Once again the lights dimmed. The back wall was lit up by hidden spotlights as it slid open to reveal a small phanx of skeleton warriors. Awenda stepped back and let out a loud roar to capture their attention.
This time Lilit decided to test out her ability to draw and use her prayer book with her new wing-shield on her arm. Her fingers were free, but the strap holding the shield bracer with her hand made pulling the book out a little more difficult. It wasn’t enough that she thought it would really be a problem, just something to adjust to.
Thinking of her ward spell, she opened her prayer book and began chanting. She was getting faster as she became more confident about speaking the prayers. She focused on Awenda as she cast her ward, and soon the skeletons’ weapons were bouncing off of the light ward, several inches in front of Awenda’s armor.
With a single sweep of her sword, Awenda stepped into the mob and ripped two skeletons in half. At the same time, Rana dashed forward and began dismantling another skeleton, one limb at a time.
Izumi’s phantasm wasn’t fairing as well. Its sshing attack didn’t seem to be nearly as effective against the skeletons. Izumi unched an arrow into the crowd of skeletons, but it seemed to lodge between the ribs of one of the skeletons, not dealing much damage.
“Izumi, aim for the head!” Lilit called out before stepping forward to engage her own skeleton.
Izumi called out for her phantasm to become a tank before Lilit could reach anything, and several of the skeletons near the back of the mob broke away to engage the phantasm.
Frustrated, Lilit changed direction and smashed her mace through the middle of a skeleton, sending bone fragments scattering across the room. The skeleton turned around toward her sword raised high, shield arm on the floor.
Lilit shoved her arm in front of her as the skeleton swung down. She felt the strike reverberate through her entire arm. Note to self, deflect instead of block…ow. As the skeleton’s strike was rebounding, Lilit swung under her arm, shattering the skeleton’s pelvis, dropping it to the floor.
The upper half of the skeleton flipped itself over and started to crawl toward her. Lilit stepped forward and smashed the skull to powder. The rest of the skeleton fell apart.
She looked around. The skeletons that Awenda had cut in half were currently trying to trip her up. So, Lilit rushed over to beat them off of her.
“Smash the skulls or they just keep coming!” Lilit yelled to her companions.
“Decapitation works as well,” Rana yelled back.
Lilit took a moment to catch her breath before wading back into the mob. It looked like the phantasm was on its st legs as it took a ssh across its chest. Darkness seemed to creep out of the cut. Izumi chanted a short incantation that Lilit couldn’t decipher and the rip in the phantasm closed up and it stood taller. Once again doing its best to hold off the skeletons.
Rana was on the side of the room, working on the phantasm’s mob with Izumi. So, Lilit stayed near Awenda and did her best to help reduce their number. Awenda’s sword wasn’t very effective for killing the skeletons. She didn’t have the room for more than jabs and the occasional sweeping cut with her giant shield on her other arm.
There were several skeletons missing an arm or leg, but they kept coming. Since they didn’t bleed, or seem to feel pain, they didn’t slow down. They just adjusted how they moved forward and kept coming.
Lilit came in from the side and began smashing her way through skeletons. While Awenda’s sword wasn’t the best weapon in this situation, Lilit’s mace worked beautifully as bone splintered and shattered under her attacks.
As Lilit’s assault began to draw more attention from the rest of the mob, Awenda let out another roar to bring back their attention to her. Around the same time, Lilit heard the eerie shriek that the phantasm used to do the same thing.
Lilit came up to one of the skeletons with one leg. It hopped forward to lunge at Awenda. Lilit reared back and kicked it, knocking it over easily. Then she bent over and smashed her mace through its skull.
They continued like this for several more minutes before the final skeleton fell apart as Rana removed its head. Lilit was bent over, breathing heavily. Her stamina bar had been empty for the st two minutes or so, and swinging her mace had taken an extreme amount of effort.
“So…maybe not skeletons next time,” Izumi suggested.
“Yeah, maybe not,” Awenda responded. “I didn’t realize how ineffective I would be as anything but a damage sponge.”
“And I didn’t realize how ineffective my summons would be.”
“It was still a good learning experience, I think.” Lilit said. “We know if we run into skeletons that the typical attacks and strategy won’t work as well. I feel like with my mace, I was a lot more helpful than I normally am though.”
“Definitely,” Rana agreed. “And once we figured out their weakness, it was a lot easier for me to kill them.”
“Unfortunately even shooting them in the head wasn’t always good enough to kill them,” Izumi compined.
“Should we look into getting some weapons that would work better against skeletons just in case?” Awenda asked.
“I mean, it couldn’t hurt,” Lilit answered.
“Let me think about what we might use,” Rana suggested.
“Let’s see what else we can py with in the meantime,” Lilit suggested. She pulled up her Delver and reopened the menu for the room. The time was down to a little more than thirty minutes. The others gathered around and they began more seriously going through the list of opponents.
By the end of the hour, Lilit’s dex had gone up a level. Now she sat at a nine in dexterity. Awenda had somehow gone up a level in charisma, bringing her to a whopping seven. That expined so much about the imposing woman.
Lilit had also had to cast her healing prayer a few times as fatigue and sloppiness had started to catch up to even the party members that had stamina for days. Lilit wished she could soak in a tub, let her sore muscles rex in the heat. She’d have to settle for standing under the hot water in her shower for as long as it sted.
