THE DIVINE DUNGEON

Complete Series

Written by Dakota Krout

© 2020 Mountaindale Press. All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form without permission from the publisher, except as permitted by US copyright law.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

Table of Contents

DUNGEON BORN

DUNGEON MADNESS

DUNGEON CALAMITY

DUNGEON DESOLATION

DUNGEON ETERNIUM

BUTCHER BOY

Foreword

I really wanted to say thank you to all the readers that have been supportive of my writing career. Thanks to all of you, I am able to continue writing more books, and faster, than I had ever dreamed would be possible. This has allowed me to support my family and become a full-time author, and none of it would have happened without you. Thank you.

To my wonderful wife and child, thank you for being so understanding! I can get so caught up in what I am doing that I don’t pay attention to what is happening in the moment, but you are always there for me, and I can’t thank you enough.

To everyone that has been supportive even more directly, such as my patrons on Patreon, my editors, beta readers, and artists, I hope that I give you all the recognition and thanks that you deserve: a lot of it!

DUNGEON BORN

Book One of THE DIVINE DUNGEON Series

Written by Dakota Krout

Table of Contents

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-one

Chapter Twenty-two

Chapter Twenty-three

Chapter Twenty-four

Chapter Twenty-five

Chapter Twenty-six

Chapter Twenty-seven

Chapter Twenty-eight

Chapter Twenty-nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-one

Epilogue

Prologue

They laughed when they murdered me. Laughed! Their squeals of delight were sickening as they reveled in the blood pouring from the jagged knife wounds spread across my chest. These disgusting people—I use the term people with trepidation—were obviously disdainful of all living beings. They killed me just for… for…? Odd. This was strange—I couldn’t remember why they killed me. Who were ‘they’? Matter of fact, everything was starting to become… hard to… remember…? I…

“Oh no, you don’t!” The nasal, phlegmy voice of one of the assailants shattered the silence. He loomed over the broken, tortured body I was fleeing. “Dying won’t let you off the hook! Hee hee hee! Stealing from me was the worst decision you ever made! Now you will serve me, beg me,” he screamed, spittle flying; his mood shifted abruptly, as madmen’s are prone to do, “to free you because of your own stupidity! Ha-ha-ha!” A smile was back on his face, though his eyes were manic and unfocused.

With his declaration and an arcane gesture, pain shattered my confused senses—pain more traumatizing than my recent death by repeated stabbing. I found myself being forcefully drawn toward a tiny gem in his hand. I screamed as only a tortured soul is able, albeit silently to the human ear. I imploded into the small gem, which gleamed brighter by the second. The agony became more intense, interrupting all rational thought until all I knew was torment. With a final gasp of pain, I became firmly embedded in the glowing gemstone.

“Welcome to your eternity, thief,” the malicious voice spat at me. Then he coughed at me, spitting again.

W-wait. Spit wasn’t red? With an unexpected spasm of his hand, I found myself slipping the surly bonds of earth. That is, I found myself flying.

Bizarrely, I could see everything around me, three hundred sixty degrees in perfect detail. We were in a mountain range with a beautiful and lush forest surrounding the base. The air had a stiff, crisp breeze flowing through it. The sun poured across the landscape with properties more befitting viscous honey.

One detail, in particular, stood out as I reached the apex of my flight. A group of people in armor which blazed with the reflection of the sun were walking toward black-clad bodies now sprawled in ignoble poses.

“Filthy Necromancers!” the largest, shiniest man roared, distaste evident in every motion he made. “Make sure to burn their rotten corpses and everything they have with them. It is sure to be tainted by the infernal.” He glanced to where a—somehow familiar?—body lay broken and covered with blood and filth.

“Poor bastard, I’m sorry we weren’t fast enough… to save you,” he managed to say brokenly, keeping his voice low in an attempt to preserve morale in his followers. Mixed emotions skittered across his face before finally settling on anger. He then turned and began barking orders, the last I saw of his group before slipping over the edge of a crevasse, falling deep into the earth.

There was one final hole in the wall, where I got my last glance of the wide world for a long, long time. Gorgeous. It truly was too beautiful a day to die.

Chapter One

I fell for an extremely long time, rock blurring past me as my fall increased in speed. Dropping too long really, as I began to worry that I would shatter when I landed. This was a serious concern for me—momentarily. Then some shiny rock distracted me, light sparkling off it as I passed. Pretty! Was my mental state deteriorating? Ooh, that sparkle was red! The fall was probably only a few hundred feet, but since I was so tiny, it felt like miles, like hours to my distracted thoughts.

*Bloop*

I landed in a puddle! Rejoicing at the good fortune that had saved me from shattering when I landed, I realized that I couldn’t remember why I was falling in the first place. I had fallen, right? I tried to think back, but hadn’t I always been in this puddle, on this stone? Rocks don’t move around, do we? Well, I was rather cozy here, nothing to worry about now at least. Filthy Necromancers.

Necromancers? I hated Necromancers! Where had that thought come from? I clung to it, trying to ensure that I would remember this. The thought wrapped around me, becoming one of my mental pillars, a foundation for my thoughts. Knowing I would remember my hatred for, um? Necromancers! Right. What the heck is a Necromancer? I don’t really care, I suppose, but ohhh boy do I hate them! I finally looked around myself, trying to describe for my fleeting sanity how things looked.

I didn’t really have words for things, but the names of them kept popping into my head. Rock. More rock. Water. Head? What? Where am I? What am I? Oh yeah! I’m a gem! A beautiful, shining gem.

Blue light appeared around me at the thought. Actually, it was coming from me! Am I a light stone? The water surrounding me began to absorb the light and, over time, became brighter. This took hours. Days? The natural light that managed to filter down to me came and went many times. Does that help? Does that mean anything?

Remembering is hard. I eventually gave up trying.

Time slipped by, and even the lingering remnants of memories faded, vanishing until I was near thoughtless as a babe. My mind became small and unconcerned with anything outside of my life from moment to moment. The water I was in froze and melted several times. When it froze it seemed like forever until it warmed up again! That was never fun.

One day, I noticed that the puddle I was in had slowly shrunk as temperature increased, but now water was coming down from above and refilling it! This made me really happy. That is a good thing, I think, having my puddle full. I like my puddle. But now it is getting too full? This had never happened before! My puddle was about to spill! Oh no, would that ruin it? *Drip* A final drop hit, and the puddle spilled over its stony boundary, pouring down the sides of what turned out to be a hollow stalagmite. Water must have taken the core of this rock and hollowed it out before I got here.

Something was happening, something… odd? Not bad, I don’t think, but certainly odd. I was at the bottom of the small puddle in my rock, and whereas previously I could only see in a direct line of sight around me, I could now see everything where the water had overflowed to! Neat! More than see, actually! I could sense everything in that area perfectly—as if all of my senses were attuned to the space around me.

I tasted the salty stone, smelled the earthy fragrance, saw every flaw and nuance of the rock, and heard echoes of falling water. The perception only went as far as the water had drained, so it wasn’t true sight or hearing or… but, really, it was better! More fulfilling and satisfying somehow. For some reason, I also really began to understand the rock I was on. After all, now I knew the word “stalagmite”. I also knew it was made out of limestone, mostly calcium carbonate. Fun, new words! Even when the water that had spilled eventually dried up, my perception of the area remained.

What was that? There was a dark, earthy color moving through the rock, wriggling in set sequences like a worm moves through dirt. I reflexively reached out and touched it with my mind, and little sparkles of it pulled away from the stone and drifted toward me! What was this? How did it follow my mind? It kept coming closer, now of its own accord. In an act of defiance, when the dark color touched my crystalline surface, I grabbed at it and pulled it in, absorbing it. Shock rippled throughout my being.

It. Was. Amazing. The most delicious thing I had ever tasted in my life. To be fair, it was the only thing I had tasted in my life. I wanted more. I tried to reach out to that brown energy again, but it kept slipping away before I could “touch” it again. Was it mad at me? I kept trying, again and again, but I got so tired.

Refocusing on myself again and moving in disappointment, I looked at the energy I had absorbed. I “ate” what I could, savoring every bit while the light within slowly faded away until there was only a filthy, brackish-brown color remaining. Trying to “eat” this as well, I found it tasted horrendous, like roasted turds. Disgusted, I tried to “spit” it out, and surprisingly, it quickly streamed out of me and floated back to the rock around me, which drank it in like rainwater falling on desert sands. Wait a sec, what is a desert? Meh. What was I thinking about? I forget. There is food to be eaten. Hopefully I could get more!

Surprised at how quickly the brackish energy vanished, I watched as the brown energy in the rocks returned to a normal look, and the clean energy seemed to wave at me again. I tried to reach out, and success! I was able to make a few more sparkles flow toward me! A little more than last time too! Was that the secret? I just had to return the waste, then it would like me again? The energy I had already absorbed was pure white, slowly gaining color toward my normal blue.

Taking in the brown energy, I really focused on what I was doing this time, instead of just eating as quickly as I could. I was actually pulling the white energy from the brown, separating the two until only a dull brown color remained. “Spitting” out the filthy tasting remainder, I again pulled the earth colored light from the stone around me, continuing for a time I didn’t know how to count.

Rain came infrequently; every time it did, the depth of my vision, my knowledge of the surrounding world, increased. Each stone the water washed over increased my knowledge. Soon, I could tell you the names of everything in “reach” and their properties. For instance, I knew just how much energy they contained, allowing me to calculate the sustenance I would be able to draw from them. I knew what they were made of, how tightly bonded they were, their density, and which of them would float—none of them. From this knowledge, I found more efficient ways of “eating”. Pulling the brown stuff from sand released almost no energy, while more dense stones like quartz gave off larger amounts, so I made sure to focus on them.

During a powerful rainstorm, my knowledge of the world suddenly and drastically changed. The water had come again, and I was happy that I would be able to see farther soon. As my puddle finally overflowed, more rocks appeared to me, but the water also sloshed over moss. Moss… I suddenly knew everything there was to know about it. How you could grind it up and put it on shallow cuts to help wounds recover, how it grew with abundance when it had access to water and space, but most importantly, that it was alive. The life in it sang to me, tantalizing my senses with the knowledge that there was so much to learn and taste. In simple astonishment, I realized a new color was suddenly visible to me. Green… What a beautiful, vibrant color this tiny plant exuded. I stretched my mind over to caress this unknown, gorgeous, emerald light when it suddenly reached back. Shocked, I pulled away, and the light returned to the moss, seamlessly re-integrating with itself.

Tentatively and with great trepidation, I reached out again. So did the light! Connecting with it, the contained energy flowed toward me, similarly to the way the brown energy moved, though much faster and far more powerfully. I drank it in, then began to “eat” it. The crispest, flavorful salad in the world could not compare to the pure, delicious energy this small plant willingly gave to me.

I gorged myself, eating so fast I would have choked if I were able. Unlike the stone’s energy, which only ever lasted a few bites, the green energy just kept coming, and I ate it until there was no more light coming in. Just as I thought it was over, a moss-ive burst of energy flew into me, so much that I nearly shattered! Terrified, I quickly absorbed the energy, simultaneously releasing the waste to return. When I finally had processed everything, I was full, something that had never happened as far as I had been alive. Also, I had made a pun, another first for me.

I looked back at the moss and was horrifically shocked at what I saw. It was no longer vibrant and living. It was crumbling before my eyes, turning to dust. I was disgusted with myself that I had killed it—not the death itself, which was just a natural part of life but the fact that I could no longer pull the yummy food to myself. Ruminating over the loss of this huge source of mouthwatering energy, I quickly brightened when I noticed that behind it there was a veritable carpet of the stuff, growing across the floor of this crevasse. I returned to the brown energy, slightly disappointed now by how hard it was to keep forcefully pulling it to myself. Hungrily, I waited for the rain to come again, so I could reach that tasty, tasty treat just out of my reach.

<Hello, little dungeon,> a measured, powerful voice reverberated in my mind.

<What?! Who… how?> I looked at everything I could see, but there was nothing around me.

<I am Kantor,> the voice continued.

<What is a Kantor?> I panicked a bit; a potential threat could find me, but I could not see it.

<Ha. So much to learn, and we have but moments. I wish I could explain all to you, but already, the wind moves me along. I must go as the wind takes me, and the air is turbulent in recent times. I digress. Youngling, do you know what you are?> The words Kantor gave me reverberated in my mind like a clarion call, so full of power I was afraid I would be killed by his speech, let alone whatever he could bring to bear against me.

<I… I’m a gem. I’m shiny.> I was unsure of how to answer; Kantor’s words were confusing, intricate, and hard to understand.

<While… technically true, you are much more. You are a dungeon Core, a Beast Core that has gained the first level of its own sentience and has realized the consequences of life and death. This awareness is why you are able to hear me now, though I have whispered for weeks. Already I reach the furthest range of my ability to communicate,> he spoke, sadness tinging his grand voice.

<Sentience?> I questioned, trying out the word.

<It means you are aware, young one. It means that you understand that things beyond yourself are alive. Also, it means that you want. Food, knowledge, power. To stay alive. You can now think of the future and make small plans, retaining memories of your own.>

I realized this was true. I did want things. I wanted to be alive. I remembered that I planned on eating the moss just out of reach.

<Good, you understand.”> Kantor seemed satisfied. “<To allay your concerns, I am not right next to you, little one. We are communicating with ‘mind speech’. This allows us to bypass the limitations of our bodies, in order to talk to those we wish. I have no wish to hurt you, but to help you become smarter and stronger. Although, before I explain too much further, you must satisfy my curiosity—what color are you?> Kantor probed me far too casually.

<Color? I’m> a word popped into my head from somewhere deep in my mind, as well as hundreds of subtle variations, <blue? Mind speech?>

<Blue? Good! Good. Yes, small one, mind speech. To talk to someone, all you need to do is intentionally send your thoughts to them. You can send words, pictures, ideas. Whatever thoughts you have, you can gift to another.> A tension I did not realize it had before seemed to vanish from Kantor’s voice.

<I am going to help you, tiny one. I am moving along, and it will be a long time before you hear from another one of your own kind. I wish I could do more, but it would do more damage than good. If fates are kind, I will speak to you again someday.> He paused, thinking. I feared he had disappeared when his voice sounded again, <To survive, you will need assistance. I am going to send you a helper. This is the absolute limit of what I can do for you currently. I… I wish it weren’t so. Please don’t absorb her. Her mother would be furious with me,> he… joked? I think? Kantor’s voice was fading, becoming more strained as he worked to speak with me.

<I don’t understand… but thank you, Kantor!> I cried out, desperate to continue hearing another voice in the darkness.

<Best of luck.> I could feel the satisfaction flowing from him.

Chapter Two

I wondered what kind of help Kantor was sending me. This thought occupied my mind for a spare moment until my hungry gaze returned to the feast of moss waiting just out of reach.

<Soon, my scrumptious ones,> I thought to myself, chuckling with a slightly maniacal undertone.

“Wait, you’re not evil, are you?” a voice questioned me.

<What is evil? Wait, what are you? Where are you?> I glanced around. Two voices on the same day?

“We’ll talk about evil later. Much later. I’m above you, making sure you don’t try to eat me,” the voice called, echoing slightly, making it hard to pinpoint the exact position it came from.

<Why? Are you delicious?> I could go for a snack, I supposed.

“No! Nope, not even slightly tasty. I’m a Wisp. As in ‘will-of-the’,” the echoing voice assured me.

<What is will?> I was a bit disappointed. The voice sounded tasty.

“Oh boy.” Now that just sounded condescending. “You really are a newborn, aren’t you?”

<What is–>

I was cut off as I began speaking. “Yeah got it, you don’t know too many words.”

<…> Really, I had no idea what to say to that.

“Here is the deal. We are going to make a pact, a bond. This is more than an agreement; it is a sharing of power. You need help, knowledge, and a friend to keep you from going insane. That can be me if you will allow it.”

<…> Now coy, the voice seemed to be trying to seduce me with gifts. I did like gifts I guess. Really, who doesn’t? I was about to answer when it spoke again.

“You have to agree to give me protection and Essence. In return, I will do everything I can to make you strong and prosperous. If you die, so do I because nothing else can give me the Essence I need to survive.” Seemingly frustrated, the voice was talking faster and faster.

<Please! Slow down! Can you just answer a quick question? It’s just… Why do I need you?> I thought it was a fair question. I was doing fine on my own.

“I promise you that it will be worth it. Besides that, Kantor is too far away for me to return to, and no one else is coming to help or would even want to,” she guaranteed.

<Well, when you put it like that… and Kantor sent you…> I trailed off. I really did not want to let down Kantor. <Sounds good! Teach me those big words, and it’s a deal. Um, I don’t know how to do all the things you want, but if you teach me I am… amenable.> I could already feel my intellect growing, just being in her presence. I was proud of that new word. Amenable meant that I was agreeable to the situation. I think. Yes. Whatever, the voice was talking again.

“Deal. Here I come.” A bright ball of softly glowing, pink energy resolved itself from behind a stone outcropping that had been blocking my view. “Hello, tiny dungeon. I am Dani. Do you have a name yet?”

<Not that I know of. What does a name look like?> I knew that everything around me had a name, but I thought a name was just part of what a thing was. Wait! Was my name ‘gem’ then?! I was about to ask when Dani started speaking again.

“Well, then,” she blatantly ignored my question, “since you are surrounded by calcium, I hereby name you ‘Cal’.”

<I like it!> I shone brighter for a moment to show my happiness. I had a name! A real name, not a description! I suddenly knew the difference! I felt like I was shaking in excitement. Actually, I was shaking? Vibrating really, the water around me moving enough to splash.

<What’s happening?!> I was so startled that I even stopped eating the brown energy for a moment.

“Looks like I got here just in time. Quick, Cal, repeat after me! ‘By the agreement we have made, I become your bonded partner’!” With that pronouncement and a resounding splash, Dani came down and entered my puddle. I followed her instructions, repeating her word for word. As I did, a beam of blue light shot out of me, and a beam of pink came from her.

As they touched, they fused into a beautiful light, which traveled along a shimmering path in the air that connected both of us. The fused pink-blue light entered her, filling her with light and energy. A blue blot formed in her body, surrounded by her natural pink coloration. Now the glow coming off of her was a light purple and far more intense, lighting up the air around her. The beam entered me as well, and I became a darker blue, nearly violet. I lost a lot of energy, the vibration subsiding as the link was formed.

<What was that?> I asked offhandedly, far less tense now. I was pretty hungry again. She had entered my pool, and just like when my water washed over the rocks, now I knew everything about pink will-of-the-wisps. I still didn’t know the knowledge she contained, the experiences she had lived through. I hoped she would tell me stories. Hmm. Is it important that I only know about pink Wisps? Are there more colors? Do they do different things? Oops, I hear Dani talking again. I guess I’ll have to save my questions for another time.

“That was us joining, forming a bond. I can’t believe you came so close to self-destructing! Have you never used your Essence before?” Dani’s color darkened—which I understood meant that she was cross.

<Would you mind answering another question? What is Essence?> Seriously, she is just a deep well of knowledge, isn’t she? So full of words and meanings!

“Really? Well, maybe that explains why I am purple now.” She blew out a long sigh. “Essence is… complicated. The real name of it is ‘Quintessence’, but that is a mouthful, so it is usually shortened. It is the fundamental energy of the universe, the pure power of heavens and earth that is used by the basic elements to become… everything. Rocks turn it into earth Essence, water into water Essence, though both are impure forms.

Cultivating is the process of absorbing Essence from the Heaven and the Earth around you. It is a part of all things, and all things are a part of it. The purer you can refine it, the closer it becomes to the true form of Essence.” She quieted for a moment, overcome by some far away memory. “Also, if the accumulated Essence you have is the purest possible, it is better for the both of us. It will make us stronger, healthier, and smarter. The Essence you are holding is really pure, so you must have cultivated all you could from that water before refining it until it became too dense for your Core. Good job so far!” She ended the topic on a cheerful note.

<From the water?> What the heck? There is Essence in my puddle?

“Yes, you are a blue Core, so you cultivate Essence from water,” she explained almost condescendingly.

<I can do that? I’ve never pulled from water before.> I was inspecting the water for food but only saw my light.

“…” She appeared to be trying to speak.

<What?> Was she in pain? Did I do something to her?

“Then where did you pull Essence from?” She was really demanding. Was this bond really worth this scrutiny?

<Everything I’ve been able to touch so far, except you, since you told me you weren’t tasty,> I reassured her. She seemed to be getting worked up.

“That shouldn’t be possible… At this level, you can only cultivate from the element you are attuned to. Show me?” she forced herself to ask politely.

I was hungry. The joining had drained a lot of my energy, at least as much as the moss had given me. The moss! I was mentally drooling as I thought of the exquisite food, no, um, Essence that it contained.

<I’d be happy to, but… I can’t reach the moss over there anymore.> I seemed pathetic I guess because she laughed and scooped up some of the water I was in. She didn’t have limbs, so this impressed me an inordinate amount.

“The moss, huh? Sure.” She flew over to the moss, and instead of pouring the water on to it, she blew it over ALL of the moss as a mist!

<AHH!> I exclaimed, my vision exploding outward. I had never before been able to see so much more at one time. With a gentle sprinkling, she had more than tripled the area I could see! The information gained from all of these new things was nearly overwhelming.

“What?!” she yelped, “Did I hurt you?”

<No… it’s just, I can see so much more! It is so beautiful! I had wanted to have access to more area, after all. I didn’t realize that it could be done so quickly. That was the only issue, and it just startled me a bit.> My mind was distracted with sorting through all of the new things I had learned.

“Oh.” She sighed softly. “You scared me there.”

<You have already proven that I made a good deal bonding with you! Thank you.> I was really happy! It seemed that the more I learned, the faster I could learn other things. When I experienced something that coincided with another bit of esoteric understanding, I processed it even faster. For instance, since I already knew dirt and stone I was able to comprehend moss faster and more thoroughly because I knew where it got its food and energy—the dirt! It used dirt for all sorts of things. Hopefully, building the basics of my knowledge here would allow me to understand greater things in the future.

“That is what I’m here for, Cal.” She gracefully accepted my compliment.

<Well,> I rumbled gruffly, somewhat embarrassed for an unknown reason, <I’m hungry, and you want to see me eat, sooo…>

“Go for it.” She laughed, watching me closely.

I reached out for the veritable feast before me and started pulling in energy. Dani watched in amazement the entire time. Pulling from so many different groups of moss, I was again vibrating, much less than before, but still.

“Wow! But that corruption is really thick in you. Must be a side effect of pulling from an unattuned source.” Dani gave a frustrated sigh. “Drat, you had such pure Essence when I got here.”

<You mean the waste stuff? Yeah, I don’t like it very much either,> I agreed, “spitting” the sickly energy back out to rejoin the plant.

“No. Freaking. Way!” She zoomed in for a closer look, making me feel a bit awkward. Why was she so giddy over me eating?

<What?> Without the waste, there was a little more room for food, and I was already eying an untouched patch of moss. Curiously, none of the moss had withered this time.

“You just got rid of your own corruption?! That’s not…” she started accusingly.

<Possible,> I intentionally interrupted, <or you’ve just never seen it before?> I was getting a bit irritated over her telling me what I couldn’t do when it was obviously happening right in front of her.

Trying and failing to come up with a good response to this, she conceded the point with a bit of ill grace. “Fair enough,” she mumbled. “Are you already full again?”

<Well, I mean, I could eat,> I declared nonchalantly, licking my mental lips.

“Not what I mean, you glutton.” She laughed. “I mean, we just joined. You should be low on power for weeks! If you are already full, that just means good things for the both of us in the future. You can pull power from multiple sources. We should really see what all is doable, but that comes later. First, let’s get you an upgrade.”

<More plants?!> Where was she hiding them?

“No, an upgrade for you, silly rock! Look, you are a dungeon Core. You grow your dungeon around your Core by releasing Essence in a way unique to dungeons, called influence,” she explained, gaining my rapt attention.

There were things only dungeons could do?

She continued, basking in my undivided attention, “We need to spread your influence about as much as we can, and then when something is under your influence, you are able to fully understand it. When you fully understand something, you control it absolutely.” She waited for a response.

<Go on…> I prodded her.

“Using the Essence, you collect you can directly alter the world that is under your influence. Doing so will drain you a bit, so you need to expand slowly, becoming a bigger and more important dungeon. Eventually, people will discover you and come in to explore you, looking for treasure and ways to make themselves stronger,” she explained, shining brightly in her excitement.

“When people come, they bring things in like weapons, armor, magic, and even animals! Whatever is left in here you can study, absorbing it and gaining the knowledge of how to make it, use it, control it!” she enthused. “Even when people die, you can absorb them, make copies, and re-animate their bodies as zombies, like a Necromancer does!”

<What?!> My sudden shout nearly knocked her out of the air. <I HATE NECROMANCERS!> I was furious that she would compare me to those animals. I trembled in rage, losing control of the Essence in me as I did so. The stalagmite received the brunt of this released Essence, growing sharp quartz spikes, which quivered in time with the fury ignited in my Core.

“Cal! Cal! It is okay! I’m sorry, I didn’t know!” Her voice calmed me down, the fear in her voice snapping me out of my fury in an indescribable manner. “How do you even know what a Necromancer is?”

<I… I’m sorry. I really don’t know where that came from. I just hate them so much.> I was really confused and had no idea why her words made me so uncontrollably angry.

“It’s okay, Cal,” she shakily stated, still quivering slightly. “That actually may be for the best. There is a church that is quite powerful right now that tries very hard to destroy dungeons that have undead or demonic creatures in them. I was just trying to give you a comprehensive idea of what you could do.”

<What? People try to kill dungeons? Are people going to try to kill me?> I was rather stuck on this point; it seemed somewhat important.

“Yes, but don’t worry too much. Usually, they prefer to have dungeons stay alive as they are very beneficial to the world.” She soothingly tried to appease me by telling stories of the world, “Flora and fauna alike prosper in areas with high Essence concentration. Plants can use it instead of good soil and sunlight, and animals become much stronger in the presence of Essence.”

<Why do animals get stronger?> Dang it, she was able to distract me so easily!

“Animals gain Essence from the world mainly just by living their lives, and it makes them stronger over time. Other sentient creatures like Humans, Elves, Dwarves, or even Orcs are able to absorb Essence during meditation.” She paused to let me fantasize about all the creatures I could eventually eat.

“Magical beasts have Beast Cores similar to your gem that grow inside them from birth. Every type of creature absorbs Essence but can only absorb the type they are suited to until they are really strong, which can take over a hundred years, roughly. This is why I think you are going to be very popular. The Essence you concentrate has no affinity that I can tell. It’s just… pure Essence.” She was still amazed by that fact. Pure Essence was unheard of; even the best cultivators had some taint.

<Is that good?> Did people try to kill popular things?

Dani snapped out of her reverie. “It means everything can thrive in your area of influence if you let it. Plants, animals, Beasts, and creatures of light and shadow.”

<That is good though, right, and why are you emphasizing Beast when you say it?> It was tickling my thoughts oddly.

“Having really pure Essence with no affinity should be very good, I think. Heck, wars may be fought over the right to explore here! I am a lucky Wisp!” Dani gleefully exclaimed, flying in a spiral pattern. “Also, I am emphasizing it because Beasts are different from animals. They have gained awareness and can use Essence, becoming far stronger and much more intelligent than their original animalistic counterparts.”

<This is all so interesting!> Much as I loved learning, I was far more enthusiastic about being able to do things. <So can we start? How do we start?>

Dani launched into another lecture, “Well, we start with an upgrade! Here are a few basics first, though. There are many different levels of Essence cultivation. Starting with the lowest, we have G, F, E, D, C, B, A, S, SS, SSS, Heavenly, and Godly. Each rank has ten levels within it, the lowest being zero and the highest at nine. When I got here, you were at G-zero, which is basic life with only the instinct to eat.” She chuckled at that; I had progressed far in intelligence since then. “After making the deal with me, you moved to G-rank one, which opens the way for more complex actions and thought. You have enough power already to move to G-rank two, which lets you begin to grow your power and use your own influence intentionally.”

<Intentionally?> I thought I already had been. Was she being condescending again?

“Remember those spikes poking out of you? Can you do that without being really mad?” Yup, definitely being condescending.

I tried but couldn’t make anything happen.

<Nope. Where did those come from anyway? There was no quartz there earlier.> I looked at the reflective quartz poking out of the stone.

“You made it with your Essence. If you have absorbed it in the past, you can make it with your Essence. Another ability unique to dungeons.” She showed off her knowledge once again.

<Wow! How do I make things, pretty lady?> I wheedled her.

“Upgrade first.” She was firm on that point.

Well, poo. I thought flattery would do it. <So, how do I upgrade?>

She seemed appreciative of my work ethic. “Get as full of energy as you can. Then I’ll guide you through the process.”

Following her instructions, I cultivated and ate—no, I refined!—the plant’s energy until I was shaking dangerously again.

<Dani… Help,> I began worriedly.

“It’s okay, Cal. Focus on your crystal. Do you feel the flaws in the gem? There are a few perfect parts where your facets are smooth and sharp, without cracks or discoloration,” Dani quickly and calmly coached me. “Feel those, find how it is that they bind perfectly whereas the other spots are rough or malformed. Now smooth those bad patches so that they are correctly formed. Try to make your Core as flawless as possible. Focus now, but don’t rush it.”

It was amazing. As she guided me, I could feel exactly what she meant and suddenly perfectly understood the body I was now in. Why had I never tried to understand myself before? I guess it was just not something a normal mind would do. The basic structure of my Core consisted of carbon but was reinforced by the Essence that I had refined to its most pure form. Only the center of my Core was truly perfect, and I could see that my mind resided within in that perfect structure. From this perfect facet, I got the blueprints of how my Core needed to be restructured and started applying pressure to the poorly formed outer carbon bonds.

“Careful now, not all at once or you may shatter yourself,” Dani murmured, trying not to break my focus.

*Click*

A small patch of perfectly bonded carbon molecules formed.

*Click* *Click*

As I became used to the process, I was able to accomplish the task faster, letting me make more connections, faster and faster, until with a jolt I found there were no more poorly formed areas. A good thing too, as my light had dimmed enough to nearly extinguish. My mind, losing the single track intensity that had propelled me to this stage, nearly broke under the exhaustion I now felt.

“Cal! Are you awake yet? Cal!” Dani desperately begged, voice hoarse and weak.

<What’s wrong?> I grouched sleepily. That was new. Could I sleep?

“You need to absorb… Essence. Please, hurry…” she pleaded, her light dimming as well.

Her words barely registered in my mind, my thoughts moving at a glacial speed. I was hungry. I reached for the moss, and as per usual, it eagerly flowed toward me as well. I started eating, and as I did, I only got hungrier, the input of Essence awakening my unquenchable gluttony. Greedily reaching for more moss, I pulled more and more energy from the entire patch of moss, until dying moss started to emit blasts of energy which shot into me. I stopped pulling Essence and looked nervously at where it came from.

As I suspected, a small patch of moss withered away, crumbling to dust as I watched. I finished refining what I had and realized that while this amount of energy would have killed me before I fixed my facets, now it was barely satiating my hunger. I turned my attention to Dani, who was beginning to glow again.

<What happened?> I prodded her. That was a bad idea. She woke up angry.

“You nearly killed us both is what happened!” Her glow was flashing to a deep crimson with fury. “You altered your basic structure until completion—without even stopping to recover! I had to close our connection just to stop from draining the last bits of Essence from you and nearly starved to death myself before you gained enough energy for me to safely take some! Do you have any idea how horrible of a death dying from lack of Essence is?!”

I tried to defend my actions, <But I was only doing what you told me to do?>

“I told you not to rush!” Her anger fading, her body slowly returned to her regular coloration. “Are you okay? Did you hurt yourself?”

<I’m fine,> I cautiously stated. <Hungry but fine,> I amended.

“Good.” She blew out a breath. “Cal, you really need to have some self-preservation skills.”

<I’ll do better. I’m sorry.> I was ashamed.

“Don’t be sorry, be smart! If you die, so do I! We need you to be the smartest dungeon that exists because we need each other!” she exploded, obviously still mad for some reason.

<I said I am sorry. I’ll do better!> I promised her vigorously.

“Good. You’d better. Well, let’s take a look at you.” She flew closer to me, examining me for any flaw or defect. After a short time, she pronounced her assessment, “Cal, you are the most perfect diamond I have ever seen.”

<I’m not a diamond. I’m a dungeon Core,> I reminded her. Was she still groggy from sleep?

“Well, you look like a flawless diamond. When you get full of energy, it’ll be nearly impossible to break you, I bet.” Her abrupt reversal of attitude threw me off, but her words were really nice. A pink glow joined my normal blue as I “blushed” from her praise. Interesting, it seemed my emotions could alter my coloration for a moment or two.

<You think I did a good job?> I tried for another compliment.

She granted my desire, “A very good job.” Then my new favorite thing to hear, “Well, let’s get some food, shall we?”

<I would love to, but I think I took everything I could from the moss over there. It started dying.> I felt a bit embarrassed about killing off my only good source of food.

She examined the withered moss and nodded. “True, but why didn’t you finish the rest of it off?”

She never ceased to surprise me. <Then I wouldn’t be able to get more from it when it recovered,> I explained carefully.

“Well! I thought you were just a glutton, but you keep throwing me for a loop!” She flew to me and tested the energy flows I was emitting. “I think I was wrong earlier. You must have been a G-rank three Core, just with so many flaws your energy came out scattered and weak. You have the cultivation base of a G-rank four now, and this allows you to have forethought. It’s okay, Cal, try and finish off the moss there and take in its life energy. It is the remaining cultivation base of the moss, the densest concentration, so it will give slightly more energy than it does normally.”

<But then the moss will be gone,> I forlornly reminded her.

“We will grow more. Just eat it already.” Yikes! I didn’t want to make her angry again.

<Okay then.> I waited a moment. <Be nicer,> I grumbled at Dani, and then I started pulling in the Essence, this time watching what happened to the moss. As I took more energy, it started wilting and becoming desiccated, like it had gone too long without water. I could tell the moment each strand died, as I was assaulted with a burst of condensed Essence each time it happened. As each strand died I grew more satiated, but when the last bit had crumbled, I was still not even a quarter full, and this was before I purified it and got rid of the waste, which was usually a sizable portion of the energy. When I finished cultivating and refining, removing the waste, I was about one-eighth full.

<I can’t believe how much more energy I can take! This is amazing!> I felt incredible, strong, and powerful. That is not how I responded to her next question though.

“How do you feel?” She was testing the waters, looking at my cultivation.

I responded as honestly as possible, <Hungry.>

“Why am I not surprised, ya hog,” she admonished flatly. “I think it is time for you to try and use your Essence. I want you to move the entire stalagmite you are on as far toward that cave as you can go. You are too exposed here; your Core should be insanely difficult to get to. Right now, anything could swoop in and grab you.”

<How do I move?> I was excited, ready to learn a new skill.

“You reach into the area around you and tell it to move. Only you can really know what it will take, so if I can do anything for you, let me know.” Well. That was rather unhelpful advice.

<I’ll try.> I reached into the stone around me and eventually found what I needed in order to make it move. With horribly loud screeching, the entire stone area that was filled with my influence tore itself out of the ground and began jerkily moving toward the hole in the wall.

<Whoa!> I shouted, stopping my momentum.

“That’s normal! If you left this area behind, you would lose a lot of your power. Everything filled with your Essence is, in reality, your body, and you are the heart, the soul. You can never willingly move your heart from your body, but you can reposition it. That is how dungeons grow and evolve,” Dani explained courteously, then told me to hurry up.

Moving my form through the opening in the rock wall, I yanked my whole mass as far through the cave as I could; after hours, I finally reached a wall and could go no further. I settled to the floor with great relief.

“How is your Essence doing? Did you use too much?” queried Dani, fluttering about the cave and exploring its depths.

<Pretty good, that really didn’t take too much Essence. How far did we go? A mile? Two?> I was so ready for a nap. Too bad I couldn’t sleep.

“Close!” she sounded off brightly. “We got about forty feet or so before you hit a wall.”

<What?! But my body– But that took hours!> I whined at her.

“I forgot that you can just barely see past your influence. How big do you think your body is?” She was leading the conversation somewhere.

<Thirty yards or so?> I pleaded to her, joking weakly.

She dashed my hopes immediately. “Your stalagmite is about two feet tall, and the ground you have at the base is about five feet in diameter. A bit lopsided where the moss was because I helped you grow there.”

I was flabbergasted. <And… Me?>

“Well, you were a bit larger when you were a flawed gem,” she paused, dangling the information just out of reach, “but now you are the size of a one-carat diamond. Soooo about six and a half millimeters.”

<That’s it?! Is that small? What unit of measurement is that?> I had so many questions!

“Yup, that’s it. Stop being a narcissist! You can’t worry about things you can’t control. You have too much work to do if you want to become a big, strong dungeon, and you can start by spreading your influence.” She was ignoring my questions again!

<I’m not a narcissist! I think. What’s a narcissist? How do I spread influence?>

“Remember how I made all that Essence turn into a mist and spread it around?” she reminded me. “I need you to do the same thing but with your accumulated Essence. Concentrate hard on making the surroundings… you,” Dani finished lamely.

Sure. Why not. <How much Essence should I use?>

“Keep going until I tell you to stop or until you reach those mushrooms,” she directed, settling on to a grey stone outcropping to watch my progress.

Why was she being so unhelpful? <What’s a mushroom?>

“You’ll know it when you find it,” she sing-sang in a know-it-all voice.

<Dani… Just… Fine.> I tried doing as she told me. Nothing happened at first, but after a bit of trial and error, a fine mist, more like water vapor, began emanating from my puddle. The vapor went where I told it to, clinging to anything it touched unless some vapor had made it there previously. This vapor was true Essence, but I knew somehow that I could not reabsorb this. Is this what other people would come here to cultivate? Luckily for me, the amount of Essence I used to create the vapor, my influence, was minuscule.

<I’m doing it!> Soon I was at the edge of my territory and began forcing the vapor to expand outward, gaining vision and knowledge with every fraction of an inch.

“Hey! Go up and down too,” Dani demanded, twitching up off her rock an inch to look at my apparently shoddy work.

<The floor and ceiling? Why?> There was so much to look at! I really did not want to waste time on empty space.

“Those need to be permeated with your Essence most of all!”

<Ugh…> Why couldn’t she just tell me why? I sighed with frustration. She hadn’t steered me wrong yet, I guess.

I reached as high as I could go and coated the ceiling and floor, then kept doing what I could to fill the chamber. Quickly, I found that I had tripled my range of influence and was just starting to get worried about the amount of Essence I had remaining when I found mushrooms. As I learned everything about this type of mushroom, I tasted it for the first time. It was made of a mixture of plant and earth Essence, and both types of Essence were more abundant than either the rocks or the moss had been able to contain or give me. While it was more difficult to take the Essence from the mushrooms than the moss had been, it was still far easier than the stone, and so I began to eat. Cultivate. Whatever.

The flavor was reminiscent of sweet salad leaves dipped in the rich chocolate that is the earth. I ate much slower than ever before, the complexities of this Essence eluding my slavering “tongue” until I discovered the trick of it, breaking the complex Essence down to its elemental form, separating it into its basic Essence, finally absorbing it in a sweet and fulfilling rush. The flavor was so wonderfully potent that I was nearly unable to hear Dani when she started to talk to me. “You made it! That is surprising. It only took you a few days!”

<That long? It felt like such a short time…?> I was still focused on the Essence I was acquiring, only listening to her with half an ‘ear’.

“Well, that isn’t surprising now, is it? Time doesn’t have the same effect on us as it does other living things,” Dani explained. “By the way, how do you feel now with your Essence?”

Turning my attention inward, it was obvious that the energy in me was less than it had been but not nearly the amount that I had feared it would be. The tiny amount of the mushrooms’ overall energy had replaced this much?! Surprised by this development, I told Dani.

“That is great! It means that although you are unique in many ways, my knowledge isn’t entirely useless!” she boasted with a ‘wink’ that consisted of her light dimming and shining in a strobe-like way. “As the range of your influence increases, the Essence of the world will passively flow to you, very slowly filling your Core to replace what you use. Obviously, it is far slower than actively pulling the energy to yourself, but as your range grows, so will the passive Essence influx. Eventually, you may not even need to pull Essence to increase in ranking.”

<This is great! By the way, have you ever had mushrooms before? Those white ones are safe for you to eat,> I promised her, feeling happy now that I was gaining sustenance again.

“I don’t need to eat! The energy you provide me with directly fulfills those needs,” she assured me. “How is that Essence by the way? You having any trouble with it?”

<Why would I be?> I retorted, slurping in a long stream of earth Essence.

“Well, that is a more complex Essence is all,” she told me carefully. “It is intrinsically combined earth and water Essence, right? That is known as ‘mud’ Essence and is notoriously hard to cultivate from.”

<Oh. Well, it didn’t want to separate right away, but I got the hang of it!> I assured her, not stopping my gorging.

“You are going to be the most amazing dungeon ever. I just know it!” Dani then looked at the quickly wilting stalks of the mushrooms I was pulling Essence from. “Hey, you want to learn how to grow more of those?”

<Yes please.> More would be good. Much more.

She looked at me oddly. “I thought you would be more excited than this.” Zipping over to me, she looked at my Essence. “G-rank five already?! This is wonderful! You are growing so well! And so fast,” she murmured, almost with concern.

<I want to know how you can tell my ranking, but first those mushrooms?> The ones I was ‘gnawing’ on were going to die soon if I did nothing to spread out the drain on their resources.

Dani seemed to shake off her contemplative stupor. “Right, so, focus on the mushroom that you want to grow first—I’d suggest that reddish poisonous looking one. Got it? Okay, now focus on what it needs to survive. You should know all of that. Look at what it needs to grow and reproduce.”

<I got it!> Growing and reproducing was almost its entire pattern, after all. A pattern was the intricate design that comes together in a unique way to create everything in the universe. An inanimate object has a far less complex pattern that a living being, which explained why it was easier to absorb Essence from rocks than plants. Plants had really simple purposes in their life.

“Great, hold the pattern in your mind, exactly as it is. Got it? Good. Now pour a bit of Essence into the pattern, and try and integrate it into the flow that is moving through it. When it feels mature, make it produce and release spores into the room. When those land, you can do one of two things,” she explained thoroughly, “either infuse the spores with Essence directly and grow those with your Essence, or slather that Essence-rich vapor on to the area they land, which will allow them to grow naturally but still way faster than they could otherwise. You can control how fast and where things grow by infusing different amounts of Essence into the area. Don’t want something to grow? Don’t give it any Essence! Really easy.”

<Alright, I think I understand. First, focus on the pattern.> I concentrated, and the pure Essence inside me began to flow into the mushrooms pattern. The tiny stalk on the ground rippled and grew a little bit. <I did it!> Now to make it get large and reproduce. I fed it a trickle of Essence. Nothing seemed to happen, so I increased the flow to a steady stream.

“Stop, stop!” ordered Dani, dismayed. “It takes a moment to change into the Essence of its own… type. Oh my.”

It was obvious that the mushroom absorbed the Essence because it began to grow at a rapid, mutated pace. I could see how much energy this took, nearly what it would produce in its own natural lifespan, and it still was not close to the amount I had given it. Continuing to grow, it suddenly shuddered and began to develop a crease in the stalk. As we watched, the crease grew, and the remaining Essence began to diffuse throughout the entire plant, focusing heavily for a bit on the crease. When the Essence was stable, Dani flew closer to get a better look at the finished product.

“Ahhh!” she screamed as the plant lunged at her, the crease revealing itself as a mouth filled with sharp thorns instead of teeth. Zipping back to a safe distance, Dani stopped screaming. The mushroom exuded an air of disappointment until it settled back into its stationary state, looking just like a larger version of the others around it. “Too close! Ohmygosh that was scary!” Dani panted.

She came over to me, shivering, and continued in a brave voice, “Well, not what we were after, but congratulations! You made your first dungeon monster! There is an… issue though. It is a natural plant that gained cultivation ranks by absorbing Essence, not a monster you actually created. Because of this, it will not obey you completely, unless it swears loyalty to you. Since it can’t make that deal, as a plant, you need to drain away its Essence.”

<But I did just make it!> I looked at the plant. It was just a plant before; now it was a monster.

“You didn’t, though. Do you understand it?” she prodded knowingly. “Could you make another one with the same pattern?”

I refocused on the monster—I’ll call it a Shroomish—and tried to study it. I couldn’t, for some reason. Looking at the Essence in it, I tried to grab it, then to coax it away but was met with severe resistance.

<It is not giving me the Essence.> How rude! Really, I was basically its creator.

Dani grunted, a very unladylike sound. “Oh right! As a monster, it won’t just happily give you its life force. It needs to be defeated. Make a chunk of rock fall off the ceiling above it, squashing it and releasing its Essence, which will then be automatically pulled to you because it is in your influence,” she verbosely directed.

<I’ll give it a shot.> Concentrating on the roof of the cave, I carved a small rock away and let it fall. The Shroomish splattered with a keening sound, and the Essence shot into me, far more Essence than I had ever taken in one go before, as I had not drained it somewhat beforehand. The Essence was entirely different than I had been expecting, a much more complex blend of earth, plant, and a cool, refreshing feeling which revealed itself to be water Essence. It absorbed far easier than other Essence did but tasted rather bland to me. After the last bit had filled me, I turned my attention to the pattern of its body.

<It is so different!> I exclaimed in surprise. <It has an entirely different pattern! How did that happen? I don’t know how to do that!> I was babbling, so I tried to stop talking.

“It is a natural evolution,” Dani informed me. When all I gave in return for this information was confusion, she decided to explain herself.

“As you get stronger, you can make creatures evolve by supplying them with the energy to do so, or they can absorb items or different elements to change themselves naturally,” Dani explained, looking at the splattered remains from a careful distance. “Usually, the Essence you supply would direct the changes, but since yours seems to be so pure, it must have allowed for it to become what it would have after decades of cultivating or a ‘natural evolution’. You keep throwing me for a loop.”

<I haven’t touched you.> At least the cultivation stuff made sense.

“It is a figure of speech. Not a literal statement. Stay with me here; this opens up a slew of options for us that I hadn’t considered.” Dani was getting excited again. Should I be nervous? “We’ll get to that, but first, try to recreate the Mob. And before you attack my verbiage, my choice of words that is, a ‘Mob’ is a short way to say ‘dungeon monster’.”

<Why not call it a ‘Dum’? For ‘dungeon monster’.> Where was she getting that abbreviation?

“It just… It just isn’t,” Dani sputtered, seemingly exasperated.

I looked at where the Shroomish had originally been and was startled to see the body was melting directly into the floor; it was mostly goo at this point. Must be an effect of my influence. I tried to pay attention to what Dani was telling me to do, so I began listening carefully. Dani explained that to create a Mob, all I had to do was make a ‘seed’ of energy infused with the pattern of the creature I wanted to make. Apparently, this would even work if I wanted to make creatures that weren’t normally made from actual seeds, all the way up to the largest beasts in existence, although those big creatures would obviously take longer to mature. Or lots of Essence.

I focused and made the needed pattern on an Essence ‘seed’ and watched as it absorbed the ambient energy in the room to quickly grow to full size. I would never know the difference between the original and the current one if it weren’t for the fact that I could feel a link to the creature in my mind. I imprinted on it that it should not attack Dani, but anything else was fair game. I could feel its assent as it ate a smaller mushroom right next to it, then moved into a near hibernating state, waiting for any inattentive prey.

Finally done with the Mob creation, I returned to infusing an area with enough Essence to quickly grow plants and properly made the remaining regular mushrooms put spores out on to the Essence-rich stone. Following this, I resumed passively absorbing Essence and trying to increase my area of influence. After roughly ten days, I was able to fill the entire cave with a light coating of Essence and had reached the entrance of the cave.

Chapter Three

“Good work!” congratulated a very bored Dani. The poor girl hadn’t been able to order me around for days. I think it was wearing on her. “What you need to do now is work on concentrating the Essence as densely as possible in this room, and we will expand our work from there.”

<What about the door? Won’t it flow out?>

“If you focus hard there first, you can direct your will to cause the air to be too dense for less concentrated Essence to leak out, like a bubble,” Dani distractedly stated.

I considered this for a moment. <I like bubbles. They make my puddle dance.>

“HA! What? That took me by surprise.” She chuckled. “Try it out.”

I worked on this for a few days as the Essence in the room became denser. The mushrooms and other flora I had discovered in the room flourished. Before I knew it, the room had filled with many varieties of moss, fungus, and other low-level plants. Grass tickled my senses. The regular mushrooms were the same size as the Shroomish, which had also multiplied as the original had put out spores. Because I had created the original Shroomish, I still had a connection to all of the others, known as ‘dungeon born’ creatures. The monsters were well hidden in the patches and growing stronger by the day.

Dani explained to me that being dungeon born means that I did not directly create the creature but that it was given life through me. This gives the creature the ability to function autonomously with the downside of not allowing me to take direct control of its mind. I can “ride along” in a dungeon born creature’s mind from any distance and experience what it does; I also may be able to influence the creature if it remains of a lower cultivation rank than myself. When I am able to create creatures that are actually intelligent, I would use them as scouts outside of my dungeon. That way they can bring back things for me to study or attack other things away from me.

Eventually, I would need to have plenty of the dungeon born Mobs if I wanted to see beyond my boundaries. If I were to directly create every Mob, I would be able to control them much better, but the downside would be that they could not ever leave my depths without dying from lack of Essence. They simply could not survive in the wild without my help.

“I think that the Essence has been concentrated enough for us to start to expand. We need to have you make a tunnel, which we will build another room at the end of,” Dani started babbling excitedly.

Another room to grow things in?! <Great! How do we start?>

“Build your Essence up on that wall, and convince the wall to open small holes and absorb your influence. Fill a tunnel about six feet tall by four feet wide. When you reach a point where you want to build another room, use your power to compact the stone to either side. The stone will be much stronger than the original and will serve to guide adventurers where you want them to go. It’ll also likely glow with the accumulated Essence you put into it, which will look fairly spectacular if I say so myself,” Dani directed, stopping only because she ran out of breath. Truly impressive as she did not have lungs.

I focused on the wall and made the stone become porous. Without a ‘bubble’ like the entrance had, the dense Essence in the cave poured into the wall like water through a sieve.

“Make sure to put curves or sharp turns in that are hard to see past,” Dani suggested.

<On it.> I already had the basic shape I wanted in mind, but sooner than I wanted, the air had become less dense. The concentrated Essence in the room had decreased through this forced osmosis until I had to push very hard to continue to move it forward. Finally, the Essence had reached an equilibrium that I could not continue bringing pressure to bear upon. Nearly drained, I stopped and began to sip on the power released by my lush garden. Since I had created them, even the Shroomish gladly put forth their energy for me to use. Feeling myself stabilize a bit more, I looked at the patch on the wall that glowed to my senses.

I hadn’t been able to move the stone, but nearly one hundred and fifty feet of rock was now under my influence, my direct control. My mind easily followed the path, and I found some very interesting things I had ignored in my haste. I found a material that revealed itself as polycrystalline tungsten. It was an intrinsically brittle and hard material and extraordinarily dense. Farther along, I found an iron ore vein and even anthracite! Anthracite is a rare form of coal that burns hotter and longer than normal coal and is a beautiful black color with a high sheen. I told Dani about these, and she got very excited about the possibility of having metal to tempt adventurers and miners with when they started showing up.

This was also when Dani told how I could create more than just monsters. With the same process as creating them, I could create seeds of other materials, like metals and stone. This way, I could inhibit mining to a small section of myself, so people didn’t poke around where I didn’t want them. Apparently, when people were mining it could really grate on my nerves. She suggested that when we made a place for mining, we stick to low-grade materials, especially at first.

“We don’t want to bring in people that are too strong, too soon. Although dungeon Cores are supposed to be a well-kept secret, high ranked groups may know about you. You are a needed component in some of the highest powered spells, so if they find you, they will want to take you. If you leave the dungeon, your body, it will die. Even if you somehow escape, you will need to rebuild from scratch,” Dani warned. “Which is also why you cannot cut yourself off from your body. You can’t just burrow down and cover yourself in stone to hide unless you have no other option.”

I reluctantly acknowledged her logic, <Makes sense, I guess.>

She seemed happy that I was listening to her. “Now, why didn’t you move any of the stone? Was it really hard for you to let your Essence flow into the stone?”

I thought about my answer. <Not particularly. I just wanted to get the most influence possible, so I pushed it as far as I could, you see. I had to stop when I ran low on Essence because I don’t like to worry you.>

“Oh.” She flushed a bit. “Well, there was a lot of Essence in here. How far did you get?”

I tried to calculate the exact distance; I had just thought about it a moment ago. How long was it? <You know that I am terrible with distances. It felt like a really long way, though. More than a hundred feet for sure.>

“Well, considering it took you a few weeks to run low on Essence when you were pushing it, I’d be surprised if you didn’t make it a really long way. I’m trying hard not to be surprised by you anymore.” She glowed cheerfully.

