The thought of a Royal Rank Bloodbath Spider was honestly terrifying for most of the people in the camp, even most of the Nature Priests who still had a healthy respect for their own lives. There were just some things in life that you didn’t want to mess with, and two hundred kilo spiders were among of those things.
The beasts were mostly happily resting in their spaces while everyone enjoyed their lunch, but Remi was still hanging out with Morgana, watching the world from the Witch Doctor’s shoulder, with her tail wrapped around Morgana’s neck for security.
She had been around the advisor long enough now that Remi had decided that it was safe to take food from her, and Morgana was patrolling around the camp, free to pass Remi morsels of anything that caught her interest.
“Remi seems to have found her calling. The venomous snake really completes the creepy witch doctor look.” One of the other students chuckled as the pair passed by.
Morgana smiled at him. “You have a large cut on your hand there, would you like to have it healed? Remi is working on her direct injected [Healing Splash] skill.”
The boy frantically waved his bandaged hand. “No, that’s fine, thank you. It will be fine in a day or two.”
Remi tried her pleading look, but the warrior’s mistrust ran too deep, and there was no way that he was letting the snake bite him as a training exercise for a supposed healing ability.
Besides, who had ever heard of a snake that healed with a bite?
Once the food was done, the bards began to play some lighter dance music, taking the weariness from the students who had just come from the line.
“Care to dance?” Karl asked Dana with a wink.
“I’d rather sleep, but a dance still sounds good.” She agreed, looking tired.
Karl hadn’t really been watching the back of the battle, but the mages would have been busy trying to keep the barriers up against the constant barrage of rocks and spears the Hill Giants used in place of artillery.
The students were already filing out into the open area to dance as the bards played, and Lotus was dragging Ophelia by the hand while Tessa gave a glare at a hopeful young man that Karl suspected had him frozen in terror.
He would have to ask her to dance later to see if it was personal or if she just didn’t dance.
Karl and Dana danced and spun through the first song, as the energy seemed to slowly return to her from the refreshing magic of the bard’s songs. The same was true all over the improvised dance floor, and even a few of the teachers had come out to join them.
The afternoon classes were on hold, as everyone relaxed a little and forgot for a moment that they were still supposed to be in training and not fighting a border dispute with the Hill Giants.
Dana bowed out of the dancing after one song, but she traded spots with Ophelia, while an unwilling Tessa was dragged into the action by Lotus.
Nobody else knew the improvised dance steps that the Nature Priestess had made up during their time at the Seminary Academy, while neither Karl nor Ophelia actually knew how to dance.
That didn’t really matter, as nobody else did either, and knowing what you were doing was never an essential part of having fun.
So, they danced until they were tired, and then the instructors began to slowly pick students from the crowd to drag back to their afternoon studies.
That greatly thinned the crowd and calmed down some of the party atmosphere, which was threatening to ruin the schedules of those who were off-duty for the afternoon.
The teachers didn’t mind them unwinding, but if they got so into partying that they forgot to go to sleep on time, they would be tired and sluggish for their next shift on the line. These were still students, and couldn’t really be counted on to be responsible with their time management when unsupervised.
That was why the teachers were here with them, instead of just deploying all the Elites from the Academy wherever they were needed.
More soldiers were coming over from the artillery division further down the line, called to enjoy the celebration once they were off-duty, and the party was going to run late into the evening. The boar had yielded far more than any of the teachers of the cooking staff had anticipated, but they couldn’t keep it hot for multiple days without ruining the quality.
It was a pleasant change for Karl, having such a high percentage of happy people around. The battle lines were always fairly grim, but the impromptu party had raised everyone’s spirits in a way that he hadn’t anticipated when he had first thought to try to get a fancy birthday barbecue.
“This turned out rather well, didn’t it?” He asked Lotus, his dance partner at the time, when the first of the artillery soldiers finished eating and joined the dance floor.
“It really did. The Hill Giants are finally learning what it is like to lose battles, and the troops who have been here since the start of the war are happy to see it.
But you should grab a couple of plates to go and sneak back to the tree fort before Morgana changes her mind and decides that you should have lessons this afternoon after all.” She informed him with a wink.
Karl headed off to the fort with the food, and found Dana waiting there for him with a nest made from extra blankets in the empty extra room.
“It took you long enough. Come lay down and have a rest.” She greeted him, gesturing to the pile of blankets next to her.
That was where the others found them late that night. Curled up in the blanket pile in the spare room, Dana wrapped in Karl’s arms, with a magic theory text on one side of them and empty plates on the other.
“Should we wake them up so they can sleep in a proper bed?” Tessa whispered as she saw the two curled up on the blankets.
Lotus shrugged. “Or we could make a puppy pile, and just all sleep in one spot.”
Thor thought that was the winning idea, but Rae hadn’t made the floor of the fort to support a full-grown Lightning Cerro, as his weight would break the trees that it was attached to.
“Let the lovebirds sleep. I’m sure they won’t get up to too much trouble, they usually share a hammock anyhow.” Ophelia reminded them, referring to the Frost Giant border where everyone shared for warmth.
Lotus nodded. “True, and I stocked his toiletries bag with safety precautions anyhow. Let’s sleep, the Witch Doctor and Remi will be here first thing in the morning to wake Karl for classes.”
Tessa shook her head at the little Nature Cleric. Of course, she would have done something like giving Karl condoms before they left the Cathedral.
Of course, Tessa didn’t know that Lotus had stocked Karl’s bag long before this mission, but that didn’t change the fact that the War Cleric was fairly certain things between the Beast Master and the Mage were still on the wholesome level, even while sharing a bed.
