Honey, I've Leveled the Kids [Family-Focus, LitRPG - COMPLETE]

"Crap!" I called out and reached for my shield.

The barbed arrow in my chest dug in deeper with my movement. The bleed effect stealing even more of my precious health as I equipped my shield and guarded Triangle and I. Naiad backed up to get behind me. It bought me time to yank the arrow out.

An evil laughter filled the air and déjà vu of the event started.

"The price of bleed potions went up just now. Buy before they go up again, unless you want to die?" Alcender called out from a patio on the second floor of a red colored nearby building.

On the opposite side of the street, on the roof of a green flower shop, was the armed archer. Another arrow launched and hit my shield right over Triangle's head.

"Get to the guild hall!" I called to him and his sister.

As he ran, I kept my shield up and blocking further shots that were aimed at him. Naiad took her counter shots behind us any chance the archer popped up.

"Where are the guards?" Naiad got close to me, putting a hand on my back. Her eyes glazed for a moment.

"I don't trust them. Alcender controlled Purge and those guards. It's best to avoid them," I answered.

"Why won't you turn on your stream, Boulder? Not brave enough to face me?" mocked Alcender.

The childish taunts were easy to ignore. He confirmed what I feared. When I launched the stream earlier like an idiot, someone notified the Pantheon that we were online. Which meant Alcender was ready, waiting and looking for us.

An arrow bounced off the shield. I finally had us next to the wall under where Alcender stood. If we kept moving toward our guildhall, that would put both Pantheon members behind us. There were multiple street corners we had to watch out for an ambush. But what was ahead of us? I had to be ready for anything. Naiad was still getting intel from Kerry based on her eye color.

"Dude, they're kids! You're picking on someone half your age," I informed him. This person was having fun ruining other people's game. It's a trick I did to get more powerful when I was younger, and I hated myself more than ever.

"It's fine with your party's average age, you old man," Alcender explained. "Or is okay for you to hit me, and I can't hit them? Oooh, I get it actually." A glass bottle crashed around the corner next to us.

Yellow smoke spread out before us, clouding up like a chalk explosion. I yanked Triangle back before it touched him. Another tick of my health dropped from the bleed effect. Triangle and Naiad were still full, thankfully.

For the moment.

Another bottle crashed behind us, dropped directly by Alcender himself. "Oopsie!" he joked above us with a laugh.

"Go!" I lifted my shield up, grabbing Triangle by his neck shirt, and carried him into the open street with us to get away faster.

Naiad screamed behind me as the yellow smoke creeped out to her. Tears welted around her eyes and she coughed out, "Poison."

In the empty street, the archer took easy shots at us. Naiad rolled aside to avoid getting hit, but she coughed more. She couldn't counter to the ranger above. My shield was too small to cover me, Triangle, and her.

I gritted my teeth in frustration, looking for a solution. Arrows we could deal with for now. We had to get out of Alcender's throwing range. Being in the middle of the street was stupid. Sitting in the fog was dumber. Being underneath the archer only made us easy targets for Alcender's spells. He was holding them back for a reason.

I would not stand still. "This way!" I ordered, running back toward the mountain range. Naiad, now slower because of the poison, followed along, taking shots up at both the archer Alcender.

Alcender mockingly laughed at me and said, "You're still keeping the precious innocent ones in front AND behind you. You want a guild of these kids to act as your bubble! That's low."

Another vial exploded now in front of us. Three piles of smoke cornered us, forcing us to run toward the flower shop where the archer defended. If we ran across, we would have to gamble running to a nearby street that was forced into the back alley along the city wall. Forcing the enemy to walk the line you controlled, a trapping trick I used when hunting guild in Globe of Battlecraft. Making players easy pickings for me waiting around the corner.

I still had my shield and my body to protect Naiad and Triangle. The street along the wall would lead us to the mountains and its forest. It was the way we came before turning back to get Triangle to the guildhall and running into the Pantheon players.

They hadn't expected us to turn back.

"Follow me," I repeated to Naiad, while still holding onto Triangle.

We just had to risk receiving a few shots of magic and arrows.

Thwap.

My heart jumped, but it was Naiad's arrow that launched.

"I got them!" Naiad cheered before coughing up more.

"Good, don't shoot if guards show up. We don't want to give them an excuse." I explained.

"Kerry says they're two blocks out. Triangle, Jingle Bomb time!"

"What, no!" I countered, but my gnome teammate ignored my words.

He twisted free of my hold on his shirt. The red hat sprinted behind me and away from my protection. I pivoted to stay with him, terrified of an electric glow attack coming from Alcender. He ran into the smoke and lobbed up a bomb at Alcender on the second floor. I wish he threw it harder as it arced and jingled under the porch Alcender was on.

