Vol.1 Ch.5 – Leveling Up

Chapter 5: Leveling Up

Elaine and her team only made it back to Base 15 after nightfall. The reduced visibility had slowed them down and having to go through thick underbrush in that darkness had made it worse. Well, for Alexis and Elaine at least. Ophelia's movements had actually gotten more and more confident as the light had dimmed. To be fair though, thanks to her supernatural abilities she'd been faster than them even before that.

The moment they passed through the airlock Alexis got multiple notifications on her CARD.

After she had shared this Ophelia mentioned that she had gained the same achievements.

They changed out of their armor and back into their regular uniforms and then decided to hit in the cafeteria, just in time to put in some final orders before they would have shut down for the night. Nobody had to go hungry at the base but if they'd missed the staff they would have had to make do with ready-made meals, which were a far cry from the delights the cafeteria could conjure up when open.

“So”, Alexis had said once they'd each gotten something to eat. “How does this leveling thing work?”

Alexis had gone for a bowl of chicken fried rice, Ophelia had taken steak and fries, putting emphasis on how she did not want it bloody, eliciting the snort from Elaine she'd been going for, and Elaine had picked the spaghetti carbonara, saying that she'd earned herself a big bowl of carbs, protein and fat.

“Alright”, Elaine began after a few bites. “Open your level up screen, that'll make it much easier to explain.” Then she paused and turned to Ophelia and said: “We'll do Alexis first and then we'll work on you, okay?”

Ophelia nodded.

Alexis' level up screen showed multiple glowing orbs arranged around a central orb, looking a lot like multiple planets orbiting a star. The central orb was large and golden and surrounding it was a ring with four smaller orbs on it, one red, one blue, one green, and one white. Surrounding that ring was another with four more orbs of the same colors. Beyond that things got hazy.

“I have no idea what I'm looking at”, Alexis admitted as she shared the screen.

Elaine could move her finger over the orbs to see descriptions but it was tedious to do and she told Alexis: “In the upper corner, change it to list view.”

Alexis did and the level up screen shifted to give a list of available abilities.

“That is a lot to unpack”, Alexis said as she stared at the abilities.

“It's really easier than it looks”, Elaine began. “You use your EXP to buy skills until you reach the requirement for the next level. Upon leveling up, you gain a boost to all your stats, but particularly to the stats you've been focusing on. So for each physical skill you bought your physical stats grow farther. For each magical skill you bought your magical stats grow farther and for each recovery skill you bought your Vigor and Endurance grow farther.”

“What about M skills?”, Alexis asked.

“They're special”, Elaine said. “M skills increase all of your stats, but with a focus on Luck. It's almost as though they're trying to push you into buying those. As I understand it, if you gain access to a piece of gear from an M skill, I can get that as well.”

“So, about that Glory Hound skill”, Ophelia said. “I think that should be her first priority.”

Elaine nodded. “Agreed. That sounds super useful. Alexis, can you try and see if you can buy that without needing the other Physical skill first?”

Alexis fiddled with her AR display and said: “I can. Should I buy it now?”

“No!”, Elaine replied, forcefully. “We're going to game the system a little. Buy the spear, then buy the Glory Hound skill. That way when you level up you'll get the bonus stats from two skills rather than just one. And once you have those we can decide what else you should take.”

“Alright.”

When Alexis' stat upgrades appeared on her screen, Elaine also got a notification.

“Well, I'm not sure how to feel about that”, Elaine said as she shared her screen. “On the one hand, the fact that I got Glory Hound from you is amazing. On the other hand, I was really looking forward to getting access to your magic spear.” And then she had to hold back a snort as she realized what she'd just said.

“I would be more put off by the paltry stat bonuses you got”, Ophelia said.

“Eh. I'm getting those paltry bonuses from everyone in my team, so they'll add up soon enough”, Elaine waved it off. “Now, what about the other 26 points?”

“If I can make a suggestion”, Ophelia said to Alexis, “I would like for you to purchase the light magic.”

“Okay, but why?”, Alexis asked. “Light magic sounds dangerous if I have a vampire teammate.”

