Jeru was in a better mood than Penelope.

  “Third time’s a charm?” The blue Elf teased.

  This is the fourth time. Penelope growled as she adjusted the grip on her wands as she waited for Patrick to charge through the barrier.

  “The time that Rae took the lead doesn’t count.” Jeru teased. “And you almost had it the last time.”

  Penelope glanced over at the swordswoman beside her. Considering Nina was also level twenty-three, she needed to be included on the team, but that gave them seven people. Circe, Riva, and Frederica were the other three who had leveled due to killing the others, but considering that they had to have Caleb and Patrick on the team as the Healer and Tank, that meant one of the higher-level people had to be put on one of Rae’s teams.

  Nina had been shifted onto the right team, but that run had ended with the Shadow Caster from the left using to lock down the left team and wipe them out. For the next run, Penelope had advocated for Riva to be put on that team, but even with the Fear Immunity due to being a Dark affinity, Riva hadn’t been enough to save everyone.

  For this run, Frederica had joined the left team. This had forced Raelyn to shift over to the right-sided team. Penelope had used the argument that putting one of each of the leaders on a team made the most sense, and since the others were reluctant to work with her due to the idea that her team was ‘cursed’, it made the most sense to keep the higher-levelled people under Patrick.

  “Nervous?” Nina swallowed as she changed the grip on her sword.

  Penelope looked over at the other woman. Considering how many times she’d walked into a square to fight monsters in the last two weeks, her nerves had gotten used to it. But Nina had only been part of the lead team, and thus expected to fight, for a handful of squares. And this was the biggest fight that any of them had been in so far. She glanced at the other two women.

  Riva wore a mask of indifference, but there was enough uncertainty written on the 54-year-old woman’s face to know that she was also feeling uncomfortable about this fight.

  Circe, on the other hand, was too excited. The brunette hopped from foot to foot, slicing her bow through the air like it was a sword. Most people would think that she was nervous, but considering how quickly the archer began laughing after she entered the square and started shooting at the monsters, Penelope knew better. Circe loved being in combat.

  “Remember…” Penelope cleared her throat. “The big blue one has , so I can’t get close until you take him out.”

  “Don’t worry, Pen, I’ll shoot him in the eye holes, then I’m going to work on those flying monkeys!” Circe giggled. “I LOVE when we have free-for-alls!”

  “You just like having lots of stuff to shoot at.” Caleb griped. “More monsters means more bumps and bruises that I have to heal.”

  “It could be worse.” Riva kept her face and voice emotionless. “There might be cuts and missing limbs.”

  Caleb shuddered at the thought, but didn’t comment.

  “Enough chatter!” Patrick barked. “We’re going in and drawing their attention. This treeline is a killbox and Penelope has already pointed out that there are notches on the trees so they’ll fall on us.” He pointed at the sides of the path. “I’m going to make a wall on either side, then put a wall behind me every ten feet. I’ll zigzag the pattern so it’ll hold up the roof and give you cover when you come around the other side.” He looked over at Nina. “Stay close to me and deal with anything that tries to rush us. Our ranged attackers will take care of what they can of the charge.”

  “Why don’t we just have Pen stick her hand through the barrier and shoot the trees herself?” Caleb pointed at Penelope, then motioned at the square.

  “Because, then we won’t be able to walk down the path.” Patrick facepalmed his own metal helmet.

  “Oh…” Caleb shrank towards the back of their group. “I’ll shut up.”

  “Just because you had a bad idea doesn’t mean that you need to stop asking questions.” Patrick growled. “None of us can see everything, so we need harebrained questions like that because you might say something we haven’t thought of sometime.”

  Caleb opened his mouth but got cut off before he could speak.

  “---But not right now, because we’ve got people waiting on us to start.” Patrick lifted the visor on his helmet so everyone could see his face. He gave them a tired smile, then pulled out his sword and pointed it at the barrier. “Stay close to me.”