An explosion replaced the sound of the jingles. Triangle fell back to me for cover and Naiad did the same. I brought my shield out in front to stop the explosion attack, leaving our backs exposed to the archer. My heart raced with fear. This wasn't a fun fight because I didn't have control.

Another arrow landed in my shoulder, knocking my health dangerously low so that the warning red lights flashed in my vision.

Naiad fired at the archer as the yellow smoke encroached on us. Triangle cried, "My stomach hurts!"

"Poison and it's blocking our path to guild hall. We need to go along the wall to the forest." I grumbled at seeing everyone's health dropping from bleed and poison effects. I hated how I failed to protect them. "Triangle, do you have any antidotes?"

The whties of his eyes turned red as he cried more and nodded as he pulled out a potion to drink. The poison cloud was gone thanks to his Jingle Bell bomb explosion. That was one creative way to remove a cloud base attack.

This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.

"Excellent," purred an unfamiliar, nasal, over-confident voice next to us. "Use all your potions. We're going to make sure you never come back to Fanamel."

From around the corner we were just running to, confirming that it was a trap, an additional threat appeared. A man dressed in black leather and he blurred in and out of my vision. The newcomer exaggerated his hip swing, looking like a drunk giraffe holding onto a saber. The goatee on his face instantly reminded me of the day Naiad went to prison. I took a closer look at his gear and realized it was the same guy. If we had run down that corner to go along the city wall, we would've been easy targets for the archer while this fighter kept us distracted.

Thanks to the kids' unpredictable chaos, we just avoided another ambush.

"Get up against the red wall." I snapped at Naiad while I dragged Triangle toward the rubble he caused. "How close are the guards?"

She stopped walking as she glossed over to interact with her pet. "They're running here. Crap! They are going another way."

"Of course." It confirmed what I feared. There was never protection in this city as long as the Pantheon guild was here. The thought enraged me. This was my home, my turf, and it wasn't just the Pantheon's game.

A wave of anger filled me as the Pantheon pinned us against the wall, lobbing potions, shooting arrows, and finally attacking us with a sword. Every corner on the street made me nervous, and I wondered how many more of their guild members were hiding nearby. At least I knew the burning, rubble red building Alcender stood in would be safe, thanks to Triangle. Fires were something we had experience with and knew how to handle.

"Now!" Naiad cried out suddenly as she grabbed my shield, forcing it to be fully in front of us.

I pushed against her. She wasn't paying attention to the archer above us. Then I realized it wasn't a command for me, but for Kerry. I followed her lead with the shield and put it in front of us.

A powerful gust flew down the street, clearing all the poison in the air and pushing my shield up against me. A blue dot was in the street as the Carrion of Life sent air attacks right at Goatee player and archer on the roof.

The players stumbled over, but it was only air and didn't do any damage to them. An arrow struck the wall a yard away from my head. Tail wind attack for the win.

Naiad knew the second the wind attack would stop and took a shot at the archer. She landed a direct hit. "Ha! I got her!"

We couldn't celebrate. This was a three on three situation still. They were veteran players, and we were chaos. Goatee player stood up, and brushed his hair back, and pointed his sword at us again before continuing. "It is I, Michael Buccaneers of the Pantheon, and you have offended my guild. For that, you shall die."

"Seriously!" I called out. "What did the kids do?"

Michael charged instead of answering. A yellow light came off his sword and directly into my face.

>>><<<

[You've been snailed! Buff: This slime slows you down to inches per minute.

Duration: 10 seconds.]

>>><<<

Everything turned into yellow slime around me. I couldn't lower my shield in front of us fast enough, as Michael ran closer with his sharp saber. With the shield stuck out from blocking the wind attack, it left my head and Naiad's sitting on a chopping block lined up for Michael.

I screamed no, but it came out more like a cow with nasal infection. "Nooooo."

Naiad moved with lightning speed, not affected by the snail spell, and grabbed Triangle from my arms before getting low.

That left me to stranded. Kerry flew in front of me, grunting at Michael to distract. It bought three seconds, enough for the kids to get away from me. Triangle was free of Naiad's hold and split up.

"Stay close!" I cried, but still too slow as Triangle acted on his own idea. I still had a few seconds on the debuff.

"I cast bubble beam!" Triangle called out.

In his arms was a large striped archer fish that squirted out water. Triangle dropped a tiny marble into the flow. The water transformed into a rainbow of bubbles.

"Wait no, a car wash!" Triangle updated his attacking ability. "I'm taking you to the car wash!"

He sang music to an old song, and I had no clue where he heard the original. How he changed abilities I didn't know, but he combined them in a way the game accepted it. A water blasting attack would be stronger than a bubble one. Still, Triangle pointed Goldy at Michael. Towers of bubbles rose in the street, and puddles formed on the ground.