“Sort of”, Ophelia said. “Us vampires have an odd relationship with light mages. On the one hand they're dangerous because they can simulate sunlight but on the other hand they can bend light away from us. But that's exactly why I'm suggesting this. Since we know light magic so well we know how useful it is to have a light mage around. They can bend light away to make someone invisible, they can focus light into laser beams and they can blind enemies like a flash grenade.”

Alexis' eyes had grown wide.

“You do realize that skill only gives her rudimentary skills in light magic, right?”, Elaine asked.

Ophelia nodded. “Those should all fall under rudimentary skills. Advanced light magic can do stuff like letting your allies move at light speed for a fraction of a second or creating blades of solid light.”

“Well I'm sold”, Alexis said.

“Yeah, me too”, Elaine said. “Having at least some magic is better than none. Question is, do you want to buy another Level 1 skill or do you want to save the remaining 16 points up?”

“I'm not convinced that charge attack skill is worth it and the passive regeneration is really not that interesting, so I'd rather save them up”, Alexis said, then poked the button to purchase the light magic.

Then she continued: “Maybe I'll buy the horse next. It'd be great if we could make those trips faster. But I still don't get the Bond Level thing yet. Can you explain that to me?”

“It's what it says on the tin”, Elaine said. “The higher the Bond Level the more skills you gain access to. And you increase that level by bonding with your Awakener. So Alexis, wanna hang out with me some time?”

Alexis blushed at that and nodded.

Then Elaine looked over to Ophelia, who was looking at her with something akin to hunger. Elaine thought Ophelia was very attractive, if in a completely different way from Alexis. She was worried she'd offended Ophelia but the raven-haired girl simply said:

“So, Bond Level. That has to do with trust, right?”

“Right.”

“In that case, let's power-level that Bond, shall we?”, she asked, licking her lip.

Elaine suddenly felt very warm. “What did you have in mind?”, she asked. The tremble in her voice was barely audible but Ophelia did have superhuman senses. She smiled.

“Let me drink your blood”, she told Elaine.

Alexis was halfway out of her chair before Elaine motioned for her to sit down. The brunette thought about what Ophelia had proposed. “The logic being that if I trust you enough to let you, it'd raise our Bond Level?”

Ophelia smiled even wider. “Exactly.”

“I have three questions”, Elaine said evenly.

“Go ahead.”

“One. I once read a book. I said I wasn't going to rely on books but that one has stuck with me. In that book the vampires didn't have to drink people dry but the victims died of something akin to mad cow disease.”

“Yeah, I've read that one, too”, Ophelia said. “V-syndrome isn't real. Except for taking some of your blood you won't suffer any other side effects. I wouldn't even take a whole blood bag's worth.

“Okay. Second question. Will this turn me into a vampire?”

Ophelia shook her head. “The process of turning is complicated. I'd have to drink your blood three days in a row, you'd have to drink mine on every one of those days, and at least one of those times would have to be under the sky of a new moon. There is no way to accidentally turn someone.”

“Alright, then I've only got one more question. Why would you want my blood? I thought you're getting enough.”

“I am. It's...”, Ophelia paused. “Offering to suck someone's blood is a fairly intimate thing. It's kinda like offering someone a blowjob.”

Alexis and Elaine both swallowed at that.

“Allegedly it feels as good as having someone suck your dick, too, but I don't have one so I wouldn't know.”

Maybe it was just Elaine's imagination but she felt as if Ophelia had put the tiniest amount of emphasis on the 'I', as if... did she suspect something? Or was Elaine jumping at shadows?

“So, where would you suck my blood?”, Elaine asked, trying to remain calm.

“Right here works. We're the only ones left in the cafeteria and I don't mind if Alexis watches.” At this point both Alexis and Elaine were blushing furiously.

“I meant”, Elaine managed, “where do you want to bite me?”

Ophelia smiled, showing she knew exactly what she was doing. “Oh we're not that close yet, Elaine. Cut your index finger, I'll drink from that. Between the clotting agent in my saliva and your twelve Vigor you should be good as new by morning.”

Elaine swallowed but pulled out her utility knife and methodically made a long diagonal cut across the ball of her index finger, then held the finger out to Ophelia, blood already welling from the cut.

Ophelia pulled her close, held Elaine's hand above her head, and let a single drop fall onto her tongue. She shuddered, then sucked the bleeding finger into her mouth. She swirled her tongue around the long, slender digit, then began gently suckling on it.