  The older man closed his visor, then trudged through the barrier, raising a wall in front of him to soak up the eye beams from the Cypups. A pair of parallel walls flanked the path, with the one on the left connecting to the one behind Patrick.

  The Cengons roared as they skittered forward, mouths wide open with rows of hungry teeth ready to tear into the Humans. Riva used to cause a pile-up, which the Slorpies flew over. The three sets that had peeled off to charge the groups on the sides hesitated but, after a moment, continued their charge towards the side groups.

  Ding!

  Experience +2

  Penelope slammed all four from into the lead Slorpy, ending the flying bug’s charge.

  “Take down the Tanks, I’ve got the bugs!” Circe ducked around Penelope and released a flurry of arrows into the swarm of bugs.

  Experience notifications popped up in front of her, but Penelope dismissed them. She needed to focus on the monsters, especially since they resisted her spells. She summoned another set of projectiles and launched them into the closest Cengon, but the cowering monster didn’t die. Penelope sighed and created two sets this time. Green light glowed around the injured monster and it took all eight to earn her the experience notification.

  With the rest of the party protected, the Cypups turned their eyebeams to the trees lining the path. The large pine trees groaned as the wedges in the side were blasted out, causing the trees to lean towards the party.

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  “Ceiling up!” Patrick shifted his wall horizontally, which wasn’t an easy feat. Most of the other people were still struggling to change the nature of the spells and skills they used.

  It had taken Penelope dozens of runs to learn how to force a spell to do something other than its labeled action, but Patrick had spent over a week experimenting with this particular skill and was able to create a ceiling overhead as easily as he had raised the walls.

  CRACK!

  The pine trees broke over the top of the little bunker. Cracks spiderwebbed around the walls, forcing Patrick to raise another wall in front of them, cutting off their line of sight with the advancing monsters.

  Circe wasn’t able to stop her attack in time, shooting three arrows into the stone wall.

  “Watch it!” Patrick hissed as he turned to face the Archer. “This much stone will crush us if it falls on our heads!”

  “Then give me a heads up before you stick a wall in my face next time!” Circe stuck out her tongue, then tried to elbow her way around Penelope so she could reach the other opening.

  There were four feet between the walls, which was enough space for one person to walk comfortably but not enough space for anyone to get around the Tank with his giant shield.

  Penelope touched the back of her right hand to the side of her face and closed her eyes, mimicking that she was using . “Pat, watch out!”

  Patrick gripped his shield, which kept it from being knocked out of his hands as a Scaled Serpent slammed through the opening at the end. The armored monster rammed Patrick up against the corner, exposing its back to the rest of the party, but only for a moment. It bunched up the center of its body against the shield, boxing Patrick into the corner and giving the snake monster enough of a coil that it could launch itself down the hall at the rest of the party.

  Penelope pulled Circe back out of the lead position as Nina drew her sword and met the Scaled Serpent’s charge. Riva directed at the only monster she could see, staggering the monster, but instead of making it cower in place, it acted like a cornered animal and began its attack with renewed fervor. It also meant that the Cengons were released from their bindings since the spell had been recast.

  Nina drove her sword into the Scaled Serpent’s mouth, with her entire right arm getting swallowed by the monster. Riva tried to brace the younger woman as the snake fell on top of her, but the weight of the monster plus Nina’s armor was too much for the older woman to hold.

  Ding!

  Experience +2

  You are now Level Twenty-One

  Stats increased: Speed +1, Magic +1

  You have learned: Remote Casting

  “Incoming!” Patrick heaved the part of the tail that was still spasming off of him as he moved into the opening to stop the next monster from getting in.

  “One second!” Penelope backed up, getting herself out of the bunker, then she cast , , and . The effect was instantly disorienting, but she was able to stop the headache that came from seeing through each of her four by canceling the effect on three of them. She guided the into the air above her and surveyed the battlefield.

