Jennie and Lucy were both panting, slumped as they tried to recover from their furious assault.
I could feel bruises forming all over my body. Skeptically, I tried healing myself, but was unsurprised to find it impossible to activate the skill.
“Your band was called the band band?!” I asked critically, trying to buy time.
“Brawly and the bammin’ SLAMMIN’ band band.” Corrected Brawly, firmly.
“…why?” I asked, goading her to keep talking.
“Cause we were bammin and slammin!” She answered, slapping the noodle on the cave floor with a sound like dynamite.
“Not what I was—“ I muttered.
I surreptitiously hit Lucy with my last bit of healing, bringing her back to fighting condition.
“Hey now that’s cheating! Getting me talking about the band band to give your friends a breather?! Ratboss does not approve of such trickery!!” Brawly shook her finger.
Brawly shot towards me.
“You said ANY tactic!” I said, scrambling for my life.
The rest of the fight became a classic game of protect the healer. Brawly tried to pummel me to death with a pool noodle. Jennie and Lucy tried to create enough threat to force her off of me. I tried to keep my teammates healed JUST enough, without emptying my finite pool of Pleasure.
Ten of the longest minutes of my life later, we got our third and final tally mark from the Tank professor.
It took all of our combined efforts. Mostly Lucy and Jennie ‘overwhelming’ Brawly with relentless barrages of attacks while I snuck up behind and made a pitiful attack with my camp knife.
I couldn’t even charge up a [tempest strike].
Nonetheless, Brawly counted the touch as an attack.
Perhaps because she genuinely couldn't tell the difference between our strongest blows and me essentially dropping a knife exhaustedly along her back.
She held up the shredded pool noodle, causing us all to flinch.
But she dropped it to the ground in surrender.
“Noooooo! RATBOSS will have his REVENGGGGGE!” She cried, adding a tally mark.
She looked thrilled for us.
We dropped to our backs in the dirt, as one.
“I’m never getting up again. Bury me here.” Groaned Jennie.
“Uuufuginmmmmf.” I said, immediately regretting using the energy to make sound.
“Come along first years. Come see your loot!” Coaxed Brawly, studying us curiously, in turn. “Good loot! Shiiiiiny!”
Jennie stared at the ceiling like she hadn’t heard.
Lucy managed to flop over onto her stomach, leaving her perfect rump in the air, fetchingly.
I hauled myself to my knees.
“Are pool toys ruined for anyone else?” I asked, then started doggedly crawling for the back of the cave where I could see a chest, and some elevator doors.
“Awww but I have so many.” Grumbled Brawly, producing another from the air.
Evidently the high level Wayfinder had a personal inventory Skill. A coveted power, both for convenience and utility.
I wondered what kind of Catalyst she had used to get it.
I kept crawling.
As I passed Lucy, the exhausted familiar raised her head and gave my ass a firm slap.
She resumed her collapsed position.
The girl had priorities.
I found the little wooden chest empty.
I glared at where Brawly had been, and found her right over my shoulder looking into the chest with wonder. She pointed.
“Ohhhh a common mana regeneration ring!” She said, innocently. “Maybe for a summoner who’s got no regeneration when her familiar is active?! Who knows!”
I looked down and in the center of the chest lay a small brass ring.
I slipped it on, and felt a little warmth as it attuned to me, sizing itself to my finger.
My mana started rising, slowly. I sighed in relief.
Jennie appeared, disheveled but unwilling to miss loot.
“Woah, is that a common dexterity trinket?! Perfect for a backstabbing stealth specialist! Wild.” Said Brawly.
I looked at the empty chest and a brass necklace with a small black flower shone dully where my ring had been.
I handed it to Jennie.
I went to move on, but Brawly’s hand kept me firmly where I was.
“Ohhh shiny new running shoes for a mobility based off-tank. Weird. Only two students. But three pieces of loot. Crazy.” Brawly strode away abruptly, whistling a piercing…tune?
A pair of racecar-red sneakers sat in the loot chest.
I shared a skeptical look with Jennie. I made an offering gesture. The mobility would be excellent for her. But Jennie refused immediately, tiredly handing them to me.
“They’re obviously for Lucy.” She said. “They’re her color.”
I took them, grinning. “Oh you know her color do you?”
Jennie went scarlet, and tilted her head so her long black hair obscured her face.