<A few weeks? Wow, I really do lose track of time. Hope you weren’t too bored.>

“You will get faster with practice,” she responded flippantly. “I remember Kantor could change the entire layout of himself in a single night if he tried really hard. And he is a flying island so you know that has to be difficult.”

<Wow! How did he learn how to fly?> I wanted to fly. That sounded amazing.

“Well, over time, a lot of really powerful dungeon divers died or lost gear that had strong enchantments, and he learned how to make them. He made huge Mana accumulator stones that he can fill, or they fill themselves maybe? Anyway, those stones power the enchantments, and he flies with that magic!” Dani elaborated, excited to have his full attention. “He also is always trying to help new dungeons grow so he can relax every once in a while. So long as you aren’t a black or white stone, of course.”

<Why those color stones? Is that why he helped me? So people would attack me and not him sometimes?> I started to get a bit heated. Was I just a way to divert attention? I don’t want to be used like that!

“Remember how he asked you what color you were? If you were a black or white stone, he probably would have killed you. Before you ask, that means that they can only absorb energy from celestial or infernal energy. He doesn’t dislike them, but they have no way to ever grow without horrible things being done around them.” Dani stopped my attempted interruption, going into full lecturing mode.

“They both, celestial and infernal Cores that is, have ways to influence sentient beings. They should just use their minions to bring food, but what usually ends up happening is a war where demons are summoned and angels are counter-summoned to fight them. The stone can get really powerful with thousands of people dying around them, jumping from G-rank to A in just a few days if it is smart, but usually, crusades are declared to destroy them. It is really a lot of bother for everyone, so Kantor usually just kills them,” she explained.

<That is nice of him, I guess,> I admitted reluctantly. Then I remembered the point of this conversation. <Will you teach me how to fly someday? It would be fun.>

“It’s really just floating. He has to go where the wind takes him,” she attempted to dissuade me, noticing my interest in the idea.

<Even still, I’d like to someday,> I demanded, to which she nodded and tried to distract me.

“That’s a really long way away. Let’s focus on building your body up, shall we? The dungeon that is. I am going to go look for plants outside that help to increase Essence or really any plants with a lot of different properties.”

<Isn’t that dangerous?> I nudged her nervously. <What if someone attacks you?>

“Well, it is almost noon, so I should be nearly invisible in the sunlight. Thank you for being concerned about me, cutie.” Dani flirtatiously flew a few spirals around me. “Don’t worry, I’ll be right back.” After ensuring I wouldn’t be too nervous, she flew out and away.

Chapter Four

Alone for the first time in months, my cave was totally silent. Well, I could hear the plants slowly growing, but that was pretty quiet, if annoying. I figured that I may as well try and cultivate some Essence, so I gently connected to all of my plants and let their energy flow to me and connected to my newly energized tunnel and started pulling, then pushing hard. I quickly realized several things. Firstly, the tungsten and iron had much more Essence to give me than regular rocks, and secondly, anthracite had a colossal amount of Essence to give but crumbled as soon as it gave it away.

Receiving the pattern as I absorbed its Essence showed me why the anthracite fell apart—coal was made from decomposed organic matter! It was made from compressed plant Essence and didn’t really have its own form. When I pulled the energy, there was nowhere for it to regain the lost Essence and it would fall apart. On the positive side, it was absolutely stuffed with Essence, and I was soon draining the anthracite exclusively. I had found what I assumed was a relatively small vein of the dark material, but by the time I finished off the last bit of it, I was ninety percent full, something that would have taken months to achieve with just my trivial garden.

Knowing that Dani had wanted me to make more rooms, I decided to surprise her when she got back and began compressing the stone in my influence to either side. With so much energy available to me, I was quickly able to open the passage. Now, I should say that this was not a quiet process. If you have ever ground two stones against each other, you will have a quiet and soothing version of what was transpiring at my location. Unbeknownst to me, this was usually a process that took many months at a time, in an attempt to remain hidden as long as possible. The vibrations caused by my expedited work caused problems around the mountain; landslides, rock falls, and a distant avalanche were triggered.

Just as I finished my fourth room, Dani zipped in at full speed. “Cal! Are you okay? There is an earthquake happening!”

<Surprise! I grew!> I paused, waiting for the glowing admiration to flow from her.

“Oh, Cal no,” Dani whimpered. “We need to get ready. People are going to want to know what is going on.”

<Did I do something wrong?> I was a bit sad that she wasn’t happy with the new additions. <I was just trying to show you that I could do the things you wanted.>

“You didn’t do anything wrong, Cal. Just a little… too fast for the moment. Usually, you would want to create an influence around the area you are going to move and force it to absorb the vibrations of the work you are doing. That way, you remain hidden. The next time you want to grow, make sure I am around, and I’ll show you how to do it. For now, how about… you show me what you made?” Dani released a short sigh, trying to remain positive about the situation they were sure to find themselves in.

Flying through the new open space, she oohed and ahhed at the work I had done, the smooth tunnel walls and the new caves full of stalactites and stalagmites that I had included for visual effect.

“You made three more rooms? I didn’t realize you reached all the way back here! I’m so impressed!” There was the praise I wanted. Aw yisss.

I pretended to be embarrassed, <Aww shucks, you are going to make me blush.>

“No, I am serious! You are growing so well! And your knowledge must be growing too. After all the work you put in, I’m seeing you as an F-rank zero dungeon! You are almost dangerous!” She half-praised, half-teased.

Hey! This was a moment of shining triumph! No teasing! <How strong do I have to be to be dangerous?>

“Well,” she considered for a moment, “the average human toddler is about F-rank zero, but they don’t have biting mushrooms sprouting from their feet. A human adult that has never done more than just normal farm work and has no weapons is usually around an F-rank four adventurer. At that level, they are derisively called ‘fishies’ by people that have spent time adventuring.”

<What is a fish?> My unspoken thought ‘does it taste good’ nearly escaped me. I was more than just a glutton. Gotta keep telling myself that.

She nodded, noting my self-control. “A fish is an animal that lives in water, which people collect to feed themselves. Usually very weak, hence the nickname ‘fishies’ for new adventurers.”

<I see.> I paused, considering. <Dani, how can I make myself more dangerous?>

If she had a mouth she would be grinning, I just knew it. “We can start by making more Shroomish, and you can try to evolve them or some of the others into stronger monsters. Next, we will make a few traps, like pitfalls, spike traps, or poison cloud spewers. Finally, we need to make a dungeon Boss.”

<That all sounds great, but how do I make a dungeon Boss? And am I stuck with that forever?> I really have been enjoying changing things and didn’t want to get slowed down due to a lack of imagination on my part.

“No, actually, when you get bigger, your dungeon Boss might actually become just an average Mob. It is just that you need to put a large amount of your power into your Boss so that it is stronger than the normal ones because it is going to be in your room to protect you and me. Also, you can’t make a monster of your level or higher. So, since you are an F-rank zero, your best creature can only be of G-rank nine, and you only have the power to control one of them,” Dani clarified.

She suddenly bounced in the air. “Oh! Oh! I forgot! Before we start with all of that, I have a present for you! When I was out looking for herbs, I had just found a really secluded grove at the bottom of a crevasse a few miles from here. The walls were really sheer, so it wasn’t surprising that no one had been down there before. There, I found a tree in a clearing that was glowing brightly enough that it was noticeable even in the sunlight.” Dani was quivering in excitement, flying in sporadic zig-zags.

Her excitement was exceedingly contagious. <What?! What was it?>

“Cal! I found a Silverwood tree!” she grandly announced.

<Wow!> How amazing! <What is that?>

“… Right.” She seemed to deflate a bit.

<…What?>

“Sorry, I forgot that you are still very young,” she apologized. “This tree has some of the most potent magic of any plant! It purifies the Essence of those around it.”

<So? Purifying Essence isn’t hard,> I scoffed.

Can a Wisp get headaches? Most likely no, but she seemed pained as she told me, “Cal, do you remember how shocked I was that you had removed the corruption you had pulled in while cultivating?”

<Yeah?>

“Well, most beings, which can only pull from their associated elemental Essence, gain corruption slowly but surely, no matter what they do. At the higher ranks, this corruption can block people from ascending to higher cultivation ranks.”

That would be terrible! <Oh wow. I didn’t know that. How will the Silverwood tree help?>

“Well, I took a seed. A single seed from a Silverwood tree takes years for the tree to make. Also, normally these will never grow outside of their groves, but I think that the Essence you provide might become a decent substitute for what it gets from the grove. If we can grow it, we can almost guarantee that people will come from all around to be here. It may even help to keep you safe if people come for this instead of focusing on trying to get your Core.”

Another layer of protection would be nice. <You are the best, Dani! How can I grow it? Should I make a room for it?>

She coughed. “Well… that’s the thing, if we want to give this its best shot, we will need to give it the most concentrated, pure Essence that you can give it. It will have to be in your Essence puddle with you. It might eventually take up a lot of room too.”

<Will it hurt me? Is it dangerous?> Pertinent questions.

“Since it will be growing from your Essence, it should act like your creatures and listen to you, but you have to be careful not to absorb it. I really doubt that you could make a dungeon born version that would do the same as an original,” she cautioned. “Also, I don’t think that we can ever get another seed…”

I noticed her wince when she said this, as though she hadn’t intended to mention it. <Why is that? Is it far away?>

“No… Well, for one thing, they really rarely make seeds. They are basically super concentrated Essence that accumulates into seeds, actually similarly to how you make your dungeon ‘seeds’. The reason I don’t think you can make them is that it takes S-ranked spiritual energy to duplicate the effects they offer. I don’t know why; the trees are not S-ranked themselves. They have a very mysterious origin.” She was circumventing her real reason; I could tell.

<What is the matter, Dani? What happened?>

She slowly answered, knowing she had my attention and I wouldn’t be distracted, “It’s… Right after I left there, the earthquake buried the whole area. The grove is gone.”

Another thing I had done wrong. <Oh. Sorry again.>

She rushed to defend me, “It’s okay. You didn’t know. How could you? Should we try growing it?”

<Go for it. All this talk is meaningless if we can’t even grow it right? Gimme.> I sent her an image of me growing hands and snapping my fingers at her.

Startling a laugh with that, she floated over to me and let go of a shining teardrop I hadn’t noticed she had been holding in her body. It fell slower than I felt it should have, like gravity was a thing it deigned to obey only when it so chose and entered my puddle with only a small ripple. I tried to push Essence into it but could not get the energy to pass through the surface. With a disappointed sigh, I tried to collect the purest, most dense energy I had into an orb around the seed. Then turning back to the other matters at hand, I quizzed Dani on how to go about making a Boss monster.

She hesitated. “Let’s move you to the last room. Then we will talk.”

I remembered how hard it had been to move myself the first time and mentally winced. I focused on my pillar and tried to start the process. To my surprise, I moved smoothly and soundlessly.

<Why is this so easy?> I was having so much fun I started moving faster, zipping through the tunnels in an ecstatic blur. <This is so fun!>

“Ha-ha!” she laughed, flying along behind me. “It’s due to you being in your body this time! Last time you were going along uninfluenced ground outside, and you were dragging yourself along. Now, in your influence, you control all of this!”

<Awesome!> Disappointedly reaching the final room, I slowed and put myself near the back, and with Dani directing me, I raised a small hill of stone around my pillar, leaving a hole in the exact center leading down to me and my puddle. With my Core better hidden and protected, I listened to Dani tell me how to make my Boss.

“Start by making the strongest monster you know how to,” Dani directed. Quickly forming a poisonous Shroomish, I waited for further instructions. “Well, this process is pretty much the same as when you accidentally made your first monster. Basically, you just feed it more and more Essence until it reaches a point of evolution where it is as strong as you can make it. At your current rank, your Boss monster will become a G-rank nine if you give it everything it can take.”

Her instructions seemed… lacking. <Got it. That’s it? Just pump it full of Essence? Seems a bit anticlimactic.>

“I know, I know.” She sighed at her lack of clear explanation, “Well, when you get stronger or learn more about magic or enchantments, even powerful creatures or plants, you will be able to direct the growth how you want it to go.”

<Well, I’ll look forward to that, then.> I started pushing Essence into the Shroomish and watched as it was greedily absorbed. Watching carefully as it started changing, I continued putting in energy until I suddenly felt like a wall had popped up between my power and what had previously been a simple Shroomish. It began growing at an exponential rate, the power funneling into different areas of the plant in ways I would have never expected. The process slowed down, but spiky thorns began protruding from the stalk. They dripped with poison, and the gill-like ridges under the cap were holding spores that would be released in clouds when it was fighting.

“Okay, that looks cool. Can I name it?” Dani excitedly pleaded.

<Sure, I’m glad, actually. I was coming up with blanks. What do you have for me?> I cheerfully responded.

“How about ‘Dire Shroom: Bane’?” Dani offered.

<Awesome! How will people know what it is named though? Does it matter?> Even if it were just for us, I still liked the name.

“Well, cultivators can use analysis magic to study things—similar to how we can—to check a Mob’s information and what it can do. When they do so, it will show the name of the monster and any abilities that they know about. If they were to analyze it before it was dead, all they see is a name and its cultivation rank,” explained Dani.

That was a handy tidbit to know! <You are just a fount of knowledge, aren’t you! So I’m guessing that we just… leave him be?> I peered at the rustling form of Bane.

Dani puffed up with pride. “Yup, and he’ll only get stronger the longer he is alive. Bane is strong enough to cultivate on his own. By the way, the title ‘Dire’ is applied to a really strong version of a creature. I didn’t come up with that. Anyway. Let’s move on to the other Mobs, and then the traps, shall we?”

<Great!> Moving as fast as we could, we evolved several new creatures. One of the mushrooms with healing benefits grew barbed spikes but on the inside. They didn’t attack, but if stepped on, they would send the spike right through the top of the plant, jamming into the foot. Once there, the healing properties would kick in, sealing the spike into healthy meat. If someone tried to pull it out or step away, it would tear their flesh, creating a much larger wound.

Even the moss turned into tiny grasping vines which would snag on to any objects moving by. The barbs on them would scratch and tear at whatever they connected to, hopefully dragging prey down. While not very dangerous by themselves, if someone were to fall into the other Mobs nearby, it could become very deadly. More of a support style Mob, I guess.

Switching to traps, we lined the tunnels with pitfalls—very thin stone that would crumble when stepped on. When fallen through, spikes at the bottom made from quartz would penetrate the flesh and shatter, dealing even more damage and causing wounds to become infected. I also put spikes in the wall, similar to the pitfalls. If someone leaned on the wall, they would fall through and into the spikes. Rock falls in the ceiling would be triggered when people stepped on certain areas that were pressure sensitive. On a whim, I made mushrooms grow around the base of the spikes in the pitfalls, hopefully adding a poison effect when people fell on to them.

Dani sounded tired when she finally called it a night for us, “Well, I think that will do for now. I don’t think there are many more things for us to do except, well, how about you do some decorating. Let’s add some inlay and embellish the entryway. We are still at the bottom of a crevasse, but I think that we should start to make ourselves look good before people find us.” Dani looked around with a critical eye. “Eventually, we will make stairs down to where we are when we are really confident that you can protect yourself.”

<Works for me. How do you want it to look?> Making things ‘pretty’ didn’t matter to me so much. I’d help her decorate if she wanted though.

“However it is appealing you, maybe some geometric patterns, or loops or knots.” She trailed off into silence for a moment. “Whatever you like.”

We worked out a few basic ideas and, within an hour, had some basic patterns surrounding the entrance. It looked nice, and with the soft blue glow coming out the door, it would be hard to mistake the entryway for a regular cave.

Chapter Five

“Well, something had to cause it!” broadcasted an angry bearded man. “I lost half my flock. Maybe some meteoric iron is laying around? The whole damn mountain nearly fell over.”

“Stop whining! We all lost part of our herd,” a swarthy man walking beside the bearded one firmly demanded. “You know the dangers of living in the Phantom Mountains. Death is everywhere.” This drew nods from the people around them.

A small group of sheepherders was walking along a sloping mountainside, sunshine streaming around them as they searched for the source of their sudden misfortune. The grass they were walking through was waist high, and while the day was beautiful and clear, the forest around the base of the mountain range visible from this lofty vantage, the mood was ruined by the incessant yammering of the bearded man named Tim.

A fresh-faced young man decided to input his thoughts, “Well, we are on a plain currently, right? Maybe when we get to higher ground, we will be able to see where it hit.”

“Maybe you’ll learn to keep your mouth shut when your betters are talking,” Tim sniped nastily.

“Elder, maybe,” murmured the swarthy man. “Better…?”

You got something to say?!” snarled Tim, turning aggressively on the man standing next to him.

“I think it is late, and we grow hungry,” the swarthy man appeased the bulky form that was Tim. “Let’s set up camp and return to our search in the morning. The sun will soon set as it is.”

Fine,” Tim grumbled. “Why not just give someone else the treasure while you are at it?” Throwing down his bag, he pulled out a bedroll and lay on the ground while the others set up camp.

The swarthy man eyed Tim. “Since you decided to rest while we worked, you can have the ‘pleasure’ of taking first shift this evening.”

“Eat shit.”

The swarthy man blew out some air in frustration, closing his eyes and taking a few deep breaths. “Tim, contribute, or we’ll leave you to search on your own.”

After staring at the other man for a few moments, Tim finally conceded with poor grace, “Whatever.”

After dinner, the small camp wound down. The other men talked for a while, mainly about sheep, weather, and life in their semi-nomadic village. Slowly they fell into a light slumber with a still-angry Tim keeping guard.

Walking around the campsite to stay awake, Tim kept up a low, grumbling complaint until the light had faded to darkness in that peculiarly rapid way which seemed to happen on mountains. Shortly after twilight had faded to true darkness, Tim was making his way around camp for what ‘must have been the hundredth time, those heartless bastards’, when he saw a soft gathering of light emanating from the edge of the plain they were sleeping on. Moving to examine it, he found light flowing from a crevasse just past an unmarked grave that seemed to give off an unnatural chill.

“Well, would you. Look. At. That.” His eyes were gleaming with the light of greed. “Looks like I found me some treasure.” He set about searching for a way to the bottom, but the sides were simply too sheer for him to scale. With mounting disappointment and a realization that he was going to have to wake up the others and share his find, he returned to the group and roused them from their slumbers with kicks and curses. Furiously, they started yelling at him but quickly calmed when he pointed out the glow. Anger turning to excitement, the group moved toward the hole in the ground and looked for a safe way down but, with frustration, decided they would need to wait till morning if they wanted to survive the descent.

Hours later, when the sun achieved its lofty placement on the horizon known as dawn, the men reeled out the rope ladders that highlanders always brought into new areas. Slipping the ladders down the side, they found that after only thirty feet or so, they reached the ground once more. Securing the ladders as best as they could, which was very well, they started their own descent. One by one, they got to the bottom, the first down trying hard to hold his enthusiasm in check as he waited for the rest. A total of five men stood before the cave entrance and deliberated about what to do.

“What is it?”

“You think it is a Beast lair?”

“Don’t be foolish. They would never make that kind of art around the edges. It’s some old city ruins!”

“Well,” began the fresh-faced young man excitedly, “do you think it might be a dungeon?”

Turning to face him, Tim condescendingly talked down to him, “No, you moron, you think we would be the first to find a dungeon? The Adventurers’ Guild pays a huge amount of money to scouts who find them. How could they miss this? It freaking glows. Keep your mouth shut when your betters are talking.”

“Looks like the best way to find out what it is would be to enter it, don’t you think?” the swarthy man supposed.

“Looks like.” The group walked through the entryway, noting the abundance of mushrooms immediately.

“Are those redcaps? Those are good eating. Never seen ‘em so big before.”

“Careful not to mix ‘em with those white ones. They are poisonous I think. I know the medicine man wanted some to make an antidote a few years back.”

“Do you feel that?” prompted the young man.

Tim growled, rounding on him. “What now?”

“The air, it is so… clean. I feel healthier than I have in years.”

“Me too. The ache in my bum knee is fading fast too.”

“My shoulder feels nice.”

“Hey, look. Even Tim doesn’t look like such a sourpuss.”

The men laughing at his expense, of course, had the sneer right back on his face, and Tim’s glare shot daggers at the young man like it was the young man’s fault the group was laughing at him. They decided to explore the cave a bit more, as it seemed well-lit and to collect some ‘shrooms on the way out. By chance, they walked past each of the Mobs without rousing any of them and had gone through the tunnel far enough that the second room was visible before tragedy stuck.

“Ahh!” screamed one of the men as his foot went directly through the floor. He fell forward, his body vanishing for only a few moments before a wet crunch and a whimper floated up from below.

“Are you alright?”

“Can you hear us?”

“Where are you?!” The men clustered around the hole in the floor, trying to establish contact with their fallen comrade. They lit a torch and held it over the opening in time to see and smell their friend void his bowels in his death throes.

“Disgusting.” Tim sneered.

Shocked looks were thrown his way as the remaining men discussed what to do. The words ‘heartless asshole’ were heard a few times as well. They had very little extra rope and no way to lift him from the crevasse. The decision was made that they would need to come back with rope the next day to lift him from his resting place, after informing any family he might have. They turned to leave when Tim’s voice reminded them that they were here for a reason.

“You can all turn and run from a weak floor if you like, but I’m going nowhere empty-handed. If you leave, you forfeit any right to your share, I tell you right now,” Tim announced firmly. These were practical men, and life was hard in the mountains. While they were shocked at the death, they knew Tim was right. Each of them hardening their hearts, they moved more carefully, unknowingly following Tim deeper into terrible danger. Death was everywhere in the Phantom Mountains.

Tim moved carefully, testing the floor with each step, hand against the wall for balance. Once, the floor crumbled, and the men laughed with nervous tension as Tim yelped and jumped back. Making their way into the second room, they saw it was similar to the first, filled with mushrooms and other plant life.

“Well, would you look at that?” the swarthy man breathed. He held up his torch, the light reflecting off something on the wall. “Well, men, I’d say we are going to become very rich. Unless I miss my guess, that is native iron. We’re looking at the future site of an iron mine!”

With exclamations of joy, the other men whooped and shouted! This wasn’t for nothing! Their livelihoods were saved, and they were going to become rich, influential men. Hearts much lighter, they followed Tim deeper in, almost throwing caution to the wind. This time, the swarthy man took the lead, testing the floor, keeping balance against the wall, and saved them twice when the floor gave way and when a large rock suddenly fell from the ceiling.

Entering the third room, they saw no metals, so went directly toward the adjacent tunnel. One of the men lost his boot when it got stuck in a clump of weeds and moss that must have hidden a hole. Testing their weight each step, they made it through the last tunnel without any major issues.

“What in the world is that?”

“What?”

“It’s a big-ass mushroom! Look at the size of that thing! It must come up to my hip!”

“I don’t see any more metal, but at least we’re gonna eat well tonight.” The fourth man laughingly walked toward the giant, red capped mushroom, intent on carving off a sizable chunk, when the young man gave an exclamation of horror.

“What?” Turning toward them, the man next to the mushroom never saw the mouth that closed around his torso, ripping him in half with a single bite.

Jumping back in terror saved the young man from the thorn that shot from the stalk of the mushroom, which instead embedded in the wall with a twang. Immediately shouting and vacating the room, they peeked back in to see if it were able to chase them. A glance at its stationary position convinced them that it wouldn’t follow, and a thorn the size of a hand whistling past his ear convinced the swarthy man that it was time to leave. The room was also becoming very bright, which they took to mean bad things were about to happen.

The remaining three moved quickly down the tunnels, retracing their steps and were in the second tunnel when a puff of something was inhaled by the swarthy man, reducing him to a coughing mess. Blinded by the tears streaming from his eyes, something caught his foot as they were crossing the second room.

The young man looked back to check on the swarthy man just as his head fell on to a light yellow mushroom, and a spike suddenly protruded from the back of his head with an organic tearing sound. Knowing that the fallen group member was already dead, the young man sped up to get behind Tim, who was leaving him behind without a glance. They raced to the entrance to the first room and stopped, breathing heavily as they tried to make their minds stop spinning from the trauma they had witnessed.

“This… this is for sure a dungeon,” Tim rasped, half laughing, half gasping. “I’m going to be so… so rich.”

The young man’s head snapped up at Tim’s comment. “What? What about me?”

Shaking his head, Tim angrily turned away from the lad and viewed the room. “Boy, do I have to tell you again to shut your mouth when your betters is talkin’? Do you even understand how much this is going to change my life? What would you be going to do with the money anyway? Better to let me take care of this, you stupid–”

With fire in his eyes, the young man watched the mushrooms devour the man he had just shoved into them. “You were never my better, just older than me. Much older. Also, my name is Dale, you jerk.” He left the cave and started home quickly, preparing to become a very, very rich man.

Chapter Six

I watched with great excitement as the first explorers walked into my depths. I watched them stop and was horrified for a moment when I thought they were about to turn back. Then they turned and walked right into the garden! Each step was almost close enough for an attack, but they somehow didn’t ever quite move within reach. A man stepping quickly never even saw a Shroomish miss its bite at an ankle. My disappointment kept ramping up as each trap was just… walked around! Not one plant got an attack off, no traps were working… until suddenly one did. A man shrieked and fell on to the spikes! The others exploded into motion, trying to see what had happened to him. They lit a torch and somehow missed seeing the reflective spikes in their haste to find a way to save the man.

Suddenly, though, their concerns didn’t matter to me anymore.

The dead man’s Essence blasted into me, more varied and elaborate than any I had ever had the pleasure of enjoying before. The power was so vast that it was simply impossible for me to contain it. Fire, water, air, earth, celestial, and infernal—all the basic Essences—were pouring into me and processing themselves. He released raw, unstable, pure Essence into my Core and into the world around me as it overflowed.

Dani tried to help, “Cal! Try and collect it in a shell around you! Make a larger body for yourself!”

Through the pain of my vibrating body, I listened to her words, forming perfect facets of pure energy around me. Nearly doubling in size, my new body had barely solidified into a perfect, comparatively empty gem when I felt the second man die. His life force flamed into me, filling my newly improved Core to the brim with energy. I was able to look out into my dungeon and see Bane chewing on something when the third rush filled my Core. I tried to solidify the outpouring energy into a larger crystalline system, but it wasn’t working!

<Dani, what do I do?!> I screamed, the pain making my vision strobe.

“Push it out! Release the Essence out into your body, the dungeon!” Dani shouted back.

Nearly smacking myself for not thinking of it, I sprayed the condensed Essence out of me, allowing it to accumulate in the air as my vaporous, Essence-rich influence.

“They made it to the entrance, you should be okay, Cal,” Dani stated with obvious relief. I felt the fourth man die at that moment, and as the Essence ripped through me, I focused on pushing the overflow out as hard as possible. The thick energy already pouring out of me condensed further, forming a beam that shot directly upward and out of me. The beam continued for several seconds until returning to a more mist-like form as I stopped having energies dumped into me.

<Ow,> I complained, an understatement if I had ever spoken one.

“Well, congratulations, my F-rank eight Cal. You survived your first dungeon dive,” Dani tiredly informed me. “See how lots of people dying around you can affect your rank?”

<I jumped in rank that much? Wow. Humans have a lot of Essence in them.> I was carefully monitoring the Essence I had gained.

“Yeah, they do. Good work. Um. How do you feel right now?” Dani inquired, oddly nervous for some reason.

<What do you mean? I feel good. Pretty full, I guess,> I offered questioningly.

Dani looked at me then did her version of a shrug, bobbing up and down a bit. “Well, I was just worried. People did just die in here, and I thought that you might be scared, horrified, or just plain upset.”

I considered this for a moment. <Well, this is what I need to do to get stronger, right? I don’t think that I have the same morals or values as flesh and blood creatures. It isn’t so much that I am happy they died, I am happy that I lived. I’m glad that I got stronger. The cost of it is just… the way it happens.>

Dani agreed. “It is what you are. You’re right. Always remember, the people that come here are risking their lives to get stronger and to get rich. It is a risk that many will not survive, but it is their own choices—and greed—that will drive them here.”

<I’ll remember, Dani.> I promised myself that I would try not to put my life on the line for greed.

“Good,” she stated firmly, “and by the way…”

<Yeah?> I prodded her to continue.

“The Silverwood tree sprouted!” she shouted, unable to contain herself any more.

<Wow, look at that!> The tiny seed had fragmented away from the plant, like an egg releasing a creature, only for the roots to absorb the solid Essence the shell had been composed of. The tiny roots glowed and started moving hungrily. Growing at a pace I was surprised at, the roots expanded outward, drinking the Essence that filled my puddle.

<Aww, my puddle,> I pouted sadly, trying not to let on how much I was actually worried.

“I’ll bring you more water, you whiner,” Dani grumbled at me. The roots quickly reached to bottom and were waving around looking for something. “Cal! Make dirt and open holes in the rock that the roots can go through! Hurry!”

I did as she asked, making strong, healthy, black soil under the rock of the small hill surrounding me and little holes that the roots shot toward like intelligent beings. I could always make the holes larger, so I decided not to let dirt get in and muddy up what was left of my poor puddle. The roots sank into the rich dirt and quickly burrowed in, seemingly finding their new home to their liking.

I was impressed by how many roots had grown. There had to be hundreds of tendrils extending from the tiny plant. If I were not in the midst of the root jungle, I would have mistakenly believed that the sapling above me was a regular plant, and no one looking at it from an angle would ever be able to see the advanced root system it had created in just a few minutes. Finally slowing, the minuscule sprout stood proudly, a full three inches tall. The roots must have been a few feet long each. Therefore, this was very misleading.

<What an odd plant.>

Dani chuckled at my understatement. “You aren’t kidding! Are you getting any information from it?”

<No, > I grumbled, <it must be beyond my understanding at this point.>

“Don’t worry about it too much, you have a lot of growing to do, after all. Things have been going really easily for you thus far. It is not overly surprising that you will be plateauing as you get older,” she explained cautiously. “Also, we need to talk about what happened during that fight!”

<Agreed. Why wasn’t I able to expand my Core when I was full of energy? That was really dangerous for me.>

“Well, not what I wanted to start with, but increasing in rank is not always just a matter of raw power. It requires forethought and insight into the world around you. As you grow in power, what you do can reshape the world. To achieve these insights, you need to fully understand what you are changing, how it will affect the world around you, and if you should do it.”

<Well, that is very profound,> I teased.

“True, though. When Mages use Essence to warp the universe, they are saying the true name of what they want and infusing it with their power. This is called an incantation and is the way they cast spells without objects. Now, words without power mean nothing, and power without knowledge is dangerous. All you knew to do was make your own body larger. You don’t know how to make power automatically direct itself or how to refine Essence further,” Dani wisely stated.

<Refine it further?> Wasn’t my Essence really pure, though?

“Yeah, Essence is only the most basic form of energy provided by the heavens and the earth. To break into the ‘B’ rank, you will need to learn to further refine Essence into Mana, to get into the S-rank you will need to learn about spiritual energy, and when we finally escape the SSS-rank and move into ‘Heavenly’, you will need to find a ‘fundamental’ energy,” Dani started a lecture as I silently groaned.

“To progress into the E-rank, you have to start the process that will activate your refinement. What is your energy doing right now, for instance?” she prompted leadingly.

<What do you mean? It is doing what it always does. Glowing while waiting for me to release it.> Even as I uttered the words, I knew it was the wrong answer but still the one she wanted to hear.

“Bwa-ha-ha!” she mockingly laughed. “This is why I, your Dungeon Wisp, am here for you, young one!”

<Oh wise leader,> I dryly replied, <please, share your hard-earned knowledge with this poor being.>

She chuckled evilly as she began, “Oh, you are gonna learn today. Start by releasing about half the energy you collected back into the air. You need to start less full than you are or it won’t work.” Apparently, what I needed to do next was to focus on my exact center—easy for me since I was perfectly symmetrical, thank you very much—and start spinning my Essence along the outer edge of my Core. After a few hours, I was able to get it swirling to Dani’s liking.

Next, I had to pull the absolute smallest thread I possibly could from the large swirl and pull it to my “center”. According to Dani, the center of a being was actually the center of their soul, where Essence would feed into their life-force. Therefore, the better the quality of the Essence, the stronger the life-force and the more robust the soul. Needless to say, I had to work for quite a while before Dani reluctantly allowed me to use the thread I had stretched. Everything before that quality was quickly rejected by her.

Connecting the incredibly fine strip of Essence to my center, I began to spin it in the opposite direction from the large swirl. As these competing swirls continued to spin, the fine inner center started to accumulate. Apparently, this process was called a “Chi spiral”—pronounced “Key spiral”, Dani told me haughtily.

The Chi spiral had several functions that helped to further process Essence. An individual’s Chi spiral was a vast amount of intricately knotted Essence; the more complex and complete the pattern woven into it, the more Essence it can hold and the finer the Essence would be refined. Dani compared this to packing clothes in a bag by stuffing them in versus neatly folding them and carefully placing for maximum storage capacity. The downside was that it took a long time for the Essence to be refined, but I was assured that as I became more practiced, it would become faster. On a positive note, the swirling light was absolutely gorgeous. The light moved and played along my facets, sending shimmering fluorescence across the ceiling above me. While beautiful, I hoped the tree above me would grow fast enough to soon hide the emanating light.

It took a lot of focus to keep swirling the Essence incongruently, but I was again assured that it would eventually become automatic to me. While my goal was to create a very complex Chi spiral, at this level, it was exhausting just to keep it moving at all. The important process started, we had some free time to discuss what had happened during the incursion by humans.

“The monsters in here need to be stronger, ranged, or able to move around. That group made it into the Boss room without having to fight a single time!”

<I know, but how can we make that happen? I’m not sure how to do that. I can’t direct their evolution.> I was a bit distracted by my need to keep my Essence swirling properly.

“I have a thought.” Dani gleefully chuckled. “You jumped all the way to the eighth rank in ‘F’, while your Boss stayed down at G-rank nine. I’m betting that you will be able to absorb him and make him a common monster at this point, though much smaller if you want several. Then we can start on a new Boss!”

I slowly acquiesced, ‘nodding’, <That’s a great idea! By the way, what should I do about the bodies of those humans?>

“Oh nasty, I had forgotten the smell.” She sneezed and shuddered.

<I don’t have a nose.>

“Lucky you. Just study them. As soon as you know how their bodies work, they will automatically dissolve into your influence. Easy-peasy cleanup. Oh! Let’s see if they had any gear with them!”

Now armed with the knowledge of how to make humans, I could easily have made skeletons or zombies to fight for me, but I just could not get over how upset a constant reminder of Necromancers would make me. Looking at the items they had with them, I learned how to make several new things: poor quality wool shirt, wool pants, rope, bone dagger, wool boots, wool belt, waterskin, and a leather bag.

There were also a few copper coins in the bag, which is when Dani explained how currency worked and had me make copper coins with the exact same imprint these had on them. I made them out of pure copper, though, not the low grade, shoddy copper alloy these were made of. I needed to have pride in my work, after all.

Dani went quiet for a moment, like she always did before having something interesting to say. “Let’s talk about loot.”

<Loot. Got it. What’s that?> I wanted to know, and she would always drag these conversations out to keep my full attention.

Surprising me, she jumped right in, “Loot is a payment system for defeating monsters. It helps distract adventures from taking everything they see and will guarantee that people will come back if they survive. Escalating the reward to more elaborate items for coming deeper in the dungeon increases the odds that you will have more opportunities to kill them off and become stronger.”

How would that work? <So I just litter the ground with trinkets?>

“No, and this is kinda cool. You know how you grow creatures with a ‘seed and pattern’?” She was amused by something. I nodded my assent, and she continued, “Well, the concept is the same, but you attach the ‘loot’ seed to the monster, and when it dies it triggers the ‘seed’ to grow. It is really funny to see because if you don’t know how it works, it makes no sense! Imagine someone accidentally squishing a patch of moss, and out pops a helmet! I bet they would scream! Haha!”

That sounded hilarious, and I could not wait to get started. She cautioned me not to make it too obvious to start, though and to try to make things properly. No dagger handles that had a boot instead of a blade for instance and to eventually try to make enchantments on items that made things worth the effort to obtain. Don’t put a dancing enchantment on a wand, put it on shoes, for example.

The smaller mushrooms could be used in potion-making and for food already, so I only attached coin loot seeds to them. Really, even my Bane could be mostly used as potion material—if they knew what they were doing—so I just gave him a larger coin value, and sometimes, he would drop sets of clothes or a dagger. I made the dagger better than what I had found, substituting iron for the bone blade. It was heavy and brittle but far more effective.

Next, it was time to absorb Bane and make more of him. Resisting a bit at first, he eventually gave up his energy, and I was able to study his pattern. Easily able to replicate it, I made several Dire Shroomish: Bane monsters in each room but the last. They were smaller and would only come up to the knee of the last group but were now the ranged attackers of my dungeon.

Now, it was time to make a new Boss. Since my last was at G-rank nine, and I could create one up to F-rank seven, this room was about to get significantly more dangerous. On Dani’s recommendation, I tried to combine the pattern of Bane with the patterns of other things I knew how to make. Each attempt at combining Bane with other mushrooms failed for some reason. Casting about for a way to understand this, no easy answer came to mind. Almost ready to scream with frustration, I was just about to pour energy into it in an attempt to force a natural evolution when my mind skittered over a Mob I didn’t know. Looking closer, I saw that a patch of the moss had upgraded itself when it had tripped a person and eaten part of his foot.

The new monster, Bloodmoss, could still do everything it had been able to—grasping, holding, and scratching—but had a new passive ability: Vampirism, Taste for Blood! Dani was characteristically excited that my monsters were getting stronger and told me that if they fought and won, the longer they stayed alive, the more powerful they would grow. Each eradication would flood me with energy, but a part of it would also go directly into the monster who helped with the kill. Since it wasn’t energy purified by me first, the Essence taken would alter the path of its growth. I decided to plant a few Bane Mobs on the ceiling, so they had less chance of dying during a fight.

“Vampirism, huh?” That is a really good ability, but you should be careful not to give it to too many creatures. Technically, it is an infernal alignment ability, and if you have too many demonic traits, the church may become… nervous and call for your destruction,” Dani warned me in a tone that brooked no argument.

<Yikes, yeah, how about we avoid that. Do you know what it does?> I requested.

“At this level, if it gets blood on it, the damage will heal a little, automatically repairing its pattern which will fix the Mob’s wound. If not damaged, it becomes a little stronger and harder to hurt. The higher levels have different effects, but you will need to reach them to know what they do. I’m not an expert on the infernal,” Dani recounted, thinking hard.

<Good to know. I’m gonna try something real quick.> Since grafting mushrooms on to Bane hadn’t worked, I tried with the moss. The pattern glowed in my mind, successfully building a new monster. Analyzing this pattern, I was surprised to see letters and numbers on it.

When I mentioned the numbers, Dani zipped over to congratulate me again. “Oh! You can use your viewing ability on abstract concepts now! Great, now you will know when you progress in rank and can view the cultivation base—or rank—of other creatures. The word you see on that pattern is how strong the monster will be once created. If it is one level below you, you can create it but not upgrade it.” She paused for breath. “If it is lower, you can attempt to use your Essence to make it stronger, though it may not always work.”

I made an educated guess, <Well, this guy is one rank below me. Can I make him into my Boss monster?>

“Okay, but remember that if it is one rank below you, it will be really hard to absorb it back if you don’t like how it turns out,” she unnecessarily warned me.

<Yes, dear.>

“I don’t nag you. I explain,” she huffed with a glare.

I focused hard on the pattern, for the first time infusing it with the refined version of Essence from my Chi spiral. This had an interesting effect, as the fine energy went exactly where I wanted it to instead of filling the entire template with diffuse energy. It took about eighty-five percent of the power I thought it would, and Dani told me this was because I was being more efficient. I planted the ‘Seed’ on to the ground and watched as it sprouted into a scary mushroom.

It reached its full height around chest level for the men that died here and was very similar to the Bane except for a few minor details. A carpet of moss spread out from its base, and I saw it flexing into ropey groups that would be able to grab prey and pull it into an effective attack range. It also had the Vampirism effect, so attacking would greatly benefit the monster. Its name? Dire Shroomish: Bloody Bane. I could hardly wait to see it fight.

Chapter Seven

Dale had returned home with the sad news of the deaths of his comrades, citing a landslide which buried all of them. The recent events and his guileless, lightly bearded face meant he had no issues convincing the townsfolk of his sincerity. He shed tears from soulful, brown eyes for the lost men… while at the same time selling everything he owned. With the money gained, he purchased the empty parcel of land containing the dungeon—claiming it would be good grazing for the sheep he was planning to buy. His claim to the land secure, he sent a letter to the Adventurers’ Guild, announcing that he had found a new dungeon and was willing to allow adventurers to come into it for a percentage of the yearly profit it brought in. Since this was the standard agreement, he had no trouble enticing a small party to travel from the Guild and appraise its value.

Within a few weeks, a group of four travel-worn individuals had arrived in the small village. Quite an event to have any travelers at all, this far into the mountains, people were shocked to see not only armored knights, but an Elf in the group! Every courtesy was extended, but they only accepted a bath and a hot meal. After meeting with the elders, the group found Dale and got the mostly unedited version of events that had transpired from him, without the murder coming up for some reason.

Without even bothering to stay the night in the cramped village, Dale and the group started off immediately into the mountain, hurrying to the entrance but failing to make it by nightfall. Camping a few miles from the entrance, the men explained that sleeping in the vicinity of a dungeon with only a small group was tantamount to suicide, as monsters tended to be drawn to the energy emitted from even weak places of power.

“So what are you guys actually going to do when you get there?” Dale quizzed them.

“Well,” pronounced the large man with plate armor, looking uncomfortably at the men around him, “when we first came, it was to assess the value, but after hearing that a brand-new area has already been able to kill four men, we decided to destroy it. If it is this strong and was not here when the scout came through only a decade or so ago, it is likely that it has some kind of infernal origin. The reports of our scouts killing a coven of Necromancers in the area about that time give credit to this.”

“But this was supposed to be my new source of income! I sold everything I own to make sure this land was ready for you!” Dale pronounced, face draining of color. “I’m ruined.” He sank to the ground, head in his hands.

“Ach,” an easy-going Guild member tisked at Dale. “Lad, take it easy. The Guild will pay you ten gold for your trouble and five each year after that for the rest of your life. That is what it is worth to us to stop Demon wars.”

“Ten gold…?” Dale breathed. In the mountain, that was enough to live like a lord for a solid decade. For two gold and a small bribe, he could likely buy the whole mountain since there was so little worth to the land. It was harsh and nearly impassable, especially in winter.

“Ten gold… up front, before we go into the lair. If we decide that the dungeon does not need to be destroyed, we’ll be wanting that back, but we will leave you half as a down payment.”

“O-of course! Not that I think a small place such as this would be able to hurt any of you, certainly,” Dale stammered.

Laughing, the other men agreed with him and started a watch rotation, settling in for the night. When dawn broke, they continued on their way to the crevasse.

“Oh yeah, look at this. Some old mountain lion tracks here, bear there, and even a few goats, lots of rabbit tracks too. Look a bit old, though. We may have been alright sleeping here,” guild man number three—as Dale thought of him—informed them, pointing out the tracks as he called them out.

“Should I know your names?” blurted Dale suddenly. By the furtive glances and shaken heads, he assumed the answer was no.

“I’m guessing we are close to the entrance? I am feeling an uptick in ambient Essence.” The smooth voice of the Elf broke the awkward silence.

“Very close, it is right over here. I left the rope ladders to help us and brought an extra just in case–” Stopping mid-sentence, his eyes nearly burst from his head as he saw that the crevasse was no longer a hole in the ground with sheer walls but a solid looking, spiral, stone staircase leading to the depths.

“Well, that makes it easy.” The Elf stepped forward, and after a brief look of concentration, pronounced the stairs safe to use.

“It’s like an invitation!” Dale declared nervously.

“That is exactly what it is,” the large man replied ominously. “Stay here, Dale. Keep all this money safe for us, okay?” He poured a small sack of clinking coins into Dale’s hand. “We will be right back.” The group started their incursion into the dungeon, weapons coming out and slowly beginning to shine with accumulated Essence.

Coming into the garden room, the group waited in formation, studying everything in their path.

The cold, logical voice of the Elf began cataloging his surroundings as soon as they entered, “Mushrooms and moss, some good for making antidotes, one a needed ingredient in weak health restoration potions, a few monsters with unknown yet weak abilities. But that, men, is why we are here.” The Elf pointed at a reddish patch of moss growing innocently in the garden.

“What is it?”

“Bloodmoss,” the Elf grimly alerted them. “It is a known component in infernal potions and enchantments. If purified, it makes some of the most high-grade, non-magical bandages that can be produced. The issue is, it needs concentrated infernal Essence to gain the vampirism-style ability it almost certainly has.”

All sense of relaxation gone, the men set about systematically destroying every living thing in the room. Within just a few minutes, only a few charred scraps remained. A few copper coins suddenly rained to the ground.

“Bribery will not save you from your despicable ways,” a taciturn man with a glowing holy symbol on his chest announced in a ringing tone. “Onward!”

Quickly moving on, they expertly destroyed or evaded every trap in the tunnel and gave the same treatment to the next rooms and tunnels until they were in the Boss room. As they stepped in, with the large man holding a tower shield in front of them for cover, the over-zealous cleric boldly stepped forward, proud of their easy travel to this point and ready to finish the mission. The smile left his face as he was pulled to the floor, a vine dragging him quickly to the center of the room.

“What? This is a G-ranked dungeon. How did it sneak up on me?” he shrieked, fighting to secure a handhold on the too-smooth floor. The others sprang into motion, moving to his rescue as a large thorn pinged off the shield. Despite the sneak attack and the subsequent battle, the strength of the Boss was nowhere near enough to even dent their armor.

With only a few slashes of a sword and a quick flash of fire, the Boss crumbled to the ground and was mostly reabsorbed, all but a few coins and useful parts of the mushroom. Studying the body before it vanished, the Elf grimly noted the vampirism ability it had before noticing its cultivation rank in shock.

“This was an F-rank seven Boss! Where did that come from? Did anyone else see monsters above G-rank nine?” A round of negatives followed his question as he kept an eye on the shroom. The large man maintained that he had found where the Core was hidden but that there was a plant in the way. “Carefully get it out of your way, then–” Looking up, the Elf saw the plant in question as a sword was drawn back to cut it out of the way.

As the sword came down, a blast of wind knocked the burly man away.

“Oh-ho! Looks like it had another trick up its sleeve!” the big man said, brushing off dirt and springing upright.

“That was me.” The Elf was walking over unnervingly calmly and quickly inspected the small tree. “Whew. Just in time! If I had let you cut that tree, I would have had to declare war on your Kingdom on behalf of my race.”

“You whaaa?”

“Look carefully. That is a Silverwood sapling,” the Elf stated, calm in a way that terrified the human men. This was the sort of calm shown only to enemies directly before their annihilation.

“Y-you don’t say…” The large man nervously chuckled. “Forgive me, I have never seen one before. I will dig it up so that we can move it to a suitable location.”

“If you are able to find a way to do that, you will have to show me,” the oddly flat voice resounded from the Elf, “because untold generations of Elves have been unable to find a way to do it. Which is why we build cities where we find them, not the other way around. I think it is safe to say this is not an infernal dungeon. That kind of Essence would stunt its growth severely, and this one, though young, is vibrantly healthy. I’d say our mission is complete, though I need to put protections in place for this tree. After all,” his face jerked upward, staring hard at a point near the ceiling, “if anything were to happen to the tree, I am sure the Elven-kind would destroy everything nearby in an attempt to find what had happened,” he blandly stated to apparently no-one.

The others looked at each other in worry and confusion but did nothing that may upset the powerful Mage. As per his instructions, they moved while he cast powerful protective magic on the tree and handed over a gold coin, a silver coin, and a small, high quality, honed steel dagger. The large man was grumbling at this until he was smacked in the head and pointedly glared at by the final member of their party. These items were placed on the floor in the room, and the Elf moved to usher them out.

The cleric made a pointed, haughty noise in his throat. “I cannot, in good faith, leave this place until I have ascertained for myself that this is not a place of darkness.” He pulled his glowing holy symbol off his neck and held it by the chain. “I will be placing this near that dungeon Core. If it is evil, god’s might will smite it. I will not allow even the specter of war stop me from doing this.”

A smirk appeared on the Elven face. “Go for it. Heh.”

Eying the Elf, the cleric slipped the pendant down into the hole, skillfully maneuvering around the many roots just visible. At the furthest effective range he could manage, he chanted a prayer and waited a moment. When nothing apparently happened to the gem, he apprehensively began to speak, “Well, it seems that you were correct my frie–” In horror, he looked at the small amount of chain remaining in his hand that he had pulled out of the hole. “My pendant!” Furiously whirling on the Elf, he said, “You knew that would happen!”

With an innocent look on his face, the Elf defended himself, “Well, I thought my manner was sufficient warning, but, well…”

Three of the men started laughing loudly at the protestations of the cleric—until they stepped into the first room where a small mushroom was innocently awaiting them.

The large man spoke quietly, “I thought we had cleared this room.”

“We did,” grunted the cleric, the first non-complaint in several minutes.

An arrow thunked into the mushroom, rendering it into pulp in an instant.

*Clink* *Clink* *Clatter* *Thud*

Announcing the fall of a gold coin, a silver coin, a steel dagger, and a shining pendant on a chain, the noises were the only ones heard for several seconds.

“How the…?” a confused voice.

“My pendant!” a joyful voice.

“My money!” a greedy voice.

“Oh, dear. It is a fast learner,” a soft voice.

Chapter Eight

I was terrified when these people destroyed my first room in a blaze of fire. I should never have made it so easy to get down. I just really had a thing for the spiral staircase ever since Dani had suggested it. It was such a cool idea, and it would allow animals to get down here. Obviously, I needed to start upgrading my monsters; these people were spooky.

<Dani… I think they are going to kill me,> I uttered slowly when the strange looking man talked about my Bloodmoss.

“It’ll be okay, Cal. Can you tell what rank they are?” Dani replied soothingly.

<No, I just visualize an ‘X’ when I try to analyze them. I can’t analyze their gear either… What is going on?> I demanded, voice low and scared. I liked to understand things.

“The gear makes sense; their aura would protect it unless it got too far away from them. Oh! I never told you about auras! You see, when an aura is present, you can’t affect things in the same way. Their Essence flows in such a manner that it interrupts your control in the area. That’s why you need monsters and traps, else you could just eat them directly. Every living creature has an aura—just so you know. Even you! Your aura is the size of your dungeon but is disparate in any given area. Hence why theirs will block your control,” She paused a moment, “but you can’t read their aura at all? Nothing? No information whatsoever? I’ll go look.” She zipped away, her light fading to invisibility.

I was suitably impressed. “Wow, where did you learn that?”

“I get stronger when you doooo,” her sing-song voice echoed back to me. A few minutes later, she appeared in front of yours truly, obviously upset. “Cal, the humans are C-ranked, and the Elf is B-ranked. We might be in real trouble.”

<What can we do?> I was determined to make it through this trial.

Her voice was lowered to an almost-whisper, “Hope they get bored and go home?”

I growled at her, <Not super useful, thanks.>

“I… wish I were joking. They could kill us without any effort at all. Stay quiet, and maybe they will not look for you?” She pretended to be hopeful, though she was obviously overly optimistic.

They were just about to enter my final room, so I directed the Boss to attempt a sneak attack. It worked! Then… it didn’t. I heard them talking but couldn’t focus past my terror. A face appeared in the hole over me! AHH! The man raised a sword… and fell over with an ‘oomph’! Finally, able to hear their conversation properly, I was amazed that the tree offered me so much protection. When the Elf looked directly at Dani, though she was invisible, I knew his veiled threat was actually for me.

“If anything were to happen to the tree, I am sure the Elven-kind would destroy everything nearby in an attempt to find what had happened.”

Shuddering, I watched as they cast magic and left a few offerings. One of them even fed me a symbol with celestial Essence infused in it! I filed the enchantment on it away for future reference. As they left, Dani spoke up.

“I cannot believe that just happened. All of that to give you tribute?” She started laughing, the previous feeling of impending death moving away.

I shushed her, my concentration too honed to be polite. <Hold on, I’m trying to finish these.>

Obviously affronted at my lack of happiness, she demanded, “What are you doing? Celebrate with me!”

<Attach it to a Shroomish…> I mumbled. <Done. Whew. I wasn’t able to activate the thing, but he seemed really sad that I ate his necklace. I gave them all a copy of what they gave me in tribute.> I felt really weak right now. Their auras had made it difficult for me to put the mushroom back in the room, especially when they were getting so close to it.

“… You never cease to amaze me, Cal,” Dani declared. “For a dungeon, you are surprisingly giving. That Elf was right; you are a really fast learner. Also, for being a low level, you are really adept at making monsters perform better than their rank should allow. Concepts come easy, and you are able to absorb every type of Essence…” She started mumbling too quietly for me to hear.

