I do not own Rising of the Shield Hero or any of the characters.
Teaming Up
Fenris ducked around one of the Karma Penguin Familiars, small nasty-looking penguine monsters summoned by a Karma Penguin, a giant version that looked otherwise the same. As soon as he was past the penguin, Eileen put an arrow through its head, killing it. Fenris slashed two as they neared him, then froze mid-stride as L'Arc spun around him, using his scythe to split half a dozen in half at once. L'Arc grinned back at him and Fenris smirked. Then he rested a hand on L'Arc's scythe's handle and his sword flashed replicating the scythe.
"Hey!" L'Arc said. "That's cheating!"
Fenris chuckled, switching to the basic form of Ren's sword and twirled it in his hand for a moment before stabbing it into the ground and smirking. Then, Shiva sped past them, six-inch ice claws extending from her sleeves, and shredded a dozen penguins in seconds.
"Face it L'Arc," Fenris said. "Now that I've got Shiva, my party's juat too strong for you to keep up with."
"Alright, I'll admit Shiva's a bit overkill, but it's not impossible for me to win," L'Arc said. "This competition will be mine."
"Power of jewels, far and wide, I beseech thee to heed my call and come to me," Therese said, her new bracelet that Naofumi had made, which was aparently a sunburst crystal and not a ruby, shining as her blue hair and eyes turned crimson. "My name is Therese Alexanderite. I ask my friends to come and be the force that destroys my targets. Bejeweled Ruby Blaze!" She swung her left hand, a massive blue fireball flying out of the jewel and exploding around Fenris and Shiva, swallowing almost two dozen penguins they had been about to kill.
"Fenris!" Hana and Sofia screamed.
"Now just calm down," L'Arc said as the flames began to die down, Fenris and Shiva both completely unharmed.
"What gives?" Fenris asked. "My armor didn't even register there being an attack. And I actually feel healed."
"My magic only negatively affects enemies," Therese said. "Any allies caught up in the spells receive positive affects, such as healing, or mana regeneration, or curse removal."
"What kind of bullshit overpowered magic do you use lady!?" Hana gaped.
Therese laughed into her hand and Fenris sighed, switching his sword back to his usual black form. He sheathed it and checked everyone's levels. He was at seventy two, Sofia and Naomi were both seventy one, Eileen was seventy, Riley was sixty nine, and Hana was at forty. She wouldn't be able to level up again until she got a class upgrade.
"Hey Naofumi, can we teleport back to Melromarc real quick?" Fenris asked.
"Why?" Naofumi asked.
"Hana's sitting at level forty," Fenris said.
"Shit," Naofumi sighed. "Fine, but make it quick."
"Will do," Fenris said.
He brought up his teleportation options and selected the Dragon Hourglass, then was blinded by a bright light before reappearing with his harem beside the hourglass.
"Oh, Fenris!" Ake gasped. "What are you doing here?"
"My friend needs a class upgrade," Fenris said.
"Absolutely!" Ake nodded, eyes flashing over Hana's body almoat fast enough that Fenris didn't notice. "Just place your hand on the hourglass."
Hana reached up, placing her hand against it and a pop up asked Fenris if he wanted her to choose for herself. He allowed her to choose, and a couple of minutes later, she was finished and they teleported back to Naofumi directly.
"All done," Fenris said. "That teleportation skill is useful."
"No kidding," Naofumi nodded. "That took all of, what, three minutes?"
"Just about," Fenris nodded. "So, where were we?"
"Level grinding," Naofumi said.
"Oh yeah," Fenris smirked. "Hana, if you would."
Hana nodded and her eyes both turned a bright gold, similar to Fenris's normal eyes, before she whistled loudly, Raphtalia covering her ears.
"Ow," Raphtalia said. "What was that?"
"The first ability unlocked by Tamer Magic, which requires a class upgrade of Beast Tamer to activate," Hana said. "It summons monsters."
"No way!" L'Arc smirked. "What kind?"
Just then, monsters of all kinds began to swarm out of the trees around them. Penguins, hellhounds, Karma Dogs, spiders, Karma Rabbits. Fenris grinned and swit hed to his Spider Arms, tearing into the enemies as they flooded toward them, Naomi doing the same to his right, L'Arc to his left. Naofumi covered Raphtalia and Fo as they fought, and Shiva and Therese slaughtered everything. Then, Sofia begsn to rain fireballs throughout the enemies as Phoenix and Shadow flew around bladting monzters, Phoenix with flames, and Shadow with lightning. After a few minutes, they finished the last of the monsters and all began to try to catch their breath, Fenris switching back to his usual sword and sitting heavily against a tree.
