Chapter 31: XVIII Puzzling things out

Philip woke up to light filtering in through the window, she first thought it was sunlight, but then she remembered she stayed the night in the dungeon. Looking over it seemed as if Misaki was still asleep at first, then she noticed Misaki’s unfocused yet open eyes and realized she was awake. Probably focusing on something involving the dungeon. Not wanting to disturb her she rolled over slightly and started thinking on her recent change in condition.

“I’m not ready to be a mother. I don’t even know the first thing about being a mother. Why couldn’t this have just been a dream?” thought Philip as she stared at the notification she had brought back up. “What am I going to say when it starts to show? No wait didn’t my sister send me a letter saying she was going to visit! What am I going to tell her!? I haven’t even told her I got turned into a girl! How is she going to react when she sees me!? What will she say when I tell her I got myself pregnant!?” thought Philip as she began to panic about the impending visit from her sister, she had been hoping to get rid of the ring before her sister arrives. However, now that she was pregnant that was no longer an option. “Wait when did the letter say that she was going to be here?” thought Philip moments before opening her item box something most adventurers had it was a simple ring that could be used to store small items. You could store potions letters, and a change of clothes for a few examples, but storing something large like a bed wasn’t possible. Hers had an excellent storage space and could store the same amount as two large backpacks. It took her only moments to sort through her list of items to find the letter. She was glad she had the habit of storing her letters in the ring. Reopening the letter she began to read.

Hey brother,

I’m just letting you know I’m heading your way. I’ll be there in about a week so expect to see me either late on the first or early on the second of next month. I’ll be bringing my youngest daughters so you might want to stock up on food, especially sweets. They have quite the sweet tooth. My eldest just struck out on her own, got herself a nice job with the mages guild and is dating one of the town guards. He’s a handsome man and well respected by everyone around, it would be nice if they just married and had children already. Now I know how mom felt when you turned down all those marriage offers and struck out as an adventurer. I know you didn’t want other families to suffer like ours did, but you really should settle down and have a kid already. Oh yes, I’m also bringing someone else who wants to see you, so don’t forget to have enough rooms ready for when we arrive.

Sincerely,

Your sister, Emily.

It was a short letter, but Emily never was one to write long letters. She preferred to do most of her talking in person. The last line though concerned her and made her wish her sister wrote a little more. She hated surprises and she didn’t even know who the extra she was bringing was. Worse, she had forgotten to prepare and the letter basically said she was going to be here today or tomorrow. Then an image of what would happen, when her sister finds out she was not only a girl now, but pregnant, too, passed through her mind. Her entire body turned red as she blushed with embarrassment at the thought. She just wanted to hide in that moment, but knew she couldn’t. “I’m going to have to tell her, eventually. The real question is when,” thought Philip then a voice intruded on her thoughts. One she was familiar with, it was her father's voice being recalled from when she was a little boy before she lost him to monsters. “Hiding from your problems never works. When you hide from your problems they just grow and get worse. Next time you have a problem ask me for help, and I’ll help you.” Her father had been right, thinking about it she finally decided to tell her sister what happened to her when she gets here.

She was still dreading it, however. Looking over she noticed Misaki was no longer, staring into space and was looking at her. She smiled and sat up before saying good morning to Misaki.

“Good morning, sleep well?” asked Misaki.

“Yes, someone challenging the dungeon or something?” asked Philip.

“Yeah, I have a couple of strong mages in my dungeon. They just beat my first floor, the older one seems to be holding back and teaching the younger ones. No idea how strong the older one is since most of her stats are hidden from me, the system won’t even give me a level for her. As for the younger one, something about her seems familiar I just can’t put my finger on it,” replied Misaki.

“Seems familiar, but you don’t know why? Maybe she reminds you of someone you knew,” replied Philip.

“Can’t think of anything else to explain this. Anyway, do you have anything to do in town? I can help lead you to town,” said Misaki.

“Unfortunately, yes I do have something to do in town. I’d much rather stay here though. Maybe you could come over later,” said Philip as she showed Misaki her sister’s letter. Misaki gave the letter a quick glance, taking only a minute to read it. 

“Your sister? I take it you forgot about this,” said Misaki.

“Unfortunately I did,” said Philip.

“I’ll help you prepare, I don’t have to be here unless they reach my tenth floor. So I’ll help out and just keep an eye on those two, I’ll have to hurry back if they reach my tenth floor, though,” Misaki said.

“That will be a big help,” replied Philip.

“Okay just give me a moment, I have to take care of Reiko,” replied Misaki as she went to take care of Reiko. Philip had been surprised when she saw Reiko last night. It wasn’t her first time meeting the girl. She had last met her about five years ago when she was still active. The change in Reiko’s personality was rather startling, but this wasn’t the first time she had met someone cursed by the gods. So it wasn’t entirely surprising, she did get Misaki to agree to her sending a letter to the king of Stormwind. 