Elaine had to grit her teeth to stifle a groan. It didn't hurt. No, that would have been bad enough. Instead, the feeling of Ophelia's long tongue and her warm wet mouth was utter bliss the likes of which she'd never felt in her life. There had to be something in Ophelia's saliva that made it feel that good. Just having Ophelia's tongue curl around her finger shouldn't feel so good.

Her pants were tightening up in a flash and she was terrified everyone was going to notice her dirty little secret. This little vixen was going to make her cum from her freaking index finger and Elaine's mind couldn't help drifting. She moaned as she imagined Ophelia's mouth on another part of her anatomy, one that was thicker and longer than her finger, one that she had still not gotten used to having yet.

Finally, finally, with a slight pop Ophelia's mouth let go of Elaine's finger. In response Elaine's arm along with the entire rest of her upper body collapsed onto the table and she panted.

Yep, gonna need to change my boxers, Elaine thought.

“Are you okay?”, Alexis asked, worried. “Did that hurt?”

“Nope, she just creamed herself”, Ophelia said as she swallowed the last of Elaine's blood and shuddered in pleasure of her own.

Alexis meanwhile had gotten even redder than before.

Once Elaine had the strength to right herself Ophelia shared her notification with the others, a smug expression on her face.

Elaine couldn't tell whether she should be thanking Ophelia for the great time or whether she should feel offended and used.

“Now then, shall we see what abilities I can unlock?”, Ophelia asked giddily and shared her level up screen. She'd already shifted it to list view, but through the slightly transparent menu it was obvious that the glowing orbs were different for her. The central orb was black and red and purple and surrounding it was only a single red orb, with more blue and green orbs instead.

Elaine and Alexis were both gawking at Ophelia's level up sheet.

“I don't even know where to start here”, Elaine said.

“If that's what the Bond Level 3 skills look like, I feel fucking stupid for wasting all my EXP on those lower tier skills”, Alexis said.

“Yeah, I feel you”, Ophelia said. “How about this. I'll tell you what I think I should do and you critique it?”

Elaine and Alexis nodded.

“So, as I see it, these abilities can roughly be grouped into three categories. Magic, stuff that messes with shadows and miscellaneous stuff. If I want to go all in on the shadow stuff I need Shadow Cowl first. I'm pretty sure I could use Shadow magic to gain the same effect but, as the Shadow Cowl description reads, it'd be a constant drain. So, since Shadow Cowl is a bit too expensive for me right now, I'll leave all the shadow stuff out, as much as not having Shadow's Embrace sucks because that skill sounds awesome. Aspect of Liminality sounds absurdly powerful but, again, it's expensive.

“Next, if I'm going to deal with a skill set focused on magic I need to start with the lowest tier magic skill, the Rudimentary Shadow Magic. I also want those Hounds of Hades. Homing and rebounding projectiles sound good, extra damage against undead sounds even better. That leaves twenty-five points. I could save up for Shadow Cowl, but I think I'd rather buy that wand. Because I've noticed something when Alexis went through her levels and I want to see how to game that system.”

“What did you see?”, Alexis and Elaine asked, almost at the same time.

“So, she got plus one in each stat from leveling up. Then she got a further plus one in everything from the M skill, except for Luck, where she got two. The Bond Level 2 Physical skill gave her plus three in each physical stat. So now I'm wondering. Will a Bond Level 2 M skill give me plus two in all stats or plus one in all stats and plus three in Luck? And what does Luck do, anyway?”

Elaine stroked her chin. “Good observation, that is worth trying. And Luck is kind of an oddball stat. It lets you randomly hit weak spots you didn't know about, find fault lines in armor, accidentally stumble out of the way of attacks, find useful stuff in the world. A low Luck stat does nothing. A high Luck stat is borderline reality manipulation.”

“Alright, so both outcomes would be good. So I would buy two M skills at once, but then I wouldn't be doing very much for my Intelligence stat which, as I understand, governs how strong my magic is. So I'll buy the Rudimentary Shadow Magic first, then the Lampade Wand and then the Hounds of Hades afterwards.