<What? I’m just trying to do the correct thing for us. Starting a feud with the church sounded like a terrible idea.> She had told me that the church was powerful, after all. Did she mean a different church?

“Politics too, now. Cal… do you have any memories that are…? Before you became a dungeon?” she prodded, looking hopeful yet still worried.

A flash of a knife, pain, filthy Necromancers…

<Just little flashes,> I admitted. <Is that out of the norm?>

“There is no way,” she muttered, “Cal, were you a… human?”

I considered. The Elf had seemed too foreign so…<Yeah. I think so at least.>

“Oh wow. Oh boy, oh boy.” Swooping around the room, Dani was trying to process this new development. “Cal, how did this never come up? This explains so much.”

<It does?! Great! Um, I guess it didn’t come up because I don’t really remember anything and it didn’t seem important?> I voiced weakly, knowing this answer wouldn’t work for her.

Dani stopped flying and looked right at me. “This is very, very important. Let me explain. Unlike beasts, animals, and plants, humans and other close relations like Elves or Dwarves have the ability to use all kinds of Essence. While they may have a greater affinity for one or the other, they are made of all of them, so can use them all to some extent if they have the training.”

Well, that cleared up a few things. <So, that is how my Bloodmoss got infernal energy?>

She bobbed vigorously. “Yes, and it also explains why you can absorb all of them without ill effects! I still don’t know how you can get rid of the corruption, but we will… figure it out.” Enlightenment touched her. “Cal! That is why it is so easy for you to learn some things! Words and concepts especially! It is because you are re-learning them!”

I was watching her insane flying and weaving with a bit of concern for her mental well-being. <Dani, you need to tell me why this is such a big deal.>

“You are unique! That’s why! Remember how I told you dungeon Cores were usually naturally occurring? The gem always forms first, and usually, a Beast who dies nearby, or maybe a strong animal, gets pulled in entirely by accident.”

<But Kantor could talk. He wasn’t a human?> He had certainly sounded human or at least more intelligent than a simple animal.

She moved around in a pattern I had associated with a negative. “Nope, he was actually an Alpha Dire Wolf when he died. It took him something like fifty years to learn how to ‘talk’ in a way that humans and other sentients could understand.”

I wanted to know more about Kantor, but I needed to know about myself. <Okay, I get it, but why is this such a shock to you?> My single process mind finally broke through her babbling.

She was almost too riled up to answer me directly. “Humans never get pulled into Beast Cores! It doesn’t happen! It never has, Cal!”

<I… don’t think I was pulled into a Beast Core. Do the words ‘soul gem’ mean anything to you? I think I was trapped in one by those disgusting Necromancers.>

She squealed a bit. “That makes perfect sense! Oh. My. Gosh, Cal! We have so much to learn! Imagine, ME being the first Wisp to be bonded with a cunning, human-soul dungeon! We are going to get SO famous.”

Well, when she puts it like that… I ‘grinned’. <You know it.>

Chapter Nine

We decided we probably had some time before people delved into my depths again. I was particularly nervous that another group would come in soon, due to every living thing in my dungeon except me, Dani, and the Silverwood tree being dead and reduced to ash when the jerks—I mean the scouting group—had come through. It was not too hard to make new Mobs and plants, but each one took some energy to produce. Without a source of ready Essence to replenish me, I had to go really slowly.

<This sucks.> I definitely did not whine.

Dani had heard this, or a variant thereof, rather frequently in recent times. “You are just grumpy because you are hungry. Why don’t you eat some granite? Mm-mm, tasty earth Essence!”

<It takes too long.> I huffed. <I’m not grumpy.>

“We used to call it ‘hangry’. It means angry because of hunger. How is the first room going?” She tried to divert my attention to happy thoughts.

It didn’t work. <It’s going. The stupid plants are too small for me to eat without killing them, and I can’t eat the Mobs because they need all their stupid Essence if some stupid person comes in here.>

She rolled in the air, her equivalent of an eye roll. “Definitely not grumpy. I’m surprised all of your grumbling didn’t start another earthquake.”

Not dignifying her comment with a response, I focused all my waning power on increasing the number of Mobs in the first room. I had made ‘biting’ Shroomish more populous, remembering how people were just walking through without having to fight at all and included a few of the ranged Bane types where the biters were especially thick. I felt good about the strength contained in the first room but thus far had been unable to even grow moss in the remaining rooms.

<Instead of making fun of me, how about you go find me some new plants? The last time you did it, it really paid off by me not dying, after all.> I did not grump at her.

“Fair enough. I could use a break from Mr. Grumpy-face.” She zipped away, her retreating form shouting, “Take a nap!”

<You know I can’t nap, rude little firefly,> I rumbled after her. She was way too far away to hear me, but I swear I heard her chuckle. Brat. I switched to absorbing energy from the rocks and metals in my influence, but I swore I was getting less than I had ever before. Keeping my Chi spiral going was starting to get easier but still took a bit more concentration than I liked. Pulling hard on the energy sources, I was able to regain a trifling amount of Essence. I was sitting far below what I felt comfortable with, but this process simply took a lot of time. Twilight was falling outside when Dani returned.

“Nothing too special this time, Cal, sorry,” Dani started, “I did get some flower seeds and a few more herbs that smell really good. Let’s see, I got basil, parsley, and some… mint I think? Not really scary, I know, but you are starting to smell a bit.” She tested my mood jokingly.

<Sounds good, Dani. Sorry I was so grumpy. I guess you were right,> I apologized sheepishly. <The last few hours of eating helped a lot.>

“Aww, thank you.” Dani flew over and dropped the seeds and herbs in front of me to make it easier for me to study them. Within a few minutes, I had made copies and planted them along the tunnels. That would freak a few people out. I chuckled at the thought. ‘Oh no, basil! Look out, it’s mint!’ Maybe I would get lucky, and someone would be allergic to them and die from a bad reaction.

<Heh,> I chuckled, projecting accidentally.

Dani glanced over. “Hmm?”

<Oh nothing, just thinking. These are going to look really good Dani. Thank you for getting them. They are going to be really colorful, by the way. I figured out how to mix a few attributes of the seeds together.>

“I knew you would like them!” She beamed, then whispered, “Narcissist.”

I gasped at the unexpected attack. <I am not!>

“Well, you do spend all day every day looking at yourself soooo…” she teased me.

I played along, <It is as far as I can see, rude-oh!>

The friendly banter continued for a bit until Dani got sleepy and flew over to the ledge she tended to rest on. As a living creature, she still had to sleep occasionally. For the rest of the night, I focused on growing plants. Mint grew like a literal weed, covering anything I gave it access to very quickly. The basil grew a bit slower but had much thicker leaves and was quite a bit hardier. The flowers blossomed, adding splashes of color around my otherwise somewhat monochromatic dwelling. And each of these plants gave off a heady aroma, which is what eventually awoke Dani.

“Mmmm something smells good. You making me breakfast?” She yawned.

I smiled at the thought of me trying to cook. <No, but go fly around and tell me what you think! I grew all those seeds you gave me.>

She took off, and I could soon hear multiple sounds of appreciation. Coming back rapidly, she pronounced, “You know, if you wanted to be really boring, you could feed an entire city for decades.”

I responded tartly, <I am not a farm, thank you very much. I just don’t want to have bad body odor.>

“Dead body odor,” she quipped, looking over for a reaction.

<Well, yeah, what did you think I meant?> I questioned confusedly.

Dani acted like I was intentionally not understanding her pun. “Never mind. Today, lets–”

An odd sensation alerted me to an uninvited guest. <Shh! Wait! There is something on the stairs!>

She went still for the first time since waking up. “What! Dungeon divers again this soon?! We aren’t ready!”

<No, it doesn’t feel like that.> While I had made the stairs, my influence was not yet dense enough to see what was on them. I made a note to focus on that when I had some Essence stored up. <It is coming to the entrance. I should be able to see it any second now.>

<…>

“What is it?!”

<I don’t know! I’ve never seen anything like it before.>

“Should I be worried?”

<No, it is just coming in. It doesn’t seem to be doing muc– It’s attacking my herbs!> I howled, desperately searching for a way to fight back.

Dani was aghast. “All of them?!”

<No, just the one for now. It isn’t in range of the Bane Shroomish yet. Now it is just waiting, staring at my mushrooms!> I really didn’t have the energy to make more plants. As it was, my Chi spiral had no excess swirling Essence to pull from, and I was exhausted. I asked Dani to take a look, as she could connect with me with a bit of effort. Her reaction shocked me.

“Bwahahahah! Cal, oh sweet, naive C-cal,” she laughed, choking on the words. “That is the scourge of the mountains, the destroyer of herbs, a mountain bunny!” I could get nothing else from her for a few minutes, as she was laughing too hard to catch her breath.

Grumbling, <It’s still eating my plants! What’s a bunny? Is it poisonous. Does it have sharp teeth?>

“No,” she gasped a bit still in an attempt to contain her mirth, “they are plant eaters! Usually prey for the larger animals and Beasts, they survive by being really prolific.”

Prolific? <Meaning?>

“That they have babies really fast, and a lot of them,” she explained offhandedly, used to me asking questions about new words.

An idea came to life in my mind. <… Dani. Idea, Dani. Do you think I could spawn these as Mobs?>

Catching on instantly, she replied, “I think so. These are low F-ranked animals.”

I had been able to study humans, but the complexity involved in the pattern made them too far beyond my knowledge or power to produce. A mindless husk? Sure, though the mushrooms were more useful. If I were able to produce an ambulatory, semi-intelligent creature, no matter how weak, it would be a huge stride forward for me. For us, really.

<Dani, get ready! It’s moving closer!> I took aim.

It came in range of the Bane, and when a speeding thorn penetrated its skull, my mind exploded with information.

Chapter Ten

It had taken a few weeks of hard travel, but the group of mostly C-ranked adventurers had finally reached a city large enough to have a Guild office, an Elven embassy, and a church with a B-ranked priest. Going to the embassy first, as the Elf in their midst had seniority, they made their report to the incredulous Elven ambassadors, inciting a near riot as they rushed to make memory stones to hold the news.

Memory stones were Beast Cores that had been further refined by Essence to be able to hold copies of memories, skills, or other pertinent information. When someone used a memory stone, they would gain all of the information in the stone as their own ideas and memories, allowing them to gain knowledge quickly and easily. This helped with learning skills, cultivation techniques, and even fighting styles. Depending on the quality, more people could use them before their power was exhausted, at which point they would crumble and become useless. Higher grade stones could be refined with Mana and were able to hold items in a sub-dimensional space, nicknamed a ‘Bag of Holding’ as these high-grade stones were usually attached to bags in order to hide their identity, being very expensive to purchase.

A few Elven delegates were selected for their endurance, rare amongst Elves, given supplies and a memory stone each, and told to make for the Elven nation, allowing nothing to stop them. Their horses were spelled, allowing them to run the entire distance without discomfort, and the Elves were given potions that would mimic the effects of a good night of rest. Riding within the hour, the Elven nation would soon prepare to move part of its population to this newfound Silverwood location.

Their Elven leader’s mission complete, the party split to make their individual reports. Most went to the Guild, but the priest went directly to the Church. After a short prayer near the altar, he went in search of the Bishop. Although he needed to wait a short while, he was admitted when they heard the seriousness of his business.

“Good afternoon, my child,” the sonorous voice of the bishop spoke. “Tell me of your travels.”

“Thank you for seeing me, your grace.” The cleric gave a short bow. “With the rumor of a dungeon being discovered in the mountains, we were dispatched to check the rumors validity. As per regulation, we gathered a Mage, B-ranked, several Guild warriors, and myself to determine if the dungeon were an infernal cesspool. Upon arrival to the village, we were guided to the entrance of what was indeed a dungeon and quickly and easily dispatched the creatures inside. While we did find plants with a vampiric effect, there was no evidence beyond that to suggest infernal designs.”

Taking a breath, he continued, “To ensure this, I lowered my blessed pendant to the dungeon Core. Far from being destroyed or even slightly damaged, my pendant was absorbed.”

“Is it a celestial dungeon, then?” the Bishop interrupted, nearly as concerned about this possibility as he was at the thought of an infernal dungeon.

The cleric shook his head. “I was unable to discern that fact, but as we were leaving, a small mushroom appeared in the first room. We killed it, but as loot, it dropped… this.” He pulled out his restored pendant, handing it to his spiritual leader with a flourish.

Brow furrowed, the bishop inspected the pendant and the Essence contained within. “This is odd. It has no affinity that I can sense, but it certainly is a Runed item. The Inscription to turn aside infernal creatures is correct but cannot be activated without being filled with celestial energy. Therefore, I am sorry to say, this is useless.”

Crestfallen, the cleric sat down. “I had hoped you would be able to find what affinity it had. I just assumed my knowledge was insufficient to ascertain its origins.”

“We can always try prayer.” The bishop held the pendant in his hand and began to pray. The celestial Essence which was his greatest strength extended to and entered the Inscription on the pendant’s face. Dropping the necklace after an instant, the bishop looked at it in shock.

“Your grace?”

“W-we need to build a church in that area forthwith.” The Bishop looked down at the pendant which was now nearly humming with celestial energy. “As my prayer touched it, all of the Essence it contained gained a celestial affinity. This pendant alone represents six months of Inscription work, purification, and prayer. If that dungeon drops more, we will have a potent weapon against the darkness in the world. I think… I think I know the perfect person. Go and find Father Richard for me.”

The cleric blanched at this order.

Frank

The group that went into the Guild was finally able to relax as they returned to their erstwhile home. Grabbing some beer from the counter, they dropped an expense report with the secretary and moved to make their accounting. Explaining that there was indeed a new dungeon, no the mountains had not finally driven the sheepherders insane, the local Guild leader was about to dismiss this as a beginner training area of no importance when he was told of the Elven nation’s mobilization.

The Guild Master twitched, and he just knew he would be getting a headache soon. “What? Why? No! Come on! It is a low F-ranked at best, suitable for giving our fishies some combat experience, and you told us it dropped only copper on the Mob death. The loot isn’t even good enough for us to justify setting up a training camp there. It is too far out of the way!” He was concerned by this direction of events. When the Silverwood tree was explained, he closed his eyes and grit his teeth.

“Oh, you boys just love dropping a shit-storm of politics on my head don’t you?” At their confused glances, he growled, “That land is already contested by the human Kingdoms of the Phoenix and the Lion; now the Elves are going to be making a claim. We need to get there first.” The Guild Master groaned softly, sitting back against his chair.

He created and sent out orders for craftsmen, hunters, and fighters to prepare to march to the mountain. He also sent a message to the Mages’ Guild, a high level of the Adventurers’ Guild that only B-ranked cultivators or higher were allowed entry to. Asking for inscribers and enchanters for an emergency mission, he specifically asked for members who specialized in dimensional magic, as he had a feeling that a portal to this disgustingly remote location would be exceedingly beneficial.

A chill passing over him, he turned to the patiently waiting, slightly tipsy group. “What was the affinity of the dungeon?”

“Far as we could tell, it didn’t seem to have one, Frank.” The large man from the scouting party belched.

“Is that so? Hey! It is Guild Master Frank to you, bub.” A distant look passed through Frank’s eyes, and he amended his message to the Mage Guild. No affinity and a Silverwood tree? That was a combination that promised fast advancement through the cultivation ranks. That could offer power and great influence to whoever established themselves in the area. Frank now intended to lead the first group of settlers and to stake a claim. This sort of thing didn’t come along every day, after all.

Chapter Eleven

The bunny’s death provided me with intimate knowledge of its pattern, and I expected the energy to slam into me as usual, so I braced myself for impact. Instead, the Chi spiral showed its usefulness for the first time ever! Where the energy had before stuffed my core full of the newly-gained Essence instantly, it now surrounded me and was held in a slowly swirling pattern in the outer spiral, awaiting cultivation.

<Wow! Look at that!> I was thrilled by this new development, and I really wanted Dani to be excited too.

“Yeah, that looks neat. I am glad you are holding that spiral so well. I kind of expected you to get lazy when you weren’t getting much Essence! Don’t be too surprised now. That is what is supposed to happen.” Dani was a master at making a compliment into an advertisement for a better work ethic.

<It finally makes sense why I have to hold this pattern for cultivation! Now I can refine the Essence into Chi threads on my schedule rather than having to get rid of the excess! It’s all coming together.> I knew I should never doubt Dani, but until now, the intricate pattern I had been forcing myself to hold seemed to have no purpose while taking a lot of effort and concentration to maintain.

Waiting till I had fully processed all of the Essence, which took an hour or so even with all my attention being bent to the task, I made two young rabbits. Instead of feeding them Essence until fully grown like I could have done, I tried to conserve the energy I had remaining. They would grow quickly in the Essence-rich air of my dungeon anyway and should be able to mate soon; especially since the pattern I had focused on while creating them gave extra strength to their fecundity.

<How long until they can reproduce naturally?> I offhandedly interrogated Dani, my attention focused on watching my new creatures bound around the room playfully.

“Well,” she snorted, a very unladylike sound, “seeing as you have two male rabbits, it may be a long time.”

That shouldn’t be too much of a problem. <What time frame are we looking at here? Like three, four days?>

She released an explosion of air, a cross between a snort and a chuckle, remembering that I had only been aware of life for a few months. “More like never, Cal.”

<Uhm.>

“You need a female in order for them to… copulate, Cal.” She seemed frustrated, knowing I didn’t understand her laughter or odd embarrassment. She started floating toward the entrance. “I’ll go try and lure one down here.”

<You can do that?> That could be handy in the future. Why hadn’t she done that before?

She laughed in a haughty tone, as if to highlight my ignorance. “I am a will-o-the wisp! I am the preeminent expert at luring all manner of creatures to their doom.”

<If you say so. Hurry home!> Never know when someone is going to attack, after all.

She stopped in midair, hovering malevolently. “Who said I’m going right now? Maybe I want a nap!”

I hadn’t thought of that! We had been rather busy, after all. <Oh sorry, you normally only sleep once every few days so I–>

“Cal, I’m being intentionally difficult. Ugh. I’ll be back shortly. We need to work on your understanding of sarcasm.”

She did indeed return shortly. Apparently, there was a rabbit warren nearby, but until the stairs were put in place, there was no way for them to reach me. The rabbit that followed Dani down in a hypnotized state was larger than the first bunny had been. Dani later explained that this was because it was an animal. Usually females tended to be larger than the male, an interesting concept as only male creatures besides Dani had entered my dungeon to this point. In the time it took for a spike from a shroom to find the skull of the female rabbit, I had a slightly altered pattern of the rabbit ready to be used. I made a few young versions and waited impatiently for them to reach adulthood.

Dale

Guild Master Frank looked at the staircase leading to the depths below. A gust of wind blew a spicy mixture of scents upward, and he could feel a hint of raw Essence.

“This is the place, huh?” Frank turned toward the owner of the land, Dale.

“Indeed, milord,” a nervous Dale spoke. Although now the richest man in his village, he knew the Guild Master could likely crush him with the weight of his wallet, using his strength or influence to kill every person Dale knew without facing any repercussions.

“Not much to look at are ya?” Frank glanced at the now uncomfortable Dale.

“E-excuse me?”

 Frank shook his head and started again, “Look, Dave–”

“Dale. Common mistake, sir.” Dale paled with the realization he had interrupted this powerful figure.

Frank grunted at the correction. “Whatever. Listen, you are about to become more wealthy than most small towns. The standard Guild agreement is five percent of all profit from the dungeon will go to you, the finder and owner of the land.”

Dale coughed as he interrupted again, “Sir, I plan on giving a portion of that to the families of the men who found it with me and died trying to escape.” Luckily for him, the jerk he had murdered had no family. “Will that, uhm, be an issue?”

“Huh. Good on you, lad. Might actually be worth me remembering your name. Your money, I don’t care what you do with it,” Frank disinterestedly offered, though Dale brightened significantly at the words. “I have a different idea for our agreement. The standard is all well and good, but think on this. For the first five years, you get three percent. That should still be an income of several gold per week as it matures, a bit less before then.”

“During those years, the other two percent comes to me, and I will use it to outfit you with a team, basic equipment, food, lodging, and teachers who will help you fix that… mess… of a cultivation base you have.” Frank gestured at Dale when he said this, making him flush with embarrassment, though he didn’t understand the insult.

Frank gave a short explanation of cultivation to Dale when he saw the obvious confusion on his face. He informed Dale that everything passively absorbed Essence as long as it lived. Even plants that lived long enough could even become somewhat powerful as their cultivation slowly and naturally allowed them to become stronger. There was a certain disadvantage to this, though because even when people did not actively cultivate their Essence, they still absorbed some from their strongest affinities through passive accumulation.

Since they had no Chi spiral and therefore didn’t reduce the amount of corruption they obtained, their cultivation base became full of tainted Essence, which spread through their bodies, eventually killing them as ‘old age’ set in. Dale was obviously suited to the earthen element, showing surprisingly strong affinity by pulling in large amounts of the tainted Essence. The issue here was that he reeked of corruption to the trained senses of the Guild Master. With low Essence and high corruption in his cultivation base, Dale would never be able to move into the higher ranks of cultivation. Heck, if he kept pulling earthen corruption at this rate, Dale would die of a heart attack in ten years, tops.

“Thank you for explaining a bit about cultivation, sir, but as to giving up all of that profit… Why would I do that? How would that help me? That is a lot of money, sir.” The confused young man worried that Frank was trying to swindle him. Just because he was from a poor village didn’t mean he was stupid!

Frank nodded and calmly began listing his thoughts on the matter, “There are a lot of reasons someone would kill you. For now, just the income you are going to receive will be enough for some. You will also soon gain political enemies, as you will receive a vote on any matters pertaining to the growth or destruction of this dungeon. If you stay at the fishy rank, they may kill you out of hand just to get you out of the way.” Dale had paled as he realized the accuracy of each implied threat, so Frank paused to let him think and absorb the information for a moment.

“If you accept my terms, I will also admit you into the Guild directly, which will give you good people to turn to for advice or help. You will have a perfect dungeon to train in without having to fear traitors in your party; with us beside you, you will have a unified front against people who try to take advantage of you.”

Dale didn’t know what to say, and his mouth opened and closed a few times.

“Of course,” Frank nonchalantly continued, “you will have to obey our laws, but they are very straightforward. Oh, and after the first five years, you will return to five percent income, beyond what you personally make of course. This continues until your death, at which point any heirs you produce will split the income.”

Still, no words were passing Dale’s lips.

Frank decided to roll out the heavy hitter, as casually as possible. “One more thing, if you reach the Mage rank of cultivation, B-rank that is, your natural lifespan tends to jump into the hundreds of years. Unless killed, you won’t die for a very long time. At the Saint rank—or S-rank—we have been unable to determine the natural lifespan. It is just too long for anyone but another Saint to measure,” Frank finished, letting the temptation flow.

Dale finally found his voice, “I… Wow! Of course, I accept! Yes, and thank you, sir!”

Frank grinned at Dale’s newfound exuberance. “Excellent! And no more calling me sir. I work for a living. It is ‘Frank’ when we are alone with our Guild or ‘Guild Master’ around strangers. We will get you outfitted tomorrow and start your training right away. Report to me at first light.”

Cal

It had been about two months since the group had last left my area when Dani told me people were gathering above. I had made few improvements since then, mostly cosmetic, no new rooms. The Mobs, at least, were more interesting than they had been.

The rabbits’ population had exploded, the best part being that they were all under my control. Since I had created their parents, even these new creatures were dungeon born, meaning they were given life through my power as a dungeon. Their living in me generated plenty of Essence, which I constantly gathered a significant amount passively. Enough Essence, in fact, that my plants were near obsolete as an energy source but still grown to feed the rabbits.

That reminded me, a minor yet entertaining war had occurred as the rabbits ate the plants and the shrooms tried to rescue them. Due to this civil war, I had imprinted on both subsets that they were not to fight each other, and the rabbits would need to eat from certain areas. They started getting along far better, albeit uneasily, when I forced the arrangement. The different groups moved to be on friendly terms when the mushrooms found that rabbit feces were excellent fertilizer.

I had, of course, evolved the rabbits. Their natural pattern put them in F-rank two, and I was able to increase the average Mob to F-rank five. I was still stuck in F-rank eight myself but was hoping for a breakthrough soon. With so much varied life, the Essence in the rooms became denser, as the amount produced was more than I was able to consume and cultivate on a daily basis. Not only was this good for the creatures living in me, as it helped them grow, but Dani assured me that dungeoneers would be ecstatic as well.

Evolving the rabbits had greatly benefitted them; they now had far stronger muscles in their bodies and a stronger skeletal frame to match. When their bones ossified to accommodate their new system, a smooth nub of bone had also grown on their skulls. I had originally assumed this was the start of a horn, but it never seemed to develop past a nub. The reason for this growth soon became apparent. No longer timid creatures, they competed for food and mates by sprinting at their adversary, jumping and head-butting them with their bone nubs. When they jumped, their bodies grew rigid as they braced for impact, and their bone nubs cracked into their opponent. The first to fall unconscious lost the right to the mate or feeding ground they were after. I had named them Bashers, and I thought they were adorable.

I hadn’t been able to develop a new Boss, and I was now out of spare Essence to experiment without becoming dangerously low on power for a few weeks. Being that my current Boss was at the maximum ranking I could create, it was not that I could make a stronger one, though I was hoping that I could make a mobile one. Directing a few of the Bashers into the Boss room to help him during the fights, I settled in to wait for some easy prey. I was as prepared as I could be.

Dale

Dale slept poorly that night, as the excitement the next day would hold plagued his dreams. He awoke before dawn and broke his fast with some leftover foodstuff. When the rest of the small tent city began to rouse, he went to the main Guild tent to await the Guild Master, still gnawing on some tough yet filling jerky.

“Oh good, you’re punctual. I was going to have my boys douse you with a bucket of water if you were still sleeping!” Frank laughed jovially.

“Ha…?” Dale chuckled, petering off as he saw the serious looks and slowly shaking heads from the working staff that were being directed at him warningly.

“Well, let’s get started. I have a tutor for you to help catch you up on the basics. Did you bring any money with you?” Frank looked at him questioningly. When Dale shook his head, silently cursing his stupidity, Frank continued, “No matter, we’ll put it on your credit. I know you will be good for it after all! Our agreement was only for standard equipment, but I’d prefer to give you armor that you will be able to use for a longer time. If we do that, though, you will need to pay the difference. Is that reasonable?” Frank waited for Dale to nod, almost imperceptible as his eyes wandered over all of the treasures displayed just in the tent they were standing in. “Great! I will cover the cost of repairs for you when you need them. You’ll pay us for the equipment over time then, but the tutor is on me, as per our agreement.”

They moved into a storeroom and started looking at the available equipment. The prices attached to them made Dale choke a bit, but Frank efficiently moved along the rows, pointing at armor for the staff on duty to bring them. A full set of plate armor was eventually gathered by the leader before they moved into an armory to find a good weapon to use.

“Every swung a sword before?” At the expected negative, Frank grunted and moved on, “Axe?” No trees on the mountain, only around the base. “Bow?” Wouldn’t be able to use it in plate armor. “War mace it is. Maybe a morningstar,” he mused, tossing a few ideas around. “I’d start you with a spear, but in a confined space like a dungeon, that is more of a—shall we say—liability.”

Deciding on a morningstar, Frank turned on Dale and demandingly grilled him, “You know how to use one of these?” It was essentially a stick with a spiked metal ball at the top.

Dale tried to inject some humor, “Spikey ball goes into the enemy?”

“Correct! I think we found the armament for you.” Frank grinned and handed the weapon over.

They moved into a tent with the purchased equipment, and the staff helped him put on all of his new, shining armor. It was a matching set, so Dale thought he looked rather dashing. The layers kept coming on, first the padding, then the chainmail, and finally the plate armor. It was so heavy that Dale could barely move; if he hadn’t been fairly used to hard work, he wouldn’t have been able to stand. Finally, Frank came over with a shield, presenting it as a short term gift.

“This is an enchanted training buckler. It is the smallest shield type, but I really don’t think you should carry too much more weight.” Frank looked frankly at his already straining and sweating initiate. “It is called a ‘training’ type armor because it helps you to learn to block correctly.” He demonstrated by swinging his fist, and the shield pulled Dale’s arm into position to stop it. “You are going to want to learn how to use a shield correctly as fast as possible. It’ll save lives—especially yours.”

“Wow! Why is it short term? This is great!” Dale enthused, happy that this shield could block attacks for him.

“Allow me to demonstrate.” Tossing a rock to the side of Dale, Frank moved in and slapped him in the face as the shield swung to knock the rock away. “It tries to block the first threat, and it’ll take more muscle than you have to put it somewhere else.”

Dale felt his teeth to make sure none had loosened. “Well. Point taken.”

“I’m just glad we waited before putting on your helmet,” Frank mentioned. Dale groaned internally at the thought of more armor.

Frank did not take kindly to the whining. “Until sundown, you are going to wear that armor, each day until I tell you otherwise. You are far enough behind your group that you will need to train constantly to catch up. Your muscles will hate you now, but you’ll thank me later. Eventually, you might move to a different fighting style and wear less armor, but for now, we do things my way.”

A staff member walked over and handed Dale his bill. “Here you are, Sir Knight. We have applied the Guild discount, of course.”

Dale’s eyes nearly left his skull as he saw the total. One platinum, thirty gold, forty silver, and six copper. That was more money than everyone on this mountain combined had ever seen before. Would he ever be able to pay this off?

“You are going to need to work hard, but I think you have what it takes to succeed. I sense serious ambition in you lad,” Frank spoke kindly. Dale’s mind flashed to murdering Tim, and he nodded. Dale had ambition in spades. “I’m going to send you to your tutor now. Pay attention to what he says because that armor will mean nothing if you fail to improve yourself.”

They walked over to a group of men preparing their armor and weapons. Unlike Dale who had shining armor, those in the group who wore it had scratched, dented, well worn, and patchwork armor. Walking directly to a man wearing only wrapped cloth, no discernable armor at all, Frank introduced him as Craig, a monk and Essence specialist. A monk was not a religious man like a cleric but someone who focused on their chosen martial arts to the exclusion of all other knowledge. As an Essence specialist, he would have focused all of his life on cultivation and Essence management, making him an unmatched expert and teacher in his area of study.

“Craig will be your supervisor and tutor. He also has an affinity for earthen Essence, so he will be able to give you the very best guidance.” Frank handed a memory stone to Dale, telling him that it would allow him to skip a few steps in learning how to control his Essence. “Craig, if you would be so kind as to teach him how to properly cultivate, I would appreciate it. It’ll be better if he knows now before we strip him. Last time didn’t work out well.” With this ominous foreshadowing, he handed Craig a small item, wished Dale good luck, and set off to start working for the rest of his busy day.

“Nice to meet you all. My name is Dale,” Dale stated. “So… how do we start?”

“You the guy who found this shithole?” one of the men grunted, polishing a massive shield.

“Um. Yeah,” Dale stammered. The other man coughed, hawked up some mucus and spit to the side.

“Great.”

Craig spoke then, ignoring pleasantries and launching directly into lecture mode, “Dale, you are what we call a ‘fishy’. This means you are an F-ranked newbie, thrashing around and trying to figure out what is going on. You are going to be useless in there today and even more so tomorrow. Let me be very clear about what we want you to do. Your job in the dungeon is to not die. No heroics, you do only what we tell you to. That is it. You follow?”

“Yes. Sorry,” Dale apologized, not even sure why he was doing so.

“Don’t be sorry. Just pay attention. We were all there once, but for us, it was many years ago. I’m going to give you a cultivation technique, and since it’ll be going through a memory stone, you’ll be able to use it without years of practice. That’ll let you catch up quick, once we fix this,” he waved his hand at Dale’s entire body, “cesspool of a center you have going on here.” He reached out and motioned for the stone Frank had given Dale. Dale dropped it in his hand as he wondered what could possibly be so bad about him that everyone kept mentioning that he was filthy on the inside.

Craig took the memory stone and placed it against his head. Focusing intently for a few moments, a silvery light streamed into it. Handing it back to Dale, he told him to press it against his forehead and try not to fall over. He enunciated ‘try’ a bit too much for Dale to be happy about.

“That’s it?” Dale inquired, looking at the glittering stone in his hand. The light inside of it seemed to whisper to his senses.

“That’s it,” Craig promised.

Pressing the stone against his head, knowledge of how to consciously pull in Essence from the earth and earthen sources flooded his mind. Dale saw how to control the Essence, allowing it to flow through into his body to his center without damaging himself or gaining too much corruption and how to begin a Chi spiral so he didn’t waste the Essence he gained. Most importantly to Dale, he could finally see what his own center looked like.

The clearer the energy, the better, as it showed high refinement and low corruption. When Essence was poorly processed, it retained some of the features of its source. While Craig’s memory of his center, which came along from the memory stone, looked quite clear with only a tinge of coloration showing his affinity, Dale’s looked like a mixture of mud and feces. Cesspool of a Core indeed.

“Oh my.” Dale nearly gagged. He tried to start a Chi spiral like he was supposed to, but the thick Essence in his center only bubbled and moved like mucus, refusing to do more than ooze in a circle. “What actually is this corruption?”

Craig was watching him and nodded when he saw him try to move the corrupted Essence. “Good question. Listen up, I’ll only explain this now, and never again. Corruption is a side effect of the energy of the heavens and the earth being turned into the universal basic elements. Everything begins as purest energy, but the world creates things out of it, yes?”

Dale nodded. “So, rocks and stuff?”

“Pretty much. To do this, the item is formed, but then its ‘identity’ seeps into the pure Essence, corrupting it. A rock, which at its basic form is this stored energy, adds its ‘identity’ to the energy, which then becomes earthen Essence. Essence joins together in complex ways to form combinations which form what we call higher Essences. Fire and water to form steam, water and earth to plant, and so forth. Those lucky enough to gain affinities in multiple elements can become higher level cultivators very quickly if they have access to all of the elements they need. For instance, fire, water, and earth form a soot affinity. The combinations are endless, allowing for any kind of material or even life,” Craig lectured briefly. “Essence is endless, and the more of each type of basic Essence in an area, the more Essence is generated. If you somehow got all of them to coexist together, you would have a very powerful Essence generator.”

“Your job now is to try to purify all the Essence you can accumulate back to its cleanest state within your center. Now you understand? Any more questions? No? Good. We’re going to take care of the mess you have right now, don’t worry. After that, it is up to you and your hard work,” Craig finished, ignoring the fact that Dale actually was trying to ask more questions.

They began their descent into the darkness below.

Chapter Twelve

<People are on the stairs, Dani. Get ready for an incursion! This is gonna be awe-some,> I nearly sang, enthusiasm dancing in my mental voice.

The group approached my entrance, moved into formation and started their workday. Now that I had semi-intelligent creatures under my influence, I could move into my Mobs’ minds and directly control their movement. I was only good enough at this to do it one at a time but was assured—by Dani of course—that with practice, I could control a squad of monsters at the same time. The rabbits were hidden in the thick vegetation, so the room had no significant difference from the original mushroom-Mob appearance. This would be fun!

The men walked in and began slashing at the Shroomishes, quickly targeting the ranged Banes. When their attention was focused on a particularly thick grouping of mushrooms, I sent <Attack!> into the minds of the hidden rabbits. Taking direct control of the largest, I launched my new body at the back of someone’s knee. A direct hit in the tender pressure point and the man fell. The attacks on the other humans had varying degrees of success with a few landing decent hits against legs, some bouncing off armor, and one even being knocked away by a shield that moved when the guy wasn’t even looking! He must be really aware of his surroundings.

The dozens of rabbits were almost entirely silent, but when they hit armor, it sounded like metal being beaten or, as Dani told me, a ‘gong’ or hail falling on tin. The man who had fallen was being pummeled, but his thick armor allowed him to quickly regain his footing. One man stepped on a spike-filled Shroomish, which had to hurt as he twisted his ankle, but even the underside of his boot was armored enough to stop the spike from entering his flesh.

The men had been taken by surprise but were an efficient team and quickly turned the tides against me. A sword dropped down, slaying some Bashers, but most of my creatures were nimble enough to avoid it. A few of the fighters used weapons that required less skill, such as a staff, while another struck with his fists, and these quickly decimated my ranks. Sounding a retreat, I directed the Bashers into a bolt hole which made it impossible to attack them without magic.

“Did they just run away? I’ve never seen Mobs run away before.” One of the men sounded suspicious of my motives. Good.

An answering grunt came in reply, then resolved into words, “Ugh. Just keep an eye out. We don’t want to be ambushed again. These aren’t magical Beasts, right? Just weird looking, mutated rabbits?”

“Looks that way.” A few answering grunts showed the others’ agreement.

They moved further in, ignoring the other plants. Entering my first tunnel, I really wanted to hit them from behind, but they were too wary. I didn’t want to lose more creatures, though I captured the energy they released upon death, which was enough for me to bring a new one back to roughly the same stage of life. If I made them young instead and let them grow unaided at an accelerated rate, I gained much more Essence than I had invested in their progenitors; it was actually a nice way to gain Essence quickly.

Skillfully avoiding traps, the group rested just before entering my second room. When they had finished catching their breath and with looks of determination, they moved to attack the denizens of the second room. A similar situation developed, and by the time they had killed half of the prolific Bashers, their legs had to be in great pain. Take that! Minor inconveniences! Even with the armor, each hit was as strong as a decent mace blow landing and must have been doing some damage. The only one I couldn’t seem to hit was wearing almost no armor whatsoever, just some kind of cloth, and I was nervous that he would be casting spells soon.

Sounding the retreat once more, I watched as they inspected the loot I dropped for each death—usually just a couple copper, but if they managed to take out the one I was inhabiting, I gave them a bit extra. Nothing major, usually extra coins or a boot if I felt I could get away with it. So far they had found three left boots. Maybe I am evil.

I really was getting frustrated. Why did I have such high-level groups? I studied them as they entered the next tunnel and could see that most of them were C-ranked, but the one with the shield was F-ranked! I decided to focus on him as my most likely meal.

When they entered the third room, I waited until they had cleared about half the room before the Bashers attacked, and I had most of them charge at the shielded one. Right before they jumped, a Bane hiding on the ceiling fired a thorn directly at his head, and he blocked it! This did open him up for attack from the Bashers, and sensing victory, they pounced as hard as they could, pummeling his shiny armor from multiple sides.

He dropped to the ground! Redoubling their efforts, they slammed against him, trying to crack his metal shell. He weakly counterattacked, but the Bashers easily dodged. They continued throwing themselves at him. Then I realized I was down to only two in the room. I had gotten too focused and forgot to retreat, dang it. The group finished the remaining two off and tried to gather their collective breaths.

“What the abyss?” gasped the one I had been beating on.

“They must have decided you were the weak link and gone for the kill. They seemed to frenzy a bit there. None of em ran this time,” the unarmored one verbalized. “You okay to continue?”

“Yeah,” Dale spit out a bit of blood, weakly finishing with, “try not to let ‘em hit your chest, guys.”

“Duly noted.”

“And why are there so many boots down here?!” That got a chuckle from his team and from me.

They limped toward the final room, preparing to meet the Boss. Peeking at him from around the corner, they decided on their battle plan. Too bad for them, I could hear every word, of course. I adjusted my plan accordingly and got ready for their charge. None of them had ranged weapons, an obvious lack, which would put them in the best range of the Bloody Bane. Since he had no real intelligence, I could not directly control him, but the hidden Bashers were ready for my hostile takeover. I watched the group countdown to zero on their fingers, then silently charge the Boss.

<Terrible idea, really,> I thought maliciously.

The F-ranked man had stayed near the entrance, so when the Bloody Bane released a cloud of poisonous spores, he was outside of it. These men were so strong that the poison was really only enough to deal a little damage, make them cough, and whatnot. The poison would have been far more effective on the weak one in the now-not-so-shiny armor. Ah well, such is life. Time to go with plan B. The carpet of moss constricted, grabbing the weak one’s foot. A Basher hitting him from behind convinced the youngster to fall flat on his face into the moss as it dragged him as fast as possible to the Bane. The other members were finishing off the Boss when the lightly armored one noticed his predicament and came to his aid.

Drat, I had nearly maneuvered around that armor! I let a holy symbol drop as a token of my appreciation for the good fight and would make sure to talk to Dani later about ways to improve my tactics. They got very excited by the holy symbol for some reason, probably the etched Inscription that came pre-made on it, so I decided to make that more… rare, in the future.

Dale

“You guys okay? Dale uttered around a swelling lip.

“My legs feel tenderized, but I’m fine otherwise,” grouched the burly man carrying the massive shield near the front.

“Pretty good for such a low ranked place,” commented a man who was wielding daggers. “Did you see that necklace? I wonder if it is legitimately inscribed…”

“Let’s bring it to a cleric when we are done here—could be worth something. We need to move on to the next stage, though.” Craig abruptly cut off the conversation.

“What would that be?” Dale's voice wavered apprehensively, as the other men turned to look at him with varying degrees of either pity or excitement.

Craig exhaled through his nose and turned toward Dale. “Remember how we said we were going to get rid of that corruption?”

“Well, yeah. That was the whole point of this right? That’s why we had to be near that Silverwood tree… right?” Dale looked at the men nervously while pointing at the small sapling.

The men had surrounded him now, and Craig continued in an eerily calm voice, “Not quite. For one thing, that tree is too immature still but mainly that is a higher level technique. It helps people break into the B-ranks and convert their Essence to Mana. No, we are going to actually remove all the Essence from your center… by force.”

Dale started looking around a bit wildly. “Um.”

“It isn’t like we are going to beat you, kid. Relax,” the dagger-wielding man tried to calm him down. “Still, it isn’t exactly a fun process. Here, start drinking.” He handed Dale a water skin. “Drink until you think you are going to hurl, then drink more.”

“Okay…” Removing his helmet with hidden relief, Dale took the water and drank. Every time he stopped or slowed, the other men told him to keep going. When he was looking queasy and obviously holding back his bile, Craig motioned for him to stop.

“This next part is dangerous for you. You are going to swallow this.” He handed Dale the small package the Guild Master had given him. “It is a Beast Core. What happens when a Beast Core is swallowed is very, hmm, interesting. If done willingly, all of the Essence in your Core will flow into the gem, taking the corruption with it.”

“Then it will continue pulling Essence from your body until there is nothing in you but your personal life force, which it will also take if possible. Unwillingly ingesting one leads to a different fate, but we’ll not have that issue, right?” Craig eyed Dale with a threat lingering in his voice.

Ensuring Dale was paying attention, Craig looked him in the eyes and enunciated, “When I tell you to—and not before—you need to begin cultivating as fast as you can. You now know how to; that technique is a permanent part of your memories. Draw the Essence in this cavern into yourself as fast and cleanly as you can with your new technique. We’ll start your Chi spiral before we leave. Make sure you follow my directions exactly. The timing of this can be tricky. If you start too early, you are going to leave corruption in you. Too late, and you die. Get it? Listen to me through the pain.”

“The pain?!” Dale challenged, his head swimming.

“Forceful removal of what allows you to live tends to hurt a bit. The job of your fine squad members is to get that Core out of you when it is time, hence drinking all that water. You’re going to get punched in the stomach a bit. Which reminds me, armor off the top half,” Craig directed as if he had not just told Dale he was going to be attacked by the shield holding mans’ ham-sized fists.

Dale complied, forcing himself to stay calm, though the whites of his eyes were showing and he was starting to breathe heavily. After reducing the weight on himself, he grabbed the water skin drank more. He was nearly sick, but he told himself that anything to reduce the following stomach blows would help in the long run. Bracing himself, Dale waited for Craig to give the signal to start. It didn’t take long.

“Go.”

A bit more water helped the small gem slither down his throat, and Dale focused his mind on the filthy energy within him. There seemed to be no effect, and he wondered if this were just an excuse to terrify him or beat him up. Then he ‘saw’ a tendril of light leave the gem and reach for his center, twisting and turning through channels that Dale couldn’t understand. The light connected; Dale then saw a gentle brown light pull away from his center back to the Core. It was a nice, tingly feeling until the murky brown Essence touched the surface of the Core.

The energy ripped at his Core suddenly, taking in the Essence like a starving man eating cake. The pain came then, feeling like acid washing through his blood, destroying the tissue and knitting it together by grasping his flayed flesh and nailing it back down with salt covered spikes. Darker Essence flowed like blood from a ruptured artery into the Core, which was also growing muddy. Dale was gasping, on his knees as he watched this unfold inside himself. Eyes wild, he saw the last few Wisps of Essence leave his center, emptying it completely. For a moment the pain subsided, Dale thinking it was over somehow.

The pain erupted again—in new and torturous ways. Like a hollow needle had entered his veins, sharp pain penetrated dozens of points on his body and pulled with a strong vacuuming force. Every bit of the corruption inside of him was being pulled to the Core, which was not being gentle. Dale’s nose began to bleed as his head shook violently, looking for any escape from the pain.

Craig grabbed his head to help control the seizure. “Almost time now, Dale. Focus! If you don’t cultivate and we get the Core out of you, your life energy will attempt to fill the void, which will assuredly kill you. Feel the energy around you, and get ready to pull! Let nothing else matter!”

Dale’s mind shook. The world was wavy around him, his head spinning. He opened his eyes, revealing burst blood vessels and reached out for the energy of the heavens and the earth, preparing to pull it in as soon as Craig said…

“Now! Do it now!” Craig shouted. For a brief, shining moment, the pain abated again as the gem looked for a new source of Essence to fill itself. Dale knew this relief was a lie and began cultivating. Having never done it intentionally before but knowing how, the energy stalled a bit at first, then started to flow into him steadily. The Core, which had almost latched on to its host’s life energy, found a new and easily accessible meal. Returning the pull back to Dale’s center where the Essence was beginning to accumulate, it was nearly drinking this fresh source when Dale’s body began to shudder from well-placed blows.

“Bleaeghght!” The huge amount of water ingested previously happily made a reappearance, cheerfully splattering across anyone who didn’t move fast enough. Some well-digested jerky found a new home, and after a few waves, finally, a small gem appeared.

To those present, it was obvious that energy was trying to reach back into Dale from the gem, trying to re-establish the connection it had momentarily lost. Using the steel-shod end of a staff, one of the men crushed the gem, releasing a flash of brown light. Turning to look at Dale, the group waited as he scrambled to absorb Essence properly. Craig watched him carefully, nodding at the tiny spiral that was forming. He corrected Dale gently a few times, allowing the energy to be as pure as Dale could make it.

“This is as easy as it is going to get, Dale,” Craig promised him. “For some reason, the Essence in here has no affinity. You can pull the Essence from all around you, and it is nearly free of any taint. Personally, I love it here, Mobs and all.” The other men nodded agreement, all settling in to cultivate. “We can only stay so long, though. Eventually, the Essence in the air will lessen, and we will need to leave in order for it to replenish. Once out of here, your spiral will be pure, but you will need to continue to cultivate. Make the threads as small as possible, and remember to purify it as much as possible before you absorb it.”

Dale was still pale, bruises showing and his body shaking. Never before had he been this tired, and he wanted to collapse. As he pulled more Essence into himself, he remembered how foul his center had been before and vowed to have the purest Essence of any of his fellows.

Time passed as it always did, and the room’s ambient Essence began to wane. Dale still pulled in more until Craig gently made him stand and don his armor. “Remember to keep that spiral going. Soon, it’ll continue even in your sleep and become natural to you. Grab your weapon. We don’t know how many Mobs we are going to have to fight to get out of here.”

Chapter Thirteen

I was stunned by the actions of these men. Was this a normal occurrence? When they crushed the Beast Core, it released all of the man’s accumulated Essence into me. I greedily took the gift, shunting the corruption into the stone around the room, making it stronger. Though the young man—who I now recognized as the one who had first escaped me—had taken off his armor, it never moved far enough away from the group to allow me to absorb it. Too bad, but what can you do? I made plans to get his armor when he made a mistake in the future.

The real shock came when the group sat and began to cultivate. I was carefully watching for any chance to attack them when their auras allowed me to pass through for the first time ever! While they refined their Essence, I was able to direct some of it to myself. Not having to refine it on my own allowed me to add it directly to my own spiral. I was still considering the implications when the group stood and made their way to the entrance. In the last few hours, my spiral had significantly increased in size, which allowed it to spin much faster. When it spun faster, the fine threads also attached to my Chi spiral more rapidly. The stronger I became, the easier it was to gain Essence more quickly.

Also, as an added bonus, there was a small pool of acid that I was able to study. It seemed like very strong acid, and as I absorbed it, it became apparent that the sulphuric acid could become a potent weapon if used properly. I also studied the broken Beast Core and realized that it had a similar makeup to my own gem.

<Dani, am I a Beast Core?> I seemed to catch her off guard, and she scrambled for an answer.

“Mm, kind of. Sorry, I thought we went over this earlier. You were originally a soul gem, which is a Beast Core that has undergone strong refinement. It is pretty rare because it takes at a minimum a Mage with infernal capabilities to produce, and I’ve never heard of them using it for human souls before you,” Dani expressed thoughtfully. “Most infernal users have to go into hiding if they want to get stronger, as most places frown upon demon summoning and Necromancy.”

<Can’t imagine why,> I dryly stated. <I think I can replicate the Beast Core; would that be at all useful?>

She perked up at this statement, “Seriously? Yeah, that could really come in handy. You could use them to store excess Essence in, like really weak Mana accumulators, which could help you if you are getting too much at once to absorb.”

She gleefully continued, “Also, you could try and attach them to your Mobs. A Beast Core in a creature allows them to jump to the first level of sentience when they accumulate enough Essence and have a Chi spiral. Then your Mobs could become stronger than you while you retain control of them. Since you gave it life, even if the Mob died, you would be able to re-absorb the energy contained in the Core and re-make the Beast with the exact same ranking and spiral!”

<That sounds amazing! I’m going to see if I can make this work with their patterns!> I started trying to attach the pattern of the Core to my creatures. Sadly, no matter how much I tried, I couldn’t merge them. Disappointed, I told Dani the news.

“Well, we will just need to make stronger monsters then, won’t we?” she pronounced, full of determination.

<I think we need to revamp the entire structure soon. The traps aren’t working, and I don’t have enough chances to attack. I’m thinking of adding more tunnels that go to dead ends—hopefully literally—and a couple rooms that have no monsters in them to make people nervous and slow down.> I was becoming better at subtle puns.

“That’s a great idea! How are you doing on energy right now?” Dani queried. I was fairly certain she didn’t catch the ‘dead end’ pun, or I was sure she would be laughing right then.

<I’m about half full, but with the Chi spiral, that is a lot more Essence than I’ve had at one time before. Oh, and something odd happened earlier. When those guys started cultivating, I was able to take a bit of the loose energy for myself. Is that normal?> I wanted her to say ‘no, you are super amazing and special’ but…

“I… think so? That is one of the reasons you let the air get dense with the extra unrefined Essence instead of focusing it all on a task, I believe. We are approaching the end of my knowledge of dungeon habits, though. It should have taken you near fifty years to get to this point!” she stated almost accusingly.

<You’re welcome,> I replied haughtily. <What, you wanted to be saddled with a moron for fifty years? I think not!>

“Ha! He called my bluff,” Dani chortled ruefully. “What do you want to do first? Make the Beast Cores—or should I say Essence accumulators, or would you like to rearrange first?”

<What do you think? The moving and building is going to take a lot of energy. Should I try to make the accumulators first?>

“Hm. When you put it like that, it does seem like the obvious choice,” she mused. “I think that may be a good idea.”

I decided with her where to put them. Luckily, they were small enough that it didn’t take a lot of space. I made three to start with, equidistant from me and each other, in a triangle around me but below the stone of the hill I had made. I didn’t want people getting greedy, after all—that was my job. I settled in for the quickly approaching night, respawning my Mobs and increasing my influence. I decided that I would not make the changes incrementally; I would do them in one quick event when I was ready. Soon, people would get complacent with my setup, and I hoped the transition would deliver some much needed power to me.

Dale

Dale took off his armor, carefully placing each piece down in reverse order so he could figure out how to put it back on in the morning. The men had been far more genial toward him since they left the dungeon; he’d noticed fighting together tended to form bonds. He continued to spiral his Chi as he had been taught, and when he was finished undressing, he looked at his battered body. Covered in welts and bruises, his poor body had hardly any skin on it that was the normal coloration. He began to shake, the trauma of the day finally finding a hold in his mind. Focusing on his Chi spiral to take his mind off the terror, he noticed that it was far harder to pull Essence from the earth than it was from the air in the dungeon. Working hard to keep the Essence as pure and fine as possible, he quickly fell asleep.

*Splash!*

“What the abyss?!” Dale shouted, flailing his arms as he tried to fight off his unknown assailant.

“Good morning, sunshine!” A grinning menace, Hans was the group member who had been wielding daggers the day before. He loomed above Dale, holding an empty bucket.

Dale wanted to fight back, but his body suddenly reminded him of the torture it had just gone through, and instead, he groaned piteously. Hans pulled him to his feet and made him put on his armor.