“Let’s go.” She muttered, heading to the lifts.
I went and fetched Lucy from her heap on the ground with the sweet lure of new shoes. She got up, but insisted on trying them on, and modeling for us. I clapped and coo-ed, earning a grin and a wink. Jennie just nodded, seeming impatient.
“Well it is a race. Loftys, remember?” Jennie grumbled.
“Oh you’re not the first ones. Only people who went down will come up through the lifts. People who went up and passed the maze will have beaten you to campus.” Said Brawly, from the center of the room.
“Both ways were the right answer?!” Asked Jennie.
“Yeah! Clever, right?” Brawly nodded, hugely.
“Some test if there’s no wrong answer.” Grumbled Jennie. “I thought I was being clever, bringing us down.”
I shook my head.
Brawly grinned. “Eir’s got it, then.”
“You were right.” I said, studying the professor. “The wrong answer was indecision. Taking a strong idea and committing for long enough to see it though. That’s what they wanted. Zigzagging and changing your mind is how you fail this.”
Brawly nodded. “Or giving up!”
“How would you know if someone did that?” Asked Jennie.
“Oh we are monitoring the whole warrens during the test.” Brawly said nonchalantly. “Can’t have students dying down here.”
Jennie froze, horror dawning on her face.
I got it a second before she spoke, and paled.
“You monitor the whole warrens…?” Asked Jennie in a high pitched voice.
Brawly nodded seriously.
“The whole time?” I clarified, magma running under my collar.
“Of course.” Said Brawly. “Got to say, not many people find time to hook up, but it doesn’t seem to have slowed you down too much.”
I wanted to vanish, like Jennie did, but never reappear.
Jennie looked like she was seriously considering doing just that.
“Relaaaaaaax!” Said Brawly, waving a hand. “No one was sitting there WATCHING. We just made sure it was consensual and went back to monitoring other students.” She paused. “You were quite LOUD though.”
“I’m transferring.” Said Jennie, faintly.
I snatched her arm, trying to power through for both of us.
“Quit tomorrow. Let’s finish this first, at least.” I bargained.
Jennie nodded, looking shellshocked.
“I’m already going to be labeled a deviant.” She muttered to herself. “I’ll be lumped in with YOU!” She added in abject despair.
“Hey now!” I protested.
I got her in the lift and closed the bronze grate, giving Brawly a wave and getting an enthusiastic one in return. As the lift rose, I saw another party, five members strong, entering the arena. They looked extremely well equipped. In the lead was a leggy blonde, beach volleyball, lingerie model holding a javelin. To judge by how she looked. From context, she was probably a Wayfinder coming to school here.
“You are literally insatiable. Can you not drool over someone for one second?!” Jennie demanded.
I made a big show of staring at her perky little tits, outlined in her tight bodysuit.
She clapped my cheek with her hand, but I thought she looked secretly pleased.
“She was hot.” Lucy whispered. “We should see if she wants to kiss, later!”
“Jennie or the girl downstairs?” I asked, hushed.
“I can HEAR–” Jennie snarled.
“BOTH!” Lucy answered. “At once!”
The lift rose fast. I hadn’t realized quite how deep we were.
It took nearly a minute to reach the surface, but at last, sunlight hit our startled eyes. We squinted, straining after our long tenure with glowstones and phosphorescent mushrooms.
“Welcome to Bayloft, freshmen.” Said a stern voice. “You have officially passed the first test. Please step aside and wait.”
My eyes adjusted and a stocky, ancient woman in a sharp black robe came into focus. She was built like a boulder and shaped like one too. Short and round and unmovable.
Oh fuck.
"Principal Maule!" I blurted. "The Earthshaker! The walking mountain! You're so famous! You know that. Oh fuck. Are you really ninth Ascension?"
Principal Maule raised an unimpressed eyebrow.
"I am just now remembering that you don't like the 'walking mountain' moniker!" I yelped.
"Please step aside and wait." She repeated.
"Smooth." Jennie dragged me away with an eyeroll.
We stepped aside and were swiftly greeted by a bubbly girl in a Bayloft sweater.
“Hi, I am Emily, your student mentor! Right this way!” She gushed, blonde ponytail swishing wildly. She leaned in a whispered. “Did you two really fuck in the tunnels?! Sooooooo cool.”
Jennie groaned, squeezing her eyes tight shut.