“Can we drop off our armor and freshen up, then visit the suite merchants? I’d kill for a bathroom,” Rana pleaded as they left the training room.
“Wait, you don’t have a bathroom?” Lilit asked.
“Nah, I’ve got a shower room. Besides, bathrooms are communal. Why, do you have a bath?” Rana looked excited.
“Oh, no. We just call all rooms with a toilet and somewhere to bathe a bathroom where I’m from. I have a shower too. I’m not sure about communal baths though.”
“What do you mean? All baths are communal, right?” Rana looked around at the others.
“We had both private and public bathhouses,” Awenda answered.
With a glint in her eye Izumi shouted, “I want communal baths!”
“I’m fine with that,” Awenda said.
Everyone turned to look at Lilit. She stammered for a moment before tching onto a potential problem. “Well, who would pay for it? If we split up or something, only one of us can take it with us. Do we all chip in or does someone need to pay for it all themselves?”
“Easy, it was my idea, I haven’t bought much with my gold. If I can afford it, I’ll get it today. If not, depending on how much it costs, we split the cost and then I’ll buy you all out after the next dungeon,” Rana offered.
“I…guess,” Lilit hedged. It’s not like she’d have to use it if she wasn’t comfortable. But the idea of soaking in some hot, steamy water sounded divine right now.
The group split at the stairs, with Izumi heading the opposite direction to her single room since she’d apparently already left her team when they gathered armor. She’d assured everyone that even if they didn’t take her on, she didn’t want to keep dungeon diving with her team.
“So, what do you guys think about Izumi?” Lilit asked as soon as the goblin was out of earshot.
“I like her,” Rana answered immediately.
“Of course you do,” Lilit mumbled under her breath.
It apparently wasn’t quiet enough or Rana’s hearing was just that good, because she whipped her head around and gred at Lilit. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
It was too te to back pedal now, so Lilit just plowed ahead recklessly. “It’s no secret that you like her. You were practically drooling while she threw herself at you.” Rana growled deeply, sharp teeth fshing. “But,” Lilit continued bravely or stupidly, she’d soon find out, “she has been throwing herself at all of us. You really think she’d just stop trying to get in all our pants after she seduces you?”
Now Rana and Awenda both looked genuinely confused. “So?” Rana asked.
Lilit sputtered as they came up to their suite door. “Wh-what do you mean, so?”
“Why should I care if she wants to have a retionship with Awenda, or even you,” she sneered. “That wouldn’t change anything that happened between us. Whether anything happened or not.” She huffed, “I was not drooling.”
“Wait, what? But retionships are between two people, not four.” Lilit said, mystified.
“What are you talking about?” Awenda finally asked. “Of course a retionship is between two people. But, you know you can have more than one retionship right?”
“Oh,” Rana gasped, “is this some weird cultural thing your race has?”
“Weird cultural thing? How am I the weird one? Two people are in a retionship, and that’s it. Anything else is cheating.” Lilit was adamant.
“My world isn’t like that. We often have many mates and live as a pack. A new lover might date one, several, or all of us at once.” Rana expined.
“Yeah, and mine is simir, but we all date as a group. So any new person has a retionship with everyone or no one.” Awenda added. “I wasn’t part of a wing yet before I died. I was waiting to get out of the military first.”
“Huh. That is a lot to take in. So, you wouldn’t care if Izumi started doing stuff with anyone else?” Lilit looked at the other two.
They both shook their heads. Lilit nodded in understanding and then walked away to her room to think. She got there and began taking off her armor, pcing it piece by piece on the armor dummy in the corner.
Once again her underclothes were soaked through with sweat. She quickly stripped down and then took a quick, hot shower. After drying off she opted for a short, sundress in vender along with a set of fts. They were both a new and thankful addition to her wardrobe when she opened it.
When she came back into the sitting room area of the suite, neither of the others was there yet. She sat down in one of the armchairs, staring into the fmes in the firepce, to think.
Izumi really was a good fit for the team as far as combat went. But something about her over the top flirting bothered Lilit. She wasn’t sure if it was because it bothered her ingrained monogamous upraising or if she genuinely didn’t like Izumi’s personality. One she could eventually get over. Thinking about the other women in the party, she could probably get over that pretty fast. Both, Rana and Awenda were gorgeous in their own ways. The other would cause personality conflicts that could end up tearing the team apart if anyone sided with Izumi over her.
She needed to come to a decision soon. She had a feeling that the others weren’t going to let the day end without one. It seemed like Awenda and Rana were both leaning toward letting Izumi into the party. Lilit didn’t want to think about if she tried to force them to choose between her and Izumi. No matter the outcome things would inevitably fall apart from there.
Lilit thought back to what the armorer Slokenra had said. If Lilit decided to leave the group she wouldn’t have any problems finding a new one. If it was just Lilit that ended up having a problem with Izumi, then Lilit could find herself a new team, or even build one around herself from the ground up. That ability to bail if she wasn’t happy actually gave her the courage to commit to a decision.
A moment ter, both Awenda and Rana entered the sitting room. “Ok,” Lilit took a deep breath. “She can join. You can invite her to our party.”
Rana let out a loud shout of excitement and pulled up her delver to send the invite request to Izumi. Awenda calmly walked over and leaned against the chair Lilit was sitting in. “I think this was the right thing. I really think we’re all going to get along great,” she smiled down at Lilit.
