Six of the twelve people assigned to Penelope’s team had been ranged attackers, while Frederica had put none in her group. Since Penelope was only focusing on the ranged attackers, this gave Marlow the bulk of the responsibility of the other people.
The composition of the four level ones was a Caster, Archer, melee attacker, and Tank for Penelope. Frederica’s groups were composed of a Buffer, Debuffer, melee attacker, and Healer. There wasn’t a lot for the Buffers and Debuffers to do, so they were put on camp building duty while the melee attackers sparred with the Tanks. The Healers made sure everyone in the melee group stayed healthy since they were using swords, axes, and hammers and not just sticks.
They worked for almost two hours, with whoever ran out of mana or stamina taking a break to regenerate until they filled back up. Once people had to sit down, Penelope was able to give more targets to more people. She regenerated mana much faster than anyone else, and their accuracy wasn’t good enough to drop her below 65 mana. It also helped that this wasn’t considered combat so her mana regeneration wasn’t halved.
When Frederica entered the Dungeon, it was past eight, and most of the people were ready to stop for the night. Penelope had a pretty good idea of the capabilities of her ranged attackers at that point.
Circe and Abel were the best of their respective classes, though for Abel, that wasn’t saying much. The contrary miner’s spell was
, which had almost 100% accuracy, even though it took 17 minutes for his spell to break a single
Benedict was the other Caster besides Robert. He was in his late 40s, which gave him the good-ole-boy vibe and let him fit in with the rest of the men well. The two men weren’t bad at casting, but the moment that Penelope moved her spells instead of letting them hover in place, neither could hit anything.
Whitney had a spell, which drained her mana fast. She was a lot worse with physical arrows than with the spell and quickly gave up on using them.
Julian Williams, the last of the ranged attackers, was a mechanic in his early forties. His colorful use of language as well as his temper when he didn’t land a shot quickly earned him a trip to work with the camp group.
With a gauge of how well they could perform, Penelope felt that the evening had been productive as she canceled her spells when the older woman marched over to her.
“What’s going on?” Frederica motioned at the row of ranged attackers. “Why isn’t anyone fighting?”
“I was making sure that they could use their skills.” Penelope turned to the group. “Circe and Robert, rest up. We’re going to head into the square in a little bit. The rest of you, go ahead and take a break.”
Whitney looked relieved at being replaced and hurried over to where the main group was putting up the last of the tents.
“I thought I told you to start once you got down here.” Frederica growled as soon as the others were out of earshot. “I didn’t expect you to subvert my authority so soon.”
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“The Dungeon wasn’t what we thought.” Penelope pointed at the barrier behind her. “The squares are twice as big, meaning there are four times as many monsters in there.” She pointed at the two entrances. “There are two ways in, and I’ve already confirmed that we can get two groups in there.” She turned back to the woman in charge. “The level ones aren’t going to be helpful for a while, and if I have to take on twenty-four monsters by myself..." She let the implications hang between them.
“Fine.” Frederica sighed. “What’s your plan then?”
“Both of us head in, then try to meet up in the middle.” Penelope paused as she realized there was a problem. “Um, it’s really dark in there. You’ll either need someone who can create light or torches.”
WHOOSH…SCREECH
Frederica put her hands over her ears. Once the noise died, she looked at Penelope. “What was that?”
“A floor mechanic.” Penelope shook her head. “I don’t think torches are going to work.”
“How often does it do that?” Frederica glanced over at the tents. The last one that the group had been working on was knocked over because it hadn’t been secured in time.
“About every ten minutes.” Penelope opened her menu. “Fire will work, but light or electric would probably be best.”
Whitney had electric affinity, but the Archer’s only skill at the moment was
Kent was the only person in her group with a fire affinity, but his skill was a simple
“I don’t have anyone who can produce light. My Casters are earth, ice, and poison.” Penelope looked at the group’s leader. “Do you have anyone?”
“Eldri is light and has a
Penelope thought about correcting her but swallowed the remark.
“Probably for the best.” Jeru agreed in her mind. “No reason to antagonize her.”
I just wish she paid more attention! The way she messes up our names makes me feel like she doesn’t want to see us. Penelope complained internally.
“She’s just bad with names. It helps her to give people nicknames so she can keep track of them.” Jeru sighed as he picked up on Penelope’s inner irritation. “I’m not saying that she couldn’t do better, just letting you know her process.”
Penelope filed that information away for later. “With the squares being bigger, a maze, and there being more monsters, do you want to start tonight or wait until morning?”
“How much time do we have for each room if we only have one group?” Frederica waited while Penelope did the math.
“If we let people have 8 hours to sleep, that’s just over 2 hours per square.” Penelope tugged at her red ponytail. “I know we’ll have more than one group eventually, but I think we should start now so we can get a better idea of what we need to expect.”
“Get your team together and we’ll head out.” Frederica looked at the portal to her left. “Patrick isn’t going to come down here until tomorrow or the next day.” She shook her head. “I was hoping to have more cleared by the time he got here.”
“We can have the backup group work on bringing the monsters to rooms just for processing.” Penelope pointed at the tunnel. “There has to be lots of rooms in there.”
“How are we going to do this?” Frederica looked at Penelope. “Clear the rooms as we get to them, or focus on the tunnels and leave monsters behind us?”
“The sooner we meet up, the stronger we’ll be.” Penelope tapped on the wand at her hip. “I can provide light for all of us, and the level ones can keep an eye out for more monsters while we fight.”
“Sounds good.” Frederica gestured at the tunnel. “I’ll see you in there.”
Penelope watched the older woman walk away, then closed her eyes and took a few deep breaths to calm her nerves. Okay. I’m ready to do this.
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