Taking care of Reiko, mostly amounted to feeding her giving her a bath, and then dressing her. After that Misaki played with Reiko, and Philip joined in. The brief play was mostly a few simply games and light skinship. Nothing approaching sex, just enough petting to give her some release from the lustful minded trait. Neither one of them risked full sex with her, since that came with the risk of her getting pregnant. They already had enough children waiting to be born. While heading up to the town Philip said, “It’s such a shame she was shackled with those traits.”

“I know, but there is nothing I can do about them,” said Misaki.

“There is a ritual that will allow her to seek redemption with the gods. We would need a blood relative though preferably her mother or one of her sisters. She will still be shackled with the pet status, but the mind-altering traits would be gone if she passes,” replied Philip.

“That sounds like another good reason to let her parents know she is here,” replied Misaki.

“Yes, maybe you would like to help me with the letter,” asked Philip.

“That would be fun, thank you,” said Misaki. The rest of the walk up was filled with idle chat. They were able to avoid the pair going down into the dungeon, by using the hidden passages. When they exited the dungeon the pair was still working on the second-floor puzzles, but they had managed to solve one in that time. The two wasted no time, making their way to Philip’s house. They did have to dodge their fans on the way to the building. Fortunately, they made their way to Phillip's house without being caught. Neither one wanted to be pet for hours on end.

Lily’s POV:

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The second floor was proving much harder than the first, but the real challenge of the floor wasn’t the monsters but the puzzles. With her new higher level, she had breezed through the first branch. Milith was still letting her fight them herself. She was now standing before the second puzzle of the floor. It was a group of riddles, like the puzzle on the left side. The first one was an easy fill in the blanks type puzzle. The hard part was the lack of a word pool, which made finding the right words harder. The other two were more traditional riddles. The first of these riddles was a rather, lengthy and confusing riddle about clothing, that took her a few minutes to realize the answer for. The second was a ‘what am I’ type riddle, that she managed to solve as well. She smiled when she heard a click and a rock plate slid back to reveal a worn wood lever. Lily pulled the lever while saying, “these puzzles aren’t as hard as I heard.”

“Well, that's because I have been shielding you from the dungeons pheromones. Being horny and distracted makes these puzzles harder than they should be,” replied Milith.

“Thanks, our next challenge will be the boss, right?” asked Lily.

“Yes, according to the adventurers the boss is supposed to be a party of demons. The composition though varies with each challenge,” said Milith.

“Our dungeon seems to like groups,” commented Lily as she followed Milith out of the puzzle room. The walk to the boss room was uneventful. Lily took a moment to admire the worn stone walls as they walked to the boss room. The doors to the boss room were open when they reached the doors. Passing through they entered a decent sized arena, in the middle of the arena was the boss. The boss though wasn’t a group of demons, but a single being. Standing at 144cm tall, the boss had blue-green scales, covering her tail, forearms, legs, stomach, and part of her chest, and cheeks. She had long blue hair tied into an elaborate pair of pigtails. Her face was marked by a pair of small demonic horns and red eyes. Her chest was pretty much non-existent, but she was cute and well-toned. A pair of wings could be seen folded on her back.

“That is a Lesser Dragon Girl, she is too young to fly, but don’t underestimate her she is still strong. Now do you want to fight her yourself or would you like my help? Keep in mind her level is higher than yours,” said Milith appraising the level eighteen monster.

“I’d like to try fighting it myself,” replied Lily as she readied a spell. Moments before she stepped into the arena. Immediately the boss smiled and charged at her. She jumped to the left slightly surprised by its speed, as she barely dodged the claws of the boss which tore into the stone where she stood a fraction of a second earlier. She then unleashed her spell which struck the boss. A bolt of lightning hit the boss center mass in the back. The lightning rippled over her skin and then she merely shook herself and turned around. Seemingly unfazed by the attack, but it had actually dropped her health by a third. Gathering magic the boss, charged at her again. This time Lily was unable to dodge the magic wreathed claws of the Dragon Girl and was hit. Her magic shields absorbing the damage leaving her unhurt, but a large chunk of her shields were gone. While also flinging her across the arena.

Getting back to her feet, she started casting her another spell. The Dragon Girl had a look of pure enjoyment on her face and chanted a quick spell of her own. Forcing Lily to dance around bolts of lightning as they rained from above. The demonic dragon used the bolts to her advantage and closed the distance between the two. Just before the dragon could get in melee range though, Lily unleashed her next spell. A powerful lance of dark energy ripped through the space between them and hit the boss square in the chest. Sending her flying back into the wall, this time doing visible damage as she coughed up blood when she got up. Then the boss used its trump card, the lightning bolts still raining from the sky prevented Lily from dodging. Red-orange flames spread out in a cone engulfed Lily as she was hit with a dragon breath attack. Her magical shield strained to protect her failed and she was covered with minor burns when the attack ended.

