The Duty (Play to Live: Book # 3) by D. Rus Page A

gait holding on to the walls in order to absorb the crazy quaking until I came to the dungeon's first floor. The first hall was deserted. The next one, ditto. I walked down the empty corridors listening to the approaching sounds of a melee. Someone was having a splendid battle: I could hear spells whizzing and mobs roaring.
    Wonder if other players had somehow found a second entrance to the catacombs and were now busy mopping up a new dungeon? In that case, Grym would have to leave. Which was for the better, really: that way he'd be less reluctant to accept my offer.
    Finally I started coming across the mobs' bodies. Enormous bulks of some unidentified behemoths blocked the passages, forcing me to cling to the walls, pushing my body through some skin-tight gaps.
    Finally, it looked as if I'd reached it. I took a cautious peek into the next hall and froze in disbelief. A panther, huge and furious, chest-high, seemed tiny next to his opponent. A monster, shapeless and horrible, was a mess of various-sized eyes, teeth and thorns. He stood a good twenty feet tall on his fat columnlike legs, waving a dozen long tentacles tipped with razor-sharp claws.
    The monsters were battling to their death. The giant slashed the panther with his tentacles and stomped hard, trying to squash his opponent—and this hopping about was causing the micro earthquakes that I'd felt.
    The panther was amazing—his every blow reaching the target, critting the terrestrial octopus, burning and poisoning him, ripping out pieces of flesh, making his horrible wounds bleed some more. The panther's eyes shot bolts of lightning as a good dozen auras weakened, poisoned, paralyzed and slowed his quarry all at once.
    What an incredible collection of skills! But their levels were even awesomer. The monster's name was highlighted in purple: out of range. I selected the panther as target and read, amazed,
     
    A pet. Name: Bagheera. Level: 289. 14% left till next level.
    Life: 72%—31,877 hit points
    Mana: 31%—4,133 points
     
    Below, an endless and absolutely unfamiliar list of icons was unfolding: buffs and skills activated.
    A pet? Bagheera? Was it my dear little panther that I'd been forced to leave behind in this dungeon after fourteen hours of mopping it out? The one I hadn't had the heart to destroy so I'd just left him there, this sweet, gorgeous feline?
    By then, the panther had finished his opponent off with two clever well-directed blows, slicing his bulk into several separate pieces.
    "Bagheera?" I mouthed.
    He heard me. His large head turned, two rounded ears pricking up. Recognition glistened in his yellow eyes.
    The cave filled with a deafening roar. In a smooth imperceptible motion the panther crept over the floor. A jerk, a jump—then the beast went for me in a broken line preventing me from selecting him as target.
    I'm toast , I thought as the panther skidded to a halt by my feet. Purring like a tank engine, he shoved his large calf-like head under my ribcage.

Chapter Five
     
    T he Frontier. Asian cluster's area of responsibility. The Shui Fong clan's joint slave group.
     
    Suppressing a groan of relief, Oksana dropped her tattered cloak onto the scorching sand and collapsed on top of it. She strained her foot, wriggling it free from the clutches of a thin chain that snaked toward a tall steel stake a dozen feet away. It was installed right in the middle of the desert bandits' camp.
    This was a working break. The last round had been easier than usual: the NPCs respawned in the lower levels, producing a rare quest treasurer instead of a gang boss. From where she sat, she could see Wong's face: their slave driver beamed like a cat who'd got the cream. He was fifth in their group even though he had nothing to do with the farming itself, of course. He just sat there in the impromptu shade receiving free XP, keeping an eye on the slaves and monitoring the battle chat for any potential loot.
    Wong was busy smoking some truly mind-blowing herbal mix