“Keepin’ that spiral goin’?” Hans’s grin got wider the more Dale grunted. “You’re a lucky one, aren’t ya?”

“How so?” Dale muttered, pulling his chainmail over his head.

“You get to start that spiral pretty young. What are ye’, twenty-one?” Hans inquired.

“So? You’re in your thirties. Is ten years that big of a difference?” he grumbled, annoyed at the now damp armor he had to put on.

“Hmm.” Hans chuckled. “Well, yes, it is. Also, to join the Guild, you have to go through the process you just had or come in with a fairly pure spiral already goin’. Plus, this here be the first non-attribute dungeon I’ve ever heard-a. Usually, you gotta travel a lot to get to one that has your element type or risk stripping your center in the open with no ready Essence, if you are desperate.”

His grin somehow widened. “And I’m glad I look so young! Well, I am the youngest in the group, just my mid-sixties, after all.”

Dale looked up in shock, failing in an attempt to make a witty remark. “What? You are kidding me.”

“Frank told you that the lifespan of a Mage is calculated in hundreds of years, yea? Well, the life of a cultivator ain’t too shabby.” Hans danced around a bit, light on his feet. “We age slowly enough that we have the effective lifespan of three or four people. If we break into the Mage rank before we die, our body heals up the ravages of time even more.”

He stopped and looked at Dale. “Meeting Frank was the best thing that ever happened to you, and don’t you ever forget it, boy-oh. People kill to get into the Guild if we ask them to. You’ll notice pretty quick that you are about to become a whole helluva lot stronger and harder to hurt. That’ll be your Essence toughening you up. There’s a whole slew-a benefits. Including that enchanted armor you’re wearing.”

Dale looked at the gear he was putting on, surprised. He hadn’t known anything but the shield was enchanted.

“Heh, about what I figured. You think it was hundreds of gold for poor equipment? That discount dropped it to about twenty percent of its market value.” Dale was nearly vomiting from this revelation. The full price would have been over five hundred gold?!

“Yeah, Frank musta figured you’d be able to pay it off pretty quick, or he’d have given ya only decent gear. That stuff will become light as a feather and let ya be as mobile as Craig in his blasted cloth when ya learn how to cycle Essence through it, o’course. Right now, it’s a good muscle builder I bet.”

“I hurt everywhere, if that’s what you mean.”

“Yup, that’s what I mean,” Hans retorted flippantly. “Time for us to get some food. Don’t want what kills you in the dungeon to be hunger.”

They walked to the mess hall tent and got in the line. Early enough that they got through fairly quickly, they were just starting to eat when a chef walked over to them.

“WELL, HELLO THERE!” boomed the Chef, “Going into the dungeon are you?” He had stopped blasting his voice when he saw them wince. “Sorry, used to train soldiers, poor bastards. Listen, I hear there are pretty decent herbs down there. No one complains right now, but it’s hard to eat food that tastes of dirt.”

Handing a few sacks over, he continued, “Fill these up, and I’ll make it worth your while. Different plant, different bag. Got it? Great!” He turned away, paused, then finished menacingly, “Don’t fill ‘em up, and I’ll make sure you get your… just desserts?”

Hans looked at the chef warily and responded in a voice that was almost bereft of his previous accent, “Hmm. Dale, I’m gonna let you in on a secret to a long life. Never piss off your chef, your boss, or your wife. I even rhymed it for you. That’ll help ya remember. Also, when you get famous, never let someone make a song about you. Never ends well,” he advised sagely.

“Did someone make a song about you, Hans?” Dale looked at Hans, trying to figure out if his alternating accent was just for fun or if he had taken a blow to the head.

Cough, “Well, I’m full! Don’t forget to bring your bags. It’s your first quest, after all.” Hans hurried away… blushing?!

Dale followed him at the greatest speed he could manage, his armor creaking and groaning almost as much as Dale was, and they found the rest of their group waiting. Craig looked over at Dale and examined his Chi spiral. Pleased by his continued work and the high quality of it, Craig gained a bit of respect for the young man. Stronger men than Dale had been broken by the destruction of their center.

“Good to see you up and about. I’m impressed you found the time to bathe,” Craig stated blandly, making the others laugh and Dale get a bit pink around the ears. “Today, you are going to take a more active role. I want you near the front of the group killing Mobs. The best way to get good at fighting is to practice, after all. Gotta build that muscle.” Dale nodded seriously, and they walked toward the entrance.

The goal today was to mimic what had been done yesterday—fight the Mobs and cultivate. They would also be stopping for all loot so that the Guild could determine what they valued most. As they neared the center of the first room warily, they readied their weapons for the expected ambush attempt. Easily slaying the mushroom type Mobs, including a ranged type that Dale was able to practice blocking with, they were a bit confused when none of the rabbit types appeared.

“What is going on? Where are the Mobs?” Dale asked mistrustfully.

“How about instead of worrying, you just collect your herbs?” Hans countered. While Dale did so, the others exchanged dark looks and collected the dropped loot and mushrooms. They made their way to the next room and, again, only found mushrooms. This continued until they finally came to the Boss room. The Bloody Bane was awaiting their arrival, and they were glad to accept the challenge. A short fight ensued, the humans being the victors after only a brief struggle.

No holy symbol this time, but a fistful of copper coins and two right boots clattered to the ground, which were collected by the other members as Dale sat and began to strongly cultivate. While not as dense as the previous night, the Essence in the air was allowing him to cultivate far more than he would be able to in a week topside. The others joined him and, within an hour, were moving back toward the entrance, done for the day.

Cal

“Tell me again why you aren’t attacking them?” Dani seemed frustrated that I was holding back my Mobs.

<Sure! You were in their camp yesterday, right? Well there were other groups getting ready to come down if I am not mistaken, yes?> I was asking a leading question, so she stayed quiet.

When she nodded, I continued, <Here is my thought. We give off a sense of weakness to the really strong groups like this one, and they eventually become overconfident. When a weak group comes down, we catch them entirely off guard and make sure none return to warn the others. The strong group thinks the weak ones were killed accidentally because they know how easy the fights are.> I really hoped she would like this plan.

“That is… actually brilliant,” she stated, eying me as though I had been replaced by someone else.

I pretended to be hurt. <Why do you sound so surprised?>

She brutally ignored my pain. “Aaaanyway, why do you think this will work?”

<Well, it looks like that strong group is going to be the first to show up every day, trying to soften me up for the others. You said they called this a ‘training ground’, correct?>

“Yeah. I see. That makes sense. So most of the groups should be rather weak. I propose that we give regular fights to most of them and only wipe out a party once a week or so. Enough people are showing up out there that I think that could be attributed to poor group decisions,” Dani amended my plan prototypically, making it a better one.

<That is… brilliant,> I mocked her.

“Hey!”

<Ha! No, it really is a good idea. We don’t want too much attention, or they’ll send high ranked people with the lower groups all the time.> I allowed my admiration for her to seep into my ‘voice’.

“I agree.” She brightened considerably. “How is the place looking?”

<I think I have it all reset. I added a few more Bane types to the second room. I felt that the number of ranged Mobs in there was a bit low.>

She agreed with my estimation, “Sounds good. Did you have any ideas for the acid yet?”

<Yeah, and I discovered a really interesting thing about it. I tried combining it with monsters, and it didn’t do anything, so I tried combining it with some of the different materials I had gathered. One combination seems promising. When I added hydrogen and oxygen to the mix, it vastly increased the potency of the acid. I tested a small amount of it, and it dissolved a rabbit within about ten seconds!> I tried to keep the volume of my voice down, but this scientific breakthrough needed to be known!

She dimmed and turned a bit green in a way I had taken to mean disgust. “Wow. That is horrible. Also, I don’t know what you are talking about, Cal. I think that you forget that when you absorb things, you learn their name and what that name means. When you say those words to me, they have no meaning, and I can’t remember them… Just tell me what you are going to call it.”

<Oh. I didn’t realize that. Sorry. I’m thinking of calling it ‘etching solution’ because it eats into everything it touches. Seriously, this stuff is dangerous.> I hoped she would heed my warning; that Basher had seemed like it was really in pain.

She looked at me questioningly. “When did you make this stuff?”

<Well, you went to sleep, and I got bored–> I began sheepishly.

“And when Cal gets bored he creates deadly stuff for entertainment,” she interrupted dryly.

<Kinda.> I was a little embarrassed but also glad she was starting to have a high opinion of me, even if it was a little dark. <It’s good for us in the long run, though. Speaking of the long run, in your opinion, what is it going to take to get me to F-rank nine?>

She started considering something and spoke slowly after several seconds of intense thought, “Well, I think you have enough understanding of how things work, so now it is a matter of raw power. When your Chi spiral fills two-thirds of your Core, you should break into F-rank nine. At the rate you are going, it should be only a few weeks, faster if you get large influxes soon.”

I did some quick calculations in my head, judging how much Essence I was gaining recently. <Well, I am about half full of Essence in my spiral, but haven’t been getting many large inputs recently. If people start dropping, I might make it in a few days.>

“No rush, Cal. Slow and steady makes for a strong power base. I was actually thinking you should try and compress that Chi spiral down. I don’t want to sound mean, but I think you’ve been getting complacent and layering it on without using all the available space. It’s a bad habit,” Dani admonished, directing my attention to all of the space I was wasting in my Core.

She was right, and under her watchful eye, I worked on compressing it down as much as I could. There was a lot of empty space that I was not using, it turned out. By the time I was finished working to improve myself, I had a significantly smaller but far denser spiral spinning at greater speeds.

“Good work! Remember that the faster it spins, the more well-refined it will be, and faster spinning makes for faster Essence gathering as well.” She sounded very pleased with my effort.

I knew she was right, and my laziness may have really been costing me, especially now that I saw how fast the spiral was spinning. <Sorry, my mind had been on other things recently. I’ll try to remember that real power is not in what something looks like but in the quality of the effort that it takes to get there.>

She beamed at me. “I’m proud of you, Cal! You don’t shy away from your faults and work hard to improve yourself when you find them. Ooh! By the way, I think a new group is coming in!”

She was, of course, correct. I decided to follow her plan and give them a regular fight. When they came into the first room, I ambushed them at the center and watched as my Bashers got in several nice shin-shots before they finally took my minions down. Retreating at about half losses as usual, I watched as they paused in the room for a bit to recover and gather the loot. While they did so, I scanned their auras, double checking and pleased upon finding that this was a D-ranked group, none past the fifth ranking.

They continued onward, pushing through the pain as the promise of treasure stirred them from inaction. Already a few coppers richer, apparently the equivalent of a week’s pay in the area, they were determined to make it big. The second room was harder for them, as I attacked with the rabbits before they killed off the Shroomish, making them work harder to block the poisonous thorns while their legs took a beating. By the time half the swarm of Bashers was defeated, inspiring a retreat, the men looked exhausted and filthy. Covered in blood from my rabbits and bruises of their own, they certainly looked ready to call it a day. Most of them at least. One of the men, trying to convince them to keep going, pulled off his helmet and started arguing energetically that the group should continue.

He began stalking toward the next tunnel, very inspirationally shouting, “To money!” I saw my chance. The Bane on the ceiling by the tunnel took a clean shot, impaling the man with a hand-sized thorn directly through his temple, piercing the skull in one blow! Even if the initial attack hadn’t been enough to kill him—it was—the poison, though weak, was administered directly to the man’s brain. He fell, and as soon as his aura winked out, I was able to work on directly dissolving his armor with my influence, the process essentially aging them until they fell apart as tattered, useless chunks while I took the pattern I needed to recreate it. The suddenly rusted remnants of his armor clanging to the floor startled his team greatly, their eyes showing white as their faces drained of blood in shock.

From their perspective, it had been over in an instant. The fallen man’s teammates saw a thorn impact their friend, then saw him drop and hit the floor, for some reason almost naked. I left his wool clothes on his corpse as I already had a few sets of those to work with, but I got all of his armor and his well-made sword. Neat. Apparently, he had been fairly rich; the sword was really well made! They tried to pick the remains of the fallen gear back up, but I had bound it all to the floor by growing a layer of stone around it while I worked to break each piece down and study it, making it impossible for the frustrated humans to take. Furious, they grabbed their fallen comrade’s corpse and departed, faces grim, when the dead man’s Essence finally made its way to me.

<Oh, yeah…> I moaned in pleasure. The D-ranked man had far more pure and abundant Essence than any I had ever had the pleasure of absorbing. Carefully adding it to my spiral as densely as possible, I watched as my energy re-grew to nearly half, this time much stronger than before I had compressed it. <That’s the stuff. Dani, you wanna try any of this?> I groaned in ecstasy.

She looked on, hungry but unable to touch the Essence until it made its way to her through our bond. “Brute, you know I can’t take that directly, and what happened to taking out groups slowly?”

I thought quickly; we had made a plan, after all. Finally, I mentally shrugged. <Well, there is no way anyone will blame anything but that man’s overconfidence. Removing your armor when in a hostile area? Tsk, tsk. Not a smart move.>

“To be fair, he only removed his helmet. You removed his armor. You dirty dungeon!” She chuckled at her own joke. “But you make a good point. Congrats on the Essence! I’m glad to see that that worked out so well. Also, how good is that armor?”

<Eh, it is okay I suppose. No enchantments or anything fun on the armor, but I got a full set of plate mail and the chainmail it goes over. I’ll adjust the size for medium and larger guys and put them out as loot, most likely. The sword is more interesting, though.> I left off tantalizingly, knowing her rabid curiosity would make her ask.

“How so?” She was rather impatient today, wasn’t she? I smiled to myself.

<Well, it had a temporary enchantment on it. I think it is an augmentation that sharpens and cleans the blade. I think I can alter it a bit to add it to the spikes the Bane shoots, but that isn’t what I am interested in.>

“Oh?”

<Correct me if I’m wrong, but the enchantment like this is temporary because it was cast on the sword. It looks like tightly woven Essence, not something else like Mana, and it is always active. Permanent enchantments are formed by cutting Inscriptions like on that pendant, then putting your own Essence into the Inscriptions right? That allows you to turn it on or off at will.> She was keeping up with me so far. I could tell.

“Sounds correct so far. Just so you know, cutting those in is called ‘inscribing’, and when done properly, it is called a ‘Rune’,” she took a quick second to boost my knowledge.

I acknowledged her input and continued, <Well, I am wondering if I can use the Beast Cores to power enchantments. Since they can store Essence, it should be possible to draw the energy from them and not yourself right?>

Dani went quiet for a moment. “Well, in theory. It is possible to use specially refined Beast Cores as Mana accumulators, but the cost is usually so high for even a normal Core that no one—that I have heard of anyway—has tried it for just Essence.”

<Okay, good. Next, I am wondering if I could use the corruption in a stone for anything.> From her reaction, I think the answer I was about to get was ‘no’.

“What? Corrupted stones are useless. No one can manipulate it so…” She went silent, realizing that I had been able to move the taint around rather easily.

She walked right into my trap! <Right! I can, and when I put it back in items that naturally have the stuff, like rocks and metal, they become stronger and sturdier, closer to their pure elemental form! I’m wondering what would happen if I used the corruption instead of purified Essence to fill a Beast Core, then used that stone to create an enchantment!>

“I don’t know.” Dani slowly thought through the implications. “It is an interesting idea, though. Go for it, I mean, you can always make more Cores, right? Remember, though, you haven’t encountered all of the different Essence types that exist, so make extras.”

I set up a few more Cores next to the ones I was planning on using for Essence overflow, then increased the amount of them to six each. One each for fire, water, air, earth, infernal, and celestial Essence. Since my main prey was humans, I figured I could eventually fill them all up. Next, I looked at the sharpening augmentation on the sword. An enchantment was just a specific pattern of Essence placed on to an item, and if it was inscribed without mistakes, it could become a Rune, which was a permanent enchantment powered by Essence only when you wanted to pass energy through it.

The reason permanent enchantments, or Runes, were rarer was due to the pattern needing to be perfect. If there was a flaw, the Essence would flow out of the Rune, and the pattern would be useless, at best. At worst, it would activate and have an unintended effect. Conversely, when done properly, it was difficult to remove an enchantment because the Essence that flowed through it would eventually strengthen the pattern, again known as a Rune or Inscription, placed on the item, to the point where if it were made on wood, you could burn the log away and the Rune would still be stable. Not that they were indestructible, far from it, really. It would just take a lot of strength—or applied knowledge of where to strike—to destroy a well-used Rune, but it could be done.

The downside to using a Runed versus an enchanted item was obviously that you needed to provide Essence to it in order for it to function. This is where the Beast Cores would potentially come into play. With Mana being a far more potent source of energy that would last far longer, I could see why people would wait to get Mana accumulators set before going to the expense of creating really good Runed items, as correctly and permanently inscribed items were properly named.

I had some time before the next party would come to fight, so after resetting the place—not hard as the last group barely made progress—I tried to apply the enchantment to the daggers I could make. I was quickly frustrated, as I could not directly integrate the Rune into the pattern. I could splice creatures together for goodness sake! Did I not have enough knowledge to cut a pattern into a chunk of metal?! Oh. Wait.

A flash of inspiration struck, and I ‘grew’ a dagger in the Boss room. Then with infinite patience and precision, I formed the most accurate lines possible by creating acid molecule by molecule on to the blade. A new group had entered the dungeon and cleared the first room by the time I was finished with my newest creation. Now, to test it! I extended a few lines of Essence into the Rune, and… it flared to life!

Under my watchful gaze, the edge of the blade constricted at the molecular level, forming tighter bonds along each edge. Along the entire blade, tiny imperfections fixed themselves, leaving no space for blood or gore to find a foothold. It had worked! Now it would never need to be sharpened, and a quick flick of the blade would cast off all viscera that it accumulated.

Now for the dangerous part, as I might have lost all of my effort. I absorbed the dagger and looked at the pattern that appeared in my mind. Yes! I could now directly create this dagger with a Rune attached! I called it a ‘Honed Steel Dagger’, and I was very proud of my work. Turning my attention to the fighting happening in—oh my, the third room already? I quickly and gleefully took control of a large Basher and made a concentrated attack on the group attacking me. Bashing into the legs of the least armored human—as the creature’s namesake suggested—the archer stumbled, and I was able to do some considerable damage to him before his pals finished off my remaining defenders.

I watched the man cry in pain. <I think I broke his tibia and fibula,> I casually informed Dani.

“Mmm. That sounds dirty! What do you mean?” Dani lecherously inquired.

I breathed a snort at her odd sexual humor. <I broke his leg below the knee. There are two bones there, and in a human they are called tibia and fibula. I don’t know if that would be the same for a different race.>

“Ah. Got it.” She seemed less interested now that she realized I wasn’t playing along and making a sexual reference.

I watched the man sob on my floor as he writhed around. <Think that will be enough for them to leave?> I questioned distractedly, mind back on my new dagger.

She looked at them through her connection to me. “I doubt it. Plus, they’re already healing him.”

<They can do that?> Enraged, I turned my attention back to the group and watched as another lightly armored man directed wood-type Essence—specialized earth and water that is—into the man’s leg, which I assume knitted the bone back together as he was soon able to stand up. Then walking with a limp, he and the party moved into the tunnel toward the next room.

<That’s not fair!> I gasped in fury.

“Your Boss Mob can heal by hurting people, so why is this a surprise?” Dani did not seem to understand my indignation.

<It… It’s just… Fine! Be right, again!> I huffed, unable to form a proper response.

“I will, thank you,” she replied primly.

They attacked my Boss, the Bloody Bane, with everything they could muster. I directed a few Bashers into the fray at critical times, knocking them off balance long enough for a spike to land in an arm or a vine to whip someone across the helm. The fight lasted much longer this time around since the group was already tired and in pain.

Finally, the Boss collapsed. I had failed to take them out but had still gained some important knowledge, so I dropped a silver coin for each of them as well as the coveted holy symbol pendant thingy. Though lightly poisoned, the men still were wildly excited. The archer whose leg I had broken nearly wept, and kept repeating, “I just knew it would be worth it!” I was confused by this. Why were they so happy? I demanded the information from Dani. She informed me that the currency system was such that one hundred copper coins was worth a silver coin, one hundred silver coins were worth a gold coin, and one hundred gold coins were worth a platinum coin, whatever that was.

Apparently, I had drastically overpaid these guys. Silver and copper were easy to make, so I wasn’t worried about it until Dani informed me of what the consequences may be, “If everyone thinks you are going to be worth a month’s pay for an hour of fighting, they will come in and kill absolutely everything over and over, just looking for a way to avoid working elsewhere. Humans can be rather… enthusiastic in their greed.”

I winced at this. <Yikes. I’m not ready for that.>

“I agree and am glad you realize it.” Dani watched the men who were wandering around the room.

Each of the men who had taken a thorn and become poisoned pulled out a vial and drank something. Then the man with the plant affinity worked for a while to get his team healed up enough to stop their bleeding as they relaxed and cultivated for a while.

<What was that? They drank something,> I muttered suspiciously.

“Probably an antidote for the poison,” Dani whispered since the men were so close and her voice was audible if humans paid attention.

I tried to keep my curiosity under control but couldn’t manage it. <Oh. Thanks. Also, can only plant affinity users heal?>

Dani couldn’t refuse an opportunity to educate me. She glanced at the humans focused on their Chi spirals, then moved into a furiously whispered lecture, “No, actually all of them can heal. There is a solid reason they don’t all do it, though. Apparently, the problem is that they feel the element used, so being healed by a fire cultivator is not that pleasant, as it tends to feel like your body is being cauterized. Earth grinds really badly, as if your bones were being crushed. Cool and soothing water cultivators are sought after, and apparently, plant or wood feels like roots or worms squirming through you. Since he is a wood cultivator, he is not the ideal healer for a group this size, but most likely, he was the only trained healer they could find.”

<What about celestial and infernal?> She had said ‘every type’, after all.

“Celestial healers are called clerics and are usually a part of the church. They are actually the most effective healers, but traveling with them comes with strings attached. Infernal users… I doubt they would heal anyone but themselves, but I think their version of ‘healing’ hurts worse than getting the wound originally would.”

<I wonder if I can make something useful out of that information… Thanks for letting me know, Dani.> We watched the men cultivate for a while before eventually getting up, stretching, and leaving. They were the last group of the night, allowing me to focus hard on cultivation and the concepts I had acquired over the last few days.

That was the night when I broke into F-rank nine.

Chapter Fourteen

Dale woke up quickly, feeling something amiss. Something was wrong; there was a threat to him in the area. For several weeks, his team had been going into the dungeon at first light, and Dale was becoming stronger, his battle-trained senses more aware to impending danger. Slipping from his bed, he moved stealthily to the tent flap. It began to slide open, and the grinning head of Hans slowly peeked into the room. Stepping into the room fully, a bucket of ice-cold water became visible.

Dale shuddered internally; he had only been woken up a few times with that water, but each time it was worse. Last week, the water had ice in it somehow! It was mid-summer! Ice! Dale’s eyes narrowed as he prepared his counterattack. He carefully reached down and flipped the water back on to the startled Hans.

“Gotcha, you bastard!” Dale yelled, following up by attempting a brutal slapping combination attack on Hans.

“I’ll get you, ya brat! You got lucky today, but you can’t stay awake forever!” A drenched Hans scampered off yelling threats, leaving a cheerful Dale to get reacquainted with his armor. The full group met again at breakfast, the team having decided to eat together each day. Unexpectedly, the chef decided to swing by again as they were finishing their meal.

“MORNING, lads!” His voice faltered and dropped a few decibel levels at their wince, “Did it again, sorry. Listen, I’m gonna be makin’ the herbs that are available in there a daily request. They tasted so darn good on my foods that I had them examined by that there apothecary that showed up and has been making those fancy potions. Turns out they are jam-packed full-a Essence and help with all sorts of minor health issues that I’ve been seeing recently. So I’m gonna be cooking with ‘em a lot.”

Looking Dale in the eyes, he added, “Since y’all are the first to go in every day, I figured you’d be able to grab the best bunches. Get ‘em for me, and everyone around here’ll eat better, and I’ll be sure to tell ‘em yer ta thank. Or the food’ll get worse—maybe I’ll ‘accidentally’ burn yours every day, and I’ll still tell the other men yer ta… thank.” With that, the oddly well-muscled chef walked away, whistling off key.

“Sure is a fan of the carrot and the stick,” Dale murmured. “Shall we make sure to bring back those herbs?”

“Yup.”

“For sure.”

“Agreed.”

They moved to make their way into the dungeon, Dale in the lead. With the good tutors, clean Essence, and constant work, Dale had progressed to the F-rank six rather quickly, as well as put on some solid muscle. Now not only was he able to keep up in his heavy plate armor, he had a good handle on the skills and abilities he needed to decidedly defeat the deadly denizens of the dark dungeon.

Within an hour of hard work, they had cleared the dungeon and were finishing off the Boss. As they did daily, each sat and cultivated, but an oddity in the behavior of his friends made Dale look up, noticing the men staring at the Silverwood tree.

“What’s going on, guys?” he inquired dreamily, almost in a trance as he worked to gather the loose Essence into his center.

“The tree has been growing a lot recently. We are wondering if that is normal,” Craig let him know, frowning at an internal thought.

“We’re also trying to figure out how this tree will help us move into the B-ranks,” Hans stated. “It isn’t exactly a common thing to have access to, after all.

“Sadly, we won’t know until the Elves start making an appearance.” Craig derailed the conversation with a hand wave. “Well, let’s head on out, nothing more to do here. Dale, you should work on integrating what you have absorbed into your Chi spiral. Don’t fill up too much or it will be harder to process.”

Carefully making their way back to the surface, they were startled to see that the place was bustling with movement, people running around and shouting orders to each other. They noticed that Guild Master Frank was in the largest, loudest group, shouting at another, somewhat taller, man.

“No, you can’t have that space! We’ve had it roped off and claimed for the Portal Mage’s to build on for weeks now!” Frank was red in the face, spittle flying from his lips.

“You are going to deny the Holy Church an area that will be able to best serve the people? This will be the center of the goings-on in the area, and who better to guide people than the church?!” the taller man angrily intoned, his voice ringing out clearly in a manner trained to catch attention.

“The PORTAL MAGES!” Frank roared, throwing his hands into the air. “That is their exact job! They guide and send people where they want to go!”

“Well, the church sends them where they need to go!” the tall man boomed back, unimpressed.

Frank saw Dale’s group walking over and visibly worked to calm himself. “It’s a moot point. The man who owns all this land is here; he’ll make the decision,” Frank declared smugly, knowing that Dale was a friend.

“Excellent, where is he?” the taller man demanded. Frank pointed at the group, and he walked over. Going directly to Hans, whose face he could see was grinning, the man introduced himself, “I am Father Richard. A humble cleric,” Frank snorted at that pronouncement, “who has been promoted to run a church in this area, as it is obviously sorely needing guidance. That man,” he jabbed his finger at Frank, “has been trying to place travel and leisure over divine teaching, and I demand that you tell him that this is the perfect location for a church!” he finished in a ringing tone that reached every ear.

Hans looked from Father Richard to Frank. “Well then. Frank, it is the perfect location for a church,” Hans told his Guild Master and nearly burst into laughter at the look of triumph on Richard’s face and the wry look on Frank’s.

“And. There. You. Have. It!” Richard crowed, throwing his hands in the air and beaming.

“Excuse me, Father but–” Dale began. Unfortunately, he wasn’t able to match Father Richards pealing voice.

“The Lord provides, and we will have a beautiful place of worship and–”

“Hey!” Frank barked, thrusting his finger at Hans. “He isn’t the landowner.”

“He–” Richard whirled on the now maniacally laughing Hans and fixed him with a glare.

“Father, it is the perfect place!” Hans laughed so hard he fell over. “I… ha-hah… I told him, just like you asked!”

Everyone was chuckling except the crestfallen priest, so Dale decided to speak up. Lifting his visor, he said, “I own the land here, Father Richard.”

“Oh. You? Well. Right, lad, listen,” Richard quietly muttered, “I need this, I think my promotion to this place was a punishment. My branch of the church displeased the bishop, and when I was finally up for promotion to a location-based diocese instead of being a wandering minister, I was told to come here and build a worthy house of worship. I can’t be put to the side, I just…” He sighed sadly, looking at the chunk of land he wanted. “I need to make something memorable here.”

“Does it need to be that exact spot?” Dale looked around and saw nothing really special about the area.

“It looks like all the other flat land around here is claimed. All these tents, I’m sure people have plans to build. How much of this land do you own? A few acres around the dungeon entrance?” Richard searched.

“Not exactly. I–” Dale began with a smile, only to be cut off again.

Richard interrupted with a frustrated growl, “Not even that? Rats, the land price here must have skyrocketed when this was found. I’ll never be able to afford to build a church near here–”

“Father!” Re-gaining his attention, Dale grinned. “I own this mountain.”

“What?!”

“When I discovered the dungeon, I originally did buy only the land directly containing the dungeon. It took everything I had. When the scouting team showed up, they left me with enough gold to buy this entire mountain, since there had never been anything useful found on it. And, well, since it is a contested mountain range, the price was right,” Dale revealed with a grin, adding on accomplishments to drive the price of renting land up subconsciously in Richard’s mind. “I bought the land from both the Lion and the Phoenix Kingdom, just in case. It helped that my intelligence as a sheepherder was somewhat underestimated. Both Kingdoms assumed I wanted uninterrupted grazing pastures, not a valuable resource like a dungeon.”

“Brilliant!” Frank whispered. He hadn’t realized the forethought Dale had put into his good fortune. When land was purchased, any deeds were signed with Mana-infused ink that was impossible to fake or forge. The contracts had to be honored by both Kingdoms, when before, the contested nature of the mountain would allow one of the Kingdoms to attempt a hostile takeover if he had only bought from the other. In fact, the contract for the land would also be enforced magically. Frank wondered if Dale knew about this aspect of his purchase.

“Listen,” Dale tried to placate the priest, “I think you should move further away from here. What if beasts are drawn to this place and attack your church? What if something breaks out of the dungeon? Will you stand in the way and fight when creatures are attacking your followers? Will–”

“Yes,” Richard told him seriously.

“See–” Dale sputtered to a stop, train of thought derailed. “Wait, what?”

“Yes, I will,” Richard calmly promised. “I will protect them.”

Dale tried again, rubbing at his temples as a headache threatened, “Look, Father, praying at a problem won’t make it go away. It–”

“Yes, it will.” Father Richard chuckled darkly.

Dale tried again with a sheepish chuckle, seeing why Frank had gotten so angry. “Father, you aren’t understanding me.”

“No, you aren’t understanding me.” Father Richard grinned and bowed his head. Murmuring a short prayer, he gestured at the empty lot that he had been after. For a moment, nothing seemed to happen as the sun rose higher in the sky. A word came out of Father Richard’s mouth that shook the air and made no sense to Dale, followed by a beam of light that tore from the heavens and settled into a perfect square on the entire lot for several glorious seconds. The sound created was amazing, a cross between a choir singing… and rock exploding. When the light faded several moments later, the ground had been fused into perfectly clear glass, three feet straight down. The heat coming off of the molten land was enough to singe Dale’s eyebrows, even from this distance.

The Father turned back towards Dale. “You see, young man, I am a rank-A priest. If someone were threatening my flock, I would be more than willing, nay, I would cheerfully send them to the creator.”

Dale watched the clear liquid of the ground steam, all impurities apparently burned away. “Well. The spot, ah, is yours it… seems. Let’s make a lease, shall we? What are you willing to offer as payment?” Dale tried not to be stunned by the casual display of apocalyptic destructive capabilities.

Father Richard snorted at Dale’s attempt to seem nonchalant. “Many things. Firstly, I will build my own building. I will provide healing to people as needed, for a small offering. With this many people, families are bound to arrive. It won’t always be the simple military camp it is now. A church in the area will alleviate many concerns families may have. I will teach and train youngsters for no charge and accept any into my order who are gifted with an affinity for celestial Essence.”

“I will be able to provide them a means to gain this Essence in the proper ways. Often, children with celestial affinity are small or weak because they cannot gain any Essence. I will teach them how to properly cultivate through their prayers.”

“Finally, I will provide a bank to the community that will not be corrupt as a non-morally guided bank would be. We will only take a small amount in fees that will provide the bulk of our income and our rent to you, which will be determined by a percentage of the gross amount we earn.”

Dale was impressed by this man’s knowledge of the world but realized that as an A-ranked person, he could be several hundred years old. “Father, you seem very knowledgeable and wise. I do agree to these terms, though I must ask, why did it take so long for you to be given a church? You obviously have the power and wisdom to stand alone.”

“We, my sect of the church that is, have fallen out of favor with the Bishop due to our favored style and practice of worship,” Father Richard disclosed brightly, happy that the land was his.

“Why? What do you do that he doesn’t like?” Dale was genuinely curious.

“We do the Lord’s work as our penance, our service to the world. We hunt demons and the undead. Pardon me, I have work to do!” Father Richard jauntily stated, moving toward the small market area to find craftsmen.

Cal

Dani had been correct; wiping out a party every week or so caused no undue attention, as the number of dungeon divers increased. Apparently, the promise of long life and vast riches caused people to ignore the danger inherent in this occupational choice. Go figure. Only a month and some change since they arrived, now a sea of adventurers waited on a line for the Guild to grant them permission to enter; only the first group of the day showed up on a regular basis. They seemed to have some kind of precedence, maybe? That didn’t really bother me, though. Thanks to the constant Essence gains I was making, I had gained enough power fast enough that six of the Beast Cores around me held their own Chi spiral. They weren’t sentient stones, of course; I spiraled their Essence manually. Thanks to keeping these Cores charged, I was able to fill the rooms with Mobs nearly as soon as the humans vacated them, allowing multiple groups to enter in staggered time frames. I would eventually use or absorb the Essence accumulated in the Beast Cores, but I would have choked on the amount of energy I was gaining; I could not just take it all in. Similarly, the corruption stones were also becoming full, but try as I might, I could not make them spiral. They just sat there, glowing with their corruption’s respective color.

Thanks to the massive group of people moving through me and the large amounts of deaths that occurred seemingly by their own stupidity, just a few short weeks after entering the ninth rank of the F series, Dani was coaching me on how to move into the D-rankings.

“Let me explain to you what needs to happen, Cal. The reason it is called ‘breaking’ into a new rank is that you need enough knowledge and power to further ‘break’ your Essence and the mental barriers to advancement. I need to warn you—it hurts. A lot,” she started seriously. “To get into the D-ranks, your Chi and Essence spiral needs to shatter into a ‘fractal’. This means that each part of the pattern has the same statistical character as the whole.” She took a breath as I attempted to understand her meaning.

“In other words,” she clarified,” your Chi spiral needs to become a spiral made of spirals which are further made of spirals. The Essence swirl that it draws from needs to become a swirl made of swirling Essence. This will, when you manage it, allow you to astronomically increase the Essence you can hold and absorb at any given time, at least a hundred times more at any given point.”

I kept pace with her lecture, making affirmative noises as she spoke. <That sounds really difficult.>

“It is, and it will take a lot of your Essence to break down the other Essence. The payoff is absolutely worth it, though. I’ve been making you practice splitting your focus, which is why we waited until you had those Beast Cores swirling with energy. Spinning multiple spirals is really good practice for this. Also, it is a benefit that humans will never get to use.” She made sure I was paying attention and told me something rather unexpected, “Now, achieving a breakthrough may take a few days to do, and will require all of your focus, so I suggest that tonight when everyone is out and going to bed, you grow a wall of stone to block them and keep them out while you do this.”

<What?! Why?> This was very unlike her. She usually was encouraging more fighting and got after me sometimes when I didn’t take an opportunity to finish off an opponent.

It turned out that she had a very good reason though. “People may get—hmm, upset? When they are unable to find monsters to kill and loot, that is. Since your attention will be focused inward, Mobs won’t respawn if killed. Adventurers may look for… other ways… to get money or find a new source of energy to cultivate from.”

Waiting for evening was torture when I was this excited, but I was able to gain more energy from cultivators by pulling refined Chi from them as well as when a lucky shot from a thorn staggered a man and a Basher crushed his skull. When the sun disappeared behind the mountain range, a soft grinding of stone could be heard if one was close and paying attention.

Before attempting my breakthrough, I etched in the enchantment for protection and durability I had gained from a shield after a lucky kill some time ago. At the activation portion of the Rune—where I would normally deposit Essence into—I placed the corrupted Core instead, which was full of earth and created a shunt that sent its energy into the Rune. The energy oozed into the pattern, slowly filling it to completion until, with a dull flash and an awkward flatulence-esk noise, it successfully activated the Rune!

<Dani, it worked! Look! I made corruption useful!> I loved being the first to discover something; it made me feel smart and pretty.

“Great! Hopefully, it’ll hold until you are ready for people to come back in,” she congratulated me while reminding me that the clock was ticking.

Door now in place, I got down to the serious business of breaking into the D rank. I tried starting the process where the Essence was churning on the outer rim of my gem, but it interrupted the flow of Essence entering from outside. If I tried at the end, where it was being pulled and processed by the Chi spiral, it blocked the flow.

I broke through my pride and finally asked for assistance, <Huh. Dani, where do I start?>

Obviously, she had been waiting for me to ask. “You need to find the smallest part which doesn’t affect the rest and begin there. It should pull Essence from the rest of the Chi spiral as a thread that is the same comparative size as the thread coming from the Essence into the Chi spiral.”

Mentally moving deeper into my Chi spiral, I reached the exact center where the Essence was no longer processing, only spinning. Holding that minuscule amount of energy with my mind, more of an idea than an energy source, I began rotating it in the reverse direction of the remainder of the accumulated Chi. My mind almost broke in pain as my very being was twisted counter to the rest of my soul. Somehow, I was able to stabilize the first position in its new rotation before forcing myself to continue. I should note, all the Chi I contained was a single thread from the center to the outer edge, and if I stopped working, I would need to begin again with this first bit. Spinning it in the opposite direction did not break this thread but, instead, stretched it further, making it even thinner and well refined.

From that point in time, I needed to do two sequential areas along the thread simultaneously. Obviously harder and more painful than just one point, it was required in order for the energy flow to properly continue. This continued one spot along the thread, then two. One, then two. Each distinct position along the line was slightly larger than the one previous, and I needed to take frequent breaks to ensure all the preceding spirals were turning at the same rate. I had no idea how a flesh and blood body would be able to survive this process; I was in intense pain, and my body did not actually have nerves. Maybe the pain of the soul was the same no matter what type of being you were?

In a constant state of breaking down the Essence, I held each pattern time and again until I was certain I would be able to do so naturally with minimal concentration before I moved to the next. Eventually, I came to the end of the Chi. I was very excited at the prospect of completion until Dani sent me a sleepy reminder that I would need to do this with my Essence spiral as well, the outer edge that stored and drew in loose Essence.

Forcing the changes on to the swirl was easier now that I had figured out how to properly mold it, requiring less concentration to achieve the result I wanted. Still focusing intently on not making mistakes, I reached out, and along the spinning Essence, I made tiny vortexes that hungrily pulled power from the one previous until, finally, I came to the start of the spiral. The start of the spiral pulled loose Essence from the world around me. Luckily for my sanity, the pain of this process was far less than working on the Chi spiral had been, being so far from the center of my soul.

Until I was able to subconsciously hold this pattern at all times, allowing it to become a natural process for me, I would need to manually spin every single vortex at the same rate along the whole thread. Holding the pattern in shape was using an exorbitant amount of Essence, allowing me to see why this particular breakthrough was so difficult. When I asked Dani how I was doing time-wise, she let me know that I had been focusing for four days, still faster than she expected.

<My brain hurts,> I complained, projecting an image of a brain turning into ooze.

“You don’t have a brain,” she reminded me somewhat insensitively.

<Sure, rub it in. How are things going out here?> I quickly scanned my area to see if there were any obvious problems.

“Good, people tried breaking in a few times, but I think they are now just waiting.” She seemed smug about our door being unbreachable.

I checked my Essence levels, which, though depleted, I found that I still had plenty to work with. <Well, they can wait a bit longer. If you think we are ready for it, in my opinion, it is time to change things up in here.>

“Excellent! By the way, congratulations on your new D-ranking!” she cheered me enthusiastically.

If I could blush… <Thank you! I know it is just D-rank zero at this point, but the first five ranks are all about direct Essence accumulation, right?>

“Pretty much. D-rank six and above require greater knowledge, but at this rate, I think you will get there soon.” Dani glowed warmly, showing her approval.

<Wonderful! Let’s start… now.> Reaching out to the Essence contained in the Cores around me, I slowly and carefully pulled it in, rejoicing at the greater amount of Essence that I was able to take into myself. Still being careful as I did not want to disrupt the new energy pattern I had spent days creating, I collected every single drop of Essence they contained. One by one, the dancing lights in them went dark, their accumulated Essence flowing into me. I quickly felt bloated; each of the Cores had held nearly half the amount of energy I had been able to contain while I was in the F-ranks.

When they were empty, I still had not increased in rank but was now energized enough to move a large portion of the area I held influence over. Daily, I had slowly extended downward but had never taken the time needed to move the stone in the area, simply extending myself. The area I could now open up would—slightly—more than double my size horizontally and allow me to have another entire floor added vertically.

Now ready to begin, I followed Dani’s instructions and began ‘correctly’ moving the stone while absorbing the vibrations, so as to not cause deadly destruction I would not be able to capitalize on. Luckily, the process was not quite as slow as I had originally worried about—creating a buffer zone was simply a matter of willpower—so within a day or two, I was able to add three more rooms on the first floor and a total of eight on the new second floor.

I increased the number of tunnels as well. Obviously, the old layout was not working at the best efficiency for slowing adventurers. Instead of just one tunnel connecting all the rooms, I now had many tunnels that connected to either each other, nothing but traps, or a room that didn’t allow for access deeper into the dungeon. You would never know if a room connected without first exploring it because each of the tunnels connected at opposite ends of the room, having a sharp turn that you could not see around. Some of those turns did indeed allow people to venture deeper in, but the majority were eventually dead ends.

I left the rooms and traps on the first floor mainly alone, not bothering to alter them too much. One major change on the first floor was a vain attempt to alleviate the annoyance created by people poking at my walls by moving the iron vein into the entry room. This wasn’t so much an attempt to help prospectors as a way to provide raw materials so people could mine the ores and turn it into new items for me to study.

Moving on to the lower floor, I placed traps with highly pressurized acid pockets that would blast into the air at high speed if the thin stone covering them were disrupted. I had found that even if an item were destroyed by means other than me breaking it down with influence, as long as the destruction happened in my dungeon, I could obtain the pattern. Therefore, I was unconcerned if armor and weapons were damaged or destroyed by my etching solution. At a few of the dead end tunnels, I placed large slabs of stone that could be dropped, trapping the occupants in a room containing light drippings of acid, which would turn into a downpour when people were trapped or could possibly explode if exposed to open flame.

Everything I made was, of course, an attempt to gain as much Essence as possible, but I liked to reward intelligence and ingenuity, so I always added ways for these traps to be deactivated. I wanted people to continue coming down here, after all, and with a reputation as a place where the smartest and strongest could almost always prevail, people would always assume they were among the ranks of the ‘certain survivors’. Finally done with the cosmetic and trap changes, it was time for me to try and upgrade my Mobs, then make a Boss monster for the lower floor. I kept the Bloody Bane as the floor Boss of the first level as I didn’t really care to make him a common Mob. To be frank, he seemed a bit… lackluster. After all, the entire time he had existed, he had never managed a kill!

I looked into what I had available for Mobs. I could try to upgrade my Bashers, but what would they grow into? I was uncertain if pouring Essence into them was the correct way to go about things here. Maybe I should just use what I had, fill up the dungeon with a large number of Mobs and wait for inspiration after opening the door. Hang on a second… the door? The door! Of course! When the Bloodmoss had absorbed Essence and infernal energy, it had naturally evolved and gained vampirism-style abilities. With my ability to move corruption, could I build Mobs in the style I wished?

Nothing to do but try! But where to start? First, I created a few of my Bashers and made them hold still so I could… experiment on them. Which kinda feels creepy to think, but it had to be done! They were all at the second rank of the F series, so I had some room to grow them. I decided to start by attempting to increase one’s ranking by infusing it with air corruption and Essence. I poured a bit of each into the Basher, and it started to noticeably grow. I added more, feeling confident with this plan, when the poor thing gave a startled squeak and exploded into a bloody mist, which slowly settled on the walls and floor, scraps of fur and bone plopping wetly on to the other Bashers in the room.

<What the abyss?!> The other Bashers were now fidgeting, desperately trying to fight the compulsion I had placed on them in order to run away.

“Well, that was dramatic. What, ah, what just happened?” Dani seemed far too calm for the literal bloodbath that had just occurred.

<I was trying to rank it up, and it just… popped!> I exclaimed wildly. Did my voice sound shrill there?

“That’s odd. If you are just giving it Essence, it should have easily and naturally assimilated it.” Dani was now concerned.

<Well, I mean, I was trying to add a tiny little bit of taint to it to give it new abilities,> I confessed innocently.

“Oh, that makes sense. It seems like a sound plan at least… Hmm. What did you use?” Dani inquired in a calm tone.

<I went with air corruption. It looked like it was working but obviously not.> I walked her through the process I had attempted, followed by the obvious end result of the test.

She considered what I had done, then offered an explanation, “Your Bashers don’t normally have much air Essence in their makeup, do they? Maybe that one’s body rejected it, or maybe you just added too much taint too quickly. Try again, but add less taint at a time,” Dani declared, settling in to watch.

<You want me to try with air again?>

“Why not?”

<Because the last one exploded.>

“It’s a figure of… Yes, try air again, Cal.” She slowly exhaled.

Selecting another one of the Bashers cowering on the floor amongst the gore of its brother, I again started adding corruption; slowly this time. As before, this one started growing rapidly.

“Stop!” Dani ordered. I did, waiting for an explanation. “Look, the amount of corruption almost overtook the Essence it can hold! That is probably what happened with the first one. Are you adding corruption and Essence at the same rate?”

<Yeah, about half of what I was adding was air-type corruption.>

“Try a smaller amount, maybe… one part tainted to four parts pure Essence?” she directed. We continued on the same rabbit, and it started growing again, albeit slower. When it had gained enough to get to F-rank six, I stopped adding Essence and waited for a result to become apparent. As I had hoped, it gained an elemental ability!

<Yes! It worked!> I exulted in our success.

Dani was a bit more impatient. “What does it do?”

I looked at what the bunny could now do. <It’s called Cleave. What does that mean?>

“Ooh, cool! That means when it attacks, it’ll hit an area in an arc in front of it. Since it is air based, it’ll likely create an intense gust of wind with each hit that will form the arc. Even if it misses, the air may extend and successfully land an attack!” Dani told me triumphantly.

<Wow! That is cool! What should we try next?> I was excited to continue my experimentation.

Water corruption had yielded no effect, and I was loath to try infernal. We moved on to earth, where our effort rewarded us by granting a new ability.

<It grew armor!> I breathed, awed by the form of the new Basher. Nearly double the size of its fellows, the thick muscles and tough bones were now also hidden under plates of what appeared to be stone. This could be considered a tanking unit, the member of a group able to take the most damage.

A tank type unit was fairly common. For instance, the knights in the groups that came into the dungeon with their thick armor and big ol’ shields were a good example of a tank. By having one of these as a Mob, I could have my other Mobs focus on attacking and hope that this creature would remain the main target of adventurers because of its size and formidable appearance.

Next, we tried adding the Essence of fire to the pattern of a basher, but each time, the Basher would scream and spasm on the floor until it died. A few tests of this determined that no matter how diluted I made the combination of fire taint and Essence, I could not make a successful prototype. With some trepidation, we decided to move on to infernal taint, as we were running low on options and infernal was the most plentiful in my arsenal, after earth corruption, of course. This we were more careful with, going very slowly so we didn’t accidentally create an uncontrollable demonic animal.

Again stopping at F-rank six, we watched as the animal started panting heavily; it began shuddering, almost having a seizure. I watched its bones grow longer and denser, becoming harder than even the earth-type Basher. The nub of bone on its head grew, expanding longer and tapering into a sharp point. Its growth slowed, but it had gained a dark, solid horn. The muscles on its back legs strengthened; though fully grown, its size was roughly equivalent to the air-tainted basher.

I was a bit let down. The last creation felt so anti-climactic! <Well, it got a horn but no ability.>

“No, it did! Look at the horn!” Dani shouted.

I looked and examining it, saw ‘Hardened: Armor piercing’. <How is that an infernal ability? Wait, how is that on its bones? I’ve seen something similar but only on a few weapons.>

Dani toyed with a few ideas, finally conceding, “No idea. Maybe it combined with its own natural Essence to produce it?”

I had already turned my mind to the next attempt I was going to make. <I guess. Well, shall we try celestial, too?> Not waiting for her response, I turned my attention to the next Basher and began the process. I tried to regulate the celestial taint moving through it, but unlike the forceful joining that had been obvious with the other types of taint, this basher absorbed celestial taint like a sponge. Instead of a one to five ratio like the others, this type ended up gaining closer to one part celestial, three parts Essence—significantly more than the others.

Cutting the flow of Essence off at the F-rank six, I watched as the Basher twitched, absorbing the Essence flowing into it. Unlike the obvious pain the others had gone through, this one almost seemed to be writhing in pleasure. The fur along its body turned blond, nearly golden. Its body actually shrank a bit, unlike the others who had more than doubled in size. Its muscles reconfigured, gaining fast-twitch muscle—good for sprinting and fast reactions—whereas the others had gained tough, slow-twitch muscle for endurance and strength. The nub of bone on its head turned pure white with golden threads moving through it, looking like a vein of gold in a slab of marble.

“Well, it looks adorable,” Dani cooed.

I whooped, <It has an ability! ‘Mend’. Does that heal?> We obviously had different priorities.

“I think so. It may actually be a stronger version of the healing ability we’ve seen. It’ll likely take a lot of energy to heal, so I don’t think it’ll be able to do it very often. I mean, look how tiny and cute you are!” She was talking to the bunny now, who rubbed at his face with his front paws.

<Cute and resource intensive. It took a lot of celestial corruption to make. Way too much to be a common Mob, and I doubt it will be a great fighter…> Of all the taint we had accumulated, the smallest amount we had was by far celestial. <Well, I may not be able to make these common Mobs, but let’s see what they can do.>

I lined all of my new Bashers up in the room and made them race to the end of the room and back in a test of speed. The earthen, armor covered one was obviously the slowest; he also could not turn very well at speed, as shown when he rammed into the wall and shattered a large chunk of granite before turning around with no apparent damage.

“Damn!” Dani whistled.

The air and infernal types were near matches for speed; the infernal won simply by the length of its horn. In terms of top speed, none of them were able to match the celestial type. It took off, bounding to the end, jumped off the far wall to conserve momentum, and returned to its spot before the others had made it to the first wall. When it stopped, it sank to the floor, exhausted and panting heavily. This little guy was a sprinter, not a marathon runner.

It was almost time to reopen the dungeon, so while I wanted to run some more experiments, we needed to finish up. <What do you think, Dani? I’m leaning toward boosting a version of the armored one to F-rank nine, making him my new Boss. The others I can make mostly common Mobs, especially earth-type, small, armored ones.>

“Sounds good, and how about we place warrens in the Boss room for the healing ones to hide? Then when the Boss gets hurt too bad, they do a sprint-by healing, returning to hiding to avoid dying. Then you won’t need to spend more Essence to make new ones, and we can surprise groups who thought the fight was over.”

<Perfect! Oh, Dani, what would I do without you?> I wildly overacted, pretending she was even more helpful than she really was.

She was ready for my snarky-ness today, unfortunately. “You’d likely still be gazing lovingly at moss.”

<Ouch! Fair enough, cruel overlord!>

We got ready to create the new and enhanced Boss, marshaling our thoughts and readying my Essence while we discussed the best way to proceed. After absorbing all of the new Bashers and carefully studying each pattern, I was prepared to begin. Applying the ideas of the last few hours, I made a new armored Basher and began to flood him with Essence and corruption, literally the energy of the heavens and the earth.

He began to grow again, and I applied more earth taint than I had originally planned. Slowly, he began to grow and eventually passed the F-rank eight. At F-rank nine, his armor fell off, and new plates began to form. Collecting from the nearby granite, particles flew to join into the new, thick plating. The grinding rock segmented, allowing for greater mobility, while the multitude of plates themselves formed piecemeal as hexagonal chunks, which would make sharpened weapons skitter off without finding purchase.

In the end, this monster was near the size of what Dani called a ‘black bear’. Over waist height on a human, the creature weighed in at close to three hundred pounds. Due to the amount of time and Essence I had devoted to it, I decided that I would need to wait until someone killed it before absorbing the pattern. I saw that it had a new ability, but its aura was strong enough that without absorbing the Boss, I could not tell what it did.

Placing hidey-holes around the Boss room, I directed a few golden rabbits to them, making sure they could help or escape from any part of the room. Then to fill out the second floor, I made roving squads of the improved Bashers and named them. The small earth-types I named Smashers, the air-types Oppressors, and the infernal Impalers. The Boss got an actual name, Armored Basher: Raile, while the golden ones had a slightly different flavor to their moniker, Glitterflit. That one was Dani’s suggestion.