Right after Ophelia had shared her status screen Elaine got her own notification:

Elaine felt giddy. Compared to her starting stats as an Awakener she'd almost doubled her stats. Compared to her stats as a human, she had almost tripled the values. On top of that she had gained the Glory Hound ability, which she thought would be tremendously effective in convincing others to join her team. 'Hey, I can make you stronger faster' ought to be excellent motivation, no?

Never mind her two companions, Alexis with the unstoppable spear and the light magic and Ophelia with the magic wand, the hell hounds and the shadow magic. Even just looking at their skills excited her. Plus, it let her be excited about her teammates without dwelling too much on how attractive they were.

Alexis was the typical girl next door type, with a gorgeous face and a slight figure, shorter than average and with those shining baby blue eyes that sucked you in, especially with the glasses that just drew attention to them. Her hair was a shining golden blond, down to her shoulders, with her bangs braided off to the left, which just enhanced her cuteness by a factor of ten. Her breasts were a large A cup, maybe a small B cup, and Elaine wondered just how perky they would be.

Ophelia, by stark contrast, was average height, with sharp features that were rounded just enough to be pretty rather than intimidating, if Elaine wasn't completely mistaken there was at least a little bit of Asian in the girl's heritage, maybe quarter Asian. She was pale as one should expect from someone with a severe sunlight allergy, with straight black hair down to her collarbones, a pronounced cupid's bow of a mouth and eyes with an intriguing red color that Elaine knew only from albinos. Also, Ophelia had a body most women would be seethingly jealous over but that Elaine just wanted to run her hands all over, with a pronounced hourglass figure and generous C cup breasts. The girl looked as if she perpetually wore a corset but could move as if she wore a catsuit.

Elaine had had a preference for girls even before... the side effects kicked in, but ever since then she'd become as thirsty as a teenage boy, though in her opinion she was doing a great job of not letting it show that she wanted to bend them both over and have her way with them right there.

**

Ophelia, meanwhile, was disappointed. The second tier M skill had indeed only given her +1 to all her stats, except Luck, which it had increased by 3. Still, she now had some magic to call her own and an artifact to strengthen it by 50%, so she was happy enough with the outcome. Her next EXP she'd use to power level her magic stats.

Tagging along with Elaine and Alexis had already turned out to be the best decision she'd made since coming here and her hypothesis was also coming along nicely, the way Elaine had crossed her legs as if trying to push something down...

**

Today had been exhausting for Elaine. She'd gone on her first mission with her Shard Bearers, had almost fucked up in front of the rookies she'd been wanting to impress, and then to top it all off she'd cum in her pants because a vampire had licked her finger. Elaine wanted to get back to her room, wash up, change into less sticky clothes, and then flop into bed.

But when she got to her room she noticed that her door wasn't all the way closed. Had she forgotten to close it? Now that Brandon was no longer around she had nothing to worry about but this still wasn't like her.

She opened her door and found that her room looked like it had been ransacked. A rather inappropriate kind of ransacking that had left all of her doujins strewn around her desk, all opened

to the most... interesting bits. On top of the pile was a two page spread of the female version of Fujimaru Ritsuka railing the cute pink-haired paladin Astolfo from behind while he came all over the bed sheets.

Elaine had owned these since long before the side effects. It had been a fetish of hers for a very long time. But ever since she could... empathize... with these characters it had become difficult to ignore the allure of their pages and she was not too proud to admit that she'd come perilously close to staining that particular spread of that particular doujin on more than one occasion.

Clearly someone had been in her room. Or rather, judging by the rustling, someone was in her room. Elaine's room was a rectangular box. As one entered the room one moved directly towards the small work desk. Directly to the right was a door that led to her tiny little bathroom. It was cramped but the fact that she didn't have to share it with anyone was worth a thousand inconveniences. To the left the room opened up a little. Placed against the left wall was her bed and the wall directly next to the door was taken up by her closet. One had to step into the room and then turn around to look at the closet door.

So that's what Elaine did. She stepped into her room, turned 110 degrees to the left and was greeted by a butt.

A butt whose owner was currently kneeling on the ground, rifling through her closet. By the dark red hair hanging down the back of the butt's owner Elaine knew this was the girl who had spent her last two weeks glaring at her whenever their eyes met.

“Alright, no, I'm not doing this”, Elaine mumbled, then spoke up. “What's your damage, lady?”