Tutorial Information: You may access your minion’s information by thinking of the minion and saying the word “access.” This will display a limited amount of information regarding your minion. As they gain additional loyalty toward you, this information will become more detailed.

Lucas, seeing the tutorial guide, thought about testing it out immediately. He pictured Saba'a in his mind, thought about her stat menu, and then did as the tutorial instructed. “Access.”

Saba'a - Arachnoid Miniboss.
Loyalty Level: Contracted.
Current Evolutions: None.
Remaining Evolution Points: 2.
Cannot alter Saba'a’s evolution path until you have fully completed Monster Contract: Saba'a’s Collar.
Loot Level: [4/10].

Lucas looked over the menu, not seeing more than a few lines. So, I can’t alter her at all right now. He assumed that “Contracted” was the lowest possible loyalty level for a monster. He also noticed her inventory wasn’t even listed at all. His eyes lingered over the final line. And I can make her even stronger . . . His initial plan had been to station guards in the spider’s dungeon so as to help her fight intruders, use man-made pillars to hide the webs that were her vulnerability, and make a trap door that would drop players into her lair. He had several other ideas, but he hadn’t once thought about the fact the game might have mechanics built in for helping the boss of a dungeon improve his minions.

“You got it to agree. Can we get out of here yet?” Bonnie asked, looking over at the wall they had cast Earth Spike on last time to build a ladder. “I mean, if you need to stay, that’s fine, but magic me up a ladder so I don’t have to, please,” she requested. She added the nicety at the end of her statement as if it were an afterthought.

“Yeah,” Lucas said, “we can go. It’s probably best anyway. We’re on a timer now to take care of Kegan.” He felt a new determination to be this villain that he hadn’t had before. He didn’t know how long the process to transfer ownership of a territory might take, but he knew he wanted it done as soon as possible. He had died hundreds of times to reach negative Level 71, and if the game reset his total skill points to zero and put him back to Level 1, he’d lose the advantage his failures had provided. He’d be nothing more than a regular player all over again, and he didn’t want that. Not when I’ve come this far already.

“What about this?” Nick asked, holding up Jason’s decapitated head. While Lucas had been negotiating with Saba'a and reading the quest details after the fact, Nick had been busy wrapping Jason’s neck with bandages after letting the blood drain a bit so that it would stop dripping everywhere.

“Just keep it on you,” Lucas instructed. “We’re going to need it later.”