Chương 12: Teambuilding never goes wrong

This time, they directed me to a different preparation room before the dive. I arrived first, mostly because I didn't summon Astarielle to put me to sleep last night. So, I woke up early. Though thanks to Kareem, I had a new suit. I found the package by my door in the morning, and the charcoal suit fit me great. The shoes also fit, as did everything else, because I had Astarielle arrange me in the morning.

In the small room, I leaned against the wall, arms crossed, doing my best to look calm and cool in case Cassandra showed up. She didn't. Instead, a Japanese woman came. Yukiko Tanaka, if I recalled correctly. She had two katanas hung by her waist, and wore a dark tactical outfit with some Japanese symbols. She had black hair cut precisely at the jaw, and only graced me with the slightest of nods when she entered. She sat down on the other side of me. A man in a long, runes-covered trench coat came next.

He had an angular, pale face, wire-rimmed glasses, and carried an obsidian staff topped with a crystal focus. He spared me a glance when I entered, and his eyes flashed with a System scan. Whatever he saw, he filed it away for later and sat down. A Chinese guy came next, wearing actual dark blue flowing robes with silver embroidery, hair falling to his waist. A Chinese sword hung by his waist, jian if I recalled correctly how these were called, though it looked more ceremonial.

He didn't sit down, leaning instead against the wall opposite me. A woman came last. Tanned, blonde, wearing a mixture of medieval plate armor and modern combat armor, a massive shield on her back, a longsword hung by her waist. She wore a radiant smile.

"What a glorious morning! I am Sarah Langley, a paladin of the Order of the Divine Cross from West Virginia, here on behalf of the Church. I am from Huntington, the middle of three children, all daughters, and I am level thirty-four. I fight as a paladin, mostly in the role of a tank and supplementary healer, but my divine smite also packs quite the punch." The rest of us exchanged glances. Yes, to introduce ourselves was the normal thing to do. But we had all been too busy being sharp and edgy.

The Chinese guy spoke next, English clean and without an accent.

"I am Liu Wei of the Tribunal of Heavenly Dragons. Level thirty-three. You could call me a martial artist, fellow Daoists." The obvious mage pushed his glasses up his nose.

"Henrik Voss of Lucielle Legal, the Kaiju hunting division. I wield the power of the elements."

"Yukiko Tanaka," the Japanese woman said.

"Yamato Syndicate. Ninja." How chatty. My turn.

"I'm Damian O'Connor of Golden Sands. I'm a summoner, and I'm much stronger than what my level indicates."

"Just, summoner?" Henrik turned slightly toward me.

"Isn't that a uselessly limiting approach to magical arts?" A broad smile spread over my face.

"Funny. I see it exactly the other way. Why bother with all elements if you can't use any of them competently?" Henrik stood up, staff in hand.

"Anyway," Sarah said, pulling a few pamphlets for you.

"Here. It is our duty to mankind itself to cooperate on the goal of climbing and conquering this unholy tower. This should help you direct your thoughts toward the grace of God on your most important quest." She handed a pamphlet to each of us. I just read the title, LET LORD CHRIST GUIDE YOU THROUGH THE DARKNESS — A Guide to Finding the True Path of the Lord Even in the Darkest of Shadows. My mother would have loved this woman. Henrik glanced up.

"Are we doing introductions or Bible study? I have a proposed formation I'd like to discuss before we dive."

"Both can happen simultaneously," Liu Wei offered.

"Cultivation of the spirit and cultivation of strategy are not in opposition." Sarah beamed up. Yes, that was possible.

"Henrik's right, we should focus on our future success."

"Great," Henrik said, in a tone that meant the opposite.

"We are doing a blind entry with an asymmetric team composition. I've drafted three contingency formations." He waved his hand, conjuring three variations of how we could go.

"Formation Alpha assumes a standard dungeon layout. Formation Beta covers open terrain. Formation Gamma accounts for vertical combat." We all looked at them. Basic stuff, paladin first, ninja covering her back, Liu at the rear with me and Henrik around the center. The versions were three variations of roughly the same.

"One note," I said.

"Don't count me as a ranged spellcaster. My main summon works best on medium to long range, but I can move around." Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.

"Similar for me," Liu added.

"My most effective distance is short to medium. But the formations appear to be serviceable, for a start." The bell rang.

"Ah!" Sarah said, "May Christ bless our path!" She stepped toward the exit. Showtime. I headed after her. We almost bumped into each other with Henrik and Yukiko. By the time we got out, the host was already doing the introductions.

"And here we go, ladies and gentlemen! Five climbers enter, one from each of our organizations, and challenge the first double-digit floor. What could possibly go wrong?" Nothing, most likely. I mean, I could probably solo the floor, so the rest of them just needed to not get in my way. The host motioned toward the pods. On the way stood a pedestal, which held a pyramid-like item filled with both scanners and mana-filled crystals.

"Take the beacon along the way. It will function as a save point for your progress, should you run out of time." Yukiko, Henrik, Liu, and I all glared at him. We weren't going to run out of time. Sarah took the beacon.

