As they continued south, Levi split off some of their minions into two side groups to clear dungeons on their own, with orders to catch back up with the main group as soon as they were done. Since their days-long trip on their own had been largely unproductive, he was sure to only send them to dungeons he could pinpoint with Mana Ping before sending them out.

They were barely a half hour past the second dungeon when Gordon came to an abrupt halt.

“What’s wrong?”

“I’m getting a weird message. It’s asking me to unbind Frosty.”

Levi frowned. “Why?”

“Frosty has 'reached the edge of my control radius'.”

“Ah.” Levi had occasionally wondered if there was a maximum limit to minion distance. Looked like the answer was ‘yes, but it’s several states in size’. With their team and Laurence’s going in completely different directions, they’d managed to reach the end of that leeway. “Better have her come back.”

Gordon nodded. A moment later he exhaled in relief. “She’ll be fine.” He resumed walking, pushing back into their jog.

“It’ll be nice having Frosty back,” Peter commented. “She’s fun.”

Several hours and three minion-run side dungeons later, shortly after crossing into California, Levi finally reached level 12.

Tamer level increased to 12.

+7 health, +7 mana, +7 stamina

Nothing particularly exciting at this level, just another stat point which he promptly put into Strength, and another open minion slot. Since he still had one he hadn't filled yet, it wasn't exactly an essential upgrade.

Levi Morrison, Secret Seeker + Unassigned Levels: 0 Primary Class: Tamer Tamer Level: 12 Subclass: None Minions: 10/12 Stat Points: 0 Strength: 3 Psyche: 3 Spirit: 6 Health

209/209 Mana

119/119 Stamina

189/189 Health Regen

4 /minute Mana Regen

4 /minute Stamina Regen

7 /minute

But it did continue to improve his pools, which was always appreciated. The closer he came to his former capabilities, the less he’d worry.

It was another hour after that that he received the error messages.

'Cen' has reached the edge of your control radius and cannot proceed in its current state.

Would you like to unbind 'Cen' at this time?

Unbind Cancel 'Crackle' has reached the edge of your control radius and cannot proceed in its current state.

Would you like to unbind 'Crackle' at this time?

Unbind Cancel 'Maggie' has reached the edge of your control radius and cannot proceed in its current state.

Would you like to unbind 'Maggie' at this time?

Unbind Cancel

Levi concentrated on it, searching for any related backend in the system, and for once found a definition without too much difficulty.

Control Radius:

The distance from a tether that a construct can be located without beginning to lose integrity.

If a construct is forced outside of control radius, the unbound construct will continue to carry out its last instructions from the tether until its mana is exhausted and it destabilizes, or until the tether is re-established.

Levi cursed softly. He’d hoped that he would have enough slack in his radius that this wouldn’t be an issue. It was one thing recalling Frosty, but to leave Laurence completely undefended?

This was the kind of situation that would be so much easier if he’d taken Avatar. Being able to actually see what was going on with Laurence’s team would allow communication to occur, albeit clumsily. Without it, he had to decide to either recall his minions leaving the fledgling mage defenceless, or send them out unbound and hope they’d make it back in time before they dissolved, without any way of communicating what was happening or why to Laurence or give him the chance to suggest alternative options.

He didn’t like either option. Cen and Maggie were important members of his team, both well on their way to becoming truly powerful. Cen was only a few levels away from his first evolution, and Maggie wasn’t the kind of boss he could casually replace, even setting aside her levels.

Given how much they’d leveled in the past days, Laurence had been running dungeons practically nonstop. He’d probably reached his second threshold by now, or else was very close to it.

Of anyone but Levi himself, Laurence was the most familiar with the system. He’d hopefully realize what was going on and halt his dungeon activities. He wouldn’t assume himself strong enough and start running them solo, right? He may be eager, but he wasn’t stupid.

Levi gave the command for them to stop and remain within his tether distance, unwilling to unbind them. Next, he set them on a course that would allow them to continue leveling on their own if they happened across any dungeons as they cut across the country back towards Levi, though without a human accompanying them they’d have to rely on Levi’s memorized map and couldn’t search out new dungeons on their own. Minions could sense a dungeon only when quite close to it, making them excellent for pinpointing it once he’d narrowed down the general area, but less reliable than mana ping for anything beyond a few meters.

Laurence would be disappointed not to be able to continue leveling while he traveled, but in the end his trip was a simple and peaceful one. After all, he was only collecting items from trade deals. If he missed out on a few days of leveling with Levi’s minions, it wouldn’t hurt anything.

“Reach the end of your range too?” Gordon asked, as Levi resumed walking.

“Yup.”

“Bet Frosty gets back first.”

Levi mentally prodded them to hurry back, only stopping at dungeons they ran right into.

“Bet she doesn’t.”

