When the blackness rolled in, Margie was shocked to find her dogs standing with her.

Buford and Noodle looked around in a panic.

Noodle immediately stuck his nose to the ground and started sniffing. Margie couldn’t smell a thing in here, but she wasn’t a basset hound.

She did a slow turn of the darkness before shrugging. “Well shit, what now?”

“I admire how calm you are, Senpai.” The System spoke with more calm than usual. The voice was the same squeaky weeb shit, but it didn’t sound like it was about to pass out from excitement.

It sounded calm, almost contemplative.

“Even with how much I’m throwing at you all, it’s remarkable how much you are growing. You’re some of the first to reach the Second Threshold, but you aren’t even close to alone in that feat.”

Margie blinked. That was downright coherent.

“Okay…thanks for sharing, I guess?” Buford barked.

The System giggled. “Here, I’ll give you your options, Margie, but we need to talk.”

Margie paused, an uneasy feeling settling in her gut. The System had never used her name before. She reached out, burying her hand in Buford’s ruff, taking comfort from his presence.

“What?”

“You, my dear Senpai, need a purpose.”

“Huh?”

“That thing missing from your character sheet? You need to fill it in. You’re pretty awesome, so you might make it past the Third Threshold, but the Forth? A pipe dream.”

Margie stared at the darkness, the System’s words bouncing around in her head.

“How am I supposed to do that?”

“Silly Senpai!” The System giggled.

Her eye twitched.

“You might as well ask what the meaning of life is! I could tell you that as easily as how one finds purpose.”

Before Margie could respond, her options burst into her view.

Shadow Bite

Rare

Effect: enhances Shadow Doge with the ability to call upon its shadows, enlarging its jaws and increasing its piercing power.

Passive effect: enhances Shadow Doge in darkness, increasing speed, power, and chill.

Range: none

Duration: 5 seconds

Energy cost: small

Cooldown: 30 seconds

Margie read over that last bit again. “Chill? What does enhances chill mean?”

“Not telling,” the System giggled.

Margie ignored the stupid thing and focused back on the Skill.

Noodle’s shadows felt cool to the touch, so maybe the Skill beefed that up?

Depending on the strength, that could be useful. A full-blown cold attack, maybe. Or just better resistance against fire attacks.

She turned her eyes toward the next Skill.

Water Doge

Rare

Effect: imbues hound with the power of water, allowing for long-ranged attacks, very basic water manipulation, and the ability to breathe underwater.

Range: touch

Energy cost: small

Duration: 15 minutes

Cooldown: 20 minutes

Hmm. She liked this one. Considering that one of the Beasts was in a water zone, this Skill could be very helpful, and having another ranged option aside from Steven’s shields would be nice.

The last Skill rolled out with a flash of purple light, and Margie gasped.

Hopscotch Hound

Epic

Effect: switch places with your hounds or switch your hound's places with each other.

Skill can be charged in advance to reduce energy cost or used immediately at greater cost.

Range: X

Energy cost: variable

Cooldown: 15 seconds.

Margie picked Hop Scotch Hound without a second thought.

The other Skills weren’t bad, but they paled compared to a fucking teleport.

The options that Skill opened were wonderful.

She could bait attacks on herself and swap places with Buford.

A hit that would crumple an old woman wouldn’t even scratch her boy.

And that was just one use. Buford and Noodle fought very differently, and Noodle could get places unnoticed that Buford couldn’t.

She could flank enemies by having Noodle sneak past someone’s guard only to swap him with Buford.

She felt the Skill hover in her mind, not quite ‘clicking’ yet.

Her Traits appeared next, the text flashing with red and black light.

Hounds Of A Feather

Effect: hounds within a hundred feet of each other increase each other's powers.

When attacking the same target in quick succession, hounds gain increased power.

Hounds Are A Maiden’s Strength

Gain a portion of your Hounds strength.

Margie paused at that. A portion of her Hounds strength was rather vague but also promising. Even just a portion of Jugger-Hound on top of Micheal’s Skill could be big.

And if it included both buffs at once? That gave her some interesting options, especially as she gained more buffs.

Hound Link

Link senses with your Hounds, allowing you to see through their eyes, hear through their ears, and smell through their noses.

Before Hopscotch Hound, she would have picked option one or three. Buffing herself was nice and all, but strengthening her boys would give her more bang for her buck.

But if she was going to be swapping herself into danger, then she needed to be able to take a few more hits, as well as give them.

She considered for another beat, then locked in her choice.

Would you like to take: Hop Scotch Hound?

“Yes.”

Would you like to take: Hounds Are A Maiden’s Strength

“Yes.”

With her choices locked in, she felt a rush of power, then a rush of prompts followed.

Jugger Hound has been Tempered! All effects have been enhanced, and lesser regeneration has been upgraded to regeneration!

Shadow Doge has been Tempered! All effects have been enhanced! New function: Glancing Hit! If an attack doesn’t strike the Shadow Doge dead center, it has a chance to glance off, dealing reduced damage!

Jugger Rush has been Tempered! All effects have been enhanced! New function: Momentum Multiplier! Momentum gained will not only be stored but increased!

Smarter Than The Average Dog has been enhanced! All base effects strengthened.

Margie read over the changes as waves of power crashed through her. “Huh, well not bad. Now, how the fuck am I supposed to find a purpose?”