently. Of course, I wonder if their capability changes based on the original monster’s intelligence.”

  ”Oh, I don’t know that. I guess I haven’t given them very complicated instructions yet.”

  ”We can make it part of our plans to experiment and figure out how to best use your capybaras when we don’t have Philip and Epona anymore. Hopefully they get more abilities soon. It’s going to be rough without a tank. I also need to read more about the dungeons in the area this week, that way we know what types of creatures we want to test with. The books don’t really say how intelligent the monsters are, but maybe we can figure it out based on what abilities they have and if the books say anything about how they fight. The books I found gave information about the wolves and other monsters in the dungeon we visited, though it definitely lacked the detail I expected. I think we could do better.”

  Anika yawned, her brain beginning to rebel against actively thinking anymore.

  “I think it’s time for bed… maybe the lights can stay on tonight. Then I don’t have to get up.”

  ”Maybe I can turn it off with my magic!” Lily stood up, looking toward the door at the small magic rune on a crystal plate set into the wall. Anika wasn’t sure how it worked, she just knew that she swiped her hand over it and the lights just came on. Probably motion activated?

  A dress Anika had tossed onto the chair by the door levitated up and over to the panel, Lily staring at it intently as it gyrated in the air this way and that in front of the crystal panel. After a few seconds of back and forth movement, Lily found the right movement to swipe the light and darkness enveloped the room. Anika didn’t bother to see what happened to the dress, collapsing into sleep, her legs dangling off the bed and shoes still on.