I made squads of two Bashers, two Oppressors, and one Impaler each. I placed a few thorn-shooting Banes along the tunnel ceiling to make people look up instead of looking for traps. Then interspersing the rooms with several squads each and a few Banes for ranged attacks, I was as ready to re-open as I could be. Confirming with Dani, I drew the Runed door into the ceiling for later use, then settled in to wait for the next group foolish enough to attack us.

Chapter Fifteen

After a normal morning routine of breakfast and boasting, the first group of divers adjourned to the dungeon as per usual. To their great shock, the entrance was gone. A slab of stone that was obviously not a natural part of the surrounding landscape blocked the opening.

“What is this?” Dale murmured, poking at the obstacle.

“I’m unsure, but there is an energy moving in it that I am… unfamiliar with.” Craig sounded exceedingly confused. “Nothing for it, men. Let’s alert the Guild Master.”

They climbed up the stairs, quickly moving toward the large tent housing the upper echelon of the Guild. They had to walk past the area which had been converted to glass, the rays of sunshine bursting from the glorious dawn glimmered off the reflective surface with awe-inspiring intensity. They arrived at the tent, quickly being granted an audience with a harried-looking Guild Master.

“What? What’s the matter? Why aren’t you in the dungeon?” Frank growled at a clerk as she dropped a stack of paperwork on his desk.

“That’s what we’re here about, Frank. Dungeon’s closed. There is a big ol’ slab of rock in the entryway, and it has some kinda energy moving in it I can’t decipher,” Craig dropped into an unfamiliar cant of dialogue as he talked to Frank.

This got Frank’s attention, as Craig was a well-known expert of all things Essence. He was widely thought to be the next man that would be moving into the Mage rank, a great interest to the Guild as the Mage rank was something that was attained usually twice a decade or so. If Craig didn’t understand whatever the issue was, it could be very serious.

“Humph. Alright, I’ll send you a Spotter. Go check it out when he gets here, then have him report back to me. Actually, one of you come tell me what it is. They would stop to write a report for me to read. As if I didn’t have enough to do…” He scribbled out a note and sent a runner to find the specialist. A Spotter was a Mage-ranked person who specialized in determining the hidden properties of an unknown item. They could read Inscriptions, energy flows, and had a deep understanding of history and the lore of most abilities that had been seen before. They were often assigned to scout teams that helped determine when people, places, or items had gone down a dark path. Less well liked, the church had its own version called inquisitors.

“A Spotter?” Hans whined. “Do we have to work with one of those stuck up bastards?”

“Nope! You could take the day off of dungeoneering and help me out instead. We could use someone to dig a new latrine, ours is near overflowing.” Frank deadpanned with a gimlet stare.

“Oh, look at the time! It is work-with-the-Spotter o’clock,” Hans chattered cheerfully as he made his escape from the room.

“Mm-hm,” Frank grunted. He waved the rest of them off. “Let me know how it goes—now shoo! The portal Mages will be arriving here in the next few days, and I need to find a suitable location for them to set up. Good call giving that lot to the church, Dale. I hadn’t thought about a possible monster breakout.”

Dale, feeling a bit down about not dungeon diving this morning, brightened a bit upon hearing these words. Craig noticed his emotional shift and shook his head; sometimes it was easy to forget that Dale was so young. They stepped out of the tent, at a loss for what to do for the next while. Walking around, they played a game of ‘notice some random detail’, a way to train their perception and attention to detail by looking at all the new people who had arrived. Not all of them were Guild members; quite a few were simple treasure hunters, while others were people interested in joining the Guild.

“Half of these fools will be dead in six months,” Craig muttered darkly.

Dale was taken aback by the normally good spirited man’s sudden mood shift. “Why would you say that, Craig? They all look decently strong to me. Look at that massive guy. He looks like he could throw me over the mountain!”

“I forgot that you are looking with just your eyes all the time. I think you are ready to learn how you use your Essence, at least a bit,” Craig decided aloud, ignoring the surprised looks of the men around him. They stopped, and the other men in his group, Hans, the near-silent Josh, and the ranger Steve, now looked upset at Craig’s words.

“You think he is ready?” Steve quietly questioned, one of the very few times Dale had heard him speak.

“He’s been progressing quickly, much faster than we were able to when we became cultivators. At this pace, if we can get back into that dungeon soon, he’ll be breaking into the D-ranks within six months to a year,” Craig told the group.

They looked at Dale with surprise, all seeming to simultaneously squint at him to assess him as if for the first time. They nodded unanimous agreement after a moment.

“Looks like it.”

“Yup.”

“Unfair,” pouted Hans.

Dale looked around. “I know that is good. Why are you acting like that is that strange?”

“Normally, it takes quite a few years to get out of the F-rankings, Dale. You got very lucky, a solid group and a good dungeon to train in,” Craig informed him. “Listen, it’s time for you to learn how to be, well, actually useful to us, instead of a liability that just so happens to kill a few rabbits each day.”

Dale winced. “Ow, my pride. I thought I was doing better than that.”

“You are. I was exaggerating to make a point. So far though, you have been doing everything with just the strength of your body; when you can use your Essence to supplement your weak points, life can only get better for you,” Craig explained. “Time to let you in on a poorly guarded secret. You have a Chi spiral, but have you found your meridians?” Dale shook his head, knowing the lesson would progress faster if he didn’t pretend to know things he didn’t.

“Sit down, and get comfy. Good. Now, feel your center.” Dale focused and was soon able to perfectly see his small Chi spiral. “You are looking at the spiral, good. Instead of looking at just your spiral, look around. Look in any other direction. Find the ‘walls’ that are holding your spiral in this place, the boundaries that contain your Essence.” Dale was easily able to follow these instructions, easily feeling his limits as they were so small currently.

Craig’s voice was soft as he continued directing his protégé, “Find the holes in the wall, the empty spaces that move further into your body, and extend some Essence to these places. Don’t be scared when your Essence begins flowing on its own.”

The Essence, not used to doing anything but spinning under Dale’s control, initially was too slippery for Dale’s mind to grasp. He had done a very good job of purifying, and the thread eluded his grip for several long minutes. Finally, of course, he managed to hold it, then was able to extend the Essence to the hole but missed several times, bouncing it off the wall. This was as difficult to him as threading a small needle to sew with. Slowly, carefully, he poked the thread into the hole, succeeding this time. Thankful that Craig had warned him, Dale was still startled at the rapid pace the Essence unspooled from his center into the meridian.

“Good, now wait a moment before you try anything else. Follow the thread with your thoughts as it moves throughout your body. Also, you may notice this hurt a bit, but it should be nowhere near as painful as the last time we made you do things with Essence.” Craig chuckled a bit.

The thread left his center and traveled directly toward his heart. It impacted with the force of a hammer. For a few moments. Dale’s eyes boggled as he clutched his chest. The thread looped around his heart in a tight weave until the organ had the thread moving through every part—tissue, artery, and capillary. The purified Essence moved onward, leaving the weave intact as it continued. The pain subsided in its wake, and his heart began to beat regularly again.

Flowing downward, the thread hit his lower intestine with less force and only created a weave in a small area before moving up to his lungs. It split just before them and impacted them both at dangerous speeds, enough so that he coughed up a bit of blood and lost his breath. The weave placed on the heart repeated itself, forming tightly around both lungs, making it hard to breathe until the pattern completed. The split thread moved up his arms until it wrapped around the little finger and began its travel down along a slightly altered path until it found another hole in the walls of his center, rejoining his Chi spiral from an unexpected angle.

Dale opened his eyes and wiped a bit of blood from his mouth. He felt calm and rested, heart beating powerfully while he breathed more deeply than he could ever remember doing. The sense of calm lasted only until he looked up into the expectant eyes of his groupmates, who had looks of relief on their faces.

“What?” Dale nervously stammered.

“That was an interesting choice for the first meridian to open.” Craig’s eyes were inspecting the weave along Dale’s heart and lungs.

Dale was surprised. “I had a choice?”

“Of course. It is good that this is the one you used, though. The heart meridian can be… somewhat dangerous to open once you get older. The initial hit to your heart can kill those that are unprepared or try it without help. Don’t worry overmuch. If yours had stopped, we would have restarted it, of course,” Craig informed him seriously.

“There are twelve paired meridians, six ‘yin’ and six ‘yang’. Then there are two single sets, the ‘governing’ and ‘conception’ sets. Those are what allowed you to formulate Chi in the first place and were forced open when you were younger, usually at birth. You can reinforce them with your Chi, and you should but make sure we are around any time you plan on opening a new meridian.”

“Right, so what just happened?” Dale examined the group surrounding his prone form. “I mean, I feel good, but I was bleeding. Did I hurt myself? Did I do it wrong?”

“You just strengthened your heart, lungs, lower intestine, and a few muscles in your arms. In practical terms, this means that your endurance is going to skyrocket, the rate at which you heal will also increase as your body gets used to this transformation,” Craig imparted with a smile. “You did the job perfectly.”

“As an added bonus, you should be able to see that your Essence seems smaller, but in actuality, it is all still there; some of it is constantly following the unique pattern you have created for it. Before you think that you can just do all of those different meridians in one go, please realize that if you go below a certain amount of Essence in your center, you may die. Just do what you have been doing, and you will be fine; you simply need to build up the amount of Essence you have again before you open a new meridian.”

A smile on his face, Craig then directed, “Now, from that meridian, pull a bit of Essence to your eyes, and see what happens.”

Dale reached inside himself yet again, pulling Essence upward. His eyes quickly gathered a bit of Essence, and the light in the area became overwhelming. He squinted and was suddenly able to see the flowing Essence in the other men. Their spirals were powerful, howling twisters that spun Essence into smaller twisters that continued deep into their centers.

“Wow!” Dale breathed. He looked at them all, amazed. “You see like this all the time?” Looking around, he could see Essence moving through everything, the colors almost sickeningly bright. The best comparison he could think of was pouring honey on a massive dessert cake with creamed ice on the side, then trying to eat it when you were already full to bursting.

“In the dungeon, yes. Out here, it can be a bit… overwhelming. Practice this on your own, as often as possible,” Craig commanded him. “Since it doesn’t leave your body, there is no Essence cost associated with this skill. All of it will make its way back to your center when you stop using it. Now, look at the men in this and tell me what I meant when I said they would all be dead in a few months if they planned on delving into the dungeon.”

Dale looked at the unknown men, shocked at the thick corruption in their centers. The Essence they had in them was stagnant, simply sullenly sitting there, festering like a disease untreated for too long. “Was this what I looked like to you all before you stripped my Essence?”

“Yes. You were able to see what it looked like inside yourself; this is an outside perspective, which is why it looks a bit different to you. See that giant man over there stuffed full of earth taint?” Craig pointed at the massive man they had discussed a few minutes ago. “For all of his bulging muscles and nasty attitude,” the unknown man had just punched someone whom had accidentally bumped him, “within a few months, your arm muscles will be fully reinforced with Essence, and you will easily be able to beat him in an arm-wrestling contest or stop a blow from him as you would a child. Life lesson here, don’t forget he will still outweigh you. Don’t try to grapple with someone that huge!” Hans laughed at what was obviously an inside joke.

Craig nodded at Hans, also grinning. “This is just the start for you. The more meridians you have cleansed and opened, the more powerful your physical body will become.” Craig glanced at Dale, ensuring he had his full attention. “I’m hoping you are beginning to understand the advantage you are gaining over the average person, but remember that in the Guild, we use this power as it is intended to be used; that is, to help our fellow man. Well, those tricky Elves too, I suppose,” Craig reluctantly allowed.

“Now,” Craig broke into a smile, “I wasn’t sure if you noticed when it happened, so have an official welcome to the sixth rank of the F series!”

The others clapped Dale on the back, cheering at his success. Dale grinned, happy that this day had turned out so well. They decided to continue walking around and possibly visit the new priest and see how his preparations to build were going. They walked to the shining lot, seeing Father Richard praying in the center. They waited a moment until he noticed them and sprang up. “Lovely! Good morrow to you, m’boy!” Father Richard cheerfully called out, walking toward them.

“Good morning, Father,” Dale intoned respectfully.

“Beautiful, is it not?” Father Richard gestured towards the lot. “Turns out that giant lot is now solid quartz! I thought it was glass but was so pleased to be wrong! In an unexpected and fortunate turn, it also seems that this entire sheet collects celestial Essence from the heavens and sunlight. I will be able to build a monastery that will bring people flocking from all corners of the world!” His eyes were burning with fervor, and he was wildly gesticulating.

“Really?” Dale had never heard of objects collecting Essence on their own. He decided to try his new ability, so collected Essence in his eyes and looked at the quartz. The entire clear pane now was filled with solid bars of golden light. “Ah! My eyes!” Dale cried, slapping his hands to his face.

Hans curled his lip and looked at him piteously. “You’ll learn, kid.”

“Heh. Oh, to be young.” Father Richard chuckled. “Anyone know where I can find a good builder Mage? Quarrying enough stone from the area to build this church would take a decade, and the craftsmen I’ve been talking to are all trying to sell me on sandstone. This place is lousy with granite. Why would I not take advantage of that?”

“We have portal Mages that should be arriving in a few days. If you have the coin, I know a few I can recommend from the Lion Kingdom, for a small finder’s fee,” Hans stated greedily. They quickly dissolved into discussion while a young boy ran up to Craig, telling him that the Spotter was waiting for them near the stairs of the dungeon.

“About time, those bookworms probably only slithered out of their tent because they were tempted with a new toy,” Josh muttered in a voice like gravel. He rolled his thick shoulders, making his armor creak.

They meandered their way back to the dungeon, Hans promising to meet up with Father Richard again soon. An unfamiliar man was waiting for them, his slim frame raising questions as to his status as a Mage in Dale’s mind. He focused on the man with his new ability, but the energy inside of what was certainly a Mage was so confusing as to be beyond comprehension, actually making Dale nauseous.

“That’s what Mana looks like,” Hans muttered to Dale, seeing the odd green tint to his face. “Don’t worry about it.”

“I hear you have a quandary for me! I cannot wait to begin! Shall we?” The slim man raced down the stairs, bounding down them with no apparent concern for his safety. His words had an odd, slow inflection to them, as if each was savored before he spoke them, clashing with his rapid movements.

“That’s what near physical invulnerability looks like,” Hans dryly muttered again to Dale. “Really, try not to think about it. They are just… too weird.” The team followed at a more measured pace, meeting the Mage as he was staring at the door. They settled in for a wait, which is what they got. The man muttered, gestured, and studied a book he had with him. He peered at the stone touching, sniffing, and even licking it once or twice.

“Freaking weirdo,” Hans muttered, earning a glare from the slim man who suddenly shot up the stairs at reckless, astounding speed.

“What? Did I offend him, ya think?” Hans nervously asked as the others looked on in confusion. They glanced up just in time to see the man suddenly jump from the rim of what had once been the simple crevasse opening. A metal object gleamed in his hands as his back arched, swinging downward with a primal scream as he swung a pickaxe. The pickaxe head shattered, exploding in his hands as it impacted the stone, the shaft splintering into sawdust from the inhuman force behind the swing.

The slim man landed lightly, nodding sagely as if he had confirmed a great and profound secret. Lifting the splintered remains of the pick head, he examined it for a few minutes before turning, exposing shredded clothing with untouched flesh underneath.

“Yup! It’s cursed earth,” he proclaimed cheerfully. “Not getting through that too easily!”

He started walking away, humming, when Craig stopped him. “Can you tell us a bit more, please? We have to report to Frank.”

“Oh sure, it is stone that has been reinforced with earth corruption with the basic Essence removed!” The man sounded nearly giddy at having a sample to study. “Not easy to do, I tell you what!” He started off again, humming a happy song. Craig was turning red in his effort to remain polite. “Is there a way through, good sir? There are many people awaiting entry to the training grounds below.”

The Mage turned, startled, as if he had forgotten they existed. “Hmm? Oh, you can break it if you use enough Mana, but I don’t think you will find a willing Mage. Also, it tends to drain all the Essence out of whatever is thrown against is, so I wouldn’t recommend trying to break it yourselves.”

Hans was a bit more abrupt with the distracted man, “Oi! How do we get in?”

“Well, I imagine you’ll just have to wait for it to vanish. After all, if it just randomly appeared, it’ll likely vanish the same way.” With that unhelpful advice, the Mage skittered up the stairs on all fours and jogged away.

“Frank isn’t going to like this,” Steve sing-sang fretfully, adjusting his bow and quiver. “I call not it!” He shouted the last words.

A chorus of ‘not it!’’ followed this, except from a confused looking Dale.

“What?” Dale looked around the circle of now-happy faces.

“Thank you for volunteering to be the one to tell Frank.” Steve patted Dale on the arm, a grin on his normally stony face.

“Meet us for lunch when you are done!” They walked up the stairs and away, laughing at Dale’s misfortune.

No choice but to be the sacrificial victim for them, Dale returned to the Guild tent and waited for an audience with Frank. Roughly twenty minutes passed before he was ushered inside to make his report. When he finished, Frank heaved a sigh and nodded, rubbing his forehead.

“Ah, I see. Don’t worry too much, lad. We knew the dungeon was getting more difficult. Think of this as a short vacation before your mornings become far more dangerous. Now, how about you–” Frank looked at Dale for the first time since he had entered and did a double take. “You already have a meridian open? Good for you, Dale! Congratulations.”

“Oh. Thank you. I didn’t realize it was a big deal until it was over. The guys just walked me through what to do.” Dale blushed a bit at the unexpected praise.

“We don’t advertise what a meridian can do because it is dangerous to open when you are not ready for it. Imagine someone doing that and having corrupted Essence.” Frank shuddered at the thought. Dale did not comprehend the idea until Frank continued, “Think of it like this—suddenly, your heart is surrounded in stone, too heavy to beat, your lungs fill with water, or the blood in your veins turns to fire. Bad, bad idea. Better to let people think long life and superhuman strength is a side effect of reaching a higher rank. We don’t tell people until they are ready for it, got that?””

“Yes, sir.” Dale was then shooed out, moving to go get lunch with the others.

The team spent the remainder of the day training, the others taking turns sparring with Dale. Having only a bit over a month of experience fighting rabbits and mushrooms, he did terribly. Realizing the error in their ways, they began with the most basic of basics, teaching him the proper way to hold his morningstar. From that point forward, it was decided; Dale would take turns sparring after lunch with someone so he could become an actually good fighter instead of just a subpar stick swinger.

Dale was able to fight for several hours and was amazed that he could continue without getting exhausted as was normal for him. While he did not win a single match, he was able to continue round after round until they called for him to stop. Confused at first, he finally remembered what he had been told about opening his heart meridian. He felt great satisfaction with the already apparent effects. Dale was overjoyed that this huge increase in stamina was the result of opening just one meridian. He would ravenously await the chance to see what would happen when the rest were open.

He made good progress in learning to wield his morningstar that day but was nowhere near to mastering even this basic weapon. Understandably, picking up a weapon and suddenly being good with it wasn’t realistic; it was a childish and lazy fantasy. Having proper form and being able to maximize your usage of a weapon took an obscene amount of work; it wasn’t a magical appearance of talent. Even using a memory stone only taught you how to do something properly. It didn’t hone your muscles and reaction times, and it didn’t allow you to bypass strength training and endurance building. Dale couldn’t imagine how long it would take to learn how to use something as complex as a sword in actual combat. Whack your enemy with a spiked ball on a stick? Perfect.

Even learning to use his shield as more than an accessory was harder than he thought it should be. Practicing without the enchanted buckler taught him that you couldn’t just accept whatever blow came down; you needed to then angle it away. A heavy blow nearly breaking his arm taught him that you also needed to try to dodge at least every once in a while. Getting his legs swept out from under him as he thought of all this, taught the very important lesson of keeping your eyes and mind on your target.

Dozens of these small lessons began building into talent and huge bruises. When he could finally not get up on his own weakly waving his arms in a sad, little attempt to roll over, the men relented and sent him off to take a bath in the cold mountain stream, calling after him to ensure he cleaned his reeking armor.

After dinner, they each sat together and cultivated their respective elements. Dale and Craig sat on a slab of stone while Hans sat in the center of a ring of fire, sweating profusely. Josh was up to his neck in the river, eyes closed and shivering in the snow-fed mountain stream, while Steve danced around to find the strongest breezes. Wind was never in short supply on a mountain, of course.

The next few days followed this pattern for Dale, disappointedly checking the dungeon each morning, getting beat on after lunch, and cultivating heavily in the evening. They woke up on the fourth daybreak to excited people awaiting the Portal Mages’ imminent arrival.

“They should be here within the hour!”

“I can’t wait to see my kids!”

“A hot bath and a good meal in the capital by next week!”

Dale was a bit nonplussed at these swarming, cheering people. He wondered whether the mountains were really so bad—people really seemed to want to get away from them. A young messenger ran up to him and informed him that his presence was requested by the Guild Master. He followed the boy to the large tent and was quickly shown in. A large map and table had been acquired from some unknown locale; several people were talking in low voices while pointing at the map.

“Oh, good. Dale, looking at this map. Can you tell me where you’d prefer to have the portal set? It is a fairly permanent system once it is built, made of Inscribed stone, metal, and gems. Very heavy. Large enough to bring a couple wagons through at a time as well.” Frank offhandedly muttered, “Big-ass eyesore too.”

Dale joined him in looking at the map, pointing out a good spot. They discussed the pros and cons of the location, but eventually, all agreed that the spot was a good one. Some campers would need to shuffle around, but it was easily defensible and at the top of a small hill, which should keep it in a good location no matter the weather.

“Good choice, now we need to talk about how you can make a profit from this,” Frank began seriously.

Dale, thinking of how good the Guild had treated him so far, started by saying, “Well, I was thinking a standard lease would–”

Waving his hands to stop Dale, Frank cried, “No! No, they’d love that far too much! You need to make a percentage profit, else you are making coppers on the gold here. Please, I’ll help you make your argument for the best deal, so when they start making offers, demand a hard ten percent. You won’t get it, but take no less than five percent profit of the travel cost, or they are robbing you. Remember, this is your land, and they really want to put a portal here. Nothing like a good training place for a prince or noble to make them grease their coin purse and slo-o-owly pry it open.” The evil chuckle at the end made Dale look at Frank a bit oddly.

“I suppose that makes sense.” Dale was again confused as to why Frank was helping him make a profit off his own Guild.

“You will need that money in order to stand being around them. You’ll see,” Frank ominously promised at Dale’s blank look.

Chapter Sixteen

A caravan of wagons pulled to the outskirts of the still-growing dungeon camp, and officious-looking people stepped out. They looked down on the dirty men that were surrounding them with loopy grins on their faces. With a sniff, one man moved forward to greet Frank, and then they moved into the Guild’s tent to discuss logistics. Dale was waiting for them there.

Upon seeing him, one of the new arrivals curled his lip in a sneer.

“What is this fishy doing in here?” the man spat.

Dale thought that strange because when other people in the camp had called him fishy, it often seemed affectionate. This man clearly saw him only for his cultivation rank, as such an inferior person that he might as well have been an animal.

“He’s here to negotiate the cost of a portal in the area.” Frank grimaced, making told-you-so glances in Dale’s direction.

“Why?” he scoffed, smoothing away imagined wrinkles from his robes. “How could a newborn like him understand the complexities of associated cost in intra-dimensional travel?”

“Mm. More to the point, Dale owns the land around here, so I mean more the monetary cost of you opening a portal here.” Frank managed to get this out with a straight face.

“Oh? The landowner? Him?” He glanced disparagingly at the poor, sweat-stained quality of Dale’s clothes. “I suppose we could say, what, ten silver a month? A small fortune to the likes of you as I understand it. Not much around here, is there?” He turned back to Frank like the deal was finished. “Where can I get a proper meal around here?”

“I was thinking more along the lines of fifteen percent profit from all usage of the portal,” Dale calmly announced, controlling his anger at this treatment.

“Pah!” The man laughed aloud scathingly as he turned around, pretending he had forgotten Dale’s presence. “Where do you find these recruits, Frank? He’d make a better jester than businessman.” Coldly turning toward Dale, he added, “I’ll give you fifteen silver a month, and you’ll be grateful that I bothered to give you anything, damn it.”

“Fifteen percent and free usage for myself and all goods I care to take with me,” Dale countered just as coldly, upping his offer.

“I could incinerate you with a blink of my eye.”

“Please don’t start a war, James,” Frank begged softly.

Thinking he meant figuratively, James sneered at Frank again. “I think we will just place the portal further away then.” He turned to leave.

“Best of luck,” Dale voiced in a dry tone while Frank chuckled.

“A few hundred feet will not hamper my business any,” James claimed, suspiciously looking at them.

“Then we’ll say, I don’t know,” Dale started, pretending to be desperate before laughing and looking him directly in the eye, “fifteen percent and free usage for myself, friends, and all goods I care to take with me.”

“Brat!” James roared furiously. “I just said I would move off the land you own! Surely, the next landowner will be more open to a portal on his land.”

“Oh, well, in that case; best of luck,” Dale repeated. “Also, please do not call me Shirley. The name is Dale.”

James left the tent in a slightly confused but fully angry huff, looking to find someone who owned land in the area. Dale and Frank sat down, shaking their heads. Frank apologized for the behavior James had shown. Then they began eating lunch, talking about training techniques and cultivation. ‘Oh, and how did Dale like his team?’ ‘They were good people!’ ‘Oh, that’s good, any issues?’ In a rage, James stormed back in, eyes flashing.

He shoved an accusatory finger at Dale. “You own the entire mountain?! That’s bullshit!”

“It is accurate, though,” Frank mildly stated.

Dale responded around a mouthful of sandwich, equally bland, “True, Guild Master.”

“One gold a month, which is the best offer I will make!” James puffed up, red in the face.

“He was quite rude when he got here, wasn’t he?” Dale ignored James, talking to Frank directly. “He isn’t getting any politer. We are eating, sir.”

“Fine! We will set up off the mountain! Make people climb for a day, what does it matter to me?!” James yelled.

“Oh, I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Frank grunted.

“I agree, a very bad idea,” Dale agreed that it was indeed a bad idea.

In a high pitched tone, James screeched, “Stop that! I am your better, F-ranked scum. I will not allow you to swindle me!”

Eyes flashing, Dale rose up from his seat. “Just. My. Elder. Good luck getting business, you elderly asshole. People trying to climb a mountain that is impassable in winter, which is… a month away? Yup, a month. You know what? No! I like it here. I have no issue staying, and everyone else can god-damned walk. I have no need of a portal. I refuse your business! Get off my mountain. I will not rent my land to you.”

Something very odd happened then. James began protesting, but his arms and legs turned, and he started walking away, screaming in impotent rage all the while. Dale followed, wide-eyed to see what was happening. A group of people gathered to see the man grab a horse in passing and ride off, still cursing and shrieking in frustration.

“What the infernal abyss?” Dale breathed.

Frank passed Dale a nonchalant chunk of knowledge, “That would be the effect of being the magically enforced landowner of this mountain. Any citizen of this Realm—under the political rank of a Duke—would be forced to leave if you told them to. You cannot force someone to stay or to do things for you, but you can obviously make them leave. In a brilliant yet uncomprehending move of forethought, you bought this from two Realms, meaning there are two Kingdoms of people that would need to obey the command you just gave him.”

“Well. Damn.” Dale turned to Frank as a realization dawned on him. “Hey! Is that why you have been so helpful to me?”

“Nah, I’m just a polite person. I’m definitely this nice to everyone, Heck, I let random people into the Guild all the time.” Frank grinned. “Then I let them come to me, the Guild leader, any time they have a question.”

Dale rolled his eyes. “I get it, I get it!”

A lady from the caravan walked over, eyes flashing. “What was that about? What just happened to James?”

“Ah… He was told to leave the property by the landowner, ma’am. He was quite rude and insulted the landowner repeatedly. Trust me when I say that he deserved far worse than being told to ‘go away’,” Frank explained in an attempt to mollify the slightly glowing woman. “Can I get your name, ma’am?”

“Yes,” she warily released the Mana she had been readying, “I am High Magous Amber of the Portal Guild.” High Magous was a title that meant the person was in the upper A-Rankings. “James was supposed to be negotiating the terms of a lease for a portal, but as he is otherwise indisposed, would you introduce me to the owner?”

“I would be pleased to!” He turned to Dale, indicating him with a wave of his hand. “This is Guild apprentice Dale, owner of these surrounding lands.”

She looked at Dale and nodded, realization dawning on her face as she took in his ranking. “I apologize for the poor attitude of my subordinate Guild member. He forgets that we were all at your level at some point. His bias is well-known and documented, and I hope to make reparations as soon as is possible.” She bowed slightly toward him.

“I also apologize for sending him off my land. I hope it will not inconvenience you too much. I was… unaware of the ability the contract gave landowners.” Dale glanced at Frank as he said this.

Amber grimaced and shook her head. “Please don’t worry about it. If he is escorted back to you to ensure his good behavior, may I have your permission to allow him back on your land—with an apology and some form of recompense from him, of course?”

“That would be very acceptable, High Magous,” Dale grudgingly allowed as formally as he could manage. Something about her screamed that formality was an absolute necessity.

She seemed to disagree with his assessment. “Please, just call me Amber. How far does your land extend? We will need to get him from the edge, where I assume he is currently pacing and ranting. He will apologize sincerely within the hour,” she promised while rubbing her head. Obviously, she had a headache coming on.

Dale coughed and blushed a bit. “It may take a bit longer to bring him back. I own the whole mountain.”

Shock whipped across her face. “Ah, this also explains much.” She waved one of her people down and sent him to go collect James with instructions to escort him directly to the main Guild tent. “Now, Dale, if we could discuss the price of a portal set-up? I hope James didn’t cost us the chance to get a contract.”

“Well, the last discussed price was sixteen percent of the profit and free usage for myself, my friends, and all goods I care to take with me,” Dale started, all business as he upped the cost again.

Amber made a small choking sound. “More of James’s anger is explained… I don’t suppose you’d be willing instead to make a… standard lease for the land?” She smiled weakly, knowing he wouldn’t go for it.

“I’m sorry, my financial advisors have all demanded that any business in the area must pay percentage profit. As I will be needing to pay taxes to both the Lion and Phoenix Kingdoms, I hope you can see my dilemma,” Dale told her very seriously.

Amber smiled, getting ready for one of her favorite pastimes: haggling. “This could take a while. Do you have any refreshments, by chance? It has been at least three days and a few hundred miles since I was able to eat a cooked meal.”

They happily returned to their lunch, filling a plate for the Portal Mage. After much haggling and awkward silences, they agreed upon eight percent of the gross profit, free use for him, his goods, and close friends. Happy with the results of the day, Dale then left to train with his group, earning several bruises and putting him in a bad mood from their scolding and his poor performance. He bathed and went to dinner, discussing better tactics and form with Hans, who had proven to be a good friend. As per Frank’s orders, Dale returned to the Guild tent after dinner, where he found Amber and Frank talking to a fuming James.

“Of course he makes us wait! Probably stuffing his face with free Guild food while he laughs at making more important people wait on his whims!” James was saying maliciously.

“You really aren’t very smart, are you? I really thought better of you, James!” Amber rounded on him, voice cold. “This training ground is a potential gold mine. Already the kings of the surrounding Realms plan their visits. Princes and princesses will come here to cultivate, so they can meet on neutral ground while remaining well protected. The Elves are a few weeks behind us, for god’s sake, planning to build a city on this spot, and you insult the one person who can just tell us to leave?!” She was shouting at him by the end of her spiel.

“He needs us more than we need him! The people here would riot at the thought of losing their chance at portals!” James weakly rebutted, wilting under the powerful gaze of his supervisor.

“Why wouldn’t they just wait until the Elves got here? Their portals are just as good as ours, and they care little for our gold!” Amber exclaimed. “We would lose a massive investment because you cannot stop being a prick!”

“You don’t need to worry about that too much; I already accepted your offer, Magous Amber. I try to be a man of my word,” Dale let the others know he could hear them, striding into the room. He glared at James. “I think that you are not welcome here, Mage James. You have been here a day and already overstayed your welcome. I don’t know what it is about me that offended you so, but I will not tolerate insults like you are spewing. Not only is it rude for no reason, it is bad for morale. Due to my daily access to the dungeon, I am actually a higher cultivation rank than the average adventurer around here; how would these insults be taken by them—your paying customers?”

James’s face flushed red, indignation within him.

Dale cut James off before he could begin a tirade, “When the portal is set up, please leave. You are free to go before then, which is my preference, but I know that may really inconvenience High Magous Amber.” She nodded reluctantly as he mentioned this. “Also, if you plan to actually attack me or convince others to harm me, I need to ask you to leave, please.”

James, face suddenly pale, had his body whipped around, then started walking away, not in control of his limbs. He visibly calmed himself, taking a deep breath, stopped and turned back to the group watching him. “My actions do not befit my rank. I apologize that I have acted so poorly. Please, allow me to make amends before sending me away.”

Dale nodded, amazed at the change in demeanor James was exhibiting. “That is fine, but my decision stands. I don’t want to make an enemy of you, James, but I cannot allow insults like these. On that note, feel free to talk to me if you can find reasons I should change my mind.” James nodded sharply, ashamed, walking out of the tent under his own power for once.

“Well,” Frank grumbled, “that was a shit show.”

“Yup.” Dale, head throbbing, took his leave and moved to find his bed.

The next days followed a simple pattern: early rise, get to know people, train, cultivate. The ground rumbled for several hours each of these days, not making anyone nervous as there was no shaking, only noise. When people were starting to become truly angry that the dungeon was blocked, Frank had to punish a few people for fighting in their restlessness.

Finally, the morning came when the door to the dungeon was open again. Exceedingly cheerful, Dale’s team alerted the Guild. They got into formation and went back to the dungeon’s entrance, ready to make some money.

The difference in the room was apparent immediately. Raw iron coated practically every inch of the wall, and the air was as thick with Essence in the entrance as it had been only in the Boss’s room previously. With only a few violent mushrooms visible to make them cautious, they decided to take their time and absorb the Essence in each room. They knew that would slow them down, but in the end, it would make them stronger. Dale’s cultivation speed was so much higher at his new rank, though, that they were able to move forward in a short half hour.

Cal

<I may have allowed too much Essence out,> I noted to Dani.

“Nah, that is totally normal. It’s a byproduct of increasing your rank then not having anyone pulling the Essence into themselves. It was bound to accumulate, Cal. The huge level of Essence in the air will vanish in a few hours, I’m betting. Especially at the rate this group is cultivating. Don’t worry about them. Other people will be in a hurry to make money or get an item or two, so you’ll be able to recapture some good Essence,” Dani promised.

She was right, as per usual. As my high-powered morning group cleared the second room and sat in the lotus position to cultivate, another group entered and hurried to get ahead of them, likely thinking that the best rewards went to the fastest group. They yelled some derisive comments at the first group as they passed, laughing at their good fortune whilst taking the left branch of the tunnel. They entered a room that had a false back; after clearing it, they shouted in anger that they had been tricked. Heh. That was even funnier than I had thought it would be. They stomped back, glaring at the still-cultivating group like it was their fault, taking the branch to the right.

“Are they all F-ranked?” Dani wondered, peering at the hustling group through our connection.

<It looks like I’m feeding well today,> I smugly told her. I already was, of course, using my very useful trick of constantly pulling a few strands of refined Essence from the group that was cultivating.

This group cleared the room, joyfully filling bags with the loot they found. Moving on, I was impressed with their ability to take the wrong direction every single time. By the time they limped into the first floor Boss room, they looked tired and sour. Taking out a week’s worth of their anger on my poor Bloody Bane, they sat to rest for a bit. I had dropped a holy pendant for them because I was impressed at their tenacity, if not their attitude. I think that I was jaded, being used to professionals at this point.

They got up and were discussing where they should spend their money, so I decided that they needed a boost in the right direction. I dropped a few coppers on top of the stairs, making a loud clattering of falling coins. Of course, they came to investigate and found the tunnel hidden around the bend. Seeing the stairway leading deeper, they became so excited that I almost felt bad for them, but really, does death only come for those who are wicked? Does it spare good people just because they are good or excited? I think not!

Moving downward, they were on high guard, ready to be the first to explore these new, unknown depths. I directed a squad their way, getting ready to test out my new creations in battle. Seeing my Bashers racing at them from the gloom, two of the humans crouched with shields to block their charge. I had the other Bashers move back as the Smashers raced forward, diving directly into the shields. The poor quality metal bent at the impact from my lovely bunnies, breaking the arms of the men foolish enough to attempt to block them, simultaneously knocking the men to their knees.

The fallen humans screamed in pain for a moment, at least till the Oppressors landed their attack on the heads placed perfectly for assault. The cleave ability came into play, a gust of forceful wind blasted into the humans’ screaming mouths, shattering teeth and dislocating jaws moments before their skulls lost the ‘whose cranium is harder’ challenge.

With two of their five members dead in the first attack, the others tried to run. They did not get far before an Impaler’s horn pierced the spine of a fleeing archer. the Smashers caught up to the remaining two, breaking their legs and giving the other Bashers a chance to finish them off. Just like that, I gained enough Essence that I broke directly into D-rank one.

I whooped in joy. <Wow! Those were even more effective than I thought they would be!>

“Surprise is a glorious tool, Cal.” Dani was nearly as excited as I was for my new rank. Remembering that there were others in the dungeon, I quickly worked to dissolve the corpses and acquire their items. It wouldn’t do to have someone becoming alert to their impending doom, after all. I started fantasizing that just maybe I would finally get this group that showed up daily? I broke out of my reverie with a start, remembering that the Mobs who helped kill a person would gain a portion of their Essence! I moved the squad that had won their first battle into a hiding place to await lower level groups. As an experiment, I would try to get them to evolve naturally. I needed to keep them separate, so as to ensure I would remember them. I’d call them Alpha Squad and give them a pleasure warren for when they weren’t in combat.

The first group of humans came to the first floor Boss room just as the ‘seed’ bloomed into a new Monster, so they had to fight him. I wasn’t sure if I should be happy… or upset. Having them fight the Boss gave me time to absorb the bodies below, wringing out every last drop of Essence, but now I would need to resurrect the Boss again. I vowed that the next time I was going to upgrade my dungeon, I would begin by replacing this useless Boss! Disgusted with my weak Mobs, I dropped the holy symbol I had retaken from the wiped group below, impatiently waiting for them to finish cultivating.

I heard what I had been waiting for. “Look at that!”

“What is it, Dale?” His name is Dale, huh? I’ll call them ‘Dale’s group’ from now on.

Dale was as excited as I had hoped he would be. “Stairs leading down!”

“That must be why we didn’t pass that group yet. I was getting worried for them.” The blond man seemed relieved. Heh.

“Stay worried. A second level means stronger Mobs, and that group was weak to begin with,” a harsh voice croaked at them from the cloth wrapped man.

Dale’s group went downward, though at the landing paused, looking into the gloom.

“Dale, are you cycling your Essence for enhanced vision?”

“Eh… I am now,” Dale sheepishly replied.

“What do you see?”

“Looks like, um, moving Essence. I think earth, air, and… what is that blackish-red?”

“Infernal,” a grim voice rang out, slowly drawing a sword…

Dale gave a very unappreciative, “Oh, that’s bad I take it.”

“What else?” the cloth wrapped man prodded.

“The… earth ahead looks… wrong? Thin, like the top layer of a puddle in winter,” Dale notified them.

The man asking questions nodded, though Dale wasn’t looking his way. “Good, those are most likely traps. As an earth-affinity cultivator, one of your most important responsibilities will lie in seeing or feeling traps like that. Others might see them, but I want you to call out every trap you see. Any you fail to catch in time will mean an hour of training with Josh at full speed.”

The panic in Dale’s eyes made me chuckle. I guess ‘Josh’ wasn’t gentle. Hopefully, poor little Dale wouldn’t have to worry for much longer… about anything.

“Those moving Essence blobs are coming at us now!” Dale called out.

“Likely Mobs. Get ready boys!” the blond man holding daggers whooped.

A fresh squad raced at them, moving quickly under my direction for a kill. The huge man in Dale’s group moved forward with a tower shield, so I had both of the Smashers ram it. Higher quality than the previous group, the man’s shield held under the heavy attack, but the man himself grunted and moved back a few steps.

“Those suckers are heavy. Dodge ‘em if possible,” he told the others in a strained conversational tone.

I sent an Oppressor to jump to the side of him, pushing off the wall to gain sideways momentum. Thinking he could easily block this smaller Basher, the large man didn’t focus as he should have. Therefore, he was knocked off balance as the cleaving wind sliced into both of his legs, opening up shallow cuts where the armor was jointed, even though the Basher itself was stopped short.

The other men rushed in, the cloth-wearing one moving exceedingly fast across the ground. I could feel a bit of Essence interacting with the earth as he moved; this must be a movement skill. He seemed to vanish from his spot and appear behind the Oppressor that had knocked the large man to the side. He punched with perfect form, creating a resounding crack.

The perfectly aimed blow snapped my poor bunny’s neck; it flopped to the floor, dead. While this impossibly fast man was distracted—I hoped—I sent my Impaler at his back to try for an incapacitating blow. Mid-jump, an arrow landed in its eye! That was odd. I hadn’t seen this group having an archer before. I risked quickly looking at their weapons, noticing that the person I had thought was using a staff this whole time was actually carrying a big-ass longbow. The draw weight on that must be massive for it to look like a metal-clad staff most of the time!

The remaining Oppressor and two Smashers bounded toward the group of three people standing together, the two heavies flanking the lighter Oppressor. The blond haired man raced right at them, a dagger in each hand. As the Bashers leaped at him, he ignored defense, leaping higher than my Bashers and accurately stabbing downward between the armored plates of the leftmost Smasher, severing its spinal column.

When the remaining Bashers landed from their missed attack, a heavy, spiked ball crushed the skull of my unarmored Oppressor. Dale had moved forward without my noticing, the little brat! I may have been too focused on the jumping man while Dale landed his attack. The man with the… bow? staff? stepped forward and slammed the metal-shod end on to the last Smasher, dazing it long enough for the dagger wielder to finish it off. Just like that, the battle was over. For now.

<Whew! That was intense. What do you think, Dani?>

“A good test of their abilities. I can already think of a few improvements we should try for the next batch.” Dani quickly reminded me, “Give them some good loot!”

<Fair enough.> I had a few silver and copper coins rain down as well as a few healing potions I had gotten from a well-funded but underpowered group recently. I threw in a holy symbol for good measure.

“Well, I think that was worth it!” Dale gasped, excited at seeing silver glinting in the treasure.

“Hmm. We have not even gotten to a room on this floor, and already the Mobs were stronger than the Boss on the previous level. Should we continue or go warn the Guild?” the wise, unarmored person polled the group.

“Hard to warn against that which we don’t know.” The dagger user was placing the bodies of my Bashers into a bag he had, which I felt was far too small to hold them all. I wanted a closer look, but his aura forced me to remain frustrated.

“I suppose that’s true. We continue.”

<Yes! They’re still coming, I get another chance!> I delightedly told Dani.

“Yay, you!” she cheered.

Dale’s group moved further in, Dale calling out the traps placed throughout the tunnel. He missed one, and I was really looking forward to them boiling in acid when the cloth covered human ruined my fun by stopping the group, pointing at the ceiling and telling Dale he had an appointment with Josh when they were done. The big one, who I now assumed was Josh, was gleefully rubbing his hands together and dancing around just outside of the range of my trap.

Twice, I tried to ambush them with squads while they were distracted with the low powered, original Bashers. Sadly, each time they were defeated, though I was able to form a dent in Josh’s gigantic tower shield. He grumbled like a thunderstorm when it happened, whining till the one they called Craig reminded him the dent could instead have been in his legs. As much as I wanted to eat them and their equipment, I was still very impressed by their teamwork, perception, and coordinated efforts.

They moved on, clearing room after room, cultivating in each. After a bit, I noticed something odd about their behavior. They never took a wrong turn! I was confused as to how they found their way until I heard Dale ask the same question.

“Well, here is a fork in the tunnel. Which way do you think we should go?” Craig looked at Dale, though it was obvious that Craig somehow knew the answer.

“I’m not sure. I’ve never been here,” Dale responded, a bit frustrated.

“Neither have I, but I know we need to go to the right! Look at the quantity of Essence swirling in the air. The more Essence a path has, the more likely that it is the correct way to the Boss room,” Hans glibly informed him, throwing around precious information.

“Oh, that makes sense.” Dale accepted this answer easily, and they started down the right-hand path.

<Really? Dani, is there a way for me to get around that? I didn’t realize they could just follow the stupid air!> I demanded crossly. What a ridiculous thing for me to not notice.

“We’ll have to think about it. Maybe we could open small tunnels like air vents to more evenly distribute it around the cave?” Dani responded evenly.

<I could do that,> I decided slowly, thinking about it. <Actually, I’ll do it tonight for sure, and I’ll make a viewing hole in one of the really nasty traps that looks into the Boss room, just to taunt people. Heh-heh-heh,> I chuckled darkly. <Oh look, there’s the final room! Oh no! Squish!>

The group was in the last room before the Boss battle, and I planned on making it a spectacular fight. A few more groups of adventurers were at different stages of the dungeon by this point; one was even approaching the stairs down to the second level. Worst case scenario, even if this didn’t go as I wanted, I had another few chances to gain some Essence.

Dale’s group entered the room, noting the Silverwood tree and looking for the Boss. It was rather dark in there, and the Boss with all of his granite armor was well camouflaged with earth Essence, making him look like part of the wall unless moving.

Instead of relaxing as I had hoped, the human snacks grouped closer together for defense. Dang. One of them tossed out a flask that broke on the floor, which started putting off a lot of light. Well, I’d be absorbing that pattern when we were done, thank you very much!

Now illuminated, it was obvious that that giant mobile boulder was actually a Mob, so he wasted no more time, charging directly at them. I was nearly screaming with excitement as the battle was joined! I had direct control of my Boss, my mind merged with Raile’s simplistic thoughts, so I was able to better control how this battle would progress. Josh boldly moved to block the charge at first, but a yell from Craig forced him to dodge at the last second.

Now, I had a lot of momentum. Raile was a big ol’ boy, so when I missed, I couldn’t exactly turn him on a copper. Crashing into the wall with the grinding of stone, I quickly redirected my Boss to spring back to the attack. For a several-hundred-pound, stone-covered rabbit, I still moved pretty quickly. Instead of sprinting this time, I ran at them and leaped, gaining momentum and covering distance as only a rabbit could do. Plunging down like a meteorite intent on the extermination of all life, a shockwave shook the ground, knocking the armored members of the team off balance. The lightly armored men sprang into action to distract me whilst their comrades regained their footing.

Hans ran at my Boss, trying to wedge his daggers into the joints of my armor, but with a satisfying shattering of metal, the wedged daggers broke off as Raile moved, shaking off the weak attack easily. Ignoring the lone fighter, I began racing toward the off-balanced team members; Josh had no choice but to attempt blocking with his massive shield. He plunged the arrowhead-shaped base into the ground, leaned into it, and braced himself with a roar of challenge!

Raile pounded the shield with a mighty blow, and it almost held. Sparking with released Essence, the obviously enchanted shield was able to redirect some of the force back at Raile, slowing his charge and doing a bit of damage, before the previously dented area gave way. A flash of lightning-like Essence joined into the cacophony of sound when the metal plate shattered, Josh being thrown backward as his defenses were annihilated.

Raile was effectively stopped for a heartbeat. With his momentary halt, the others took the chance to rain blows on him. The blunt staff and spiked morningstar were whooshing through the air and dealing some damage, cracking the granite armor and transmitting force to the flesh beneath. The single dagger Hans retained simply glanced off the armor, as was intended—a useless tool in a fight like this. I laughed when Craig punched bare-knuckled at Raile, sure he would break his fist. My laughter was rudely cut off as the punch shattered the armor in a fist-sized area, and he struck Raile’s shoulder, breaking that too.

<That guy is strong!> I exclaimed in wonder. <Why the crap is he here?!>

Raile started moving again, limping a bit but still very dangerous. Charging Dale, I was able to land a glancing blow to his oversized armor as he danced out of the way. Even this light hit made him fly to the ground; I heard a crunch from his ribs. The others ran at Raile, attempting to keep his attention as Dale recovered, but I. Sensed. Blood! I turned and got Dale in my sights and started charging. A few feet away, Raile slowed drastically. I could no longer see out of his left eye.

Raile crashed to the ground, twitching. I was confused, still trying to order him to attack. Though he tried as hard as he could, he could not follow my command. Raile soon stopped moving entirely. I changed my view to get a better picture of things, no longer looking from his eyes, noticing feathers where Raile’s eye had been. Ah. An arrow had somehow made an impossible shot, piercing Raile’s eye and brain. With a furious mutter, I dropped some loot. It had been a good, enlightening fight. I’d get them eventually.

I rained quite a bit of silver, the steel dagger I had been working on with the Honing Inscription, and a steel helmet with an Inscription that boosted the protection granted against physical attacks. Also, as I absorbed Raile’s pattern for the first time, I learned that the ability he had was called ‘Avenger’. I was a bit disappointed that I could not understand what it did, but it apparently held some requirement in order to be used.

“Dibs,” Hans called, pointing at the dagger. Steve collected the silver, while Josh tried on the new helmet. Dale was sitting against the wall, wheezing a bit, but breathing easier than I felt he should be with broken ribs. Grr. He wasn’t even coughing up blood or anything!

“Let’s take a look at you, shall we?” Craig pulled off Dale’s armor. I really wished I had a Mob in here for a sneak attack. No, no. I had to be a good sport about these sorts of things—they beat me fair and square; I didn’t want to be a sore loser. Craig pushed on the bones that were broken, aligning them with his Essence while Dale gasped in pain at the movement.

“Drink this.” Craig put a recently acquired healing potion to Dale’s lips, and within a few moments after drinking, Dale was breathing easier. “That is higher quality than I thought it would be,” Craig muttered. Of course it was! I had pride in what I produced, after all. I’m not some snake-oil peddling herbologist! The original potion had indeed been barely potent, but I was able to make a much purer version when I had the pattern. While they were otherwise distracted, I ate the broken tower shield, then the remnants of the light potion. I had a chuckle at the strangled cry Josh made when he realized the halves of his old shield were gone.

“Damn it! I was still paying that off!” Josh raged, pounding the rock where his shield had been laying the last time he saw it.

They cultivated for a while, a cloud of swearing constantly flowing from Josh, then decided to head back. Another group was in the second tunnel of this floor, and my attention was now mostly on them. Surprising me, they had managed to take out a few squads without sustaining too much injury. They broke the leg of a Smasher, so instead of letting them finish him off, I had it jump into an acid trap on the wall, killing it but also releasing a flood of acid that drenched all but one of the small group.

Screaming as their flesh boiled, melting in their armor, the remaining squad quickly ended them. Since he was distracted by the horror he was witnessing, a horn found the soft flesh of the one who had managed to avoid the spray. By the time Dale’s group reached that point in the tunnel, all that remained was a series of acid scarring on the rock below, which I would soon fix. Dale’s group never even noticed the recent demise, too focused on warning the other groups they found along their way, which I growled at.

<I don’t like them warning other people that are already in here! Gah! Dani, these guys are so frustrating,> I pouted, angry that they were always one step ahead of me.

Dani suggested an easy solution, “How about we make an exit to the surface from the Boss room? Easier for them to leave and better for us to get them out of here so they can’t tell people about new obstacles.”

<You think we can do that?> I questioned. Because of the concentration of people above, the mass of auras made it really hard for me to extend upward at all, to the point where we had decided it was a futile effort.

“If we make it below ground and just push it upward… somewhere there isn’t really a strong concentration of people, it should be doable? I’ll go look for a suitable place tonight, okay?” Dani promised me as I calmed down and thought about it.

I slowly agreed, not really wanting her to go anywhere dangerous. <If you promise to be careful. Some really gigantic auras have been showing up recently, even stronger than the first group that cleared the dungeon.>

Returning my attention to the people moving in my dungeon, I started picking off groups with my well-placed traps. None of the groups that came down into the second level were above F-rank, so were easy pickings for my squads of mid-F-ranked Bashers. Beyond Dale’s group, only one other returned without casualties, even then only because they left after the first fight they had with a squad. The other, cocky, F-ranked groups provided me with enough Essence in one day for me to move into the second rank of the D-series.

Chapter Seventeen

Dale and his group retraced their steps out of the dungeon, whooping in relief when the sun was again shining on them. The battles today had been hard, even when most of them were in the C-ranks! They stopped at the accounting tent near the top of the stairs to log the money and treasure they had found. After paying the twenty-five percent Guild tax, they were given a large bonus for handing over the bodies of the newly slain Mobs.

“These are interesting!” the clerk cooed. “The Spotters will be happy to have something new to look at. We’ll have a list of their extra vulnerable points ready for you tomorrow. Anything else to report?”

