Mantle of the Gods

I was looking at the other dungeons.

The All-Temple had ownership of the one with the tentacle monsters that we had just gone over, but I wanted to look at more than just the first floor as well.

Ether was still by my side. In fact, over the last day, she’d barely been out of arm’s reach. I squeezed her and kissed the top of her head. "Lovely?”

She shifted so that she could look up at me. "Yes?”

I gave her a quick kiss. It surprised her, but she didn’t pull away. I settled back into my seat and rubbed her back. "It’s going to be okay. I’m not going anywhere.”

“Oh.” Her face dropped and she nodded slowly then started to get up.

I grabbed her waist and pulled her back down next to me. "I wasn’t saying that you couldn’t stay here. I love having you around.” I smiled as I touched her cheek. She tilted her face to lean against my hand. "I just don’t want you worrying that you have to protect me all the time. We’ve got Gesai now and I’m sure Trent is going to stay close as well.” I softly brushed her cheek. “It’s going to be okay.”

“Good.” Ether smiled and pulled her feet underneath her as she laid her head on my shoulder. She pulled my left arm against her chest and held it tightly as she closed her eyes.

Only having one hand wasn’t the best way to look things up, but it was what I had to work with.

Oz came over and sat across the table from us. The raven-haired woman nodded at Ether. “Is she sleeping?”

I looked down and realized that Ether’s chest was slowly rising and falling. I turned back to Oz. "She tried to stay awake last night until I fell asleep, I don’t know how late she stayed up, but I imagine she’s beat.”

“Worry will do that to you.” Oz pointed at the screen. "Want a hand?”

I nodded and let her take over.

“What are you wanting to look up?” The green-eyed woman turned the screen so that we both could see.

“I’d like to know about the other two dungeons.” I nodded at the line where I had started the search. “We’re probably going to spend more time walking to the boss rooms than we are fighting them.”

“Especially if we’ve fought them before.” Oz chuckled and pointed at the screen. "The Dispatcher’s first-floor boss is a Crystal Fish.”

It was one of the many bosses that Gesai had walked us through while we were in captivity as part of the arrangement for our release. Which was probably why she’d left it out of her briefing. Though Fray, Aelin, and Ether had never fought one of them.

The Crystal Fish was about seven feet tall and looked like a shark with back legs, claws, and crystals for the remaining fins. The floor monsters looked like smaller versions at about three feet tall, but all they did was run around and try to bite you. There were enough teeth in their mouths that I was pretty sure they could tear off a limb. As far as dangerous monsters went, they were some of the more dangerous floor one monsters, since these could actually kill you instead of just hurting you.

The floor boss was a whole different story. Its claws were long enough to do some actual damage if it grabbed you. Its mouth was also larger, which meant its bite was to be avoided at all costs. The extra gimmick that it had was at the end of its charging move it would spit a mouthful of its teeth at someone. Since we didn’t have a tank when we practiced against it, we had to be careful to be ready to dodge as soon as it focused on one of us. Now that we have Ether, it should be significantly easier.

“I was kinda hoping we’d never have to run into this thing in the wild.” Oz rubbed her arms where she’d been hit once when she was the target. A Healer could repair the damage, but not the memory of the pain.

“We’ll probably have to fight everything that Trent had us train against at least once.” I shook away the memories of some of the nastier bosses we’d fought. “Maybe more than once. I’ve heard Adventurers talk about how some floor bosses show up as floor bosses again, deeper in the dungeon as bigger, nastier things with more moves.”

“Ugh…” Oz dropped her head against the table. "Why can’t this all be simple?”

“I mean, we could just stay in one place and get really good at killing a specific type of monster. Some families do it all the time.” I thought about the Quarra, the Noble Family in Zeb that was in charge of preventing a dungeon break. There was at least one dedicated Noble family near each controlled gate. It wasn’t glamorous, but it was a pretty safe job compared to the floor pushers, who tried to get as deep into a dungeon as they could go.

“That’d probably be boring.” The raven haired woman sighed. "Even dad tries to book trips to different dungeons so he can stay on his toes.” She touched a few buttons. "Let’s see what’s on the second floor.”