Levi initiated almost two hundred people over the course of the convention, not all of whom were even attendees. Once word started to spread, it snowballed fast. He succeeded in making contact with local Awakened, individuals like Drakonias who already had classes but were mostly unsure of what had happened or how it all worked. Once armed with clear steps to share, these were able to bring in others in their own circles more readily.

A couple hundred was still nothing on the wider scale, but sending out hundreds of ripples could be enough to turn the tide.

Levi repeatedly stressed the importance of fighting in large groups, and of the steeply escalating danger of dungeons as they leveled, and sent the newly Awakened on their way with everything they needed to survive to their first threshold.

The next morning as they prepared to leave town to head to their next location, Cassandra reported that pre-orders on their book had notably ticked up.

“This would have been an awesome marketing campaign, if we weren’t selling it at cost,” she said, laughing. “Glad we went the distribution route. At this rate, we’d never be able to keep up with shipping them ourselves.” They could order copies themselves more cheaply, but that would require logistics in place that none of them had time for. Having them distributed through the printing company would be more expensive, but require nothing from them once everything was set up.

Levi nodded, but for all the progress they were making he felt a coil of dread lingering in his stomach. He couldn’t shake the feeling that he was forgetting something, that there was something more he could have or should have been doing. That his second chance was going to turn out just as badly as the first time, regardless of how he tried to change things.

“I’d like to start running a dungeon loop to level,” he said as they headed further into California for their next scheduled con attendance. “There’s a good spot a couple hours from here where we can run specialty dungeons one after the other. It would let us collect more uncommon ingredients I’ll need for later, and staying in one place means we can get the dungeons high enough level to be worth the time.”

“Tired of recruiting already?” Cassandra asked.

“You don’t need me. I can leave you Ward and Drok and Becca and you’ll be completely safe to Awaken as many new people as are willing. Just skip any dungeon over level 4. I can even get you a map of where I’ll be so if you actually do need me… send Crackle or something.”

The group that had been escorting Laurence had made their way back, though they’d also joined up with Frosty meaning that neither arrived first, to Gordon’s disappointment.

Cen was busy trying to sparkle at Centoo and catch him off guard, while Centoo pretended to ignore him.

The centipedes were the closest to their evolution threshold, since they only required level 10 to begin evolving, while gremlins and most others required level 15 or higher.

Levi still hadn’t found a correlation to the numbers, apart from the fact that plus creatures seemed to require more thresholds than their equivalent standard creatures. He wondered if that meant they’d end up evolving fewer times total, or if they had a higher maximum level - not that he even knew if maximum levels were a limitation. He’d never seen a gremlin above level 50, for instance, or a scarab above level 80, but it was possible that beyond that they’d end up evolving into something unrecognizably different from their base forms.

Two Control, a Nature, an Ice, a Lightning, a Beast, and two Fire dungeons formed a rough oval along with three Destruction interspersed at various points. With his current team and setup, Levi should be able to clear four or five in a day, meaning he could repeat the loop every three days or so until the dungeons leveled enough to become a real challenge.

Dungeon advancement was linear, rather than exponential, which was how they outleveled humans so rapidly. While the progress of a human Awakened slowed down more and more the higher level they got, dungeons remained able to level at almost the same speed throughout their entire duration.

It would take roughly three to five trips through a level 1 to allow it to reach level 2, and around five to seven trips to level an 11 to level 12. The rough numbers varied substantially relative to the number of people delving it, the amount of time they spent doing so, and how many of the monsters they cleared, but you could generally base your assumptions on those numbers and be fairly close.

Given that there had been three or so months before Levi's return for dungeons to have been appearing, the theoretical maximum level of anything right now would be somewhere around level 20, but that would only be possible if people had been full-clearing every single day since day 1. Most would be 10 or below, even those being run regularly, and the majority of dungeons wouldn't have been discovered yet at all.

It would take about three weeks to level a single dungeon to 5, at which point it would be strong enough for his own level to start increasing again. By running through a loop of ten or so, he would slow that progress for each individual, but it would make up for itself by advancing them all equally.

Hopefully. He needed to get the dungeons up much more than that if they were going to pull this off. But either way, he'd lost enough time as it was. He had to get started soon.

"I don't like the idea of leaving you alone for so long." Irene stepped closer, looking up at Levi with the conflict clear in her eyes. "But I know the recruitment is important. I don't want to walk away."

"I'll be fine. I've got everyone to protect me, I promise I won't take any undue risks."

"You'd better. I don't want to lose you again."

Levi enfolded her in his arms. "I don't want to lose you either. I'll be there alive and well when you're finished, waiting for you with an even bigger army of monsters to keep you safe."

"Can I come too?" Peter asked. "I want a bigger army too. Not that big, but a few more would be good."

With one final kiss, Levi reluctantly released Irene and turned to Peter. "Not this time. You'll be the one running the initiations now, while I'm away. You’re the one who has to make sure all the new Awakened know what they need to know."

Peter sighed, but nodded. "Okay, fine."

"One month, then we'll reconvene and start grinding out levels for all of you."

"I'm coming with you," Gordon said, unexpectedly.

"What? Really?"

"Yes. The girls are better at recruiting than you or I will ever be, and... you're right. I need to learn some things. Seeing everyone out there... I don't want to be left behind."

“You understand that this will be dangerous, right? Very dangerous. I’m going to be power-leveling the dungeons as well as myself, the threat level will rise—”

“Yes.” Gordon’s hands tightened into fists. "I'm tired of being the guy who runs away from his problems. Time to run at them head on, come what may. And if that means putting myself in an uncomfortable situation just so I physically can't give in to temptation and take the easy way out, then that's what I'll do." He stared down at his hands, consciously unclenching them. "This will be the perfect chance for you to teach me, in a circumstance where I can't wuss out on it." He looked up, meeting Levi’s eyes. “When we bring Robert in, I want to be ready to be a father and a protector. Not just for this fight, for good. And for that, I need the kind of inner strength that… I just don’t know how else to get. But facing adversity seems like a good place to start.”

"Good man, Gordon." Levi clapped his shoulder with a smile. "I'll do my best to see to it that you're as ready as anyone can be."

"I'll hold you to that. And you have permission to hold me to this commitment, whatever excuses I may come up with in the coming weeks."

Levi shook his head, the glint of determination in Gordon's eyes telling him all he needed to know. "It won't come to that."

"But if it does—"

"It won’t. You’ve got this. And I’ve got your back."