I Can't Get the Vampire Rogue to Romance Me

Chapter 45 - On the Level Up

"This is not fun!" Artmond screamed as he ran away from the swarm of birds picking at him.

"Why a swarm of birds?" Hagor asked.

Evangeline shrugged. "I don't know ... because it was funny?"

"Did you know it was booby trapped?" Valerian asked.

"Didn't spend the Meta point to figure it out," she admitted. The three of them sat on the top part of the fence, watching Artmond run one way, until he reached the end of the invisible line from their collars, then back the other way, all while being chased and attacked by a cloud of black birds with silver edged wings.

"You're all asses!" Artmond shouted, trying to cover his head from the attacks, while still holding on to the "precious platinum egg" they needed to fulfill the quest.

"There's nothing we can do! Just keep running," Evangeline called out to him.

"Are you sure about that?" Hagor asked, fingering his tangle of thorns wand, anxious to use it to help his party member.

Evangeline nodded. "If we try to help him, the swarm of birds will just double for each person who joins the fight and attack everyone else as well. We would just compound the problem. It's better to have one party member kite them around until we figure it out."

"A bit strange that you know all of that, but Meta didn't deem to give you the answer on how to solve this issue," Valerian pointed out.

She couldn't really argue with that, but she wanted to. Looking at her own stat blocks, she sighed at how fast the Meta points burned. "I don't know if he's just being picky but I seem to need to burn a point for every little answer."

"It's okay," Hagor assured. "We are capable enough to figure this out."

Evangeline nodded then turned to Sigismund who was digging through a book. "How's it going? Anything?"

"How did you know we needed this book in the first place?" Sigismund demanded, even as she flipped through the pages, comparing the weird text inside.

"I actually didn't. I just had a Meta point feeling when we found that old cleric shrine in the hill, so I grabbed it instead of burning the point. This is useful here right?"

Sigismund eyed her suspiciously but nodded as she returned her dark-eyed gaze to the text. Then she stood, holding the book out before her. She began speaking in a low voice and gestured with her other hand. A thrum of power reverberated the ground, and then sparks shot out from the tips of her fingers. The sparks flew like arrows, or more like heat seeking missiles because each spark found a bird. On impact, the birds popped out of existence in a little poof of smoke and feathers. Then even the feathers disappeared, leaving Artmond panting hard for breath below.

"She did it!" Evangeline called, and the whole party clapped and cheered. Artmond staggered a few steps back toward them all, then flopped backward onto the ground, still cradling the egg against his chest.

Then a small burst of light popped above him. In fact, a small burst of light popped above each of their heads. Evangeline flinched then looked up where hers had been, but nothing remained but the cloudy sky above them.

"What was that?" she asked.

"We leveled up," Hagor answered with no judgment on what Evangeline realized should have been an obvious thing for her to know.

Opening her menu, she flicked through her stats, grinning delightedly as she saw previous numbers in white get crossed out in blue and a blue number appear beside, showing her how her stat could potentially be raised. For example, she could raise her Dexterity or her Constitution. She picked Dexterity and went down to the next set. She would be able to increase her three of her skills or subskills by 10% points automatically. She continued skimming through the list of what she had acquired so far.

"Can we speak?"

Looking up at Valerian standing in front of her, Evangeline braced herself to not enjoy whatever came next. "If you like," she said with as neutral a tone as she could manage.

Valerian then looked pointedly at Hagor. The larger man got up, "I'm going to go check on Artmond," he said diplomatically.

Evangeline did the same, turning away from the others to walk a little ways into the woods so they could talk more privately.

Leaning up against a tree, she crossed her arms. "Alright, what is it?"

Valerian didn't bother with his usual preamble. "Are you still committed to being a rogue?"

Her jaw clenched, but she forced a smile. "Yup."

"Then I think you and I need to talk about maximizing our synergy."

That surprised Evangeline. Synergies were extra abilities that party members could perform together. "You would want to synergize with me?" she asked.

Valerian sighed. "Well, I gave it a lot of thought and if we're going to do this, then you and I should rely on each other. I want you to rely on me."

That took her aback. "Well... what did you have in mind?"

"I go for infiltrator and you go for assassin," he said, then ticked off his fingers. "We'll both get sneak attacks, which will increase our damage outputs, and if we synergize we'll technically get flanking if we go for the same target. Plus, you won't have to put yourself into direct danger and I've got cover if things should go horribly wrong, as long as you don't backstab me." He said the last as if he was making a joke, but she could hear the apprehension underneath it. She could recognize this was a big act of trust on his part.

"Well, if we synergize, at level three we'll get the protection from friendly fire ability," she pointed out.

"Yes, at level three," he acknowledged.

"Okay, but why me?"

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