“Yes.” Craig cleared his throat, knowing he was about to become very unpopular. He reached into his belt pouch, retrieving his Guild badge which marked him as having quite a bit of authority under Frank. “I’m declaring the second floor a D-ranked minimum. While these are mid-F-ranked Mobs, the squads they move in easily push them into the danger level of the D series.”

The clerk nodded and quickly set out a document for him to sign. As a magically bound document, this would forcibly ensure that members of the Guild below D-rank could not enter the second floor, forcing them to have a C-or-higher-ranked person with them who would have to give them special permission to enter. Since all members had sworn to follow the Guild’s rules, this may cause grumblings but would be followed until a higher ranked member revoked his decision.

Unfortunately for a lot of the people trying to enter the dungeon, they were not Guild members. This meant that they didn’t need to follow Guild rules, and they would push themselves to attempt the second level; especially since the rain of silver Dale’s group had declared had made their eyes bulge with greed while drool formed on their chins.

“And the new Boss? Any information on it?” the clerk continued inquiring, writing everything down as a report bound for the Guild leader.

“A several-hundred-pound, stone armor covered bunny,” Craig announced in a harsh tone.

The serious way he said ‘bunny’ made a few people snort and chuckle; even the stoic Josh had a smile playing about his lips. Craig blushed a bit but grimaced and said nothing to stop them.

“Heh… Ahem… Okay, danger level?” The clerk tried to hide a chuckle.

“Mid D-ranking. Actual cultivation at F nine, but its speed, armor, and weight make it very hard to damage. Blunt weapons are suggested. Few easy weak points, the eyes have armor surrounding them, and though the mouth is unarmored, stone hangs over from its nose—another possible weak point—to cover the mouth unless it opens. Which it did only once when it was in pain from a broken shoulder,” Craig succinctly stated.

Dale was very impressed at the detail Craig provided. He hadn’t seen the mouth open at all. Really, he hadn’t thought about the possible points he should have been hitting. Mainly, he had swung for the head, trying to concuss it with the heavy, spiked end of his weapon. His ribs still twanged a bit, and he felt that may have been avoided if he had been paying better attention. Lesson learned.

“Loot dropped?”

Craig continued his report, “After the first floor Boss, roaming squads of improved Bashers,” he pointed at the bodies on the table, “dropped mid-quality of low-level healing potions, rarely a holy pendant which we will most likely bring to Father Richard for his inspection, and a mixture of several copper and a few silver.”

“And the Boss?”

Craig spoke in a low tone to try and prevent others from overhearing, “Dropped a small amount of silver coinage and two possibly Inscribed items, a helmet and a dagger. We will be getting them both checked for quality and safety before activating them.” Craig didn’t speak quietly enough and caused an explosion of noise, especially from the groups that were now forbidden to enter the second level. Rune inscribed items were worth up to several hundred gold—even a poor quality one might be worth fifty.

“Make sure we get a copy of the Spotter determination and value and remember that if you sell them, twenty-five percent goes to the Guild. You are allowed to use anything you earn or give it as a gift, but if it is sold, you will be compelled to pay the fee, so be sure you know that the person you give it to won’t screw you over. If stolen, your debt is absolved unless it is recovered. Anything else?” the dry, bored tone continued as the now uninterested clerk looked at his notes.

Craig nodded and spoke loudly, obviously for the benefit of the people listening in, “Just one thing, the traps in the lower level are far more advanced than the upper level. We did not set any off, but we came upon one that had been set off by another group. The floor and walls were scarred by some force, and there was no sign that the unknown group survived. Stay safe, friends.”

The crowd which was on the verge of fury calmed a bit. They all knew this most likely meant that group was dead, as there wasn’t ever a body to recover if a team fell in a dungeon. Maybe it was for the best that they stayed out of the lower level, and Craig was not just trying to hoard all of the good loot.

“Ah, by the way,” Hans turned toward the attentive crowd, “in the first room right there,” he pointed at the entrance below them, “there is a massive iron vein along the wall. Good way to earn some cash while you cultivate!” An explosion of motion followed as those too weak to reach the second floor raced to buy picks from an overjoyed entrepreneur who had set up a small kiosk nearby. His inflated prices suddenly not an issue, he quickly made enough to later find Dale and ask for some land to set up shop. Dale agreed and assigned him a plot of land—for a percentage and a discount of course.

Dale

While the masses were distracted, Dale’s group went to have lunch. After a meal that was barely better than the dirt it was grown in, they cultivated in consideration of Dale’s sore ribs, promising him they would spar after dinner. Dale readily agreed; today showed just how poor his combat readiness was. In comfortable silence, each settled in to cultivate again. Pretending that it was not because he was bored of cultivating, having spent nearly five hours passively and actively cultivating in the Essence rich area underground, Craig determined that Dale had enough Essence built up to open another meridian.

“Now, the only reason you are ready right now is that you opened the first of the paired set. You opened the yin heart meridian, so the yang lower intestine meridian will be much easier to open. You don’t have the Essence to open one in a new set, so make sure to listen to my direction,” Craig directed in a serious manner.

Dale nodded, preparing himself. As before, he sank into his center and pulled a thin stream of Essence from the spinning Chi. Moving it along the ‘wall’, he searched for the small holes he now knew existed. Craig stopped him a few times until he apparently approached the correct one. It was nowhere near the first and didn’t seem to go to the lower intestine. His brow furrowed in confusion, but Dale still did as he was told. Craig hadn’t been wrong yet, after all.

Dale fed the Essence into the hole, and it was again sucked from his control. The Essence left his center, somehow splitting and moving directly into his little finger on each arm. On both, it crossed the wrist and ran upwards along the opposite side of the forearm as the heart meridian did until it reached the back of Dale’s shoulder where it ended at the uppermost part of the back or the bottom of his neck.

At this position, after creating weavings along its route, it traveled along the skin across his neck and cheek until it reached the outer corner of his eye, finally ending in his ear before somehow reconnecting into his center and joining the spiral from another small hole. Everything sounded a bit fuzzy, so he opened his eyes and blinked away tears. Wiping them from his check, he saw that it was actually blood dripping from his eyes.

Wiping at his ears, the fuzziness vanished as drops of blood were wiped away there as well. Surprised blood wasn’t coming out of his skin at this point, he asked why he was bleeding. Had he been hit while he was so focused? What he should expect now?

Craig waved at him to try and calm him down and slow the flow of questions. “As your meridians are opened, they are also cleaned. The impurities in your system that are forced away have to go somewhere, after all. That blood is helping the filth to be washed out, that is all. You aren’t damaged. Actually, you are now far healthier.”

“I see,” Dale murmured, thinking out loud about the incredibly foul poop he had taken after his heart meridian had opened. Now it made sense why it had connected to his intestines; it was depositing impurities.

“I bet you do!” Hans called, interrupting Dale’s reminiscence. “Your vision should clear up. Any issues you had before are gonna be gone. Oh by the way… HA!” Dale gasped as Hans shouted next to his head, his hands clapping to his ears with a wet smack of blood.

“Yup, looks like your hearing is improving as well!” Hans laughed, grinning maliciously.

“Mean!” Dale gasped. ‘Heh’ was the only apology he got.

“Get ready for a few sleepless nights, kiddo,” Steve rumbled fondly. “You are going to wake up to a herder on the next mountain farting tonight.” The men laughed uproariously at this.

“I know the one! He’s been eating too much roughage if you ask me! He needs to add some fruit to his diet!” Josh sounded off. The laughter only increased at this comment.

They calmed down after a bit, spirits much lightened. Craig continued the lesson, “As they say, eyesight and hearing will be better for you and should stay that way. It is called the lower intestine meridian because as food enters your intestines, your body will now purify the food you eat much more efficiently, and you will even be using it for Essence gathering, as some of the… extra… will have the Essence drawn out of it.”

“Oh, that’s handy, I guess.” Dale was far more excited about the improved senses, though.

“Your farts are gonna smell like death because of it!” Hans chimed in.

“You’re lucky ya have your own tent!” Steve crowed.

Craig sighed with a smile. “No manners, any of you. Alright, since we seem to have a surplus of energy, how about you start your punishment training with Josh, Dale. You did miss that trap.” Josh jumped to his feet, face lighting up—he had forgotten that he got to beat up Dale by himself for an hour!

By evening, Dale was exhausted. With the intense day that he had, sleep was only seconds away when he finally got to bed. Enhanced senses or no, that night, he slept like the dead.

Chapter Eighteen

The last group of people had finally left, making it far easier to alter myself. Those human auras inside of me had a nasty habit of making it difficult for me to directly affect things. I added openings from each cave to another and let them level out the Essence in the air. It was slow, but I figured by morning you couldn’t cheat my empty rooms anymore. Not the way they had been, anyway. Just to be safe, I reconfigured the tunnels so that people couldn’t just retrace their steps.

Next, Dani flew out and looked around for a while. She came back with very interesting news. There was a giant sheet of quartz above us, not quite directly up, but nearly so from the Boss room. With her directing me, I moved the rooms above me out of the way, creating a cylinder of empty space up to the sheet while holding the integrity of the dungeon intact. Quite a lot of work but far easier at my new ranking.

From my gem, I had perfect vision in line of sight but had mostly only seen the hole I was in and so used my influence to see. The downside was that I could only ‘see’ as far as that influence extended. Now, for the first time in my life, I looked up and saw the stars.

<Wow. That is so beautiful! I cannot believe people can go up and see them every night,> I articulated with a hint of jealousy, peering beyond the Silverwood tree above me and out into the stars.

“Most people don’t bother,” Dani quietly voiced, also enjoying the view. The sheet of quartz above us acted as a giant telescope, letting us see further and more clearly than usual. It was especially beautiful when the moon came into view; it seemed huge.

<Why is that?> I asked quizzically, disturbed that people actually ignored this beautiful scenery.

She seemed to match my disappointment in others. “Most people tend to only look at or think about things that have value to them at that moment. They look so hard at what they want that they drown out the beautiful things that would give them hope or allow them to look beyond their small lives.

They lose sight of living, trying to get to the next goal, the next important thing. They forget that everything is important, that the little moments of happiness added up overwhelm the greatness of the few large moments. Like making a friend smile or making it to the two hundred and eighteenth page of a book. Sometimes, it isn’t about finishing your objective, it is about enjoying yourself on the way there.” She focused on me. “That’s why I have so much fun here, Cal. You put detail into the little things, and even when you are beaten, you reward those who did well. You care more about being amazing than you do winning.”

<Thank you, Dani,> I choked out, feeling overwhelmed with joy at having such a good friend. <Really, you mean a lot to me as well. If there is ever anything I can do for you, anything you really need, I hope you know that I will do it for you.>

“Well, I suppose the first thing you could do is build an exit!” she shouted, breaking the sober mood and startling me badly. We both laughed at how shocked I was.

<That I can do!> Together, we designed a gazebo-like structure made of thick granite. For the rest of the night, I carved a series of large Runes into the stone, about an inch under the surface. All of them linked together so that I could use a single power source to activate them. When I finished it, dawn was only an hour away. I created a spiral staircase under the gazebo, building all of this in a small area just off of my Boss room.

I opened the ground up to the surface as far as I could reach, about three feet below the surface and raised the gazebo on the stairs I was creating underneath of it. As it rose, it spun with the creation of the spiral under it. When it finally reached the edge of my influence, the top of my first building punched through the loosely packed dirt at the top. I could see the gazebo break into the surface through the clear quartz nearly one hundred feet above.

When it shuddered to a stop, I connected its corruption stone to the inscribed Runes and felt the gazebo become even harder. The energy sluggishly filled it, glowing with a harsh, purple-brown color. I was pleased to feel that the runes were perfect. The door out could only be opened from the inside. Anyone attempting to re-enter would be crushed like a bug or find themselves in a stairwell that had no exit at the bottom when I dropped a wall in the way and let them slowly suffocate. Good times. Well. For me.

Catching my attention as I was looking up, I realized the Silverwood tree had seemed to enjoy the new light coming in. A few leaves had unfurled over the night as the moonlight bathed us. What was that? There was a person, wait, two people directly above me! I was suddenly worried looking at the quartz above us. That could be broken, couldn’t it? It was at the edge of my influence, but if I strained, pushing really hard, I was still able to make molecule thin patterns in the sheet with acid, slowly widening them until they were useful Runes. Since quartz was just stone, I planned on hooking it to a corruption stone.

My plan failed in the most wondrous way. When I finished the Inscription, a bright, golden light flashed through the Runes. I looked at it carefully, the whole thing had been filled with celestial energy! On closer inspection, Dani informed me that the entire three-foot-thick quartz was just… stuffed full of celestial energy.

“Somehow, someone made this into celestial glass,” she gibbered, awed at the beautiful light we could see when we focused. There were no visible markings on it, even though the Runes I had placed were obviously active. Odd. I couldn’t focus on that right then, though I truly wanted to solve this mystery. You see, dawn had come, another first for me. For the first time in my life, I was able to watch the sunrise. Even better, I got to do so with my best friend, the only being I loved as much as myself.

Dale

A soft, grinding noise slowly roused Dale, his newly enhanced ears throbbing at the new and unusual sound. Rubbing sleep from his eyes, he walked out of his tent and meandered around as he looked for the source. It seemed to be coming from the lot the church would be built on, Dale wondered if some earth Mages had arrived build it. He wandered over, planning to see how it was done, and noticed a gazebo.

“Earth Mages? Father Richard?” Dale called. When no one responded, he went over to inspect their work. It was a single piece of granite that had no seams as far as he could tell. They must not have put the door in. He decided to look at it with his Essence sight ability, which was much easier to use now that the new meridian was open in the corner of his eye.

Inspecting the work, he could only see its natural Essence and was impressed by the control the Mage who made this had used. Normally, there was overflow which had a ‘flavor’ to it known as the ‘Mage’s signature’. The smaller the ‘signature’, the better control the Mage had and the more the work was worth because it would interfere less with Runes added on later. Looking closer, he saw beautiful Runescripted patterns cut inside the stone itself.

“That is so cool! I need to get this guy to teach me!” he thought, very excited to meet this master Mage when he returned. About to turn away, he saw what almost looked like earth Essence starting to follow the loops and whirls of the internal pattern. Entranced, he watched as the slow-moving substance filled the pattern.

When it reached the last open spot, the stone suddenly pulsed, seeming to tighten and grow darker. Some loose sand shook off, and he was showered with dirt. The rock was suddenly opaque to him, the beautiful pattern no longer visible. It looked exactly like the slab of stone over the entrance had, as a matter of fact.

Now nervous, Dale turned to run and tell someone about this when Father Richard walked up with a, “Morning, lad!”

“Would you look at that?!” He whistled. “Is this whole piece a single slab of granite?”

“Father, this is, if I am correct, cursed earth,” Dale released in a rush.

“Hmm, I think you are indeed correct.” Richard frowned a bit. “It looks a lot like that blockage did over the entrance to the dungeon. Come look at the quartz with me over here. It came awfully close to it. I hope it didn’t do any damage.” The look of nervousness on his face convinced Dale to help before informing the Guild.

They moved to check for any damage to the quartz, Father Richard frowned as he saw scratches along the bottom of the slab with the sparse, pre-dawn light. Just before the sun crested the ridge to signal the start of a new day, the entire slab shone brilliantly, as if it—and not the sun—was the herald of the morning.

“Ahh!” both of them yelled, clutching at their eyes. Blinking rapidly in an attempt to clear the spots dancing in their vision, they stumbled about in pain, Father Richard swearing in a very non-priestly way.

Silence followed by a gasp escaped Father Richard. Dale looked over with swimming vision to see him looking down with wonder in his expression. True sunrise had arrived, and Dale looked directly down to see the Boss room he had fought in yesterday as if it were only a few feet below.

“What?!” Dale joined in the gasping.

“That’s the Silverwood tree?” Father Richard pointed.

“Looks like it. But how can we see this? It has to be so far underground!” Dale exclaimed.

Father Richard didn’t answer, instead looking at the quartz again, looking for the scratches that had been there. After a few moments, he flopped down into a kneeling position.

“It’s a miracle,” he murmured, touching the smooth surface.

“Father?”

“Dale, the entire… the whole thing. It’s been enchanted. No, those are Runes—it’s been inscribed!” Tears of joy sprang to Father Richard’s eyes as he read the Inscription that Dale could not even see.

“It’s the church’s best Essence level Rune! Protection, increased celestial energy, and dissolving of infernal bonds.” He was freely weeping now. “It’s a miracle.”

“I can’t see the Rune. The Essence in the way is too thick,” Dale ashamedly mentioned, disappointed in his ability. A flash of insight crossed his mind. “Father, is it the same Inscription as… this?” He pulled out the pendant he was wearing which was filled with Essence of no particular elemental affiliation.

The Father’s eyes locked on to it and his expression changed to almost anger. “Where did you get this?”

“It was a drop in the dungeon, from the Boss of the first floor and the Mobs beyond,” Dale informed him nervously.

“Ah, sorry, I didn’t mean to worry you. This is indeed the same Rune, but as I said, it is one of the most powerful Essence level Inscriptions we have. I was just surprised to see it out of the hands of a cleric. Would you let me see it?” Richard politely asked.

“Of course, Father.” Dale handed it over, glad he wasn’t in trouble with this powerful man.

“Yes, it is the same,” Richard spoke, almost to himself. “Useless, though.”

“Useless?” Dale was rather disappointed to hear that. Several people around the area had them for good luck.

“Yes, though filled with Essence, only celestial type is able to activate the full Inscription. Other types may be able to use the other parts, like this physical protection… I haven’t looked into it,” Father Richard muttered, tracing the pattern. He looked at it again, frowning. “Can I try something on this?”

“Sure.” Dale shrugged. It was useless anyway.

Father Richard smiled, held the pendant and started saying a short prayer. The first words had barely left his mouth when the pendant glowed with light, obviously activating.

“Wondrous!” Richard exclaimed, eyes shining. “You say this is a drop that is fairly common in the dungeon?”

“Yes, the first Boss sometimes drops it, but we got three yesterday on the second level,” Dale bragged.

“I can activate them! Look,” Father Richard held up the pendant, “the Essence it contained has taken on celestial affinity!”

“Great!” Dale was enthusiastic yet still somewhat confused.

“Here, lad. Would you like me to bind this to you? You are its rightful owner, after all,” Father Richard offered.

“I’m sorry, I don’t know what you mean, Father,” Dale stalled, nervous for an unknown reason.

“Oh, it isn’t dangerous. If you place a small thread of Essence to a certain place on your items Rune, it will only activate for you if you are the first to do so. Many don’t because then the resale value drops quite a bit, and you can still activate the Rune like normal. But someone else could get ahold of it and bind it, rendering it useless to you,” Father Richard explained.

“Well, it wouldn’t hurt to learn how, right?” Dale grinned. He loved learning new things.

“Right,” Father Richard assured.

“Okay, let’s do it!” Dale affirmed, excited for the new knowledge.

“Since you still use Essence, your power does not extend far past your physical body. Basically, you need to have contact with the place you want to put Essence into. Your armor, since it is enchanted, has the power deposit placement on the inside against your skin, and your weapon has it on the grip. You can see it if you just look.” Dale didn’t inform him that he didn’t know how to activate his gear; he now planned to practice, though.

Continuing his lecture, “Look here, every place you input energy is the same glyph or a variant of it. That is the standard activation site. Here,” he pointed to another spot, “is the binding glyph of the Rune. Again, it looks similar across all the Runes I have ever seen. Try to put a tiny, tiny amount of Essence into it.”

Taking the pendant back, Dale concentrated on pulling Essence to his fingertip. Having done this for his eyes often now, it was easy to do only on his little finger, close to the meridian. Getting a mirthful look from Father Richard when he poked the glyph with his pinky, he felt a tiny tug from the pendant, and it glowed softly for a moment.

“Good job, you did it on your first try!” Father Richard praised. “You are the first non-cleric I know to have this particular active protection. Now, can you feel where it is?” He took and moved the pendant back and forth, and Dale felt as though he was being pulled in the same direction. “You’ll always be able to find it if it doesn’t break.”

“Very cool,” Dale enthused, eyes shining.

“Remember to activate it when you need it. Just having it does nothing!” Father Richard professed. “By the way, I’ll be letting people know that I’ll pay fifty silver for each of those, so pass it on.”

“Aren’t Runed items worth gold usually?” Dale looked at the cheap priest.

“Only if they are able to be activated!” Father Richard responded with a cheeky wink.

“Sneaky old man,” Dale very quietly muttered.

“What was that?” Father Richard growled.

“Nothing!”

As Father Richard watched Dale walk away, he thought about the now enchanted quartz and the Runed pendants.

“Maybe this post… wasn’t a punishment?” He dared to hope.

Chapter Nineteen

Dale moved away to meet up with his comrades. Following his nose, he quickly found them eating breakfast. Trying to tell his story, he was shouted down by the group, banished until he was fully armored since he was under strict orders to wear his gear at all times. They would hear no argument, yelling over his voice every time he tried to explain himself. Exceedingly frustrated, Dale went back to his tent to get geared up and found a masked man rummaging through his things!

“Hey!” Dale shouted in surprise. “What the abyss are you doing?”

The startled man looked up, eyes narrowing. His information had specifically said that Dale would be in the dungeon by now. Ah, well. He was probably going to have to kill him later anyway. The masked man pulled out a long knife and lunged at Dale.

His reactions trained from months of battle, Dale jumped to the side, barely avoiding a slash at his throat. His mind whirled with options, but he was without weapons or armor so he froze up, earning a brutal kick to his knee. Knocking Dale to the ground, the masked man raised his dagger to deliver a coup de grâce, ending his existence. Panicking, Dale screamed the first thing that came to mind.

“Get off my mountain!” Dale ordered with a frantic squeal. Mid-swing, the man turned and started jerkily walking away, his dagger flying from his hand at the unexpected and unwanted movement.

Dale, relieved, shouted after the angry and confused man, “To anyone who sent you, anyone who was sent by the same person, and anyone who knows what you were doing, leave! And never come back!” Dale had no idea if that would work, but he figured it was a good idea to at least try to get rid of other potential problems. There was now nothing he could do than just to watch the would-be assassin make his escape, so he stood up, shaking with reaction. Dale glared as he watched the man go. He was sprinting away now, obviously trying to outrun anyone Dale might send to find him.

Dale rushed to put on his armor, not feeling safe until he had every piece properly equipped. He then moved to find his group and tell them the events of his morning. At his rushed words about the assassin, they pulled him along to the Guild Master, making him repeat his story.

Frank tried to be sympathetic, but it was obvious he was preoccupied and not actually worried. “Dale, he was probably a thief that panicked when you showed up. It sounds like he didn’t try too hard to kill you if he just… ran off.”

“No, I ordered him off the mountain right before he could kill me!” Dale stated passionately. “He had me dead to rights. It was the only thing I could think of! I was about to die, Frank!”

“That was smart. Good work thinking on your toes, kid,” Hans soothingly stated, slapping Dale comfortingly on the back.

Frank shook his head and sighed in exasperation as he looked over another requisition form. “Still, while I am sorry it happened, there really isn’t much to be done! He obviously wasn’t in the Guild if he tried to attack you, so I have no legal right to hunt him down. Actually,” Frank paused and mused a moment, “banishing him was a solid punishment. After all, he is now several hundred miles from any real civilization with no food, water, or equipment.”

Dale was taken aback. He hadn’t really thought making people leave would have such deadly consequences for them. Living off the land was easy around here, wasn’t it? His family had done so for generations… Calming down a bit, Dale recited the rest of his story, “Some other things happened this morning as well.” He relayed his conversation with Father Richard, telling them of the cursed earth gazebo and the massive Runescript that had appeared on the quartz—Runescript being the proper term for many Runes that interlocked together to form a larger Rune, of course.

“Amazing!” Dale cynically thought it a bit ironic that Frank was interested in this story and not the one where his life was in danger. 

“That one chunk of quartz would be worth the yearly economic output of a city! That was before it was inscribed! To think, all of these amazing events happened up here, in the middle of nowhere! And, well, the cursed earth is concerning of course, but we will have to study it before making any decisions.” He shooed the group off when they had nothing else to report, telling them he would be busy for a few days, looking into these matters.

“Well, that was certainly interesting.” Craig looked at Dale, whose face still drawn from the stress and sudden events. Taking pity on him, Craig continued, ““Let’s go kill some Mobs, shall we? That’ll calm your nerves a bit.” He punched Dale on the arm, getting a weak smile back for his camaraderie.

“Anything you say, Craig. It has been one heck of a morning, you know?” Dale sounded exhausted already.

A cheerful Hans came to the rescue. “These things happen, and the longer you live, the worse you’ll see. That’s why we’re training you up, so you can take care of yourself when we all move on. Ya can’t stay here forever, right?”

Dale’s face clouded. “I hadn’t really thought about it. I’ve never been off these mountains and I… You know what? Yeah, let’s go kill something.”

“That’s the spirit!” Hans shouted. “To battle!” Taking off at a run for the dungeon, the others had to hurry to catch up. They couldn’t let him have all the kills, after all.

Cal

<They are later than normal,> I conversed with Dani optimistically. <Think they’re getting complacent?>

“More likely they were looking at the new building and the giant window you made into here,” Dani muttered reproachfully, making me look up at the growing crowd of people above us. They sure did seem excited to see my room. Hard to blame them for looking at my beautiful work, after all. I was preening under all of the attention I was getting.

“Voyeurs,” Dani muttered, hostility coming off her in waves. “I gotta stay invisible all the time now.”

<Well that is the price we pay for this glorious sunshine,> I teased her, projecting the image of a lazy person stretching.

She huffed at me. “Fine. You’ll miss my pretty colors soon enough. How is Dale’s group doing? I assume… I mean, it is them again, right?”

<It is. Apparently, I didn’t do a lick of permanent damage to them yesterday. Dale must have healed really fast for him to be dancing around like that.> I was watching the energetic lad bouncing around with his stick.

<At least they seem to be having trouble finding the right path today. Looks like that system worked out.> Indeed, they were even now moving toward a dead end. On the first floor, though, so they quickly were able to bypass the trap and move back to the correct path. I decided to listen in on their conversation.

“Did I just pick the wrong path?” Dale was asking, “I thought I could just watch the Essence. Were you guys just testing me?” He looked around at the stony faces. “I swear I am using the technique!” He finished desperately when no one talked.

“It’s not that, kid, chill,” Hans waved him down, speaking in a perplexed tone. “I thought that was the right way as well. What do you think Craig?”

“No idea,” Craig’s tense voice muttered. “It’s all different today.”

Steve chimed in softly, “This may be dangerous, boys. If we can’t tell where to go, we may walk directly into traps. Be extra careful today.”

“Vigilance!” roared Josh, badly startling everyone. A couple of them even had to force themselves to stop attacking on reflex.

With a withering glance, Steve rounded on Josh. “Yes, thank you for your input. Very helpful.”

I chuckled at that. <Dani, looks like there is some infighting going on here. I didn’t think this would be enough to make them panic like they are.>

“Losing your way can be scary!” Dani shuddered.

<Pff, I don’t get it. It’s not a big deal.>

“You can’t get lost! You don’t go anywhere!” Dani gasped at my nonchalant dismissal.

I quickly directed her attention away. <Oh look, they are fighting the Boss.>

They had made their way through the admittedly easy first-floor maze, quickly ending the useless Boss, which made me explode with frustration again.

<Damn it! Stupid thing always dies!> I judgmentally thought of the weak, plant-based monster.

“Why not put more Mobs in there? Or a squad and call ‘em the Boss.” Dani seemed perplexed at my dislike of the current Boss.

<Is that a good idea? Then they know what to expect on the next floor.>

“I think they already know. The squad system is too strong already for most of the groups, even though they are common Mobs on the second floor. I do agree that the first floor is too easy. A squad will be a good challenge at least.”

<What would I do with the Bloody Bane? I know it is stupid, but I made it, and I don’t want to just toss it away…>

She was ruthless, probably sick of me complaining about it all the time. “It’s weaker than your common Mobs. How about put it near acid traps and pitfalls? Pull people into them instead of hoping they fall on their own, or use it as a sacrifice to set traps off. That worked really well with that injured basher, right? Plus, the first floor is so weak now that Dale’s group is just waltzing on through. Dale could clear it by himself now! Heck, when is the last time someone even got badly injured there?” Dani stopped my interjection with a harsh truth, “You need to devote some of your Essence to upkeep and upgrades, not just constant expansion.”

<Bah. What’s wrong with hoarding?> I grumbled, unhappily acknowledging that she had good points. <I am going to need a week or so to get that level of Essence to spare unless a few people die off today. Let’s try and get Dale again. Seeing him run for his life always cheers me up.>

Ooh, taking them down today may come to pass! They were moving into a tunnel on the second floor that would drop a stone door behind them, flooding a small space with acid. I could hardly wait to taste that C-ranked Essence from the main group. I caught my ‘breath’ as they walked in, and with a joyful yell, I slammed the door down behind them. Their shouts of fear made my excitement rise to a fever pitch as I made preparations for large inputs of Essence.

“Calm down! There has to be a way out if we aren’t dead yet!” The ever calm Craig took control, looking around. His eyes widened as he saw the acid beginning to pour in, his mouth forming a grim line.

“Look around for a lever, an opening, a button—anything out of place!” Hans directed, the sound of pouring liquid and hissing acid nearly drowning him out. The air was starting to become toxic as the stone melted, releasing fumes. Craig was moving his hands in complex patterns, light remaining where his nimble fingers moved.

As Dale looked around wildly, his Essence-infused eyes caught upon a lighter patch on the wall a foot above his head on the other side of the tunnel. “There!” he shouted, pointing at the spot. Acid had pooled between them and the button, so Steve pulled out an arrow and notched it to his bow.

“No! You may break it!” Hans shouted, pushing the bow aside.

“Josh!” Craig snapped, hands still fluttering. “Boot!”

The benefit of working as a team for a long period of time was that complete sentences were rarely needed in dire circumstances. Josh moved over and held his armored leg up, the boot next to the glowing pattern in the air. Craig moved his hand again, and what was obviously an enchantment flowed into being on the bottom of the proffered boot.

“Go!” Josh ran at the acid flowing across the ground, not stopping as he flung himself at the bubbling fluid. I watched and waited for his foot to start melting when it became submerged in the hissing acid. Sadly, the Rune on his boot flared to life, making the acid recede just enough to leave a dry spot on the floor where he landed. I was horrified as the area around him cleared of all liquid, though it was nearly a half inch deep just outside that zone. The others were on higher ground, but he should have been ooze by now! He sprinted, nearly flying across the now clear ground and leaped to meet the button on the wall.

With only a minor complaint, I saw the acid stop flowing and quickly drain away, leaving only scarred stone to show it had ever been there. Boo. These guys were resourceful. The door slowly raised behind them as the last dregs of fluid vanished; I was nothing if not fair.

“That was amazing!” Dale shouted, pumping his fist into the air and giving Hans a wild hug. “I never knew enchanting was so fast!”

“It normally isn’t.” Steve glanced at Craig with admiration. “Fast enchantments are dangerous. I highly doubt Craig would have done that if we weren’t in deep shit there.”

Craig gravely nodded. “Agreed. Let’s avoid that in the future.”

“What? That was cool! When will you teach me to enchant?” Dale excitedly bubbled.

“I may not. It depends on what you want to do when you learn all the other options. Enchanting isn’t popular because you permanently lose a bit of your cultivation base for each enchantment and have to re-refine the Chi. Rebuilding your cultivation base is hard, as you know. When you use your Essence for other, normal things, it will flow back into your center over time,” Craig tiredly lectured. “With enchanting, it is just… gone.”

“Oh.” Dale was less eager now. “You said what you did was dangerous?”

“If I did it wrong, it might have exploded or maybe just dissipated. If I made a correct Rune but not the one I was going for, it might have had… unintended effects,” Craig hedged.

“Like if you made the inverse,” Hans spoke out in a low tone, eliciting a shudder from the others.

“What?” Dale hesitantly probed.

Josh took over, “The inverse of a Rune reverses its effects. Simple right? In this case, instead of repelling the acid, it would have attracted all of it in range.”

Dale joined in the shuddering, thinking about what would have happened if the acid had completely covered poor Josh. It would have been like he never existed.

“But he made it. Wouldn’t he know if it were the inverse?” Dale prodded.

“When he made it, yeah. But what if he applied it upside down in his hurry before activating it?” Hans explained.

“Oh.” Dale was quiet for a moment. “I’m glad it worked out.”

“I think we all are. Let’s go kill a Boss,” Josh rumbled. “I need some fresh air.”

They moved away from the dead end, systematically searching each area, skillfully avoiding traps until they finally found my Boss room. They were concerned at the bright light coming from the room until they saw the source, at which point they were excited by the new, bright fighting arena. I say arena because we certainly had an audience today. People had been crowding along the area above until this group finally showed, at which point they started cheering and placing bets. Somehow, the sound came in clearly from above, yet I am fairly certain they could not hear what happened down here.

My priorities had shifted a bit. While I did indeed still want some tasty Essence, I really wanted that fluid repulsion enchantment. So when my Boss barreled out to the fight, amid cheering which filtered down from above, he charged directly at the large man, Josh. This must have surprised them; I think they expected me to go for Dale as per usual.

Raile crashed into the defiantly held tower shield, easily bending it. This was a weak, shoddy substitute for the one he had lost in here previously. Josh shouted in pain as the metal crumpled around his arm, forced away a few feet before he tripped and sprawled flat on his back. Raile bounced forward as blows began raining on to him, his massive weight landing on the sundered shield held up for protection. The tortured metal began caving in as Raile furiously attacked the only exposed area, Josh’s feet.

Clamping down, Raile shook his head like a dog tearing into steak, but he was knocked away with a powerful blow from Craig. Trying to preserve Josh, the blow had sent Raile away from Josh’s head, actually helping me pull the boot off. Thanks, Craig! With an audible snap, Raile broke Josh’s leg as he was launched away, the boot flying into the distance.

I devoured the boot and the enchantment it held with a moan of pleasure, filing the information away for later use. Wow, does Craig make tasty enchantments! So much Essence! Raile returned to the battle, attempting to maul the man on the ground but was being body blocked by the others. Dale pulled Josh on to his good foot as Raile bounced high and started descending like an avalanche toward the place Josh had lain. Unable to dodge fully out of the way, both Dale and Josh went flying. Josh’s head slammed into the wall, where he slumped to the ground unconscious.

This was going far better than expected! Now two tasty people were on the ground for me to squash, while Raile had taken almost no damage yet! I bounded in, ready to finish them. I jumped, my temporary body angling to flatten Dale when an arrow slammed into the armor of the head I was inhabiting. The force didn’t penetrate, but it did knock my—Raile’s—skull forward, creating an awkward landing that pushed my head into the wall next to Dale.

He stared into Raile’s eyes as I struggled to regain control. Luckily his stick wasn’t small enough for him to swing and do damage in this confined space. Thinking I had the upper hand, I was shocked when Dale reached into a pocket and withdrew a gleaming dagger that he slammed into the eye next to him! That bastard! He had never had a dagger before! Vindictively, I angled Raile in his death throes so he would land on Dale, hopefully crushing the life out of him. As Raile’s corpse landed, I could hear the breath explode from Dale’s body alongside a meaty crunch which made me rather cheerful. Maybe this battle wasn’t a waste!

The others worked quickly to lever Raile’s body off of Dale, showing a non-breathing adventurer. Hans jumped over and pushed on Dale’s chest a few times while furiously screaming. I am fairly certain the screaming did the trick, forcing Dale to take a breath in subliminal fear. While he coughed explosively, I sadly watched all of that Essence get away. Drat. They moved to Josh, who moaned as they removed his helmet.

“You okay, big man?” Hans probed, patting Josh on the arm.

“Yah,” Josh groaned, slowly getting up. “Powerful protection Rune on that helmet. Shoulda squashed me like a bug.” He spat out a bit of blood, gesturing at the giant Basher. He looked over at Dale and frowned. “How’d you kill it, lad?”

Dale was still trying to get his mind off of nearly being killed. “I, uh… I had a dagger on me. I was able to stick him before he got back up.”

“I didn’t teach you to use a dagger! Is it new? Do you have a new teacher you like better?” Hans feigned hurt at the thought of another man teaching him how to use a knife.

“No! Ha… Just nearly got stabbed this morning and decided to take a trophy,” Dale wheezed. He handed the dagger over so Hans could see it.

Craig looked up from the dead Basher. “Dale, you didn’t penetrate its brain. How did you kill it?”

“Craig.” Hans had a serious tone in his voice, which made everyone look at him. A serious Hans made everyone nervous. “This is a Demonologist blade.”

“Are you certain?” Craig inspected the blade as well. “I see no infernal Essence on it…?”

Hans shook his head. “Infernal Essence doesn’t hold well in Inscriptions. It pulls its energy from its victims to power itself. I am… unsure what this Rune does, but we should get it to a Spotter immediately.”

Hans turned toward Dale. “The life Essence in that Boss Mob was ripped out. Good job with those reflexes, but you should never use an unknown weapon, especially one with an obvious Inscription like this.” He held up the dagger. It was plain to me that the twisted pattern nearly screamed its hatred for life.

“I didn’t even think about it.” A downcast Dale kicked at a loose rock. “I was so caught up in today…”

I was watching that dagger. A new Inscription was something I dearly wanted to eat. Especially if I wouldn’t have a chance later, them giving it away and all. I had planned on giving them just standard loot, but I wanted a distraction. I generated a shower of silver coins to catch their attention and dropped a massive, metal tower shield behind them when they looked toward the money.

The resulting boom, clatter was enough for them to jump, badly startled. Jumpy, aren’t they? At the same time as the noise, a Glitterflit I had been directing smacked into the hand Hans was holding the dagger in, sending it flying. The distractions provided me with a brand new dagger and Inscription which I would be sure to study. Only Hans saw a flash of gold as the Glitterflit sped into hiding again.

“Son of a–” Hans began shouting.

“What happened?” Steve whirled around as a joyful whoop sounded from Josh.

“It’s beautiful!” Josh stated, voice somewhere between a whisper and a scream. “Look at this pattern! These Runes are immaculate! I can’t wait to use it!” He was holding the inscribed, massive shield with his non-mangled arm, the other bent at odd angles which he ignored. “So pretty!”

“Something took the dagger!” Hans tried to warn the group.

“Can I keep it?” Josh was asking, looking around at the others wildly. “Please?”

“None of us could use it, Josh.” Craig moved toward him, speaking softly, “It is all yours, okay? How about we head back now?”

“So I can keep it?” Josh again begged.

“Of course you can,” Craig promised soothingly, looking into Josh’s eyes. “I think you have a concussion, my friend.”

“No, it’s a shield,” Josh assured him, holding it a little higher.

“I know it is. How about you look at it for a while?” Craig turned toward the group. “We need to go. An injury to the brain is one I do not feel… ready… to heal.”

“A moment please.” Steve gathered the fallen coin, looking for any other dropped things. What a greedy adventurer! I had no intention of giving them anything else. After all, I had not regained any of Raile’s lost Essence thanks to my new knife. “Let’s be off.” Hans nodded as he finished his search.

They turned to go, so I dropped a rock near the hidden stairwell. They turned, weapons drawn, to look at the disturbance. Hans flew forward, hoping to catch whatever it was off guard and so was the one to find the stairs.

“Over here! A stairwell!” He waved them over to this unknown obstacle.

They looked at the stairs and almost ignored them, nearly leaving for the known route when the lolling head of Josh convinced them to move upward. After the first few steps, the door behind them swung closed, the only light in the area being the Essence in the stone around them.

They reached the top after a few minutes of huffing and puffing—three hundred eighty steps wears anyone down, I’m told. I wouldn’t know. No legs. As they touched the wall, it swung outward, revealing a cheering crowd who was describing the battle they had just witnessed. The cheering got louder as the raucous crowd noticed the famous fighters had suddenly joined them.

A cleric ran over, healing light flowing from his hands as he reached for Josh. A few less interested people tried to force their way into the stone gazebo I was closing. I didn’t try to stop them. A few made it in, cheering at their good luck. Those few ran down toward the Boss room while the door closed behind them. Little did they know it wouldn’t reopen. I guess this battle wasn’t an entire waste for me today! I was sure their constant crying would be annoying for a few hours, but I was also sure it wouldn’t last too long. Not much air in the stairwell, after all.

I turned my mind to the knowledge I had gained that day, thinking over the concepts and ideas that were flowing through me. The Inscriptions were very interesting, but I was very curious as to what I could do with inverted runes. It reversed the effect of the Rune, Craig said, hmm? I drew an inverted Rune on the ground in a small room and powered it with a tiny burst of Essence. This was the Rune that would increase the strength of armor when applied normally, so I was unsure of what would happen when it was inverted.

I dropped a boot on it and watched it glow, though seemingly nothing was happening. After a few seconds, the boot sagged and fell apart, the leather falling into scraps! Already joyfully thinking of the applications, I tried again, this time with a metal helmet. I carefully watched it as apparent stress fractures made their way along the metal. Anywhere it connected to another piece of the metal, it quickly corroded until it finally clattered apart. What remained on the Rune for a while longer fell apart further until only oxidized, rusty metal scraps remained.

“Holy cow!” Dani breathed. “It looks like what you do to anything that doesn’t have an aura when you absorb it! This could be a way for you to get patterns for armor even when you don’t take down the person wearing it!”

<I agree! This could be fun, let’s test other inverted Runes too! Also…>

“Yeah?”

<What’s a cow?>

Chapter Twenty

Dale walked out of the gazebo and was so stunned by the sudden noise and crowd that he couldn’t stop the people who pushed past him into the waiting tunnel.

“That’s a terrible idea!” he shouted as they rushed downward, the door seamlessly grinding closed behind them.

Craig just shook his head and waited for the cleric to be finished with Josh, who had focus returning to his eyes as the celestial energy flowed around his brain, clearing the built-up blood and reducing swelling. Josh blinked a few times as the cleric moved back a step, then thanked him.

“Ow!” Josh suddenly shouted. “Ahh! My arm!” The very bent arm by his side was apparent to all. A few weak stomached people were noisily sick as they noticed the ruined flesh. More were sick as they watched the arm get pulled on by the others to straighten it as Josh screamed in pain.

“Pull it straight, you heartless bastards!” Josh was shrieking. “Do it! Ahhh!” The flow of celestial energy appeared again, quickly soothing and strengthening the proffered arm.

“You missed a kink there,” the nameless cleric noticed, pointing to a knot on Josh’s ankle. Hans looked at the spot, and before Josh could tense up, he quickly twisted the foot, the grinding of bone audible only until the retching sounds drowned it out. A burst of Essence set him right, the ankle healed again if tender.

“Well, that was unpleasant.” Josh panted in an attempt to seem nonchalant. His face pale with tears streaming showed that he was not immune to the pain. “Luckily, it won’t happen again.” He held up the new shield, flaunting it for the onlookers, then reached out and bound it to himself with a burst of Essence. “Just in case.” He winked at Dale.

Turning to the cleric, Josh motioned him close. “Thank you for your timely assistance, brother. Please, accept this, a token of my thanks.” He handed the man several silver coins, his portion of the day’s dungeon dive.

The dumbfounded cleric stammered his thanks as his team pulled him away to begin their day in the dungeon.

“Why would you give him so much money?” Dale scoffed quietly at Josh, who was looking fondly after the retreating cleric. “That is enough to live comfortably for a month!”

“A good healer is a man you curry favor with! You see, lad, there is a very important lesson to be learned here. When you are able to be generous, do so! There will always come a time when you cannot afford what you need. People will be far more likely to help you when you fall on hard times if you are free with money in the good times.” Josh smiled a bit painfully at Dale.

“Go out of your way to be respectful to the one who brings you your food, holds your money, and most importantly, those who work to heal you. That cleric expected nothing for his service and now goes into danger with less power because of me. How could I do less for him?”

Dale hung his head a bit. “I had not considered things that way. Sorry, Josh. I wasn’t trying to sound like he didn’t deserve it. I think I’ve just had a bad day, and my manners have gone to trash.”

“I know, lad.” Josh had never looked so uncomfortable, including his recent bone-shattering. “You’re a good man, just… Remember that you have had some very lucky breaks, and life is still pretty hard for other people. Try to give back. People will appreciate it if they know the person they depend upon is good-hearted.”

“I’ll try. I’m going to go catch a nap before lunch, I think.”

Hans scoffed. “Smelling like a sweaty rabbit turd? How about you go bathe instead?! Nap he says! Nap indeed!”

“I need to go give my report to the Guild and get some guards and a scribe over to this new exit,” Craig announced, already walking away from them. “The Guild needs its taxes.”

Dale

Roughly a month passed, and the team settled into its routines. Dale had just returned from bathing one night after dinner when a shout rang out.

“They are going to open the portal!” Anyone not engaged in a serious task started excitedly moving toward two stone obelisks standing proudly on the small hill. Dale decided it might be fun to join, as he had never even seen a portal before. The anger James had for him had kept him away from the site they were building on.

A sonorous chant was swelling, and energy like static was flashing along the paired standing stone obelisks. Dale moved into his Essence enhanced sight, trying to understand what was happening. Mana was thick in the air, though it was normally invisible to the naked eye. With the activation of his analysis ability, it was readily apparent. He had thought that all Mana would look alike—like Essence did—and with a group working together like this, he had expected a harmonious linking of energy as they meshed their sympathetic energy toward a single purpose. In his mind, Mana was going to be beautiful.

The reality was almost… disgusting. It was a clash of primary colors and a visionary cacophony. As one man directed his words, his chant, Dale saw it as a polka-dotted scroll that unraveled and wrapped around the stone. One woman, singing, seemed to have inky bubbles roiling from her mouth which burst in a sequence of light, filling precious gems with power. Amber had the most terrifying Mana moving away from her, the oily coloration roiling in light and impressions, unrefined chaos that the mind interposed its own images on.

Dale shuddered, looking past the Mana, instead trying to look at what they were putting Mana into. The twin obelisks stood, one exactly the same as the other, though in reverse, as if they were mirror images of the other. Slowly, brightening Runescript flowed up and around each in so many varied and opulent ways that it was nigh impossible to find where each began and the surrounding Runes stopped. Each Inscription was filled with gold that had been poured in a single sitting, leaving not a single break, weld, or splatter along the glowing lines.

Exactly the same amount of power went into each stone, and they began to hum to their own song, dulling each time the Mana reached a new gem set into the patterns. At precisely the same time on each standing stone, the gem would grow nearly too bright to look at, then darken as the Mana continued up the flowing, golden pattern. The crowd was silent, completely awestruck as enough energy was accumulated into this one spot to begin to punch through the dimensional boundaries. The power became audible, snapping and hissing, the sound of a star detonating and being reborn as a furious and colossal terror of the void.

The opening expanded, and a hole of pure darkness was pulled torturously to the artificial terminus represented by pure, glowing energy. The edge of the hole in the universe extended, straining to this glowing end, finally hooking like a fish taking bait—that is, furiously and with dark intent of escape. The chanting increased, and the impossibly black interior shuddered before finally relinquishing to the Mages’ control, shimmering into a vision of another locale in the world.

Silence reigned for but a moment as the crowd tried to comprehend what they had just witnessed—some hardened men shaking in terror—before a roar of approval tore from the throat of an astonished onlooker. Then cheering, shouting, the men praised the makers of this wondrous relic. The exhausted Mages beamed as a festival air took hold, people rushing to enlist the services of these esteemed experts.

“I want to get to the capital of–”

“I have important–”

“Please! I haven’t seen my–”

“Get out of the way! I’m–”

The rush of noise, and soon violence, was shocking to Dale. This entire event reminded him that there was more to life than training and fighting but also the spectacular end goal you could achieve when you had been training. It was a paradox that made him freeze up, torn between rushing back to the dungeon or just joining the melee that was rapidly spiraling out of control, just to feel alive.

“Enough!” a familiar voice sounded, laced with absolute authority. The sound reverberated through his entire being, insisting upon instant obedience. Sixty percent of the fighting men and women stopped, their bodies no longer their own to control, while the others looked like they were moving through thick tar, their motion slowly coming to an absolute halt. Some of the weaker people passed out, their lungs unable to pull in air. All then collapsed to the ground, breathing restored to the gasping group.

“Are you animals? Are you no better than the creatures you come here to fight?!” Frank was walking toward the new portal. “I am ashamed! Ashamed of my own people! Any Guild members who started a fight, go to the clerks and pay the fee for fighting with your brothers-in-arms. Any who protected another, go collect a bonus from them.”

“Any non-Guild members, if you ever want a chance at joining the Guild, go and make amends, now. It is standard that if you have attacked a Guild member outside of self-defense, you may not join the Guild! We will pardon you this one time as the majority were from my Guild!” Frank roared furiously, face an unhealthy maroon color. “I will not tolerate this! If any do something so foolish again, their Guild fee will be raised to fifty percent of all valuables gained for a year! A third time and they are out of the Guild and blacklisted!”

He stared around at the quaking people and snorted in disgust. “Why are you still here?! You have your orders! Get moving!”

People scrambled in all directions; some would have been trampled if the threat of Guild expulsion were not hanging in the air. Hans walked over to Dale, standing by as they watched the ocean of motion.

“Well, that was fun.” Hans chuckled glibly.

“What did he do to them, Hans? This has been so… messed up.” Dale shuddered. “I just want to go to bed.”

“Never seen ol’ Frankie in action, eh? Not too surprising. Not too much around here calls for the workings of an A-ranked Mage.” Hans stretched a bit as he began walking to the portal.

“He’s a Magous?” Dale’s eyes widened in shock. He had been rude to Frank on several occasions…

“Ohhh yes. You don’t get to be in charge of things if you are weak, my boy! Those Mages can get pretty scary. How their power manifests is… mind numbing,” Hans expressed in a low, dark tone.

Dale agreed with him, “I saw. What was all of that? Essence seems to look pretty much the same, doesn’t it? Why is Mana so different?”

“Mana is… unique to the person who uses it. It is the true name and power of something that influences reality in the way they want it to. From what I understand, when you first say a word in that… ‘language’—for lack of a better word—your Essence becomes a concept of reality that you have uttered.”

Dale was more confused than he had been at the start of the conversation. “How then do they do different things? Don’t they have control of just one thing?”

Hans shook his head. “Something you will have to learn is that all of reality is really one single event. Though the concept they interpret is different for everyone, it can affect most things equally. Dangerously. It is a terrifying power to wield. I cannot even imagine what spiritual energy looks like—never ran into an S-ranked before,” Hans nearly whispered, giving a small shudder.

“What did Frank actually do, though?” Dale insisted on understanding at least one piece of this talk.

“From what he told me of the Word he uses, it seems to be the basis for movement. Really hard to explain,” Hans apologetically informed him. “Think of it like this, when you move your arm, first your muscles bunch, then leap toward your target, right?”

Dale nodded affirmatively.

Hans smiled. “Right, so all of that potential movement, which builds up when your muscles are getting ready to move, is the concept that Frank’s words embody. He took everyone’s potential movement away.”

“Holy…” Dale was stunned at this. “Didn’t some stop instantly, though?”

“Yeah, all the Guild members he outranks. So every Guild member that was in the area.” Hans glanced at Dale. “You do understand that entering the Guild, signing that document, ensures that everyone has to follow lawful orders, correct? That is what he enforced just now.”

“Wow.” Dale shook his head. “That is just the next level up from Essence? I… cannot understand what the higher rankings would be like.”

“Guess we’re just going to have to wait and see,” Hans happily chattered, clapping Dale on the shoulder. “Feel like getting a hot meal halfway across the world? If I recall correctly, you get free access for yourself and friends!” He finished with a broad wink.

“Why not? You’ll show me around, right? I’ve never been off the mountains.” Dale suddenly contemplated what he would be able to see soon.

“You know it! Get your money. I know just the place to bring you.” Hans grinned, a worrisome glint coming into his eyes.

They went and prepared themselves, then regrouped and joined the rather long queue that was slowly moving into the portal. Dale spotted Father Richard ahead, nearly bouncing as he waited his turn. Dale had to laugh at the man’s antics.

“Think he is going to go find some stonemasons?” Dale casually looked over at Hans, pointing at the powerful priest.

“Who?” Hans peered about.

“Father Richard, over there.”

“Oh. Most likely, I guess. Ah, Dale, about Father Richard, I’ve heard some–”

A bellowing voice reached them abruptly, “Dale! Dale wait, please!”

They turned toward this voice to see James, the portal maker, running toward them. He stopped, panting, face flush and eyes wild.

“Oh. Hello, James,” Dale spoke coolly. “How can I help you?” Dale was still rather displeased with James, the Mage’s insults still fresh in his mind.

“Dale, please, I want to apologize. I wronged you and acted like a buffoon, holding prejudices for no reason other than to have them. Please don’t make me leave,” James begged. “This place… I’ve never seen anything like it!”

“Oh, now we get to the crux of it,” Hans interjected snidely. “Realized how profitable this area is going to be? How the dungeon has been churning out Runed items like a merchant churns out turds?”