"Let's not...do that...again," Raphtalia panted.
"You kidding?" Fenris asked as Shadow and Phoenix began to gather him materials to feed his sword, Naofumi collecting his own and L'Arc and Therese colecting materials to give L'Arc's scythe later. "We just killed over a hundred enemies in two minutes. We're awesome. And we all jumped like three levels."
"Not me," Hana panted. "I jumped fifteen."
"Impressive," L'Arc said. "Alright. Let's go get the big guy next."
"Big guy?" Fenris asked, looking around and seeing a Karma Penguin through the trees. "I'm game."
He stood, twirling his sword and glancing at the two dozen or so smaller penguins around the larger one, which towered over the trees.
"So...who wants the small fries?" Fenris asked.
"I'll get them together and Therese can take them out," Naofumi said. "The rest of you can kill the big one in a few seconds."
"True," Fenris nodded.
Naofumi ran forward, using his shield's relatively new Hate Reaction and drawing the smaller penguins' attention. Once they'd all grouped together, Therese blasted them and the rest of them charged the bigger one. It didn't take long. Eileen blinded it first, then Sofia stunned it with a blast of wind, disrupting a swipe of its clawed flipper. Naomi and Riley both slashed it upward diagonally in a massive "X" before Shiva froze the entire thing solid. Then, Fenris switched to L'Arc's scythe and they both split the giant penguin down the front together, shattering it and killing it. Their levels all jumped to about seventy eight and Fenris fed his sword a little of the penguin, Naofumi feeding his shield as well.
Once they had finished, they layed out their accumulated loot. A sunburst stone of a slightly lower quality than the one Therese had given Naofumi, a piece of penguin poop with bits of a gemstone that literally could only be found there and was extremely valuable, some mushrooms from God knows where, a couple potions, a couple of Hellhound Hearts, another sword like Raphtalia's current one, which Fenris copied, a bunch of animal hides, and a pair of penguin suits with santa hats on their heads.
"Um...what the fuck are those?" Fenris asked.
"Not a clue," Naofumi said. "Hey, you want to divy up the drops?"
"Sure," L'Arc said. "We get anything good?"
"Well, there's some kinda weird item," Naofumi said, nudging the suits with his foot.
"Weird?" L'Arc asked.
"See for yourself," Naofumi said.
"The heck is that?" L'Arc asked.
"Beats me," Fenris shrugged, picking up a small bracelet.
It's info and special ability popped up in his menu. It stored fifty percent of all the experience the wearer or his party earned, to be distributed as the wearer saw fit later. He slipped it into his pocket and they began to sort the rest of the loot. Once finished, they all headed back to the inn. They stopped in front of the totem pole to say their goodbyes for the night.
"Thank you for all your help," Raphtalia smiled. "Thanks to you, we gained a lot of levels in just one day!"
"And if was fun!" Filo added.
"I couldn't agree more Filo," L'Arc said.
"You wanna meet back up again tomorrow?" Naofumi asked.
L'Arc hesitated, he and Therese glancing at each other. "I think we'll go it alone for now."
"Okay," Naofumi said, caught off guard slightly.
"We'll see you around though, Shield Kiddo," L'Arc said.
"Thanks for a great day," Therese smiled. "I'll think about what we discussed, Sofia."
"Good luck," Sofia smiled.
"See you later then!" Filo waved.
L'Arc turned back to wave and Fenris pointed at him, then Therese, then made a circle with one hand and moved the index finger of the other back and forth through it. L'Arc flipped him off, then turned back to the front.
"So, what's on the agenda for tomorrow?" Fenris asked.
"We're going to take a day off," Naofumi said. "I could use a day to relax."
"You do thst," Fenris nodded. "In the mean time, I'm going to take my girls to the strongest island that even the other heroes haven't touched yet and we're going to drag you all to level eighty."
"Don't do anything too stupid, alright?" Naofumi asked. "I'm going to need your girls for the Wave. They're very useful."
Fenris rolled his eyes. "And now he's got jokes, ladies and gentlemen. Come on girls. Bed time."
They all groaned dramatically, but followed him nonetheless. A few minutes later, they had all piled onto him, despite him telling them not to, and he sighed, settling in to sleep.
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