Once she arrived at the Hathor familia home, the guards let her in, knowing exactly who was here to see. It helped that she had one of the biggest, and brightest smiles in Orario… Which eased their worries, if only a little bit. She opened the main door, and walked in, and looked around for him.
Nernatti noticed Ardee was here and giggled a little. "Hey there Ardee. Whacha doing here? It looks like you came to stay the night?"
"I did! I want to focus on training a lot more! I have to meet my goal!" Ardee said with a big smile. "And training with my boyfriend is the best I can think of."
Shurry opened the door preparing to leave the room after talking with Hathor, and opting to not improve his stats just yet.
"Huh? Wow! You're so you've actually got that close?"
The door opened just enough that Hathor could hear everything now.
"Yep! I love him!"
Shurry blushed, Hathor smiled, Nernatti giggled, and the rest of the familia chuckled with cheer. As strong as he was, and as obstinate as he used to be, he could now get a little flustered with all the love talk. But, instead… He's him. So he's gotta do something here. And so he ran over to Ardee, like the way she did to him in the dungeon, gave her a little kiss. His tail briskly waved back and forth.
"I love you too!"
"OH! That's so adorable!"
The night turned into a rather large party, which caused more than a few bits of confusion throughout the city. Other familias were terrified at the prospect of this party, anyone with half a brain left working, even those completely doped up on idiocy inducement drugs knew… Whenever there's a party at Hathor familia… Someone has leveled up. And with their current standings, and the rumors going around… It wasn't unreasonable to think that maybe, just maybe, a new level 7 had been created.
Evilus canceled many plans until further notice. Erebus opted to put his people to work on preparing the other matter first. This is not good… If he really did level up just now, my current plan won't be nearly enough. And the back up plan is going to take years, if he has this kind of growth rate, then… That'll be almost useless, maybe. I'll have to change it to time with the new moon, and him being down in the dungeon, alone. "Shit… when would that be? Nearly 7 more years before we can take real action."
…
Loki familia, especially Finn, were shivering in their boots right about now. Finn's thumb throbbed. "Bara, Riveria, do me a favor-"
"Fuck that. I'm not going near that boy again if I can help it. I was lucky last time because he was level 3 and still holding back. One hit and I'm done for."
"Ha, no way, Finn. Feel free to go yourself. I'd rather deal with those demon twins."
"I don't mean you. I just need someone to go and verify what's going on over there. We can send some of our newer members that haven't been with us long. I don't care who, we just need that information."
A little bit later after a brief momentary interaction, a couple of loki familia members returned to Finn's office.
"Well, what happened? Is that kid level 7? What about new level 6s, like Bokhoir, or Nernatti? Just one would be enough to destabilize our already fragile balance."
"Uh, well, when we asked what was going on, the guards were initially hostile, but eventually told us-"
"Oh spit it out! There was a celebration for someone leveling up, but it seemed like they were joking about it. Perhaps someone reached level 2, maybe 3?"
Finn crossed his fingers and supported his head by the chin. "Is that all?"
"Yes, captain. Sorry we couldn't get more."
"No, it's fine. They're probably being secretive because of Evilus." Finn said with a soft smile, struggling very hard to keep it up. "You may go now, thank you for doing that." … After the pair left, Finn hung his head, then sighed, leaned back in his chair, and stared at the ceiling. "This nearly gave me a heart attack. Him at level 3 nearly killed Bara in a single hit. And at level 4, he made us personally introduce ourselves to the ground, face first. Level 5 he might have been enough to force all familia to become Hathor familia. And level 6… Heh, I don't even want to imagine anything else past level 5."
Dain, Gareth, and Noir all stroked their beards. In false deep thought.
"Hey, what if that level up actually was him, but it wasn't like a falna level up?" Gareth asked, thinking back on something.
"Oh, you might be right about that. It's like how we level up our drinking game."
"Exactly!"
Noir's brow shifted, and with a light smirk. "Lady Loki, what do you think? Perhaps that young love leveled up into something a little more concrete."
Loki snickered. "Oh I dunno. Probably, but then again, probably not. He did come back from the dungeon with her riding on his back."
Finn relaxed. "Let's move forward with that as a fact for now. I don't think I could handle it any other way. However, Loki, are you busy tomorrow?"
"Nope, my schedule's pretty much free and clear. Wacha need hon?"
"I'm heading to the guild tomorrow, to demand a proper answer about it, right away. We can't operate with this sort of struggle if we have to keep swimming around a giant fish."
"Pfft, alright, fine. You can use me all you like. Just don't get any pervy ideas." Loki teased. "And buy me some more soma!"
…
At the guild, Royman was dealing with Finn. "Braver, I understand your worries, but what you're asking for is completely insane."
"Stop with the stonewalling. We have to know."
"I can't just do that on a whim you know. Even if Lady Loki, and Lady Freya asked it of me, I couldn't do it."
The door opened. "Sorry for the interruption guild master but there's a situation…" The guild's woman said and came over to whisper. "Apparently one of the new hires was working as a spy for Evilus."
"You're serious, who found out?"
"Moon Pup, he came in and is now holding her. Hathor was here too, and she's already forced the hire to spill the truth."
"Wait, why did he come here today? To report a level up?"
"Uh, yes one of-"
"Shit, shit…"
"Uh, odd reaction. But one of his familia members leveled up to 3 yesterday before he returned."
"Huh? Phew…"
"Enough about that, I've got a crisis on my hands now. Evilus managing to sneak their way into the guild staff is really bad news." Royman said getting up to leave. "I'll have to ask you to lend a hand here."