Dale looked at Hans, startled at this unforeseen attitude. Hans, mistaking the look, gave an explanation, “They churn turds out frequently. Because they eat so much. Dale? You okay?”

Dale’s face was beet red. Abruptly, he erupted into laughter. Hans looked a bit confused until he also started laughing. James looked shocked, then affronted, assuming they were calling him names, laughing at him for some reason.

“You don’t have to be cruel about it. I’ll go. The enchantment is already pulling me toward the portal. I may as well just…” James decreed sharply. He turned and started to pace away.

“W-wait!” Dale snorted around his laughter. “You’re fine, James. You don’t have to go. Just try not to be an ass to everyone. It isn’t too fun when someone has so much power, and you can’t do anything to stop it, right?”

“No. It. Is. Not,” James enunciated bitingly.

“Well, that’s what you were trying to do when we met. I hope you can see the parallels in the situation. Bullying me and being pushy, with no regard for my opinion, simply due to your overwhelming strength.” Dale smiled to soften the insult. “Let’s meet up and talk sometime. I’d love to hear about portal making. Plus, I really would rather have you as a friend than an enemy.”

They left James standing there with a shocked look still on his face as they walked over to the open portal, which they stepped through after a brief talk with the attendant, who marked something in a ledger book.

Chapter Twenty-one

Dale dropped to the ground heaving.

“Ah, the best and worst feeling in the world,” Hans chattered, glancing fondly at the portal.

“The… worst… ye-blargh.” Dale didn’t puke, the long distant breakfast being the only reason. The dry heaving wasn’t fun, though.

“Oi! Move it, you’re about to be trampled!” the attendant on this side of the portal shouted.

“Oops. Forgot to tell you to close your eyes when you came through.” Hans grasped Dale, moving him forward as more people appeared in the spot they had been. Luckily, the design of the portal made it like walking through a door, not creating matter in the same area, else portal magic would have quickly gone out of style—with the exploding people and whatnot.

Dale looked around, quickly forgetting his nausea. This was a beautiful area, and the trees and flowers gave off a heady fragrance. A tang of salt was in the air as well, reminding Dale that the Lion Kingdom capital was adjacent to the ocean. The whitewashed stone of the surrounding buildings gave off a glare where the sun struck them, making him quickly avert his eyes. His clothing, thick wool under the armor he wore constantly, was already beginning to accumulate sweat as his body registered the heat and humidity of the region.

“This is…” Dale breathed.

“Hot, beautiful, and filthy,” Hans supplied cynically.

Dale looked at him askance. “Filthy?

“Under all that paint and rosy perfume, this is still a city. Last year, the shit piled so high in the streets that the King finally noticed, since his daughter’s horse slipped in it, and she got a bit… messy.” Hans quieted near the end of his tale. “Don’t go telling that story too loudly. They’re still a bit, hmm, sensitive about it here. Anyway, the Kingdom paid off the Guild and hired water Mages to flood the worst of the streets. This allowed careful flushing of everything foul off and away. Even the homeless that lived in the streets.”

“That’s… good? Getting rid of the poop, at least… Seems a bit temporary, though,” Dale ventured. “They just washed people away?”

“Right, good head on those shoulders, boy-o. Well, he also bought most of the earth Mages in the city, their services at least, and they’ve been building an elaborate sewage system under the city. Have been for the better part of a year.” Hans grimaced with finality. “And yes, they don’t particularly care about people who refuse to work for a living. To be homeless in the city, you need a license from the Beggars’ Guild, which is not a Guild approved by the Realm.”

Dale decided he didn’t really want to get into a political discussion, so he returned to the sewer system, “Why does building it take so long? Seems like it wouldn’t be too hard to make a tunnel with Mana…”

“Ah, now you come to the crux of the matter. Stonework is hard and expensive, but when it is done right, it stays in place pretty much forever. Stone Mages convince the stone that this is the shape they’ve always wanted; it would take intense destructive power to convince them otherwise,” Hans sagely imparted wisdom. “The King does care about his working citizens, though, which is the only reason this project is being successful. Since the cost is so high, short term planners don’t really see the worth of the idea, as the common citizens are the main beneficiaries of it.”

“Oh, well, I guess I don’t really see why it’s such a big deal if they can just cheaply wash it away every once in a while,” Dale suggested.

“There is the argument of the uneducated, my friend. Filth in the streets like that causes unrest, disease, and is a strong blow to morale. Not to mention, who likes shit on their feet?” Hans intently made eye contact. “The sewers will make the place healthier, wealthier, and happier for everyone. More so for cultivators like us, who may live here a very long time.”

Dale was quiet, considering Hans’s words. “Hans, why do you know these things? I mean, I know you’ve been around for a longer time than me but…”

Hans was quiet a short while, a considering look passing along on his face. Finally, he began softly, “Dale, I… don’t want you to think poorly of me, but I’ll tell you a bit about myself if you’d like.”

Dale nodded, eager to learn about any of his tight-lipped squad mates.

“Alright, well, I grew up here,” Hans started as they walked along a palm tree-lined street. “I was the lowest of the low, basically an orphan for how much I saw my father, and my mother died before I ever knew her. Undisciplined, wild, and hungry, I joined the street gangs that roam the streets. Kids my age, governed by usually just one adult, someone who survived in the gang long enough to be called an adult at least. The guards are not… kind… to thieves if they are caught.”

Dale gazed on in surprise; he had never expected these revelations. He remained quiet, knowing an interruption might stop the flow of information.

“I… distinguished myself a little too much. I was careless and boasted of my success. A thief, a real thief, from one of the hidden Guilds, approached me and offered training. It is not an offer you say no to—not if you plan to live. Soon after, I was being taught everything you would expect—stealth, legerdemain, better ways to pickpocket.” Hans glanced at Dale to see if he had his attention.

“Anyway. Then I was suddenly learning things I didn’t expect. Numbers, letters, politics, current events, etiquette. They had a plan for me to make a big haul. I ended up in the Guildhall, of all places, at a fancy dinner for the sons and daughters of nobility. We talked, danced, and ate fine food. No one suspected a thing, but many of them walked away with less jewelry or fewer coins,” Hans reminisced fondly. “Such easy marks.”

“But my real target was a cache of memory stones locked in the same rooms, the cultivation techniques of the great houses of nobility.” Hans caught the surprised look on Dale’s face and grimaced. “Not all cultivation techniques are equal. The royal family draws Essence in as a raging river compared to the trickle of most commoners’ slow drippings. If someone had access to this outside of the royals, it would allow for even cultivation all around the Kingdom.”

“Why isn’t that the case then? Do they just like to subjugate their populations?” Dale spoke with heat in his voice.

“What? No!” Hans yelped, surprised. “The lifespan of Mages and above is measured in centuries. The entire time, they are capable of siring children. Can you imagine what would happen to us if we had hundreds of millions capable of living for that long? They keep their abilities so they can rule wisely and justly, as well as being the last line of defense for their Kingdom. Their minds don’t wander; their bodies are strong.”

Dale was confused. All he had ever heard was that royals and nobility took and took and never gave aught back. Hans was saying that it was actually because they were trying to preserve their reliant citizens.

“Dale, everyone can cultivate, but as you know, it takes time and effort. Also, lots, and lots of pain. People still go off to adventure, but a large portion of them die quickly. What if everyone was a full-time cultivator? No other professions would flourish, and civilization would stagnate. We need everyone, from the lowliest cleaner to the mightiest warrior. Without all of what we are, we would all likely die off.”

Dale finally nodded in acknowledgment. “I see. So if we had no farmers because they were more interested in becoming fighters, people would starve for their neglect. No clothing makers, no chefs, no cleaners.”

“Exactly! In fact, that happens when war breaks out. Other jobs get forgotten, and the entire Realm suffers for it. It is a sad fact of life as a human,” Hans told Dale, clapping him on the arm with a happy smile. “Now, back to my story. I had opened the drawer with the memory stones and was taking my leave of the party when a flesh Mage showed up.”

At Dale’s incomprehension, Hans informed him, “A flesh Mage is a water Mage who specializes in changing, distorting, and all around altering of bodies. Usually human ‘flesh’, you see? They can find anyone, anywhere, if they have even a drop of their blood. They can also follow people from the imprints they leave on the world. Since I had opened the cabinet last, they somehow followed my trail back to the Thieves’ Guild.”

“They sound horrible.” Dale thought about what kind of a person you would need to be to willingly work on living people.

“They are actually rather popular. They are very good healers and can make people look however they want, given time. Women go to them to remove blemishes or supposed disfigurements or just to enhance their natural beauty. Men go to them for similar reasons. In my case, though, they were coming for revenge,” Hans explained, looking a bit despondent.

“When they found it was a den of thieves, they carelessly massacred everyone there, but finding all the memory stones intact, they stopped caring about me and left—the only reason I am alive today. Instead of blaming them for the deaths of my ‘friends’, I was impressed by their ability to do whatever they wanted. I joined the Guild as soon as they would take me, years later.”

“When did that all happen?” Dale queried.

“Oh, forty-ish years ago, maybe forty-five? Who remembers? Besides, we are here!” Hans exclaimed, pointing up.

Dale looked away from his friend and saw they were standing outside a garishly colored building with suggestive yet refined paintings on the walls. His face got red as he made the assumption as to what kind of establishment this was.

“Hans–” was all he got out before he was pushed inside by his grinning friend.

Several hours later, they emerged.

“Okay, Hans, you were right,” Dale groaned as he exhaustedly waved a hand at his friend. “I never knew this could be so… amazing.”

“I told you this was the place to be,” Hans purred.

Dale moaned, “I will never not come back here. It could never be better.”

“What if you were married. Would you tell your wife that?” Hans teased.

“Yes, she would have to accept it. Or I could bring her here, and she could try it for herself.” Dale sighed contentedly.

“I don’t know. She may like it too much, and that could get expensive.” Hans winked at him. Just then, a busty lady walked over to them.

“Hello, I hope everything was as pleasurable as possible for you today,” she softly addressed them in a husky voice.

“Madame, everything was as wonderful as it could have been,” Hans heaped praise on her. “There is no better place to have a meal than at the Pleasure House. I don’t know how your cooks do it, but it is worth every copper.”

“I will send your compliments to the chef.” She laughed with a smile. “It has been too long, dear Hans. Visit again soon. I’d love to get to know your friend better.” She looked at Dale, considering. “Actually, I have a granddaughter about your age, and if I know Hans, you would be a good match for her.”

Dale was blushing as hard as Hans was laughing. “Ha! You always know how to tickle my sense of humor! No, Madame, he is a cultivator and has no time for relationships. Maybe in thirty years.”

“Mm. A cultivator? So young! And already nearly into the D-rankings. Quite a catch indeed,” she murmured, glancing at him solicitously.

Dale was still too tongue-tied to babble anything, so Hans again took over, “Such a gracious host! Maybe the next time we visit we can meet this lass?”

“When might that be?” she challenged archly, expecting him to say something fancy and disappear for years again.

“Ah, when the wind blows us back to this fair city.” She humphed and started walking away when Hans surprised her. “Luckily, that may be soon, as a portal just opened to this young man’s home.”

“A new portal? So you are training at the new dungeon. Is it true that it is… unaffiliated? The Essence? Anyone can absorb it?” She seemed suddenly nearly desperate, which she tried and failed to hide.

“Yes!” Dale finally loosened his tongue and responded too loudly. He coughed. “Uh, yes, it is. So far.”

“Do you know any way that I could send my granddaughter there to train as a cultivator?” Madame demanded.

“Uhh.” Dale looked at Hans for help.

“Also, I could not send her there alone. I would need to establish a restaurant there myself. I am sure you all needed to work out land management there. Have you met the owner? I hear he is allowing businesses to set up for a beastly amount of money, but I would still go.”

“Where did you hear that from?” Dale thought he was being fair to people.

“Members of the Mages’ Guild eat here regularly. Some of them were the first through the portal, and they came here with their gossip,” she proudly announced. “I hear that the landowner is even making the church pay a tithe to him. Then he refused the services of the portal Guild until they gave in to his outrageous demands. Bet you didn’t know that, did you?” she finished a bit smugly.

“No. No, I didn’t,” Dale dejectedly replied.

“I’ve met him, and I think he was being more than reasonable, Madame. The Mages tried to browbeat him into submission, and the Church offered up a small percentage of its profits for prime realty,” Hans admonished her. “In the end, they both got fair deals based on what they could pay.”

“Oh! So you actually do know him then? Do you think he would welcome the idea of a Pleasure House in the area,” Madame inquired, not seeming to notice Dale’s introspective look, “or a team that would allow a young lady to train with them?”

“He’d go for the restaurant if you fed him and offered a fair deal,” Dale muttered hollowly. “I don’t know any teams but my own so…”

Hans cut in darkly, “Madame, you know that to get on a Guild team you need to be in the Guild. I wouldn’t trust another team with the proper care of a lady in a place where there are ways to make a body disappear, without worry, in a way no one will question.”

“You are right, of course. I’ll start with the dining house then. Who is in charge there right now? Jeffrey?” Madame seemed to understand that these two wanted to be left alone and so tried to hurry the conversation along.

“Frank,” Dale droned monotonously, all happy thoughts of food long past.

“Well, that’ll make this easy then.” She laughed. “He can’t resist me at all, and the landowner will assuredly want good food available for his tenants.”

“I’m sure he will,” Dale mumbled, earning an elbow to the ribs and a glare from Hans.

As Madame walked away, Hans turned curiously to the usually cheerful young man. “Dale, what is the matter with you?”

“Does everyone think so poorly of me?” Dale blatantly questioned him.

Hans eyed him, finally deciding not to lie. “Only those who don’t know the facts or you,” he admitted reluctantly.

Dale looked at the ceiling and exhaled noisily. “So… everyone.”

“Lad, most people don’t know you are the landowner but are still jealous that you make it into the dungeon every day when they get in maybe once a week. Others see your fine armor, not the man inside it, and covet that. People are always unhappy with those that have better fortune than them. You’ll be fine, just give it time. The portal being open will let everyone get around much easier. That should relieve tensions quite a bit. After all, people can show up on their scheduled day to train, not just sit around on their thumbs feeling sorry for themselves,” Hans lectured, trying to force Dale out of his funk.

“Now, pay this tab. All that advice isn’t free, after all.”

Dale nearly choked as he noticed the amount on the bill. “You’re outta your mind! Abyss no!”

Cal

“Okay, Cal, that was amazing. I didn’t think the inverse of the Rune would be that effective.” Dani was looking at the bubbling, hissing crater that was all that remained to show a group had been standing there recently.

I was still basking in the glorious flood of Essence that had filled me. <Hmm?> I thought at her languorously, sipping delicately at the Essence storming around me. Her words clicked after a second. <Well, you should have! Have I ever given you a reason to doubt my amazingness?> For some reason, there had been a short period of time where no one was entering my influence. It had coincided with what sounded like a thunderstorm overhead, though the sky was clear from what I could see. In that short window of opportunity, I was able to make some hasty changes, including a new trap.

“Well, I wouldn’t have thought of it. That was a really ingenious trap,” Dani praised me, playing to my ego.

<Thanks! It made sense to me. Most people will try to avoid boiling acid, you know?> I chuckled with her.

The trap was a bridge in the tunnel system that had to be crossed. On the bridge was a series of Runes across it that pushed the acid away and held the acid suspended to the sides of the bridge. If someone stepped directly on one specific pressure-sensitive pattern at the midpoint between the acid ‘walls’, the stone the runes were on would flip, and the corrupted core would then pass its energy to the inverted Rune. I was rather happy to have found a use for my water corruption cores.

When the inverted Rune was powered, the suspended acid sloshed across the entire structure, flooding it instantly. The Runes were nearly indestructible when filled with corruption, as far as I could tell, and so I was able to easily regrow the bridge around those Runes when it was destroyed, as I did now. Sadly, the fallen group of adventurers had only standard gear compared to what I had been seeing—nothing magical and nothing fancy. Just plain, boring metal and leather. Woe is me that those I slay cannot be more financially stable.

These ones had health potions, though, which was surprising given that most of the people who take serious injuries here die. Someone was making a fortune on people who would never get a chance to drink the potions. Hmm. Really, that is a good point… Was I getting too dangerous? Almost everyone who got hurt died nowadays… I felt that this was a good way to get overpowered people in here fast. I needed to start throwing the lower level guys a handout, or they would stop coming. How best to do this? I turned to my best source of ideas: Dani.

<Dani, should we give out some more freebies?> I was proud that I was using this word for the first time; it was fun to ‘say’. Freebies. Ha! <I feel like the weak groups are grumbling a lot.>

“What about the iron mining? That seems to calm them down a bit,” she querulously put forward. It was a literal sore spot; the chipping away of iron constantly gave me the equivalent of a headache.

<I’d rather not make more of those mining areas. How about potions? I can make them really easily. How about I make a cistern that has health potions flowing in them? Maybe that light potion I got too,> I offered a few concepts floating around in my mind.

She considered for a moment. “Not a bad idea, but then the apothecary up there will go out of business, leave, and there will be at least one less person you get a chance to eat. Oh, how about adding some gemstones to the iron every once in a while?”

I ventured a solution, <I can add those. I have so many different kinds from jewelry people wear in. Hmm. What if I made a few of these cisterns but poisoned them randomly? Then no one would feel safe using them without going to him first, he would get work, and I wouldn’t have his half-rate potions to throw away.>

“That sounds good.” She pondered thoughtfully. “Might even get a few people to willingly drink poison.”

<Ha. I like it. Let’s put the health one on the first floor right before the Boss room and the light one in a dead-end on the second floor. That may convince people that it is the way to get into the Boss room with all the light it’ll give off.>

“Diabolic! That is a spectacular idea!” She was so excited that she was merrily glowing, and neither of us saw the look of greed cross the face of the man stealthily watching from above. No one in the area had seen her before now.

<Hey! Someone is past the last trap down here! Ready for a fight?>

“You know it, Cal!” Dani joyously bubbled. She returned to invisibility, getting ready for the show. A five-man group hesitantly walked in, surprising me with their low levels. Only one was out of the F-ranking, and he was a low D-rank. For the first group to get here, outside of Dale’s, to be so low ranked astonished me. Well, free food and all that I supposed. Beggars and choosers and whatnot. I took direct control of Raile, wasting no time charging at them as quietly as possible.

“There it is!” a panicking voice shrieked.

“Why is it so big?” yelled another. “It didn’t look nearly this big from above!”

“Just get ready!”

Another yell from above alerted me that people had noticed a fight starting and were scrambling to make bets. Cheering filtering down gave the group determination as they dived to get out of the way of my charging Boss. One dived a second too late, and Raile’s armored paw, as large as a small bear’s, crushed the bones between himself and the floor, grinding the now shattered leg into the granite. The man’s scream resounded in the enclosed space, and the cheering abruptly cut off. They must have realized they were about to see someone die, a first for the Boss room. The show became a whole new event, as people prepared themselves to witness death firsthand.

The other group members sprang to their fallen friend’s aid, valiantly and pointlessly charging. I ignored the downed man; he had no ranged weapons that I could see. His screams would do more damage to the group than his death would. Making directly for the rest of the group, Raile sprang upward and came to the earth with a thunderous clap of stone striking flesh. One of the men had shoved the other out of the way, taking the entire weight of Raile’s body himself and dying silently. Raile nearly slipped as he regained his footing, blood and gore oozing from the underside of his armor as he turned to attack again.

The furious men now got as close as they could, beating on Raile with flanged maces and armor-shattering warhammers. They had certainly brought the correct tools for fighting Raile; even so, the damage they did was surprising, especially for such a small, weak group. I thought for a moment, realizing they were attacking in fury, their pulped friend driving them to become enraged. As Raile moved to jump again, a lucky swing from a warhammer hit the joint of his knee just before he pounced. The jump interrupted, Raile flopped down, knee cap broken. Still dangerous but far less limber, he squealed and ran at another man, clipping him with his charge.

Oof! was all I heard over the crash of armor and the wet tearing of skin as bone became visible from the inside of my victim’s chest. He spun mostly out of the way of the attack, falling to his knees as he wheezed for breath with broken ribs.

Another mace crashed down, taking out the mobility of Raile’s back legs this time. Raile pulled himself along as the teammates, those able to do so, cheered. Cockily, one walked around to the front of a very slow moving Raile and raised his mace to start trying to break through his armor. After a few hard hits, Raile flopped down, stunned, as the granite chipped and cracked. The attack broke off for a moment as the man caught his breath. He wiped his brow, smiling and laughing, obscuring his vision just long enough for a golden streak to reach Raile and boop him on the nose.

A scream too high pitched for the humans to hear went through Raile as his legs twisted, mending his bones. His head stopped ringing, his torn muscles healed, and he leaped at the man in front of him, bearing him to the ground. There was not much power to the attack, as he had not had time to build momentum, but that mattered little as the man’s body caved in under Raile. The man weakly tried to strike him, failing as the rush of Essence flowing to me signaled the man had been killed. Triumphant, I turned Raile’s head to look for more adversaries as the pointed end of a warhammer smashed down on to the cracked armor on Raile’s head, crushing through it and into his brain.

<Ah!> I shrieked silently. Luckily, the mind-speak that I used wasn’t audible, else I’d have given myself away. <I did not see that coming! It came out of nowhere! Whoa!>

Dani silently comforted me as the men rolled Raile away from their fallen comrade. Very respectfully, the ambulatory members laid him against the wall and moved to collect their other fallen comrade. They walked to where he had been obliterated, but I had finished absorbing him by then. They looked confused, then horrified as they turned to rush back to the man they had placed by the wall.

<Too late.> I silently burped.

The men were entirely destroyed as a group. The ones not openly weeping were staring stony-faced at the somber spectators above them. Their audience had a few intermixed who were swapping silver, and the adventurers below quickly grew furious.

“They made this fight look so easy! Not once were they seriously hurt!” one was raging. “I’m gonna make sure everyone knows this fight is ridiculous! No one will ever bother coming down here again!”

<Well, we can’t have that,> I thought. Time to distribute some loot. I figured since these guys were low ranked, it would be fair to give them a way bigger reward than Dale’s group earned. I bet that would stop the cries of anger!

A rain of items fell around Raile, catching the men off guard and making them startle badly. Heh. Gotta have fun somehow, right? I dropped a massive warhammer with an Inscription at each end, both powered by Essence they would have to provide at the hilt. The Rune near the hilt allowed the hammer to be near weightless, while the one at the top made the force of the swing be multiplied many times over. If they could use that in a fight correctly, it could shatter Raile’s armor like glass. In a sneaky move, I had also placed the ‘binding’ site directly under the activation; whoever used it would be the only one who could until that owner died at least.

I dropped one boot, which had a perfect liquid repulsion Rune. I bet that one would become very popular when people found out about the acid trap. The Rune was large enough to have an area of effect that surrounded the person wearing it; they could jump in a lake without getting damp. On a whim, I also gave them a sword with the sharpening augmentation. Inside of it, I placed a low-powered Beast Core that would be able to hold a charge from the activator, allowing them to use it freely in combat if they charged it beforehand.

That oughtta do it. They looked at the loot uncomprehendingly, so I dropped three extra large pieces of gold. That shook ‘em out of their reverie, and looks of joy replaced the bitter anger on their faces. They were still grieving but could sell these items for enough to live in comfort for the rest of their lives if they stopped being cultivators. The man who had killed Raile picked up the warhammer and, in a decidedly stupid act, activated the Rune. The oversized hammer suddenly light in his hands, he nearly stumbled.

He took a few swings, one-handed, to the amazement of all onlookers. Then grinning darkly, he swung as hard as he could at the corpse of Raile, which shattered into hundreds of shards. One of those shards flew into the head of his teammate on the ground with the broken leg, killing him near instantly.

<Oh, yeah!> That had worked out so well! The energy joined my spiral, pushing me over the edge into the third rank of the D series. I had not been paying attention to how close I was, so the sudden expansion of my power surprised me.

“Oh, no! No! NO!” The warhammer-wielding man cried as he dropped to his knees next to his impaled friend, openly weeping. The last remaining man gathered the loot, and slowly, the two ascended the stairs together, taking strength in their friendship and survival despite the horrible cost. They opened the door at the top to condolences and cheers. I turned in contemplation toward Dani.

<So. Where should we put the cisterns for those potions? Or should we make fountains instead?>

Dale

A lazy day in the capital was just what Dale had needed. A vacation from the dungeon, no matter how short, had greatly relaxed him. He and Hans had gone to a bathhouse and soaked in the steaming water for hours, relaxing their muscles as professional cleaners washed their armor and clothes. Then as twilight threatened, they returned to the portal area and paid an exorbitant ten silver for a return trip, a sobering reminder that they only got to leave their home for free.

“Ow. My wallet,” Hans whined as they made their way through the portal.

Dale dropped to the ground, dry heaving again but not as violently as the first time. “Ow. My body,” he whined, making Hans laugh as Dale made fun of him.

“You forgot to close your eyes again, I see.” Hans pulled Dale to his feet and looked up at the camp swarming with unfamiliar faces and sounds. One area seemed far more energetic than the rest, so they moved to take a look at what was going on. Hans got closer, then they saw a duo of men being escorted to the portal by none other than Guild Master Frank. One of the men, maybe in his mid-twenties, was holding a gigantic warhammer; both were being followed by two men carrying small but heavy chests.

“What’s going on do you think?” Dale murmured to Hans.

Hans shrugged, and they followed the men to the portal, where they vanished after a brief talk with the portal attendant. He waved down Frank as he walked back and wondered aloud about what was going on.

“Oh. You haven’t heard then?” Frank raised his eyebrow in surprise. “You must have just gotten back.”

“Heard what? We took the evening off and went to the Pleasure House for dinner,” Hans prodded him.

Frank looked shocked. “Without me? Fine, see if you get a bonus this year. What you just saw was the first group to complete the dungeon, besides yours of course.”

Dale was perplexed. “Just the two of them?”

“Well. Those were the survivors. They were non-Guild and ignored the recommendation that it was a D-ranked minimum,” Frank told him a bit sadly.

Hans winced. “Five-man team to start?” Frank nodded, and Hans shook his head empathetically.

“Why are they leaving? Did they just give up after their friends died?” Dale inferred.

“Well, one of them did. The hammer man is coming back if he can find anyone to team up with anyway. Activated that warhammer when it was dropped by the Boss and took a swing in petty revenge. That rock covered rabbit shattered, and a shard killed one of his wounded teammates. Most people don’t see it as an accident but as an idiot with a stupidly powerful weapon.” Frank shook his head at the foolishness.

“Oh wow,” Dale commiserated with the poor man.

Hans mind went on a different route. “Is he thinking of selling that hammer off?” Greed was lighting his eyes.

Frank grimaced at the typical behavior. “No, it bound to him when he activated it. The Spotters say the binding and the activation are in the same spot. That hammer is his till he dies. They did get two other inscribed items and some loose gold, which will make you very happy, Dale.”

“Why? What?” Dale looked at him confusedly. “Three people died. I’m not happy! I’m not a bad guy. Why does everyone seem to think I am an asshole?”

“Um. I’m thinking there is something going on that I don’t know about…” Frank seemed a bit confused himself. “Not what I was talking about, though. Remember how you make a portion of everything that is made? Even the three percent you made off just those two items paid off more than half the debt for your armor. Combine that with the open portal and your personal dungeon dives, I’m betting you will be paid off in a month, less if more people complete the dungeon,” Frank stated cheerfully.

What! They must have been worth thousands of gold then!” Dale was flabbergasted.

“They certainly were! One of them was a boot that repelled all liquids, and with the new acid traps, it sold at auction for nearly fifteen hundred gold,” Frank cheerfully told him.

“Was it…? Was it Josh’s boot that Raile, the Boss Mob, took off?” Hans’s eyes bulged as he tried to hold back a deep laugh.

“Hah! It was! The size is different, though!” Frank crowed, slapping his knee as he laughed. “He’s gonna be so pissed!”

Dale wanted to know what the other item was, so Frank told him about the unique sword that had been found, while Hans’s jaw dropped lower and lower.

“It holds a charge?!” Hans finally exploded. “Why would you not wait for me to get back here before you sold it?!”

“You know how these things go—sell it for the best price or put it up for extended auction. They heard a good price and chose to sell.” Frank’s grin told Dale he was happy to have had less competition.

“You bought it! I knew it!” Hans was furious. “You have to give me a chance to buy it!”

“Nah,” Frank allowed, very blasé about the situation. He spun on his heel and ran.

“Whaddaya mean, ‘nah’?” Hans roared, running off after him.

Dale looked at the portal, thinking of the loss that group must be feeling. He hoped the gold they had earned would help them through. Now, it was time to get some rest; he had a long day of monster hunting tomorrow. Maybe he could get some new items?

Dale

Dale’s group was just walking into the dungeon. The first thing they did each day was clear the first room completely to make sure there was no issue for the miners who came in to collect iron each day. Dale was still in constant wonder that no matter how much iron they tore out each day, the walls were unblemished in the morning, promising a good, easy mining operation.

“How was the city?” Steve casually questioned, kicking a Shroomish as it tried to chomp his foot. It disintegrated in a puff of spores from the casual blow.

“It was amazing! Did you know they have Mages building a sewer system there? I wonder if we could do something like that here,” Dale wonderingly put forward. The others stopped and looked at him strangely. He wasn’t sure why Hans was laughing at him so hard he couldn’t breathe. “Are they not building it? Hans, what the abyss?”

“All the wonders of the capital and you are most excited about the… sewers. Nothing else caught your attention?” Steve interrogated him levelly. “You need to go places without Hans. His politics will ruin your day.”

“We had fun! We did other things too! He brought me to a pleasure house,” Dale chattered indignantly.

“He did what?!” Craig gasped, turning and glaring at the man.

“Not like that–” Hans tried to explain, glares directed at him.

Dale continued talking over them, “I met a Madame. She gave us a discount because we went to her together, and she thinks her granddaughter would like to come train here.”

“Hans, you disgusting pervert,” Josh coldly stated. “How could you do that to the lad? You went together? At the same time? With a grandmother?”

“Well, how else do you do it? Who wants to do that alone?” Dale sounded a bit exasperated at the questions.

Hans was literally on the floor crying with laughter as he tried to hold up his hands in surrender. “N-n-n-no, guys! Guys! Hahaha! W-we went to the Pleasure House! The one Madame owns! He, he doesn’t know what this sounds like! The restaurant!” He could say nothing else as he gasped for air around his laughter.

The others started chuckling, then laughing almost as hard as Hans. The look of confusion on Dale’s face made them laugh even harder.

“What? What’s going on?!” Dale demanded. “I’ve never been off these mountains, come on! What’s the joke?!”

They regained their feet and started walking, ignoring his angry questions and laughing as they went further in, some patting their naive companion on the back and shoulders as they walked. Working quickly, they cleared several rooms, constantly making their way toward the Boss room. A splashing sound garnered their interest, but before they were able to discern the location of the bubbling liquid, the new Boss Squad was attacking them.

Chapter Twenty-two

<I made some improvements to that Boss room,> I informed Dani.

“Oh yeah? Added some traps or something?” Dani managed to tear her gaze away from the impending battle.

<Uh. That would have been better, wouldn’t it? No, but watch this!> The Boss Squad was in full attack mode, but the Impaler ran straight at the wall—which opened enough to allow him into a small tunnel that ran along the room. It had loops in it that would grant a full speed sprint into the main room, hopefully taking people by surprise from an unexpected direction.

One of the two small, rock-covered Smashers went directly for Josh, who braced himself with a grin and held out his shiny, new tower shield. At the last moment, he thrust it forward! Clang, sn-nap. The Smasher’s neck broke with an organic tearing sound, his spine protruding from just below the base of his skull.

“Yes! It’s so much better than my last one!” Josh roared in celebration.

<What does that one do again?> I worriedly queried Dani.

She answered pensively, “It returns part of the momentum of the attack back on the attacker, doesn’t it? That heavy charge had a lot of power in it, I think.”

The infernally enhanced Impaler chose that moment to erupt from a tunnel opening behind Steve just then, landing a successful sneak attack. His sharpened horn burst through the thick leather armor just below Steve’s kidney, the angle of the horn opening his spleen as it punched through his front. A pained gasp is all the sound the man could muster as he fell to his knees.

The Impaler lived up to his name well. Setting its paws on Steve’s back, it pushed backward, adding more damage to the ravaged body it was standing on. Not yet out of the fight, Steve whipped around and crushed the skull of the offending Impaler with his bare hands. He then pulled the last bit of horn from his body with a soft grunt before casually sitting down. Dale shot forward and caught an Oppressor with a swing, snapping its spine. Craig moved in a blur of motion, killing the two remaining Mobs as Hans ran to help Steve.

“You’re gonna be alright. Don’t you worry ‘bout a thing.” Hans held his hands against the gushing wound. “We’re ten minutes from the most powerful healer you’ll ever need.” He scooped Steve up easily, keeping pressure on the wound with his arm as he lifted from the ground.

“Well, I didn’t open all those meridians so I could dance,” Steve sputtered blood mid-sentence. “I’ll be fine! I’ve had worse when I was caught with that noble girl, remember?” He gurgled a bloody chuckle.

“Well, that’s for the best because I have to tell ya, you got two left feet,” Hans quipped, starting for the exit. “Plus, you are too good for a backwater noble family anyway.”

Dale caught their attention, “Wait! Look! This is pouring out a health potion!”

I focused on Dani for a second. <Did we poison that one?>

“No,” she crushed my hopes, “we wanted to get people used to the idea of a healing fountain in here.”

<Dang it! Of all the frikkin people who could have needed it first…>

Dale pulled out a flask and dunked it into the churning cistern, which had a fountain flowing into it. I had decided on that design. I wanted both function and form. I’m a sucker for pampering myself. Dale moved over to his friend who was bleeding out, helping him drink as much as he could.

Craig then instructed Dale to pour the potion directly on to the wound. Then they watched anxiously as it swiftly closed. The hanging scraps of meat pulled together into working tissue, the blood vessels flowed back together, and the ruined nerves returned to a working system.

The potion was high quality, as was everything I gave out. The potion did more than the eye could see, stimulating bone marrow to produce blood cells and fluids, mimicking proteins for growth, but still, a scar would remain. The healing process took a lot of energy, usually provided by the person doing the healing. Since a potion didn’t bring in much extra energy, I was certain Steve would be very hungry soon. He would have to eat to replenish his system. Hopefully, he would starve soon enough that he would become distracted—and I could eat him.

Crisis averted, they sat to cultivate as Dani informed me that the first of the gems had been found, so I took a look. Yup, people were going nuts over the small chunks of emeralds they found. I would keep it interesting; there were also ruby, rapis, and—really rarely—diamonds! Each of these was in a little hollow between layers of iron and stone that people would naturally come upon while mining if they worked hard enough. In these hollows, there was also….

“Augh! It’s a– gack,” The mining man’s voice cut off as an uncovered Bane fired a poisonous thorn into his shouting mouth, the lucky shot going through the roof of his mouth into his brain.

<Yes!> I just got my first pickaxe! I had really been wanting one of these! <Dani, the ‘trap Mobs’ in the wall actually worked!> A rush of Essence made its way to me, filling me with a sense of well-being. <Ahh, that’s the stuff.> A thought occurred to me then—maybe I hadn’t had it before because I was a lower ranking, but at D-rank three… Perhaps I was more empathetic?

<Dani?> I felt oddly detached. <When a person dies in here… do I eat their soul?> The thought of even passive Necromancy like that was disturbing to me.

“What? No!” Dani was shocked, making me feel instant gratitude that she understood my concern. “Souls are terrifyingly powerful, especially when freshly dead. When a being dies, they release a burst of energy which separates their bodies and souls. That is the rush of Essence you get access to.”

<Oh, thank goodness. Sorry, I never thought of it before. Wait, I was a human, wasn’t I? How was I captured then?> I realized she may just be trying to calm me.

“Honestly, I have no idea. It must have been a specially prepared stone made by someone so powerful I cannot even comprehend it. It would need to be an S-ranked Necromancer, at least. I have never heard of a Necromancer becoming that powerful though,” Dani mused. “They are always killed. Well…”

<Well what?> I growled. I needed to know anything she did.

“Well, Necromantic cultivation isn’t actually… illegal. It just has a really bad reputation. The main way they get more powerful is by absorbing the burst of Necromantic energy that results from something dying, similar to what you do…” She trailed off.

<And this is important because…?>

“Ahem, well, Necromancers get killed because they obtain more energy when strong emotions are passing through the person at the time of death. So, most quickly delve into torture and murder and other illegal things,” she whispered. “If they didn’t get caught doing that, though, they wouldn’t even be in trouble… Though demon summoning, a branch of Necromancy, is illegal everywhere,” she finished in a rush as if that tidbit would appease me.

I sighed, a neat trick without lungs. <Okay, so maybe I am too hasty in my judgment. Maybe I just hate murderous, evil Necromancers?>

“That’s the spirit!” she enthused. “Ah… hah.”

<Bad. Shame on you for that terrible pun,> I admonished her, though I was smiling on the inside. <Then what is the deal with Necromancy? What do those cultivators do besides kill people?>

“The most common thing is to raise the dead. That isn’t, well, the act itself isn’t illegal, but some places will really dislike it for obvious reasons.”

<Walking dead guys? Yeah, I can see that,> I quipped.

“Pretty much. People really don’t like desecration of their loved ones. Now, while the reanimated creature has to do what the summoner wants, the summoned creature is always, always insane.” She shuddered and cuddled up to me.

<Why is that?> I was really curious now.

“The only souls that are able to be summoned are those that have run from the Creator’s judgment. They fear the void, the nothingness that awaits them, or the abyss, which is terrible for other reasons. They wander the earth and can never stop moving. They can never sleep, never taste, never feel. By the time they feel a summoning, they are jealous of the living and will do anything to kill them, to absorb the energy of their death.” She sounded close to weeping.

<That sounds like a horrible existence. Is that what makes them so dangerous?> I was morbidly curious.

“No, the average undead isn’t that smart. They will take the most direct route for anything. They have no forethought anymore. They aren’t used to having a corporeal form. The really dangerous ones are actually the demons,” she fearfully let me know. “They are confused for undead because they need to inhabit a corpse in order to have a corporeal form, but they are actually incredibly intelligent and horrifically cunning. There is a rumor that they hate the one who summons them and, if given a chance, would kill their master. Wrong. They cheerfully obey their summoner, doing everything they can to keep them alive and happy. You see, if their master dies, the demons are yanked back into the abyss.”

“If a Necromancer were a good person, they would be nearly the best at almost any profession. Working with dead things is the domain of those with the infernal affinity. Since humans and other sentient things are made of all the different essences, as they get stronger they discover that they can use their lesser affinities to augment themselves,” she told me in a puzzling manner.

Seeing my confusion, she continued, “Take Dale, for instance.” She made me look at the cultivating group. “He has a major earth affinity. In the C-rankings, he may find that he has a minor affinity with fire Essence as well, making him a magma cultivator. Fire and water? Steam cultivator. Each distinct affinity he is able to use and cultivate from will give him better options and make him more likely to ascend into the B-rankings.”

<So humans can use all of the affinities? Why does he only cultivate from earth then?> I had been wondering why most of them only pulled from one source at a time.

“The best affinity they have will allow them to get the purest Essence as fast as possible. The older ones who know the truth—that they could pull from all sources if they found a way to unblock themselves—hide this fact because it can lead to really corrupted Essence in a hurry,” she informed me with a small smile.

<Well, that makes sense, I suppose. Back up a bit, though. Why would a Necromancer be good at most professions?> I had realized she had glossed over that.

“Oh, well, think of it like this. A blacksmith who imbues Essence into his work to make it better is a magma cultivator, usually the case anyway. If he had infernal and earth as his affinities, he or she would not even need a flame to shape the dead earth into the form they wanted. Also, they would instinctively know the best way to make a weapon to produce the deadliest version that it could become.” I got a chill as I thought of the implications and possible uses.

<Does that hold true for all of the combinations?> I wondered aloud.

“Not always. It will rely on personal skill, but typically, Necromantic cultivators can reverse the knowledge of how to destroy things into a foundation to making things better. If they are smart, they could be some of the best in the world, but killing is so much easier than the slow route they would need to take. They can’t cultivate like other humans, with meditation and pulling from elements, but neither can celestial Mages, so their growth is very slow usually.” She ended her tale as Dale’s group began to move again.

This was my chance to get them, so I decided to take time to ponder Dani’s words as the day continued. Dale now led the way, calling out stress points and possible traps with far more accuracy than he had started with a few weeks ago. With a start, I realized that those stress points were like irritants to me. When the group was further along the tunnel, I would smooth those points, which felt really good, like a muscle relaxant must to a human. I should listen to their conversations more often, I chided myself.

I tried so hard to trick them into dying, but they avoided all of my ambushes so skillfully I felt they were playing with me. I had a bit of luck when they were crossing the bridge; some acid got on to the cloth surrounding Craig’s hand. He lost a little skin but had the cloth off himself very quickly. It splashed into the acid pool with a hiss, and the information it contained came to me. I realized that it was very interesting stuff, but I would need to work through it slowly. I had never seen such a small item so intricately Inscribed with Runes.

They kept coming, falling for the light fountain room, going well out of their way. They walked in and looked confused until Steve recognized what the shimmering liquid was, convincing everyone to use any open flask to contain some of the potion. Having filled most of their flasks earlier with the healing potion, only a few were available for this shining fluid. Somehow, the light in the room must have distracted them from the Runescript on the ground around the shining cistern. To their dismay, as they walked away all of their shoes, boots, and foot wraps degenerated into piles of scraps. Heh. Barefoot adventurers.

They corrected their mistaken route, making it into the Boss room. I was looking for the best route of attack when I heard the big one, Josh, mention something rather concerning.

“Did you hear about the new quest? Apparently, there is a Mob in here we haven’t seen before, a gold colored one that healed the Boss yesterday. Huge reward for the first one caught, double if it is alive. Also something about a Wisp, but I haven’t seen anything like that here.”

“Oh? Well, let’s find it. Daddy needs a new pair of shoes.” Hans earned himself some booing from the group of barefoot individuals.

They were in for a surprise today! The crowd above was cheering again, placing bets and preparing for the battle. Well, let’s see if I can’t make them lose some money. I had made a tunnel around the room that opened up several feet above head level, and only the thundering of stone and the cries of surprise from above made the small group look up as Raile dropped toward them from on high.

They scattered in time—blast it—but were now isolated and off balance. Raile nudged Hans as he charged Josh, sending the first spinning and catching a barely prepared Josh’s shield. The Rune worked overtime, small chunks of Raile’s armor crumbled into powder and cracked. My curiosity was satisfied as Josh still went flying. During the distraction provided by the flying man, Raile charged the weak link, Dale.

“Come on, you overgrown rabbit! I’ve been practicing!” Dale turned and ran.

<What the…? He’s running!>

Dani softly chuckled into my head. “Maybe he’s been practicing his cardio?”

<Huh?>

“His running ability.” She uttered something condescending under her breath about my lack of vocabulary.

<No matter. Raile has him now.> I watched proudly as Dale reached the wall just before Raile did. Raile pounced at him from a charge, ready to do maximum damage as Dale dropped to his back and slid into the wall, pushing off at an odd angle to maintain momentum. Raile smashed into the wall full speed, stunning himself and dropping to the ground where Dale no longer was; pushing off the wall had moved him just enough.

<You know, this kid is really starting to frustrate me.> I grunted as the group’s blunt weapons broke through the armor over Raile’s head and killed him.

“I think you are starting to like him. You’ve always liked a challenge.” Dani laughed at my long-suffering moan.

<Well, I won’t fall for that again. I’m going to give them weird loot, too. I’ve been working on these.> I dropped a pair of boots for each of them. They cheered until they saw they were all left-footed. Heh. I dropped a pickaxe and a right-footed, armored boot with the same force enhancing Rune as the warhammer I had dropped yesterday and a dagger with the inverted form of the Rune that had been on the Demonologist dagger Dale had killed Raile with. I had studied it; turned out that the original dagger would pull the Essence out of its victims until it had enough to summon a powerful demon under the wielder’s control.

The effect of the dagger they had now… I was unsure of. Maybe it would summon an angel? I’m sure I would find out eventually. After a brief discussion, they agreed to sell the pickaxe and share the profits, though they cast lots for the inscribed boot. I’m fairly certain Hans cheated, while Dale fairly won the dagger but decided to get it checked by a Spotter before he decided to use it or sell it. Hans had no such compunctions, putting on his ill-gained boot and strutting around in mismatched footwear. With a look of glee on his face, he jumped and stomped down, activating the Rune.

WHAM. A shockwave knocked Hans to the shattered floor, laughing all the while.

“Woo! Look at that! Left a footprint an inch deep in solid granite! I have so many plans for this!” Hans whooped as he prepared to stomp again.

“Maybe you do that in an open area next time?” Steve called sourly, holding ringing ears and wiping rock dust off himself. The others nodded their assent.

“What?” Hans replied, pawing at his ears.

“Exactly,” Steve loudly stated. “Let’s go. I still want to see a healer for my back. And my ears now. Then lunch, I’m starving.”

They climbed the staircase, allowing not very bright people to again push past them at the top. The newcomers had decided to ignore the warnings, it seemed. Yum. There was no other group close to the second floor Boss room, though the first Boss room had been cleared while I wasn’t focused. I fixed my floor; really, smashing up my floor wasn’t the way to entice me to give good items again.

<Oh, by the way, Dani, I am quickly going to look at the hand wrapping that fell off of Craig. It was stuffed full of Inscriptions and was really full of Essence. Let me know if anyone comes in,> I nearly whispered, my mind going over the patterns and layouts that had originally seemed to be a simple hand wrapping.

“What? Oh, fine. I’ll let you know if anyone makes it in here,” Dani grumbled. “Now I’m a watchdog.”

Meanwhile, I was astounded. These were definitely Runes, but they were so strong! Only one of them I felt confident I could use without destroying something, and none of these were Runes I would give out for defeating the relatively weak Mobs in my dungeon. This was coming from me, the one who happily gave out an enchantment on a hammer that could be used to blast open a mountain pass.

I focused in on the one Rune I would feel safe using; it looked exactly like a smaller version of the fractal of energy surrounding my Chi spiral. I compared the two in my mind. The Inscription had a slightly different curve in a few places that was odd to me, as it forced the pattern to be non-symmetrical. Was this a Rune for absorbing Essence?

I had to find out. In a dead end room on my second floor as far away from my Core as possible was where I experimented with unknown Runes. I lovingly thought of it as the ‘horrible failure with a few successes room’. Long name, amazing results. Over time, if I had been unable to repair the stone in there, there would only be a smoking, simmering room full of molten rock and odd noises. It seemed that poorly made Runes tended to explode. Who knew, right? That was one of the… nicer effects.

The Runes that I used corruption with that also turned out to be badly made Runes had more… interesting effects. An air Rune I had drawn on a rock allowed it to scream, which it did constantly. Luckily, a Rune exploding underneath it had interrupted the flow of energy to the screaming rock, making it go silent again. Of course, now I wondered if rocks were alive. Dani told me I was being ridiculous, but… Screaming rocks didn’t seem to worry her much. As a rock-like being, I felt for the poor little guy.

A multi-Essence Rune that I tried to make had convinced me not to try combining corruption again until I knew what I was doing. It had created a rift, which used all of the Essence so fast that I was angry at first. The rift snapped shut after only the blink of an eye, but the rotten, clawed hand that had made it through in that timespan was a testament to the continuation of working freaking carefully. Definitely had opened a rift into the abyss there. I really didn’t want to be responsible for allowing unbound demons on to our plane of existence. It did teach me to give the Runes very little power when I first activated them, at least until I was sure of their capabilities.

I digress—I wanted to see if this new Rune was used to accumulate Essence. I very carefully recreated the Rune to the molecular level, double and triple checking it to ensure that it was exactly the same as the one I had taken from Craig. I prepared myself to activate it but was interrupted when Dani informed me that people had entered the Boss room.

<Now? Dang, I was just about to activate that new Rune. How long was I working on that?> I dazedly looked at Dani.

“You were focused for about three hours; this is the sixth group that has come down to the second level. All the other ones got injured or turned around for some other reason,” reported General Dani.

<Yes, ma’am!> I tried to match an accent I had heard. <Preparations are complete, ready for battle!>

“Why did I have to be bonded with a weirdo?” Dani muttered.

<I’m hurt!>

“Quiet down. Here they come.”

<They can’t hear me if I don’t want them to,> I bragged. <Not my fault you have to make sounds to be heard.>

A head poked around the corner of the tunnel. “Hey! We made it!”

“Told you we would! Quiet down now, I want to have surprise on our side,” a deep voice admonished.

Fat chance of that happening.

“You have the net? Remember not to kill the Boss too fast.” Oh boy, this group was cocky. I would soon show them the error of their ways.

“It’s always wandering around, so group up and make sure to stay light on your feet. We know that one group in the morning plays up how hard it is to kill that beast. If that F-ranked group made it, we should have no trouble. Watch out for the giant bunny, boys. It might still actually be able to do some real damage,” Mr. Deep Voice sneeringly preached. “Get ready… Go, go, go!”

The five-person group ran in, weapons ready but stopped and looked around confusedly when there was no apparent enemy to fight. Oh. They must have been in the dungeon when I revealed the overhead ambush it could use now. Screams were coming down from the gathered crowd, but they ignored them, thinking it was the cheering that usually happened. I took the opportunity to look at them all carefully. They were all in the low D-ranks, the highest being Mr. Deep Voice at D-rank two, several ranks higher than my F-rank nine Raile.

The sounds above rising to a crescendo suddenly, the deep-voiced man looked up and, with a startled yell, dove to the side in time to miss dying but not fast enough to get away from the wave of blood that washed over him and the remaining members. Most of them took some damage, even if it was just from human teeth pinging off exposed flesh.

“Where did it come from?”

“Bobby! No!”

Their party in disarray. I expected a quick finish to the fight, but the leader rallied them; they fell into position with the speed of much practice. Shock turning to anger, they charged Raile as a unit, a first for me I was pretty sure. I tried to leap at them, but two shield bearers bashed Raile simultaneously, hard enough to make his movement falter as the remaining two attacked the weak points in his armor, the joints on his legs. A few repeated blows were enough to force the joint into facing the wrong direction. Raile keened as both legs on his right side were broken.

“Move back!” came the order, followed by the group smoothly retreating from the prone body in front of them. I was shocked. I knew that teamwork was effective, which is why I had made the squads, but this was at a level I had not been expecting. Even Dale’s group had more trouble than this. Now I could see that it was because they were forcing Dale to fight and get experience, else they could have likely walked through here without issue.

“Get ready. It happens when he is hurt like this.”

I was confused for a second until I saw a Glitterflit sprinting toward the downed Raile.

<Oh no!> I gasped, though only Dani heard.

The speed of the Glitterflit allowed him to avoid the hastily swung weapons, but it had to slow down to heal Raile. The healing energy dissipated into Raile as a net collapsed around the squirming, golden bunny.

“Got it!” a voice laughed. “Piece of cake!” He poked the gold rabbit with a sword he was holding, which, as it turned out, was a very serious mistake.

The now-healed Raile had just gotten to his feet when the soft cry of pain from the Glitterflit drew his attention. Raile’s pupils dilated as his long-dormant ability awoke for the first time. The armor fell off of his body everywhere but his head, which shoved obsidian-sharp fragments of granite upward to create a deadly crown. The ability ‘Avenger’ flashed in my mind as I analyzed this unexpected change. I was finally going to see it in action!

The previously ponderous yet deadly Raile moved faster than I had thought was possible. His armored head impacted the chest of the man holding the net with the force of a battering ram constructed by giants. The spikes tore the poor man’s armor apart like it did not exist, leaving a gaping hole in his abdomen. The force of the charge carried the man under Raile’s power into the wall, where he slowly slid down to the floor, quickly decomposing into goo, under my influence now.

The Glitterflit was still caught in the net, but it had been dropped on the ground. The D-rank two man barreled toward Raile, his sword easily piercing Raile’s unarmored flesh with a soft sound, like a tomato being chopped. Raile fell quickly, still savaging what little remained of the dead man until he too succumbed to death’s embrace. The completely shaken men gathered the net, Glitterflit, and the loot that I dropped, including a ring with a weak inverted Rune of liquid repulsion, then made their way to the surface.

Chapter Twenty-three

Dale was excited as they waited outside the Spotters den. He would have called it their tent, but he had gotten a look inside at the filthy, cluttered area and could only consider it an animal’s living space.

“What do you think it does?” he asked excitedly, shifting from one foot to the other. “Maybe it lets you stab things as far away as an arrow can fly!”

“Ehh…” Hans replied, stepping harder than he needed to make the earth bounce around them. “Looked a lot like that demonologist dagger we lost in there.”

“That Rune looked completely different!” Dale proclaimed. “I get to keep this one.”

Hans scratched under his armpit, sniffing at the result before answering, “Nah, looked like the same Rune, just backward. Prolly the inversed Rune.”