  Allis had cleared the path on the right, allowing that side to meet the charging monsters unimpeded. Of all the monsters, only a single Cengon remained except for the three Shadow Demons. There was a Shadow Poisoner and a Plague Blade supporting a vine-clad Shadow Warrior wielding a giant axe, but that side would be able to handle themselves.

  The left side was where all nine of the Romals had moved. The Nature Elementals had created a field of rose vines for that group to chop through, impeding their progress and giving the two Shadow Snipers and Shadow Caster a much safer time to shoot at them.

  That left the Shadow Knight, which was directing everything, in front of them with a Shadow Buffer and Shadow Debuffer to back it up.

  Penelope knew better than to let her eye in the sky get close enough for the Shadow Knight to dispel, but she had some time before it got close enough. She turned her attention to the Cengon just outside of the bunker and cast .

  A streak of light shot out of each of the , spearing the monster. She cast the spell a second time, earning herself a ding! To let her know she’d killed it.

  “Just wait until you’re good enough to cast through them!” Jeru cackled. “You’ll start melting enemies!”

  A dull pain pulsed in the back of her mind, reminding Penelope of how spectacularly that had failed on the last loop. I’m not going to be that good until the fifth floor? Penelope extrapolated based on how many spells she could keep active at once.

  “You could probably figure it out before the end of this one if you really tried, but I doubt you’d be able to aim them.” Jeru grumbled. “Only reason why this is working is because will seek a target, so you just have to point in a monster’s direction for it to hit it.”

  Penelope pulled a Mana Potion out of her pocket. This isn’t very mana efficient.

  “No.” Jeru agreed. “But it essentially doubles your casting distance and allows you to trade spells with ranged enemies without having to worry about getting hit.”

  Which helps. Penelope released her spells into the ground-bound monsters, clearing the way for Patrick to exit the bunker and giving Circe a chance to join the fight again. Once the Shadow Knight charged, Penelope spread the three she wasn’t looking through out in front and continued to blast through them at the Demon.

  The Shadow Knight wasn’t able to cast directly on her, which meant it had to counter each individually.

  Patrick closed the distance, entering into a shoving match with the larger Tank, while Nina was right beside him, stabbing and slashing when she could find an opening.

  Circe moved through the shadows with Riva, going to help the left side. Once the Shadow Knight fell, the Buffer and Debuffer fled deeper into the square. Penelope leaned against the stone wall, taking a moment to slow her breathing that she hadn’t realized had sped up.

  “You okay?” Caleb’s voice pulled her back to her body from the overhead ball.

  “Just catching my breath.” Penelope forced a smile, then gestured with her thumb behind her. “Shouldn’t you be out there with Patrick and Nina?”

  “Skylar came over from the right side and they’re getting ready to go hunt down the Demons that ran off.” Caleb touched her shoulder, sending a pulse of healing magic into her.

  Penelope flinched away, severing the connection. “I told you I was okay.”

  “Pat said you’d say that.” Caleb shrugged. “Told me to heal you anyway.”

  “I’m fine.” Penelope dusted herself off as she glared at the red-haired man. The Healer was twenty years older than her, which put him the same age as her mother, yet he didn’t give off the vibe of someone who was her father’s age. She pointed up at her floating balls overhead. “I can cast spells and see through those things now, so you don’t have to stay here and watch me.”

  “If you’re sure…” The older man shrugged as he headed into the structure. “Just don’t get too distracted until the barrier comes down.”

  Penelope watched him disappear, then sat back down and sent her vision back into her main .

  “He was just trying to be nice.” Jeru insisted. “And he was doing what he was told by people who care about you.”

  That’s… Penelope searched for the words to explain how she felt. She understood the concern, the need to actively do something, as well as Patrick’s weird need for everyone to be in top form. It was just too many people getting too close. She sighed as she directed her ball to move towards the burning rose field. Let’s just focus on cleaning up the monsters in here.

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