“She’s a good girl, even if she can get distracted, and this time she won’t stop.”

“We’ll see.”

Shortly thereafter, the next team Levi had left behind rejoined them, bringing more elixirs to replenish their dwindling supply. He pinged again, searching for any other dungeons nearby, but they were in a gap between them at the moment. It took around an hour and a half to move between them, and their minions were rather overleveled for the area, often clearing the dungeons faster than Levi could locate more.

By the time they stopped for the night - inside a nice Destruction Dungeon, since that was the safest place Levi could think of to stash a bunch of monsters for the night - they’d accumulated quite a collection of levels and more common dungeon treasures.

Levi himself hadn’t leveled again, and probably wouldn’t for several days, but Peter had reached level 8, and Gordon was sitting at 9 - where he’d probably remain for a while, threshold levels requiring substantially more kills than normal levels.

After clearing the dungeon - a level 2 that had an inordinate love of scarabs, much to Levi's irritation - Levi counted out and redistributed the items they'd obtained throughout the day.

For some reason the dungeons had given a disproportionate number of mana elixirs - twelve total, and only seven health and four stamina. Ward brought him a pair of Destruction tokens and a bundle of Scarab Fur, a somewhat uncommon crafting ingredient. Skarm’s team brought in a basic tracing he could use for crafting improved weaponry later, and a bangle with a weak protection ability - it absorbed a single Destruction effect once a day, making it more of a novelty than anything actually valuable. Still, Levi could probably trade it for something to someone who didn’t run through dungeons multiple times a day.

Drok, though, turned out to be the biggest winner of the trip. His team was the last to return, and he came wearing a massive pair of gauntlets that left shadows in their wake as he moved. They were black and blocky, with sharp edges at each joint that looked ready to tear apart whatever he may punch with them.

Ogre's Dark Fists (Gloves, Uncommon)

Abilities: (Basic) Dark's Delay

Power stone: 1/1

Upgrade Slots: 0

Restricted: Cave Ogre

“Where’d you get those?” Levi asked, surprised. Apart from the gremlin armor that came with Ward, he’d never seen or heard of species-restricted items.

“Drok, yes,” Drok said proudly, gesturing back vaguely.

He’d also brought Levi a blank spellbook and a sling, neither of which he had much use for at the moment, and yet another Dark power stone. Levi was beginning to think Dark dungeons just weighted more heavily toward power stones than tokens, at this rate.

Two’s team had contributed a war-fan and two more Destruction tokens, in addition to a number of the restoratives.

Two himself had reached level 8, bringing him up to the same level as Skarm for the moment, something that made him strut about, and Skarm shake his head.

Centoo, meanwhile, had leveled twice. Once right after his first side trip, and again in clearing this final dungeon of the day. And, when Levi checked, Cen had managed to gain another as well, wherever he was.

Levi put both Two's stat points into Spirit, to help with his stealth and related abilities, and Cen and Centoo's into Strength.

Gremlin Two: Level 8 Horned Gremlin

Strength: 5

Health: 75/75

(+7/min)

Psyche: 2

Mana: 6/6

(+3/min)

Spirit: 9

Stamina: 140/140

(+11/min) Cen: Level 7 Stone Centipede

Strength: 5

Health: 145/145

(+7/min)

Psyche: 0

Mana: 30/30

(+2/min)

Spirit: 2

Stamina: 80/80

(+4/min) Centoo: Level 7 Stone Centipede

Strength: 5

Health: 145/145

(+7/min)

Psyche: 0

Mana: 30/30

(+2/min)

Spirit: 2

Stamina: 80/80

(+4/min)

"Peter, could you tell me Slayer's stats?"

Peter read them off, and Levi input them into his database.

Slayer: Level 2 Spitting Slime +

Strength: 2

Health: 340/340

(+9/min)

Psyche: 0

Mana: 5/5

(+0.5/min)

Spirit: 0

Stamina: 0/0

(+0.5/min) Strength: +20 Health, +2 H-Regen Psyche: +3 Mana, +0.5 M-Regen Spirit: +1 Stamina, +0.5 S-Regen

No wonder he was so slow. No stamina at all? Especially as a plus, that was... pretty bad. And it couldn't even be rectified without insane amounts of stat point investment. His health was higher than anyone but Becca, and his ability to rapidly regenerate health was equal to hers, but in everything else the Rift Cat came out ahead.

Slayer's per-level gains were unimpressive compared to most other pluses, leaving him behind even Shadevine in growth potential. But perhaps Levi's standards were getting a bit high.

All in all, the day was a complete success. Between them, they’d cleared seven dungeons in a single day.

Having several independent minion teams out collecting stuff from nearby was proving to be an efficient strategy. Even if each individual dungeon run brought in less than if Levi had accompanied them himself, there was more than enough in quantity to justify the lower quality.