"In the name of our Lord and saviour, Jesus Christ, we will succeed!" She walked straight to a pod and slipped in, taking the beacon with her. I saved myself the comment. The rest of us walked to our pods and got in, ignoring the host. Henrik and Liu almost bumped into each other on the way to the pod as they chose the same one, but Liu slipped past the mage, reaching it first. My pod's display flickered to life. Damian Gabriel O'Connor. Level: 12 Tower perks: 0 Artifacts: 0 Highest floor: 11 The pod closed.

Darkness. I blinked, and the darkness remained. Not the temporary darkness of transition. Actual, physical darkness, thick and stale, pressing against my skin. The air tasted metallic, like rust and old blood. Beneath my feet, something crunched. Gravel, or debris. A faint green glow seeped from cracks in the walls around us. Bioluminescent fungi, or something pretending to be fungi. The light revealed enough: we stood in a cavern, but not a natural one.

The walls were reinforced with steel beams, most of them bent or sheared. Cables hung from the ceiling like dead vines. The ground was a carpet of rubble, shattered concrete, twisted metal, and something organic I chose not to examine. It looked like someone had built a city underground and then dropped a mountain on it. The other four materialized around me within seconds. Yukiko already had one katana drawn. Henrik's staff pulsed with faint blue light. Liu Wei's hands glowed with golden energy.

Sarah had her shield up and her longsword out, a soft white glow emanating from the blade. All right. Everyone spawned in already. I pulled on my power. Astarielle! In a burst of crimson flame, she appeared. I re-did her engravings in the morning, putting the instant-summon back in, so she popped into reality in an instant. She wore a different version of her fitted black dress, which covered her decently enough. She wore the same heels, though.

"Careful!" Sarah shouted.

"There's a demon!" She bolted to Astarielle, blade raised. What? As I turned, Astarielle jumped backward, barely avoiding the slash.

"What the fuck?" I shouted. Sarah didn't look at me.

"I will banish this spawn of evil." She followed up, leading with a stab, her blade glowing brighter. Astarielle flew up in a burst of scorching, dry wind. The sword passed underneath her. Crimson flame sneaked up Astarielle's body.

"Oh, so you want to dance?"

"Stop!" I shouted.

"Both of you. Astarielle, don't cast that spell. Sarah, calm the fuck down. That's my summon." Yukiko snorted, covering her mouth. Henrik rolled his eyes while Liu shook his head. Astarielle remained floating in the air, the flame still gathered around her. Sarah turned toward me.

"This is a succubus, Damian. A demon, a spawn of evil, a servant of Hell!"

"True, but she's also my main summon. It's what I do. I summon demons."

"Oh, so not just a summoner," Henrik said.

"A summoner that only summons one type of being." Thanks, Henrik, that was exactly what this discussion needed.

"Exclusively succubi," Astarielle added. I glared at her. That was not helping. Meanwhile, Sarah glowered at me, giving herself a few seconds to think.

"This is a crucial mission for mankind. Our species' entire survival might well depend on our success here in the Tower of the Dead God. We cannot jeopardize such a crucial quest by bringing in a demon." That sounded almost reasonable. Good. I could work with that.

"As my summoned servant, she has borderline no agency of herself. View her as a tool, like your sword, or Henrik's glasses. She's a tool that I use to fight with no free will of her own."

"She's a demon! No matter what you believe, she will always only fight for herself. That's what demons do! They corrupt, they manipulate, and they devour souls. I've seen it, Damian. Back home, a mage in our parish thought he could control an imp. It ate his daughter."

"Yo!" Astarielle shouted from above.

"Do I look like an imp to you? By Earthian standards, I'm an Ivy League-educated lawyer, specialized in contract negotiations." Still not helping.

"I do give her some degree of freedom," I added.

"Because it functions well. But she did study the entire high school and university with me, with no incident, so she has a history of reliability and dependability." Sarah slightly wavered. Her eyes shone with inner light, and the blade's light dimmed to the default intensity.

"Plus, as you said," I continued.

"This is a vital mission for mankind. Its importance supersedes our individual beliefs. Suppose our mission's success ends up depending on my power. If you bar me from using my powers because of your personal beliefs, and we fail because of that, would that be fair to the rest of mankind, which depends on us?" Sarah's face reddened. Her grip on the sword tightened, then slowly, deliberately, she lowered it. The holy light guttered out.

"Since we are to cooperate as a party, it is for a group vote to decide whether you can use this power as a member. I vote against it." I glanced at the others. Yukiko shrugged.

"I don't care." Henrik pushed his glasses up his nose.

"As regrettable as it may be, I find a morbid fascination in seeing how such an absurd overspecialization in a mage functions. I vote for."

"Also for," Liu said.

"Our mission is indeed of vital importance. To limit our options for success would be unconscionable. Harmony requires tolerance of dissonance." Sarah grunted, checking the beacon strapped to her belt.

"Any wrongdoing she commits falls upon your conscience, Damian, and the Lord will judge you for it." She headed deeper into the cavern. Astarielle landed, and the crimson flame dissipated. A vicious smirk played on her lips.

"I think she likes me."