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

I thought we killed a lot of rats in this game, a lot of pointless meat collected. A lot of it I sold in Purge to make money to go home. Then we killed that other large rat nest and made all of it back. Collecting rat meat was easy, and it now became really valuable.

We needed to grind out more rats and low-level mobs to be ready for odd quests like this, especially ones that Triangle triggered. Triangle and I kept pulling out the meat, probably close to twenty pounds of them, and we barely reached the Lizard-folk rolling in the valley's mud by the stream. Triangle was happily sitting on the ozo's back. The creature loved listening to the song of the bear hunt and having its ears scratched.

"The ozo!" Hans, Falco, and Iris cheered the moment they saw us.

All three lizard-folk ran over, excited to greet their new ally. "Oh, thank you for doing this. As promised, we will take you to our village and trade."

"How far is it from here?" I inquired. I didn't want to leave our sapling alone for too long. "Can someone stay here and defend the plant?"

Naiad walked up and patted the ozo's shoulder. Enjoying the attention, it rumbled contentedly, much like a large feline.

"Only an hour's hike from here. Triangle, this is for you." Hans handed a small vial of oil and a small brass coin. "You're welcome to buy it from us at any time in our markets. Only need to present this badge."

"Dad, dad, dad! Look!" He stayed on top of the ozo and showed me the coin. He stuck his tongue out as he waited for me to study the badge.

Engraved on the coin was a Lizard-folk with a wide brim hat with a plume. Flames surrounded the lizard. There was writing on the back I couldn't understand. "What does this mean?"

"For our Nation of Lavaia." Iris explained. "Come down lad, we want to check her out."

"She?" Triangle asked.

"Yes, she. She is expecting her own cubs, it looks like. Excellent. We can have a pack of rat hunters to defend our home by next year."

"She likes rat meat." Triangle pulled another slab from his inventory and handed it to Iris. "Don't over fed her, though. I don't want her to get a stomachache."

"We'll take good care of her." Iris gently put Triangle down on the ground, hearts above her head. "Here, have this for the road, too. I found some herbs while we were waiting for you to finish. I think you might like."

Iris, Hans, Triangle, and Naiad went off to trade rewards and catch up. Before I could catch up with them, Falco patted my back with a muddy, wet claw. "Take out your shield now. I can explain your improper use."

Doing as he instructed, I equipped my shield, with the heater shield's point going down.

The lean lizard twisted my wrist, threatening to break it. I twisted my shoulder around to get my hand out before it snapped. "Hey give me a heads up."

With it free from my grip, Falco pulled out a tool, and unscrewed the location of the handle, and moved lower, down to two-fifth's below the middle. "There, that's how it's supposed to be on you." He gave it back.

"It's off balance like this," I complained. The weight felt weird to hold, and heavier now. It left my ankles exposed more, too.

"Get used to it. You'll want it that way. Because of this little oil." Falco pulled out a small little vial, just like the one Iris gave Triangle. "Pour this oil here, it's our specialty. Let it drip down along the engraving that Lady Crockery made. It will coat and gather in places."

We waited a bit. "Then create a fire spell, like this, and" Falco snapped his fingers and the small flame appeared in his hand to light the oil.

"Woah!" I said, backing up and stretching the burning shield away from me. Its unfamiliar weight caused me to go off balance and drop the shield down on the ground.

Falco reached into the flames, unphased by the tongues lashing at his fingers and arms. "No, no, you need to ram it into your foes, catch them on fire. If you put it on the ground like that, it will die out." He helped pick up the shield and pushed it up higher off the ground. "For such a large man, you sure have a weak upper body."

"You lit my shield on fire!"

"That's the shield's purpose," Iris said. "A way to lash back at those who charge at you. Smash and cook the rats in one motion."

The fire still continued on my shield. "How long will it last?"

This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

Falco handed me the oil, and I quickly put it in my inventory, away from the flames. The lizard laughed. "It will be good for five minutes of burning. The oil will last on the shield for a while before getting lit too, but don't mix it with water."

I chuckled at the obvious statement. "Got it. Thanks for this. This will be helpful in protecting the kids and fighting back."

Falco's claw hand patted my back. "Aye, don't let them go. If you don't have a fire spell, you can probably use that ring."

I looked down at my right hand. The Checkhov's Ring sat on index finger. "This?"

"Yesss, it's a flint ring. Spin it and hit your shield here so it sparks, and you have fire!" He tapped the new point part, where the metal cap protected it.

If I used the one on top, I wouldn't get burned by the flames like the lower ones. "Wow, this is a perfect gift." One I squandered these last few days. Mrs. Crockery would've explained how this shield worked if I didn't cut her off, or if I continued her quest line. Then I would've been a great tank and with the kids the whole time.

Now I was better equipped and prepared for the kids.

