Chương 95: A New Club

The next few weeks proceeded as planned, and our schedule didn't change. Another Labyrinth run upgraded my [Archery] skill to Apprentice tier, and my attributes kept climbing. Lieutenant Owl added more riftrocks to our packs, continuing the pressure, and it never got easier. We didn't go after any other quarter guardians, not yet, but Yesman and Habit said that they wanted to try to get one each in the coming weeks. Well, I told them that they could go after it when they were ready. If not…

we might snatch them first. I said it all with a smile, and they didn't kick us out of their special evening sparring cabal, so I called it a win. Every evening, after me and my squad practiced our sparring under the pressure of my enhanced gravity Art, we crossed over to the far side of the sparring pits, where Habit and Yesman's squads continued practicing with each other. The first time we joined, Yesman told us, "No one can defeat the floor guardian on his own, or with just one squad.

The Drillmaster knows this, but he hasn't told us yet."

"They want us to advance higher," I countered.

"Yes, but it's a Gold," Habit told me.

"You think you could defeat Lord Ceonwin in a fight? He's a Gold too."

"No, but Gold-tier monsters are easier than Gold-tier men," I said. My squad laughed, and nodded in agreement.

"Don't get cocky," Yesman said—still, somehow very negative despite his name.

"Your squad is good, but remember, the higher you get, the greater the gap between the tiers. It's harder for a Silver to punch up against a Gold than it is for a Copper to punch up against Iron." I nodded.

"We hadn't developed a plan of action against the central golem, the floor guardian. Yet."

"We're training to take it down as a group," Habit said.

"The sooner we take it down, the sooner we get to the bottom level of the Labyrinth, which means we can get far better gear for ourselves. Are you guys in?"

"We're in," I said. So we performed all sorts of training tasks late into the evening with Habit and Yesman's squads, and every day—except Labyrinth run days. Sure, we could be studying, but since the rest of us had our next merges planned and ready, there was only so much we could do, and this was far more valuable. After three weeks, I proposed another idea. Of course, we had to defeat the quarter guardians first. But if we wanted to defeat the floor guardian and get practice, we needed to scout it out.

So, when our next Labyrinth run came around, that was our plan. We might lose a little bit of rank, but it was better than going in blind and not training properly to defeat the floor guardian. The morning of our planned scouting run, I woke up early. There were few preparations to make. First off, I had been refining a new squad position and setup specifically for today.

My squad knew about it, but I hadn't gotten a chance to share it—and I needed to share it with them before we delved today, without Yesman's or Habit's squad noticing. Sage had volunteered her room for us to meet in, because of the privacy, and I took her up on the offer. When we woke up, still dressed in our sleep tunics, we met in her room. It was almost like the others, but only one bed was nestled into the far corner, and a desk stood in the center of the room, covered in vials and books.

Sage cleared off a spot on the table for me, and I set down the sheet of parchment I'd been drawing a new formation on. (I had recently learned that using trees for paper was a recent invention of this world—in the past, they used tanned hides to write on, then bound them together into books, but wood-pulp paper was far cheaper. Hence why we had so much of it to spare, and I could acquire some as scrap.) I motioned at the page while the squad gathered behind me.

"My goal is to perform our scouting duties while watching our backs. We need to always be able to dart to the side if something attacks from behind."

"The plan is to clear a path through the Steel and Titanium monsters surrounding the central golem, correct?" Anchor asked.

"It would be very unlikely that more would fill in and attack us from behind."

"Monsters don't typically think about complex troop maneuvers," Sage agreed. If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.

"I don't think Levi is worried about monsters, brothers," Brawl said.

"Some Dupes are slimy backstabbers." I clicked my tongue and pointed a finger at Brawl.

"You got it."

"Why, though?" Anchor asked.

"Not everyone is as tolerant of a soulstealer as you lot, I'd say," I replied.

"And something's suspicious about the way they approached me."

"You suggested this plan and mission today, brother," Brawl said.

"And that's for the best. If they're going to try to eliminate me, seeing me as competition or unworthy or whatever it is, I want to know sooner than later. If we use this formation, we can still do our duty and uphold our promises, but if they try to screw us, we can get out before things go badly."

"Or they're truly just trying to do their best and climb the ranks," Anchor said.