The bubbles floated up and around in the street's air. I wasn't sure what was in the bubbles to make them sparkle and I feared they could explode because Triangle invented them. With the colorful display going up and around us, it bought me more time. Only two seconds left.

Michael's outline danced in fractal parts of the bubbles. "Gah! What spell is this?"

With the bravado he had, he sliced and hacked at the bubbles, his sword piercing near and closer to my shield. A single step away, he laughed, realizing how harmless the cleaning attack was and lunged at me.

Michael slipped like he had stepped on a banana peel in a cartoon. In the middle of his screams, bubbles flew into his mouth. The saber in his arm swinging this way and that as he tried to balance about.

Crack.

The blade smacked into the brick inches from my head, purely by accident, as Michael's face followed shortly after into the wall and slid down it, face first into a puddle of bubbles. A single hiccup escaped his mouth, along with a few bubbles.

The snail spell timer finally ended, and I beat Michael into unconsciousness. I would've finished the job if it wasn't for a potion cracking nearby. I downed a greater health potion.

"I'll get your whole guild!" Alcender made his second appearance, but I didn't see him anywhere. His voice sounded above us, but in a different building. "Today's the day everyone will know to not resist the Pantheon guild in Fanamel."

"Give it up!" I shouted back.

[Guild Chat]

[Naiad: Keep making him talk. I'm looking for him.]

Naiad jogged away from my shield, leaving Triangle and I leaning up against the burning building. I could egg on a villain, especially one that was a clone of me. There were certain triggers that worked in popping a giant ego. I chuckled and was curious about what Naiad had planned.

"You're not even the king," I shouted back. "What's your pitiful class title again?"

"I'm an Alchemist to the King!" Alcender whined, this time from somewhere else.

Another bottle landed near where I was talking. Crap, he was doing the same thing as Naiad. Using my voice to locate where I was in this chaos. Triangle and I had to keep moving. With the red building about to collapse, it would look authentic, not like us setting our own trap to get Alcender. Because it was, the flames on the building were growing.

Triangle ran to me for protection to avoid the latest purple cloud growing on the ground. Our best protection would be to turn around the corner here, but we would abandon Naiad by doing so. We had to be the bait. I would use my shield solely to protect Triangle as we went out to the middle of the street. Only the archer and Alcender left. Kerry was keeping the archer busy with aerial attacks.

I prepared another taunt. "Alchemist? I thought you gave up that class when you finished the only herbalist NPC in town, the very one who worked for the king- Woah!"

A newly thrown vial crashed off my shield, and scattered about. Glass crunched beneath my boots and Triangle and I were stuck in the middle of the empty street.

>>><<<

[Nailed Down! These liquid nails in the bottle make sure you stay grounded no matter what storm you're in.

Duration: 59 seconds.]

>>><<<

Alcender's voice hopped again, and he spoke faster in frustration. "She had no purpose anymore once I could provide the potions for the king and control him with my own special cocktail. I could always get another herbalist in another town if I need new potions."

With a giant swing, I used my shield as a giant fan to push the bubbles Triangle created onto me. The kid cried down by my feet. He was stuck with me.

"It's going to be okay. Your big sis has us," I whispered. "Can you get more bubbles?"

He shook his head, fear growing in his face. "Dad…" He wanted to say more, but stopped looking down at Goldy.

The fish helped inhale the bubbles toward us. An entire tower of them dragged toward us, allowing me to pop them and free our feet instantly from the Nailed Down debuff.

"Haha! Good catch!" I told the fish.

Except, the cleaning solution was too good. It made the cobble roads of Fanamel as slippery as ice. It was the whole reason why Michael cracked his skull into a wall earlier.

A magic missile blasted down at my shield. The colorful lights bouncing off and destroying more bubbles around me. I adjusted my grip on my shield to avoid it slipping out of my hand. Alcender was using a weaker attack than his normal glow attack. Something had happened to his wand.

I couldn't investigate right now. I had to keep my family safe, and keep distracting the enemy from Naiad. "You toss NPCs aside so no one else can have them? Letting no one else enjoy the same gaming experience? Even newcomers?"

"This isn't a game; it's my life. I got it first and no one can have it! Even now, the guards know to avoid this area so we can fight you," Alcender revealed standing next to the green building with the archer.

A typical cliché. He cast a fireball. Not a dinky little candle flame came out, but a fiery hell the size of an SUV flew down at me, crackling.

I kneeled down to get as small as possible under my shield and prayed that I could keep my family safe. Except my child was no longer under my shield or protection.

"Water beats fire!" Triangle shouted as he held Goldy, who blasted water at the fireball.

"AAAA!" Alcender screamed in pain.

I didn't see what happened as a sauna of heat blasted at me.