"Dad!" Triangle ran over to me, holding out his little glass vial of the oil. "This oil can speed up the protection potion brew time! I can make a few for us now to get home through the woods." His voice lowered as he listed the additional ingredients. "I still need tiniture root, sandalwood, and yellow moss."

Rotating the shield around to avoid burning him, I grabbed him to prevent him from getting closer to it. "Woah, that's a lot of ingredients." I grimaced. "Do you think we can finish the potions in time?"

"We have lots of those ingredients in our shops. How much do you need?" Hans joined in.

"Triangle, buy as much as you can. Take my coins because we will need a lot. Naiad, you and I need to get fertilizer going on the seed." I said as I carefully unequipped my burning shield and put it on the ground face up near the water.

Naiad pulled out the bag of scat. "Ready!"

Hans covered his snout, "Oh what is that?"

Triangle's stinky bombs didn't bother Hans, but this did. I couldn't help but laughed. "That's a side effect you're going to have to get used to with having the ozo around. If you don't want it, put it by our tree over there."

The ozo as if understanding us and joined us over by the sapling. The tree was now pushing out of the ground, already a few inches tall. Two small leaves twirled on the side and a new status.

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[Demonic Seed from Hell, a daughter of the goddess of Leith (count 1). Time Remaining: 4 days, 8 hours, 1 minute.

Status: Over-watered (The timer speed is slowed down by 5%)]

>>><<<

"Dad!" Naiad said.

"Sorry. I already gave Triangle the watering can. Let's add these nutrients and hope it fixes what I did." I wanted to speed up the time, not had 5 hours.

Naiad and I dug out a small area near the sapling, careful to avoid any roots and put the scat in it. The soil was a mixture of dry and wet. We turned it mixed it around with our tools and buried the roots further in it.

Hans crossed his arms and shook his head. "I am not digging in the dirt to plant scat. I became a researcher to avoid this."

Falco snorted, "You never played knock and ditch?"

"What's that," Triangle asked.

"That's not something you need to know right now and shouldn't ever do." I explained. The timer was still going slow and hadn't changed. I needed more patience.

Watching a tree grow was going to suck.

"Dad, I'm done." Triangle skipped on over. "It's fun shopping!"

"You had a lot of money, making it fun." I agreed. "How much did you buy? How much can you make?"

The boy didn't answer. He was poking around at the sapling. The leaves unraveled a bit. "This is why you shouldn't water it too much. It makes even new leaves sad."

"Sorry." I mumbled again. I had to stop saying that word so much. "How many potions can you make?"

"Which potions?" He didn't look up at me, distracted in his own world.

"The protection ones, for our plan."

"Oh, a bunch! Maybe hundreds."

"Woot!" I cheered.

Naiad clapped. We were going to win this quest as long as we got the timer down on the plant.

The lizard-folk packed up their goods and patted the ozo. "Who knew being muddy was the easiest way to be your friend?" Iris said. "Falco, stay here with the ozo to train it. Hnas and I will take our guests to our home."

"Is there a way we can pay extra to have it delivered to Ms. Crockery's shop?" I wanted us to get a jump on our plan as soon as possible.

"For a bigger cost if you met us outside of the gates."

"Sure, we will meet you outside of the gates, where we first met." I said. The burned down spot wouldn't be hard to find.

"What about the tree?" Naiad was touching one of the leaves.

Triangle copied what she was doing. "They are soft for now. But with more time, it will harden up."

"It's ugly." Naiad stated.

I picked up my shield. The flames were small, but not out yet. "Yeah, that's an odd shape leaf, a mix of a palm tree with a pine needle? Are they supposed to be needles?"

Triangle shrugged. I looked at the others with us and they didn't have any answer either.

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[Demonic Seed from Hell, a daughter of the goddess of Leith (count 1). Time Remaining: 4 days, 2 hours, 3 minutes.

Status: Over-watered. Grounded (this tree will grow here no matter what), well fed (timer boosted by 7%)

>>><<<

The scat worked. I put my hands on my hips and smiled at my team."We are good to go now, then. Are you kids ready for the next phase of our plans?"

"Yup!" they both cheered.

We asked Falco to keep up with feeding the tree as he trained the ozo. Naiad paid him for his efforts, but the Lizard-folk were happy to hang out with the beat. I waited as the kids said their goodbyes and showed off their bombs and weapons to the Lizard-folk. Once they were done, we called out our mounts to get home faster. Once I was on top of my unicorn with its orange plume, I patted it, remembering long ago when we started this quest and I had a level one mount.

"With one tree growing, it's time to get the army going," I said.

"What about the protection potions to get home? We don't have any." Triangle dug in his pack. "I'm also low on bombs. I need to make more."

Naiad looked at her quiver. "I'm doing okay, unless we run into another guild brawl."

I also had items on the shopping list. The shield upgrade to the handle added a lot of potential to fighting, as long as I kept near the kids. I would want plenty of burn protection potions for myself and them.

"Triangle, stay near me and hit them with Goldy. We're going to kill some monsters on the way home."