Casting a quick spell, she unleashed another lightning bolt, which struck the dragon girl’s center mass, downing her. Then Lily slumped to the ground quite tired from that battle.

“Damn that dragon girl was strong. That's the first monster here that could take my full attack and still fight,” said Lily as she suddenly found herself bathed in a gentle light milith was emitting that healed her wounds. On the brightside she got another level up notification, so she was happy she got stronger.

“Not surprising dragons are already strong, and she was a subspecies of dragon. Then there is the fact that she also had the boss bonus. It gave her enough vitality and resistance to shrug your spells off. If you had a celestial spell, it would have been easier. Especially given the fact it also counted as a demon,” said Milith. Lily understood immediately she had read a book back home she had found which covered monsters and general characteristics. A demon's magic resistance was a well-known trait that was hard to deal with, combine that with the traits of a dragon and you get a tough opponent that can shrug off most foes their level.

Collecting the loot, the two-headed down the stairs to the third floor. Once in the third-floor entrance room, Lily sat down in a corner and rested. So that her mana and shields could regenerate. Milith sat cross-legged in the middle of the room and focused on one of her extra senses. Immediately her field of view expanded, allowing her to see everything around her and much further than the five senses humans have would allow. This extra sense was one of eight senses her race had, and was called mindsight. The other two extra senses allowed her to sense gravitic fields and electromagnetic fields. The gravitic thing wasn’t much use here on the surface of a world, but quite useful in space.

Shutting out her other senses allowed her to focus solely on the mindsight and perceive the other parts of the dungeon. Looking deeper, she observed how it had changed from what she had learned from the adventurers. Most of the changes she found were to the bosses. It seems most had received additional buffs. While the fourth and fifth-floor bosses had a chance of a Dragon Girl to appear as a monster in the group. She also noted there were five more floors than the guild spoke about, but she couldn’t discern their form. Satisfied she released her focus and her mindsight shrank back to normal and she noted she had used up nearly two thousand mana in the minute and a half she had been using her mindsight. She then turned over to Lily and smiled, “Seems the dungeon has gotten stronger recently. I can’t tell how but all the bosses seem to have been buffed past this floor. I did, however, see the possible bosses for the next three boss rooms. Can’t tell you anything past that the dungeon’s mana is too dense. I can tell you that we have eight more floors to challenge. This one has flying enemies, so I think I’ll help you with those. That way you can focus on crossing the narrow pathways on this floor,” said Milith.

“Sounds like a plan. I just need to rest a while longer and my shields will be back,” replied Lily.

“Try meditating I hear it helps with mana recovery,” said Milith while keeping an eye on the exit.

“What do you mean by hear? You’re a mage, too. Haven’t you tried meditating?” asked Lily.

“It wouldn’t work for me. My race doesn’t regenerate mana in the normal fashion. We normally lose mana, unless we are in a mana dense area like a dungeon where we recover it slowly. There are five other ways, we can regenerate our mana one of which is forbidden. Those five ways are hibernation, blood contract, the ritual of rebirth, mana crystals, and the forbidden method the spell Energy Drain,” said Milith.

“That is interesting, but why is that last one forbidden?” asked Lily.

“As forbidden magics go it isn’t all that bad. It was forbidden because of its potential for abuse. It drains the target of their mana than their life energy. The target will lose their mana permanently and the user will be strengthened by the life energy they absorb. If your willing to sacrifice others to grow strong it is very useful, but overuse of the spell has been known to drive the user insane,” replied Milith.

“I’m guessing the insanity thing played a big part in it being banned,” said Lily.

“Yeah it did,”

“So what does that ritual of rebirth do, I doubt it just regenerates mana?” asked Lily.

“It is a ritual that is normally used to avoid death. The user sacrifices their physical body and bonds with a compatible and willing host, gaining a new body with a fraction of their power, but with all of their experience about a year later. Their full power will return in about fifteen years when their new body matures. During the process the user absorbs a massive amount of mana from the surroundings, most of which is lost when creating their new body but some of it is added to their mana pool,” replied Milith.

“So it’s a last resort sort of thing. Are those blood contracts what I think they are?” said Lily.

“That is the gist of it, as for blood contracts, they’re long term magically binding contracts bound to a family line usually lasting around a thousand years. We may be required to protect their line for example and, in return, we gain mana, mana crystals and other things we might want. There are many possible terms and most have conditions in them for when a party fails to fulfill their part in the contract. Which reminds me be careful blood contracts can be dangerous. Elders can be as tricky as demons with the clauses so read one very carefully before you sign,” replied Milith.

“I’ll keep that in mind,” said Lily. A few minutes later she was done resting and got up as they went deeper into the dungeon floor.

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