"And for that, they need our help. Not everyone is out to get you."

"I'll believe it when I see it," I said.

"But we're doing this formation today. I'm not going to let myself get complacent. And if things go well today, then I know we can trust Habit and Yesman." The others nodded half-heartedly. I knew they didn't believe me, but this was for the best. If I was wrong, nothing changed. If I was right, it kept us alive. Before we left, I said, "Check your tablets. I haven't looked yet this week, no matter how much I wanted to." Following Owl's advice, we only checked once a week, before going on our labyrinth runs.

If we checked too often, we were more likely to get bogged down stressing about the individual aspects and attributes. I braced myself when I activated my own tablet.

It read: Name: Levi Gordon (ID#: DD-333) Class: Soldier Rank: Sergeant Tier: Steel Vitality: 11 Agility: 8(+4) Strength: 12 Perception: 4(+1) Focus: 15 Presence: 16 Skills: Spearmanship (Apprentice), Archery (Apprentice), Art: Directional Gravity Manipulation (Journeyman), Commanding Presence (Novice), Horseback Riding (Novice), General System Knowledge (Novice), Shield Use (Novice), Shifting Weight (Novice), Light as a Feather (Novice) I'd gained two new Skills as well, [Shifting Weight] and [Light as Feather], which wasn't the best when it came to archery, and would be far more useful for future gravity-based Skill merges, but I had a plan to get more archery focused Skills.

And crossbow focused Skills. Although not many crossbow skills had been documented, I was pretty sure I could develop a few. Like loading it quickly. Like quick-drawing arrows or bolts from the quiver. Like pulling the crossbow from my back quickly and swapping my weapons without a hitch. But I was getting ahead of myself. At the top of the sheet, it said Steel. I was a Steel. Sure enough, my attributes did total up to fifty. Just on the nose, but having ten Presence and fifty attributes was all you needed.

Next, to get to Titanium, I needed to get up to fifty points of Presence and a hundred attribute points. For Silver, a hundred Presence and three hundred and fifty general attributes. But our stats were growing faster and faster, because as our general Strength and Vitality climbed, so would our ability to lift heavier riftrocks, and we'd be able to make faster strides. Not to mention all the infused food.

Sage had hit Steel a week ago, having finished some sort of enhancement to her internal leys that was a requirement for non-Dupe Path-walkers. Brawl found out this morning that he was a Steel, and so did Anchor. In Brawl's case, he had far more Strength and Vitality than us, and he was increasing much faster now, too. He was able to carry practically twice as many riftrocks. As for Anchor and I, our major gains were still in our physical attributes, though.

"My Perception is slacking," Anchor remarked.

"And my Focus," I agreed.

"I'll think of something we can do to continue training our physical stats. And Sage…I guess you're at the tier where you're doing that Path-walker body enhancement stuff?" She nodded.

"Working on it, at least."

"I'll trust your teachers to handle that, then." I turned back to Anchor.

"After the run today, we'll come up with a strategy to keep pushing our mental attributes." Sure, it seemed like Gate needed physically strong soldiers, but as a sniper, Anchor relied on his Perception, and it needed to keep going up. As for me, I couldn't just abandon Focus, not when it was so critical to my Arts. Once I finished checking our attributes, I rushed off to the blacksmith shop. Last night, Shatter had told me the crossbow was ready, and I wanted to pick it up.

I found him and Drywsone setting up the blacksmith shop. It was still early in the morning, and they hadn't gotten too many requests yet.

"Ah, Levi," Shatter said.

"I'll get it for you." He rushed to the back room, then emerged a moment later, holding the crossbow, and set it down on the table, along with a bundle of bolts.

"Your request. It's not arcane-enhanced, no. But it's well-made, and it will serve you until we can get some prime material for making it. From the depths of the Labyrinth, I mean."

"Of course," I said. The entire crossbow was the length of a rifle, its main body made of metal instead of the wood I was expecting. It was probably heavier than it needed to be, but compared to riftrocks, it was light as a feather, and I had the stats to handle it. A stirrup protruded from the front, which I could fit my foot into to help charge it, pulling the string back to the nut. I knew the general principle, though, and there was no sense in delaying.

I thanked Shatter and Drywsone with a nod, then picked up the bolts and rushed to regroup with the rest of my squad.