“Correct! You know your Runescript! Are you looking to become a Spotter when you grow up?” a cheerful voice assailed them. The Spotter had poked his head out and was offering the dagger back to Dale.

“Abyss no,” Hans blithely stated.

Exasperation on his face, the Spotter wisely started to ignore Hans, “Well, this is a surprise for us, just so you know.” His face brightened as he talked to Dale. “Normally, we charge a few gold per service, but the fee is waived as we had never seen this Inscription before! So, since we get two Runes out of it for our books, we will also give you one more on credit!”

“Thanks! What does it do?” Dale happily wondered.

“Well,” the Spotter started excitedly, making Hans groan, “the original Rune was used to summon demons with the energy it would gain by killing people or creatures, which it would store in an attached Beast core until released. This one will allow you to banish infernal creatures by stabbing them!”

“Oh, that’s… good?” Dale uncertainly stammered.

“It’s wonderful!” the Spotter erupted. “Necromancers and their darker subset of demon summoners hoard their knowledge! We almost never get a chance to study them. Every piece of the puzzle gets us closer to stopping them if another war breaks out!”

“Oh. I guess I just haven’t really seen any undead, in, um… ever, I guess,” Dale confessed as Hans started giggling softly at the Spotters bulging eyes.

“Just think! Instead of blasting them with enough Mana to rip a hole back into their dimension to banish them, you can just poke a demon with this and its own energy will be used to send it away! With the added benefit of weakening it! This new Rune may be the key to every future war!”

“Hmm,” Hans jumped in, “seems like that Rune should be worth more to you than just ‘one on credit’ to me.”

“Standard terms and conditions apply. Thank you for choosing the Mages’ Guild.” The Spotter disappeared back into his tent.

“Hey!” Hans shouted in shock.

Dale laughed. “It’s fine, Hans. I’d rather this Rune be out there if someone else needs it. It won’t do us much good, though. Shall we go see what we can sell it for?”

“I suppose that is the best we can do.” Hans glared darkly at the silent tent. He accompanied Dale to the Guild tent to list the item for auction. They were talking to the clerk when Father Richard and Guild Master Frank walked in, heatedly discussing the church’s lot.

“I don’t care that people are using it for an arena! I am building the church there, and that is final! They want to see fighting, they can listen to a sermon at the same time!” Richard was saying hotly.

“At least charge admission! You could triple your earnings in a single move!” Frank was obviously exasperated.

“Not everything is about profit! There are things worth more than money! I would never put a rule in place that might make people not have access to a place of worship!” Father Richard was aghast at the notion.

“Well, but, if you build a church around it, no one will be able to see into the Boss room! The light will be blocked!” Frank decided triumphantly.

“I’ll make the ceiling clear! If I can do it to three feet of solid stone and dirt, I think glass might be manageable!” Father Richard boomed with finality. He turned and noticed Dale. “Oh! Well, hello, how is your training going, young Master Dale?”

“Ah, hello, Dale, Hans.” Frank coughed. “Aherm, what are you two doing here?”

“Doing well, Father! We found a uniquely Runed item in the dungeon. We are here to start an auction for it,” Dale answered them each in turn.

“Really? More inscribed items so soon! This place is a treasure trove!” Frank happily cheered, earning an ‘I-knew-it’ look from Father Richard. “What does it do?”

“We just came from the Spotters. Turns out we found an item they had never seen before.” Hans was trying to drive up the price to the bored Guild clerk. “It has a Demonologists Rune in it.”

“What? Really?” Father Richard was now fully interested, startling Hans into silence. “Those are jealously guarded. What does it do?”

“Oh, right, your order is comprised of demon hunters.” Dale realized why the interest had suddenly grown. “It is an inverted demon summoning Rune. They promised that if a demon were stabbed with it even a little, the Rune would turn their own power against them and banish them back to the abyss.”

With a groan and sagging shoulders, Father Richard turned distrustful eyes on Frank. “That isn’t funny, Dale. Alright. Who set this up? That kind of Rune doesn’t exist. We would have found it before now. That kind of thing doesn’t just… fall into your lap.”

“It almost went into my throat a while back. The same day you made that huge celestial glass area, someone tried to rob me; when they failed, they dropped a dagger accidentally. We lost it in the dungeon, but the inverted version showed up today,” Dale explained quickly. Frank nodded in agreement when Father Richard looked his way for confirmation.

“Dale,” Father Richard slowly announced, “if this is true, I need to have that dagger. Are you splitting the profits of that?”

“No, but we are on a different item. I won this one,” Dale cautiously stated. He hadn’t liked the way Father Richard had said ‘need’.

“What is the asking price on it right now?” Father Richard probed with shining eyes.

“A little over three thousand gold, though likely worth more with that information,” the clerk loudly interrupted, also eying the dagger. She worked based on commission.

Father Richard looked crestfallen for a moment before looking up, his face setting in resolution. “Dale, I don’t have that kind of money. Everything I have is going toward building the church. Earth Mages aren’t cheap right now. I can offer you two hundred gold and another… offer.”

Three thousand gold was exceedingly tempting, but Father Richard’s mysterious manner was also intriguing. Dale decided to hear him out. “What might that offer be, Father?”

“If you give me the dagger, I’ll pull you into the D-ranks tomorrow,” Father Richard pledged grimly.

“What? No!” Frank shouted. “Absolutely not!”

Hans audibly gasped. “Do it. Screw money. Do it, Dale. Damn it, do it.”

“He hasn’t even mastered all of his meridians! He can’t use his own affinity yet!” Frank continued shouting, face becoming red.

“It will be just as easy to teach him those things at the next ranks and will take twenty years off of his breakthrough.” Father Richard’s eyes never left Dale.

Dale was just confused. “What do you mean you’ll pull me into the D-ranks? Isn’t that impossible? I can’t cultivate that fast, no one can!”

“It isn’t discussed, but it is possible. It doesn’t happen often because of what can… go wrong,” Father Richard hedged. “I can do it, but it requires you to trust me absolutely and me to trust you in turn. I won’t lie, there are risks, but this is all I can offer.”

Dale stopped for a moment, thinking carefully. He enjoyed his life right now, but several months of constant training had only given him a moderate boost to his ranking. He had put on muscle but nowhere near what most other adventurers accumulated over the years of hard living and fighting. He didn’t want to spend twenty years getting to the next stage in his life. This was the very first time a shortcut had been revealed to him.

What was gold to someone who might be able to live for hundreds of years? “Also pay seventy-five silver on all future amulets you buy from me, and it is a deal,” Dale agreed to Frank’s chagrin and Hans’s and Father Richard’s enthusiasm.

“Can I come?” Hans begged. “I’ve never seen this before, but I hear it is horrif– I mean amazing to see!” he quickly finished with only a quick flash of guilt.

“He can bring anyone he wants to. Those he trusts only, I would suggest.” Father Richard turned to Dale. “May I have the dagger for safekeeping? I swear on my Mana I will honor our agreement.”

“Of course, here.” Dale offered up the dagger.

Father Richard took it with a nod. “Thank you, I would recommend you take the rest of the night off as well as all day tomorrow. This process can be… taxing.” He turned to Frank. “Please authorize a payment to him from my account.”

Frank shook his head. “Fine. I will also be there, just so you know. You better not let anything happen to him.”

As they parted ways, Hans devolved into excited laughter and slapped Dale on the back. “Good on you, lad! Not even twenty-two, and you are going to make it into the D-ranks! Also, this means you are out of debt to the Guild, even with the interest!”

“Wait, there was interest on buying my armor?” Dale’s voice was shocked.

Laughter was his only answer.

Cal

<The last group just left. Can I go back to that Rune now?> I whined petulantly. Dani had been resolute that I focus on the attackers, claiming that they made it through the traps and monsters too easily when I was distracted.

“Sure, sure. Go back to your little hobby,” she dismissively replied. “I’ll be over here, bored and alone.”

<Perfect, thank you.> I turned my attention away, ignoring her squawk of anger. She had said it was fine, right? Plus, I had been waiting all day to activate this Rune! Fully cognizant only of the small area it encompassed, I fed a small stream of Essence into the activation pattern and watched as Essence flowed through the whorls and swoops of the Rune. At full activation, nothing happened.

<Huh, it isn’t doing anything, Dani.> I looked around, not seeing her anywhere. <Dani?> She must have left the dungeon if I couldn’t sense her. Well, it would be good for her to get some exercise. She had been sighing a lot lately. I returned to the puzzle represented by this Rune. It was active, I could tell, but it didn’t seem to be doing anything. The Essence level in it was staying constant, which showed that it was neither gaining nor losing Essence.

What was I missing? I pictured the Rune as it originally had been but saw nothing different from what I was doing. The Rune had been active when I took it, so Craig knew something I did not. I puzzled over the idea for a bit while keeping an eye on the Rune, just in case it did something. Near midnight, Dani flew back in.

<There you are!> I called with no small relief. <Did you have fun?>

“I did.” She surprised me by apologizing, “I’m sorry I left in such a huff. Sometimes I forget that you don’t have the same social norms as flesh and blood creatures. You literally need to focus on yourself, and I was jealous because I’ve been kinda bored.”

<Bored? Why?> I was genuinely curious.

“I don’t have anything to do! I give you advice like, I dunno, once a month?” Dani spoke sadly. “You don’t really need me. I just take up your time and energy.”

<I don’t think that’s true!> I proclaimed indignantly. <You are my only companion! What can I do for you, Dani?>

“I don’t know.” She dramatically sighed. “I can’t affect anything in here without your help, and I can’t go too far away without dying of starvation.”

<Would you like to travel?> I was puzzled. <I think we could make that happen.>

“No, it’s impossible. I can’t store Essence, and I’m made of energy so I am only as strong as the amount you can loan me.” She seemed a bit blue.

<Awww, you’re changing colors,> I noticed sadly. <Maybe we can figure out how to connect you to a Beast Core? I have lots of those, all full of energy.>

“No, it’s too dangerous to try to alter me like that.”

<Well, let’s try on this.> I created a ‘seed’ with the pattern I had gained from her when we first bonded, creating an exact replica of her body.

“Ahhh! That’s horrible! Did you just make me into a Mob?” she shrieked, horrified.

<Well, errm… Technically?> I stammered. The new Wisp floated around mindlessly, each motion watched by Dani.

“It… it’s not intelligent?” she stammered.

<It only has the same instincts as a rabbit,> I carefully informed her. <I didn’t give it very much Essence at all.>

Reversing her admonishment abruptly, she said, “I look so pretty! Okay, Cal, let’s try to hook her up to a Beast core…”

It turned out to be a very good idea that we tried on mindless Wisps. The first one collapsed into the Beast Core faster than a rock sinks under water. Dani looked sick when it happened, and I felt terrible, of course. We continued trying until late in the night, and Dani kept looking sicker the whole time.

<Are you okay, Dani?> I gently prodded.

She shook a bit. “Not really. I’ve just seen myself die hundreds of times, Cal. Can we… move on to something else for a while? I’m sorry I was so hard on you earlier.”

<Of course! I didn’t realize how bad that would, you know, affect you.> I cringed, feeling like a jerk for not considering her mental well-being. This is what got me into trouble the first time, throwing myself single-mindedly into a task without asking her thoughts on the matter. Which reminded me…

<Would you help me figure out what is wrong with the Rune I was working on? I activated it, but nothing seems to happen.>

She shivered. “Bleh. Anything to get away from this for a while! Let’s take a look.” She zipped over to the room it was in, though she could have seen it through my mind instead. I guess she wanted actual physical distance from where hundreds of Wisps had just died.

“It looks fine.” She studied the Rune. “Nothing has been happening? It’s been active for a while?” With my affirmative answer, she continued, “So it is stable, just having no effect. That’s odd.” She moved closer to inspect it, landing at the outer edge.

She suddenly moved, following the lines and movements of the Rune, screaming the whole time. “Ahhh! It’s got me, Cal!”

Indeed, her whole body was being pulled along the lines, condensing down from her previous size until she reached the output pattern near the center and stopped, nearly half her original size but glowing intensely. As she remained in the center, stunned, her body once again began growing, and her fear stopped, shock taking its place.

“Cal! The Rune freaking refined me. Like I was loose Essence! Now it’s dumping Essence into me like I’m a Chi spiral!” Her amazed sounding voice broke my panic.

<Oh! So something has to be in the center of the Rune for it to collect Essence into! That makes sense! That Craig guy prolly had the Essence go into his meridians, and it flowed to his center from there!> I exclaimed in a burst of inspiration.

“Mmm… most likely,” She groaned happily. “This feels soooo good.”

<Isn’t it dangerous for you to take in so much Essence? Won’t you pop?> I questioned her, worried again.

“Nah, Wisps just get larger. The ambient Essence in this room is already draining out, though. Now I’m barely getting a trickle. Ah well,” she murmured contentedly. “I bet you could charge Cores like this, though. Just put one in here.”

<Good plan, lady.> I thought a moment. <Hey, what would happen if I made this Rune really big? Like, really big?> I questioned casually, an idea sprouting.

“I think it would just pull Essence from a larger area,” she thoughtfully replied, “but it wouldn’t refine as well. I suppose a big Rune like that could help increase the Essence in the air but…”

<I want to try something. Get away from the Rune real quick.> I waited for her to comply, then made a larger version of the same Rune, placing the input activation sequence of a second Rune at the output of the first. I then created a Beast Core at the final output and activated only the first large Rune. I watched the Essence flow along its pattern; then reaching the second Rune, the Essence automatically activated that, too!

With no Essence to draw beyond that given to it from the first Rune, the second Rune refined the Essence into fine threads which poured into the Beast core! Success! I had so many plans for this now. I could use it to speed my passive cultivation, create areas that would be powered by Essence without me sacrificing my cultivation, and maybe I could even find a way to use this method to create my Mobs more efficiently.

“My only concern for this is that larger runes take more Essence to activate, so if you make a really large one, there is a chance you would not be able to or you would die trying when it drained you,” Dani interrupted my beautiful daydream.

<That may be a problem. Suppose I save a portion of Essence in a Beast core every day? Then I could use those if I needed them.>

“I think it will depend on how big you want the Rune to be,” Dani stated, looking at me in a way that made me feel slightly guilty.

<I want it to be really big.> My daydream was back.

Chapter Twenty-four

Dale woke up just before dawn, as per usual. He got up and started putting on his armor before he remembered that he had the morning off. Not knowing what to do with himself, he started inspecting his armor. He knew it was enchanted but was unsure what those enchantments did. He thought for a moment, remembering that enchantments were effects that were always on when activated until they ran out of the stockpile of Essence they were originally imbued with. He found the activation sequences but decided to check with his group before activating them for the first time. It may last for years, but an enchantment was temporary, unlike an inscribed Rune.

He equipped all of his armor, putting his morningstar into the loop on his belt bandolier and went for a walk. No real destination in mind, he just enjoyed the pre-dawn morning, the quiet that was never present during the day. He sat down on a boulder and watched the sunrise over the Phantom Mountain Range and felt that today would be a good day. A soft sound made him turn, where he found a few people standing near him.

His initial reaction was to scream, but as he gasped, they held out their hands in a peaceful gesture. He blew out the breath, not really reassured as he had seen unarmed people release enough energy to kill a city; not holding a weapon meant nothing to him anymore. Weapons weren’t the dangerous portion of someone with the intent to kill; the person doing the killing can find oh-so-many creative ways to make sure you die.

“Good morning,” one of the robed figures carefully articulated with an unknown, androgynous accent. “We apologize for startling you, but we needed to speak.”

“Ah… what, ah, what can I do for you?” Dale’s eyes were darting around for an escape route. People always thought that just because someone didn’t kill you instantly, they weren’t going to. Faulty logic, really. People may want information or services, then want to silence you as well.

“We are a delegation from the Elven city of Tal en’ Ohta, of the Huine nation. We were told that you are the human landowner of this area, and that if we did not want to start a war, we would need to deal with you for access to the Silverwood tree. My name,” she—the androgynous form turned out to be a she—pronounced, “is IL-Anwa Essa.”

“Welcome, ill anna ess,” Dale butchered the name. “Can I please call you Anna so that I don’t continue to incorrectly destroy your name?”

“That will be just fine, though, I’d prefer if you called me Brianna. My name translates better into that.’” Brianna breathed a small sigh of relief. “I take it you prefer plain words over standing on ceremony then?”

“Yes! Please! I am not a cultured man. I have lived in these mountains my entire life thus far, and the small amount of schooling I have is thanks to my mother pressuring me to better my life. Etiquette was never among those lessons.” Dale looked a bit desperate.

“This works well for me, Dale.” Brianna had a hint of a smile touching her lips. “I am an ambassador for our queen and have been given the right to arbitrate an agreement between us, which will allow us access to the Silverwood tree with a favorable compensation to you.”

“I see, and what would this entail?” Dale cautiously inquired, his warm, gold hoarding inner weasel coming to life.

As Brianna nodded, one of her companions stepped forward with a small chest which he opened to show gleaming gems nearly the size of Dale’s fist.

“Are those diamonds?” Dale gasped, astonished at the size of the gems.

A look of annoyance crossed Brianna’s face for a moment. “No, far more valuable. These memory stones contain knowledge of fighting skills and Essence-based techniques for fighting. You use earth Essence, yes? If you were to master these techniques, you could shatter mountains with a wave of your hand, make the earth tremble with a punch, redirect the banks of rivers with a command, and topple walls of a city you intend to conquer!”

She took a breath, eyes shining as she breathed a bit heavily. “There is also a cultivation technique in here that is similar to the one our nation gifted the King of the Lion Realm hundreds of years ago when his Kingdom was but a small town. Now he uses it to amass power and rule.”

“What do you take from this deal? That is a lot of wealth just to see a small tree,” Dale suspiciously and insightfully inquired.

“It will not be small for too long,” she promised mysteriously. “What I am asking for is the right of our nation to have care of the tree. Allow us to protect it and build a city around it to house a part of our population. We will allow others to cultivate near it, but the final say of decisions regarding the tree will be ours.”

“I don’t understand. Why are you asking for this? What is the big deal, and why are you emphasizing ‘our nation’ like that?” Dale challenged hotly, beginning to feel a bad headache building. Brianna held up her hand angrily and waved to the side. Dale was confused until an Elf stepped away from his back, a dagger vanishing into his sleeve.

“Oh for shit's sake!” Dale stood up furiously, getting into a defensive position.

“My most sincere apology,” she began earnestly. “I am royalty. They are not too fond of heated words, but that is not,” she directed at those with her, “how I deal with people. I am not my mother.” The others looked away from her at that, embarrassed by this light treason.

“Allow me to explain, Sir Dale.” Brianna sat on the rock with him, motioning for him to re-take his seat. “Please understand that this is information that is somewhat sensitive to our kind. You do know that whenever a Silverwood tree is found, Elven-kind attempt to claim the area and build fortifications?” Frank had mentioned this to Dale, so he nodded.

“Well,” she continued, “humans think that we do so for the benefit it affords in cultivating. This is only a small side bonus for us. The real reason for our interest is that the pollen from a Silverwood tree allows my race to become fertile, able to bear children.”

Dale was shocked. This was not the direction he had foreseen this conversation taking. Brianna laughed at his stricken look. “Oh, don’t get me wrong, sometimes we get lucky, and a child is born without it—maybe one in five hundred couples is so lucky. But a Silverwood tree allows all of those couples given access to become fertile, which is why they are so well-protected when found. Without it, we would become extinct.”

“Ahem.” Dale tried to keep his voice from cracking. “I see. So if I allow you to build a city, what is the downside to this deal?”

“What do you mean?” she pleaded with wide-eyed innocence.

He eyed her critically, a dangerous life had afforded him a keen nose for danger, and she reeked of it. “I would happily give you access, but you want to build walls to keep others out. Who?” he demanded. One of the guards took a menacing step toward him, only to be waved off again with a glare.

“Fair question, young one. I was not expecting any resistance.” She released a small chuckle. “Oh, fine. Our nation is in decline. We have no Silverwood trees of our own, and the cost of the pollen has tripled in the last few decades as other nations have swollen. We have earned a bad reputation since then, becoming mercenaries and killers in order to gain the pollen we need.”

“So…” Dale gulped as he looked at the Elves surrounding him, “you would be…”

“Dark Elves, yes,” Brianna despondently muttered with an air of finality.

There was a long, very awkward silence.

“Does this mean you will reject our offer?” Brianna begged despairingly.

Dale paused a moment, thinking. “No, but there are details we need to work out.” He looked up to see Brianna waving furiously at the guards.

“You! Go sit down on your hands! What part of ‘this is a peaceful talk’ didn’t you understand?” she fumed angrily. “Sorry, Dale, he is really dagger-happy today.”

“Um. Ohhh-kay. Those details. Right, you can have access to the tree, but any shops will cede a portion of their profit as a tax to me. I will need to pay taxes to both the Lion and the Phoenix Kingdoms. That is not cheap. You can work to build the city, but you need to work with me and the Adventurers’ Guild to determine the best way to complete those fortifications,” Dale determinedly decided.

“Also, none of your people are to start fights, harm, or kill humans without being provoked. I don’t want a race war here. I am sorry to say people will likely be afraid when they find the Dark Elves have come.” Dale brought up, “As you say, you have a bad reputation. Also, your people must honor my claim as owner of this land, deferring to my wishes for the area. Is this agreeable?”

“So long as we have exclusive rights to the tree itself and all products of it—not including the Essence refined by others of course. Also, you have a council, correct? A group of people who make decisions for the area?” Brianna questioned knowingly. “I want a place on that council, a vote on any politics for the area.”

“Sure. I do have a council but have never seen them in action. Either they have never met, or I just wasn’t invited,” Dale easily obliged. “So long as you accept that my word will be the final one on the matter, council or no.”

“The deal is struck then. Our people will arrive soon, and we will begin construction of a shining city,” Brianna solemnly stated. She stood, bowed, and with a word, she and her people vanished.

“…I need to stop going for walks alone,” Dale muttered unhappily. This was the second early morning walk he had almost been stabbed on. “Hey! They took those techniques with them! Assholes!”

He began walking back to the camp, hungry and more than a bit grumpy. This was his first morning off in months! Everyone wanted something, dang it. He trudged into the mess hall and angrily spooned the bland porridge into his mouth. Hans noticed him and joined his table.

“Wide awake already! It’s almost like someone taught you good habits by soaking you with a bucket of ice water,” Hans glibly mentioned, deftly swiping Dale’s toast.

“Humph,” Dale grumped.

Hans shook his head. “The plight of the young! Morning is such a horrible time to be awake! Are you not pleased that you are going to be cheating your way into the next ranking series?” He seemed serious suddenly. “I know that three thousand gold is a lot to give up. I’m sure you could change your mind.”

“That’s right, that’s today!” Dale’s mood brightened considerably. “It will take me four ranks higher than I currently am, and my spiral will look like the design you all have, correct?”

“It is called a ‘fractal’ and is something you would have learned how to do over several months to avoid hurting yourself,” Hans consideringly mentioned. “I’m actually wondering how he plans to get around that. Just knowing how to do it isn’t enough.”

“We’ll find out soon enough, I’m sure.” Craig appeared behind them. “I don’t suppose you would reconsider this, Dale? I have heard that this process is at least as painful as getting your Essence stripped.”

Dale looked stricken for a moment. “Of course it is,” he breathed. “Now they tell me.” He shook his head; this day was going downhill so fast. He stood up and decided to go… somewhere. Really, he had no hobbies or job anymore. Every day was an amalgamation of fighting or training to fight. What was the endgame?

Dale sat back down with a sigh as he tried to relax. Hans looked at his depressed friend and took pity on him. “Dale, what’s the matter, my friend?”

“I don’t know. Everything I used to do seems so simplistic now. I fight and fight, but for what?” Dale replied, not really expecting an answer.

“Well, that makes sense. You are smarter than you used to be. Quite a bit smarter, too, I would assume,” Hans told him with enthusiasm. “You rarely see smart people happy to live a humble life.”

“What? All I do is fight all day! Sure I know more about fighting, but that doesn’t really make me smarter…” He trailed off as Hans shook his head.

“Mph nhpo yokrk eddsenve is–” Hans started, blasting crumbs out of his mouth.

Dale made a disgusted face, “Not with your mouth full, please. That’s nasty.”

“Ha.” Hans quickly swallowed. “It’s because your Essence is able to purify your body. No longer fighting against blocked channels, your body gets stronger, faster, and your brain is a part of that. A healthy mind makes more connections, allowing you to experience the world on a deeper level than you could before. You will see how things link together and be able to see how one action affects another. There are people who do that as a profession, you know.”

“Really?” Dale was exceedingly interested.

“Yup,” Hans disclosed, eating more toast. “Sstpotters,” he finished around the mouthful, spitting several crumbs out.

“Spotters? That sounds about right.” Dale laughed at Hans’s disdain for the group.

“Well, really, everyone does. Other professions just use those connections in a practical way. Like a fire Mage knowing that melted sand makes glass and that some sand is better for it than others,” Hans extrapolated. “The more connections that you understand, the faster your power will grow, which is why being a Spotter is so appealing to many.”

“What will I be able to do, though?” Dale insisted earnestly.

Hans shrugged. “Whatever you like. First, you need to see where your talents lie within the earth. Everyone has different strengths and weaknesses, and the uses for Essence are endless.”

Dale deflated again, “So it comes down to waiting again.” He grumped sourly.

Hans laughed a dark laugh. “Welcome to life, kiddo! Where you need to work for everything worth having, and anyone trying to give you a handout is just waiting to use you until you are useful to them.”

Craig spoke up then, “That’s a dark outlook, Hans. No matter how true it may be. Dale, when you reach the D-rankings, you will be able to exert control over your element. I will teach you then, as we had always planned to do. It seems it will be years sooner than we thought it would be, though. Gaining control of your element is the best part of being a cultivator, in my opinion.”

A familiar face in the crowd of people grabbed Dale’s attention as he was thanking Craig for his consideration. “Hey! Hans, is that… Madame? What is she doing here?”

“Yup, that is her alright. Annnnd, wel-l-l, she’s prolly looking for us so she can yell at me.” Hans was barely understandable around the hemming and hawing.

Dale rounded on him dangerously. “…Why?”

“Remember how when we were there, at her restaurant, she was talking about starting one here? She would most likely have set up a deal with you right then,” Hans reminded him, “Well, she really hates not knowing what’s going on. Since we didn’t tell her who you were, she’s likely pissed at you.”

“Why yes, she is pissed at you,” a deceptively soft, decidedly female voice hissed next to their ears. They had only taken their eyes off Madame for a moment, then she was behind them. Her hands clamped down on their shoulders. “Let’s talk about this outside, shall we?”

Dale and a stammering Hans were unceremoniously dragged outside while Craig carefully focused on his food, avoiding Hans’s and Dale’s pleading looks.

“Did you not like my food? Was my service subpar?” she interrogated them, a dangerous glint in her eye. “Why was it that you made me wait days to find out that the young adventurer that dined in my business was the owner of the land I so badly wanted to create a fine dining area upon?”

“Madame, your food was fit for a king! We had just–” Hans promised.

With a glare, Madame ended his babbling. “Not you. Him.” She nodded at Dale.

Honestly? It was because I felt really bad, insulted that you had such a low opinion of me without even meeting me,” Dale boldly began. “You had no idea who I was, but you spouted mean gossip and cruel rumors.”

Hans gaped at him, mouth working silently as he shook his head. Madame turned red, eyes bulging out a bit.

Whoo, Dale thought, thinking she was reminiscent of an owl when she did that.

Madame took a deep breath, and Dale prepared himself to be lashed brutally by her words. “That is… fair, I suppose.” She sighed in embarrassment, rubbing at her temples. “I haven’t left the city in years. I forget that not everyone enjoys gossip as the city folk do. Please know that I didn’t try to upset you. I was only trying to make conversation.”

A bit stunned by this turnaround, Dale stammered, “Uh. Don’t worry about it.” All the heat and argumentation he had been building up to rushed away.

“If I didn’t ruin my chances, I would still like to create a Pleasure House in the area. My granddaughter will be joining the dungeon dives as a cultivator, and I want to stay busy while I keep an eye on her,” Madame humbly requested.

Dale sighed, now rubbing at his forehead. “It’s fine, Madame. We’ll work out the details, but is ten percent too much to ask from you as a tax? You’ll also need to build your own restaurant, but we’ll pick out the location later. I have an appointment to get to.”

“That will be just fine. Please, Madame is my title. My friends call me by name, and I would greatly enjoy being your friend,” the short lady proclaimed.

“Of course, Madame. I need all the friends I can get.” Dale was greatly cheered by this statement.

“My name is Chandra; it is a pleasure to do business with you. We will talk later then.” With a smile and a wave, she walked away.

Shh-ann-drah,” Dale repeated. “Man, am I bad at names.” He turned toward Hans. “You think she will have trouble with making the building?”

Hans snorted. “Doubtful. She’ll likely grow it in a day. She’s an A-rank nine plant Mage. She’s the closest thing to a Saint I have ever seen. Heck, she trained Frank for nearly a decade.”

Dale’s mouth dropped open. He hadn’t even thought to look at her cultivation. A bad habit he would need to break; even regular-seeming people could be horrifyingly dangerous if he didn’t even bother to notice them. He needed to keep his eyes and ears open and get used to all of the overwhelming input. It may save his life someday. He activated the Essence flow to his eyes, watching the overlay appear, colors becoming brighter, the flows of the heavens and earth visible to him once again.

 “You feeling okay, Dale?” Hans enquired worriedly.

 “Yeah. I’m just working through some stuff. Hey,” Dale realized he hadn’t mentioned his earlier encounter, “I met an Elven ambassador this morning.”

“Really? Today already?” Hans seemed surprised by the sudden conversation topic. “It is, what, eight o’ clock? Did they shake you out of bed?”

“Naw, I had gone for a walk around dawn. They found me on the outskirts of the camp,” Dale nonchalantly stated. “They wanted to make a deal for access to the Silverwood tree.”

“Were they surprised when you told them it was in the dungeon?” Hans demanded gleefully.

Dale was stunned for a moment. “Uh, I may have failed to, um, mention that.”

Hans thought this was a hysterical riot of course. “Wait, they made a deal to see it, and they didn’t even ask questions? Typical High Elves, never really thinking of the details. They’re all about the ‘big picture’.” He chuckled at the thought of the dainty Elves trying to ward off Raile. “It should make for a fun afternoon if we watch ‘em, though.”

“High Elves?” Dale was confused. “What are High Elves? Or is that just what they call themselves?”

“Oh boy, you could get in some real trouble. I’ll find someone to tell you the whole history, but basically, there are High Elves of the nation Luminaria. These guys are the largest nation and spend most of their time as merchants, artists, or thinkers. Rich beyond any need to actually work, their King is an S-Ranked expert, and their cities shine with light and wealth. They like to think of themselves as ‘above’ other Elves, thus ‘High’ Elves,” Hans explained with a shake of his head at the thought.

“Next, there are Wood Elves, shorter than the High Elves and a bit more reclusive. They live in the forests! Surprise!” Hans dictated. “Seriously, though, they are not a fan of the High Elves. They think they are too hedonistic or something. They live more simply but have a greater connection to the earth and the elements. They are ruled by a council of S-ranked elders and rarely leave their woods. Though seen less often, they have great power. They grow and collect food and animal products for themselves and other Elven nations.”

“There are the Sea Elves, who live on boats their entire lives. They facilitate trade between all the races of Elves and man, trying not to take sides in conflicts. They work for themselves and are considered rather mysterious.”

“The fourth type are known as ‘Wild Elves’. They are the outcasts of their societies. Basically feral, they scorn society, civilization, and the rules of others. They have the worst reputation of any of the races of Elves, practicing dark arts and infernal summoning. They have no homeland, living only where they can get away with their dark deeds.”

“The fifth and final are the Drow or Dark Elves. No one knows where they live, only where they can go to get in contact with them. Dark Elves also have a dark reputation as assassins and mercenaries for the other races. The worst of their lot are ‘Moon Elves’, the best-known assassins of any race.” He pondered for a moment. “Anyway, Dark Elves work for the highest bidder and will change their allegiance mid-fight if offered enough. Never work with them unless they sign a Mana-contract, else you could quickly end up dead,” Hans finished, a bit out of breath.

Dale listened raptly to these descriptions. He had never much considered the outside world and was constantly amazed by how intricate it really was. Someday, he promised himself, he would travel and see everything the world had to offer. He would live long enough to see it all if he became strong enough.

“Well, I might be in trouble.” Dale gave a weak chuckle. “I didn’t make a deal with the High Elves, it–”

Father Richard walked up to them at that point, forcing Dale to abruptly stop talking, so he made motions to Hans that they would talk at a later date.

Chapter Twenty-five

“Oh, there you are!” Father Richard exclaimed cheerfully. “Listen, I didn’t think about it, but making you wait until noon seemed like torture. Are you ready now, or do you have other things on your plate?”

“Well, no, but I just ate and–” Dale began frantically.

Father Richard cut him off with a wave. “No problem, my child, you’ll likely vomit either way. Might as well get it over with!”

Hans chimed in, “You aren’t trying to avoid Frank being there, are you? I can go get–”

A slightly panicked look crossed Father Richard’s face. “No, no.” He hastily stated, “No time for that if you want to join us! I have the area prepared. We need to get to it!”

Dale’s wrist was grasped firmly, and he was all but dragged along behind Father Richard. They were moving toward the celestial infused lot, which made Dale gasp when he saw it. A white granite, coliseum-style arena had appeared around the entirety of the area, perfectly framing the quartz. Beyond that, a massive chapel was glowing in the morning sun. Father Richard was also using this as an opportunity to showcase his purchase, it seemed.

“If you look over there, there is a healing ward that connects directly to the exit from the dungeon. That way, people can be checked in and healed as soon as they leave their fight. Next to that is the vault, which I personally blessed and enchanted, to hold valuables as we begin our function as a bank. Sermons will be given next to the quartz. The roof is perfectly clear glass, so we will function in all seasons. The doors are granite reinforced with steel and Essence to protect the worshippers within,” Father Richard babbled happily.

“Over there is the dormitory. We can have up to thirty people living there comfortably or near one hundred uncomfortably. Kitchen, library, garden.” Father Richard turned toward Dale. “So? What do you think?”

“I’m amazed. This was built overnight?” Dale gaped at the gleaming building.

“Of course not,” was the scoffed reply. “We started after lunch yesterday. I could only hire that team of Mages for twelve hours or so.”

“How did I not see this when I went to breakfast?” Hans squinted at him suspiciously.

Father Richard smoothly countered, “Must have been dark.”

“I think there is more to it than that.” Hans narrowed his eyes further. “No rumors, no one noticed the work, why? What were you hiding?”

Father Richard looked at Hans furiously, then Dale and admitted, “Well, the church was a bit… bigger than I had planned at first.”

“How much bigger?” Dale questioned him, features hardening.

“It’s only… three lots,” Richard mumbled.

Dale looked at him oddly; the way he said those words was so quiet yet perfectly clear. “Three lots?” Dale barked incredulously. “What the heck?! I didn’t approve that!”

Father Richard rubbed his forehead. “We couldn’t dig. That was the issue. Everything had to be on one level because if we went down, we would affect the dungeon. So the place became more… ranch style than monastery style.”

He turned his head to Dale. “I’m sorry we didn’t ask first, but we will happily pay the difference in price that those lots would cover.”

Dale was undecided on his feelings in this matter but concluded that being angry at the man who was about to alter his innards was not a good plan. “It’s fine, Father. Please just ask permission next time. There are a lot of people that want to live here.”

“Thank you, and sorry again. Maybe you would like to have one of the rooms for a while? I have no acolytes here yet, and I’m sure a bed would be preferable to the cot you have been sleeping on.”

“Throw in a room for each of my team, then we’ll call it good,” Dale grunted after catching Hans’s pleading look. Sometimes it was easy to forget Hans was in his sixties. The cot would have been murder on his back without the reinforcement that cultivating provided.

“Done!” Richard beamed. “At least until I have students who need them.”

Dale nodded. “That’s fair. They are who the rooms were intended for anyway. Where are we going?”

As they continued at a brisk pace through the winding corridor, Father Richard told them, “The practice room. It was made especially thick and enchanted to hold in spells and block outside influences. It blocks sound and holds in heat to a set temperature. Also, it has a very strong lock. We won’t be disturbed there, which is of the utmost importance. Once this process starts, if we end early, you may die.”

“This is sounding more and more fun,” Dale deadpanned.

The three men arrived at a glowing, stone door. “Here we go,” beamed Father Richard. “After you!” He swept the door open, showing a circular room roughly twenty feet in diameter.

They all walked to the center where Father Richard and Dale sat while Hans flopped on to the ground in a prone position.

“Are you ready to begin?” Father Richard intoned in a ritualistic manner.

Dale nodded, too nervous to respond.

“Good. Now, go into your center. Sink into it as deeply as possible,” Father Richard commanded, waiting as Dale followed the order. “Excellent. Now, this is going to be hard to do. I want you to listen to my voice, very carefully following all of my directions. Take my hands. Now, feel the meridians along your hands, and extend your Essence outward, allowing it to flow into me.”

“This will feel like you are giving up Essence. You are. This will allow me access to your center, following through to your own source of power. If I were an unscrupulous person, I would be able to take your entire cultivation base and keep it as my own,” Father Richard told him, making Dale rather nervous.

Dale followed the command; with a feeling like an artery being severed, Essence began to pour out of him like blood from a mortal wound. In seconds, he had been reduced a rank, dropping to F-rank five—which terrified him.

Father Richard’s calm voice sounded, “Prepare your mind, Dale. I am going to speak a True Name, the name that allowed me to gain my status as a Mage. Linked as we are, you will understand it. If your mind is weak or unprepared, it may break you.”

He leaned toward Dale and spoke a word. Hans heard it as sonder, while Dale’s eyes went wide, then blank. Blood began to erupt from the ear that had been spoken into, though the flow quickly stopped. Dale’s mouth worked, but no sound came out and goosebumps rippled across his skin.

In Dale’s mind, the effect was far more intense. He was suddenly able to understand a basic truth of life that he had never really considered before. He found that each person was unique. Every being in existence was living a life as vivid and complex as his own in its own way. They had their own ambitions, friends, enemies, hopes and dreams. The life of each individual was an amazing, epic storyline that continues—grandly and invisibly—to interact with everything else that lives.

There were tens of millions of these interactions that shaped the universe, millions of lives that he had never before considered, which suddenly sang to him, bombarding him with information and ideas that threatened to strip his individuality. One voice stood out among the rest, guiding him to return to his own mind, filling him with power and control.

“There we go, Dale. Good lad. Welcome back, now,” Father Richard was saying. “Good, now you have access to my Mana, yet I can still shape your center. Focus inward, and watch what I am doing.”

Dale, still stunned by the outpouring of others, found it hard to focus on himself. He finally managed and watched incredulously as his Chi spiral became more dense and brighter without his input. It was a mesmerizing effect, truly hypnotic. The Essence he contained was exceedingly pure; the Essence pouring into him from Father Richard matched his exactly.

“This may hurt, Dale,” Father Richard murmured. “Shattering your Chi and Essence spiral is a process that takes between days and weeks naturally. I can easily handle the amount of Essence you have, so I am going to do it all at once. Look closely. You are now at the peak of the F-series; this is currently what your Chi spiral looks like. Your center is full of energy, which is too dense for you to really contain anymore.”

“This,” Father Richard was now straining, sweating profusely, “is D-series zero, where your spiral becomes…. a… fractal.” He pushed with his mind, forcing Dale’s Essence to shatter into billions of shards. Father Richard had certainly been correct earlier; Dale vomited directly on to Father Richard’s body and face.

Father Richard tried not to gag as he continued his work. “Please turn your head to the side if that happens again,” he managed to say through gritted teeth.

Dale nodded and blushed, returning his attention to his center. He was weaker at this moment than he had ever been in his life; only the energy moving through him kept him upright, his muscles locked in place as though lightning had struck him.

Father Richard kept muttering, directing Dale’s energy as he wanted. He smoothed the shards into place, a nucleus of power forming in the direct center. That nucleus formed into an infinitesimally small spiral, directing the resulting power throughout Dale’s body into his life-force. Other spirals began to form, draining their Essence downward to be further refined by the next spiral in the series. The process continued for an immeasurable time, for them anyway, as they watched the progression as closely as possible.

As the danger of dying from lack of Essence began to wane, the process picked up speed. The spirals grew, moving further and further away from the origin, soon straining the boundary of his center. Father Richard gleefully exhaled as he released a final burst of Essence, affixing an enchantment he had prepared to the terminus of the spiral. This enchantment would keep Dale’s Essence in this fractal formation until Dale was able to hold the pattern for himself.

“Finished,” Father Richard happily stated. “Listen, Dale, the Chi threads are rough right now, broken beyond my power to repair. As you cultivate more energy, they will smooth and fix themselves. All the tiny breaks will be mended. Time and effort on your part are the only things you need to become whole again. When the threads are fixed, you will be able to feel the real power and cultivation speed this rank affords you.”

“Thank god.” Hans’s outburst caught Father Richard completely off guard, making him flinch. “You trapped me in this room with you and a pile of vomit for two days. The least you could have done was show me how to open the stinkin’ door!”

Dale stood shakily, his body adjusting to the flow of energy within him. He didn’t feel stronger, but that may simply be due to his near starvation as he waited for the process to complete. The others watched him carefully, making sure he didn’t abruptly die or explode.

“Well,” Dale was looking down at his soiled clothes, “I don’t suppose you have baths in here?”

Father Richard nearly slapped his forehead. “How could I forget bathrooms?” he rhetorically muttered in horror.

“No matter. Let’s… go get cleaned up, then find food. I’m… I’m not sure if I am okay.” Dale was wobbling while standing, trying to remember something… something that had happened when Father Richard breathed a word, but it slipped away as does a dream, leaving only the word ‘sonder’ in his mind with no context to it. He felt like he had forgotten a profound truth; all he could remember was the process he had undergone afterward.

Father Richard opened the door, and the small group slowly moved to find a spot to bathe along the river, sore from the lack of movement over the last few days. Father Richard happily scrubbed the dried vomit off of himself, shuddering even as he did so. Dale reached into himself, trying to follow the complex path his center had become. He was nervous that he would need to hold this pattern himself soon, though Father Richard assured him it would become as easy as breathing.

Clean but still damp, the three started walking toward the mess hall when a voice reached them, “Try the Pleasure House for lunch today! Forget the watered-down gruel the Guild offers. Fill up with a real meal!” A young teen boy was shouting, trying to find customers for the new business.

“It’s already running?” Dale was surprised and a bit upset by this development. “Where did she build it?” They walked over to the herald, asking for the location of the restaurant. The boy sneered at them as if they were insane.

“There are two permanent buildings in twenty miles, and you can’t find ‘em?” The boy pointed it out to them rudely, “’S’over there.” He pointed in a direction, and they gladly left the unpleasant young man alone. They walked toward the area he had pointed and whistled as the building came into view. Whereas the church had sprawled, this restaurant went straight upward. At least four stories tall, the building was made out of gleaming walnut trees which were growing and interweaving into an interesting design even as they watched.

Dale snapped his fingers. “That’s what it is! It looks like a really tall copy of the one in the capital.”

The others nodded, and Hans piped up, “Yup. She is all about brand recognition. When it is done growing to how she wants it, she’ll carve it herself. All of her places look the same, so everyone knows where the best food is.” They joined the queue moving toward the door; in a few minutes, they were in a small waiting room as a host took their names and started to put them on a list. When she made the connection of Dale’s name and something she had been told, she blanched and ran from the room.

“Dale!” Hans’s voice was mockingly horrified. “What did you do to the poor girl to make her run off like that?”

The other people in the room rounded on him with dangerous looks, starting to become rather rowdy, when the girl and Madame Chandra walked back in.

“Dale! There you are! You caused quite a stir, vanishing like that. Come in, come in! We’ll be using the private dining area,” she told the host in passing. Chandra personally walked them up several flights of stairs, stopping them at the very top. “Do you know how my businesses work?”

Dale shook his head. She smiled knowingly and explained, “The floors are based on price and quality of food. The higher you go, the better it will be—though more expensive. Don’t get me wrong, all of our food is sumptuous, but as any true gourmand will assure you, high-quality meals of varying ingredients are still very different. A quality salad will not match the flavor complexity of a quality steak dinner, for example.”

Chandra threw open the door, allowing a wave of tantalizing aromas to flood out as the group filed in. There was a kitchen attached to the dining area; she explained that each floor had its own kitchen and wait staff. No sooner had they been seated than a thin soup arrived for them to sip whilst they awaited their meal. The decor in the room was stunning, and the soup vastly superior to anything Dale had eaten in this area previously.

Several servers emerged from the kitchen as the last person finished their appetizer. Each of the servers laid out a massive steak covered in finely diced herbs and a spicy sauce Dale had no name for. They ate with gusto; each time they felt full, their stomachs would demand more. After the deprivation of the last few days, they ate like wolves, stuffing themselves as full as possible. Chandra watched them, shocked at their poor manners until she took a good look at Dale.

“Who did that to you?” She gasped in horror, one hand going to her throat while the other clenched into a fist. “Dale, how did you reach the D-rankings in two days?”

Father Richard waved his hand. “I did. We made a deal for it.”

Chandra was not pleased. “And you thought this was a good deal? There is, what, a thirty percent survival rate? Maybe?”

Dale was shocked at this tidbit of information. “That low?” He looked incredulously at Father Richard. “You gambled a seventy percent chance that I would die for a dagger?”

“I knew you could do it!” Richard waved at them nonchalantly. “I put myself at risk too, you know.”

Chandra glowered at him. “If it were up to me, I’d kick you off this mountain right now.” She looked meaningfully at Dale.

“Oh come on!” Richard looked up nervously, eyes darting between them before settling on Dale. “It turned out fine! He didn’t lose his mind or die or bleed out or…” He trailed off as he saw his words were having the opposite effect he intended. “Ahem! Anyway, it turned out for the best! Look at him! Already in the D-ranks and only twenty-one years old!”

“Hmm.” Dale looked at him. “If this weren’t so freaking tasty, I’d be mad at you.” He took another considering bite, just to make sure he still wasn’t mad. “What is this, Madame? It’s so flavorful!”

“This is seared Raile steak. Freshly butchered this morning, of course,” she boasted, still glaring at Father Richard.

Dale looked at the meat oddly. “As in the Boss Mob? Is this safe to eat?”

“Of course it is!” She turned the conversation to another topic suspiciously quickly. “About my granddaughter coming here to train, I was wondering if you might be willing to put her on your team.”

“Isn’t five people the maximum?” Dale got out around a mouth full of rabbit steak. “I’ve never seen more than five go in at once.”

“What?” she said, surprise evident in her voice. “You already have a full team? You made D-Zero today, I thought?”

“What? What does that have to do with anything?” Dale looked at Hans for assurances, but he wouldn’t meet his eye. “Hans? Did… did I get kicked off the team?”

Hans shook his head a bit sadly. “Not quite as bad as that. At the start of the D-ranks, Guild rules state that you need to form a team of your own. You can have one person in the C-ranks join you for guidance, but the rest need to also be in the D or high F-rankings. The team is still here to train you and show you how to use your Essence and whatnot, but Guild law stands, even in your case.”

Dale considered this for a moment. The dungeon would be far more dangerous from now on, but he thought he had a good handle on the correct way of doing things after half a year of constant fighting. If the other parties that had completed the dungeon were any indication, the rewards for a lower leveled team were drastically higher than what they had been earning.

Taking a deep breath to calm his tumultuous thoughts, Dale made a request, “Hans, if Craig will still train me either way, would you join my team? You are fun to work with, and I think that you would help me pick a good group.”

A bit choked up, Hans replied in the affirmative. He was truly happy that Dale thought so well of him. Through his bawdy jokes and teasing, he had really come to think of Dale as a friend, and it was good to see that feeling reciprocated.

Dale cleared his throat. “Your grand-daughter?” he prompted Madame Chandra.

“Yes! Of course!” Chandra started, almost flinching a bit. “Rose! Get in here!” Her manner was nervous, and she was casting pleading looks at Hans. A tall lady walked in from the attached kitchen, fluidly moving across the walnut wood of the floor. She stood nearly six feet tall, had grey eyes, flowing black hair, and a slim, willowy figure. Dale was impressed by her graceful movement, but growing up in the mountains had him looking at her a bit critically.

In his mind, she was too tall and thin to do the work required of the highlanders. His people were of average height with packed muscles and stout frames. He understood better why Chandra was looking for a team for this girl; she didn’t look like she could survive an unescorted night in the city, let alone a dungeon in the mountains. His vision flipped to his Essence enhanced vision, and he looked at her center, roughly at the same time as Hans.

Father Richard gasped in anger. “You just shouted at me for pulling Dale ahead in the rankings, yet you clearly did the same for her! Look at her center! It’s barely even healed from the trauma, just like Dale, and you try to foist her off on them!”

Rose looked a bit stricken. Embarrassed by the sudden judgment of her, she opened her mouth to speak. Chandra cut her off unintentionally, “You don’t get to yell at me in my place of business, Richard!” The tree they were in suddenly swayed ominously. “Look at her! Tell me why I did it! I know your reasons. You wanted to get away with not having to pay the worth of something and so handed out power like a treat!”

Father Richard was taken aback and looked at the girl again. His eyes widened fractionally. “Oh. Oh, you poor girl, I am so sorry. Please forgive my assumptions.”

Dale, of course, had no idea what was transpiring. “Oh, spit it out. What?! What’s wrong with her?”

Rose’s face was becoming the color of her namesake. “Excuse me, I am right here,” she seethed, turning toward Dale, “and nothing is wrong with me, you ass.”

Her voice was cultured and delicate for the harsh words. Dale was instantly mad at her. “I’m not going into danger with someone who can’t even be around people without them feeling sorry for her unknown weakness,” he announced harshly.

“Dale!” Chandra was aghast. “Where is this coming from?”

Dale looked at her coldly, the cold steel of a man who has had to force others to show him respect every time their opinions differed. “This is coming from a highlander. I worked for what I have. I paid fairly for my increase in rank, if not in time then in goods. What gives her the right to come in here and start attacking me for asking a simple question? I’m guessing as well that you simply pulled her to the higher ranks for free. The look in his eyes and tone of voice,” he pointed at Father Richard, “tells me other people’s charity and pity falling on her is not an uncommon occurrence. Her reaction,” a gesture at Rose, “shows that she has a chip on her shoulder that will get us killed if we take her. Either she will not be able to pull her weight, or she will try to overcompensate and do something stupid. I need people that will work to keep me alive as I do the same for them, so find another team or explain why it benefits my team to take her with us.”

The others in the room were stunned into silence. They had not seen this side of Dale, and now they were realizing that—just maybe—they should be a bit warier of making decisions for him without his knowing consent. Hans broke into a proud grin when he realized that Dale had made a well-reasoned argument, while Father Richard started to sweat a bit over the future expansion plans he had for his church.

“Dale,” Chandra started uncomfortably, “Rose is—as I’ve mentioned—my granddaughter. My son, before he was murdered, eloped with a High Elf and eventually blessed us with Rose. She has been ostracized in society for being a half-breed.” her eyes darted to Rose to see if she was offending her, but Rose’s eyes were flint hard as she tried to stare Dale down. “That by itself is not too much of an issue. The real problem is her Essence.”

Dale looked at Rose’s core again. It had the same reconstructed, shattered look that his did. “What? It looks really pure, so, yay you. Beyond that, I see no other issue.”

“What do you know about Essence affinities?” Chandra probed patiently.

Dale looked at her. “Not too much, I suppose. I know we all have them and they get stronger over time as we affect them.”

“Well,” Chandra smacked Rose’s arm when she rolled her eyes, “you see, we all are able to eventually use other elements to pull Essence from. As you grow, so does your capability to use other affinities. Your main one will always be your strongest, though. Rose is… well, special.”

Rose rolled her eyes at this, obviously hearing it for the thousandth time. Chandra charged on, “She began life with a dual affinity. That means she has two main affinity channels and has to train them both at the same time. Usually, this is not an issue. If she had fire and earth, she could cultivate near lava, glassblowers, or some such. This is not the case, as she has the opposing affinities for celestial and infernal.”

Hans’s eyes were wide; he breathed in amazement, “A chaos cultivator. Alive?”

“Just so.” Chandra nodded reluctantly. “As such, Rose has never been able to cultivate. She would have died if I did not pull her up into the D-ranking as a child. The scars in her cultivation have been there for nearly twenty years. She cannot use Essence for fear that the lack will kill her, as she cannot replace what she uses.”

The news he was given disturbed Dale; the others also seemed uncomfortable at Rose’s plight. “Well,” Dale hemmed, “I may have been hasty in my snap judgment, but the fact of the matter is that this does not change things. If she cannot fight, it would be too dangerous for all involved to take her with us.” He clandestinely ate another bite of the rabbit steak that was beginning to cool.

Rose broke into the conversation hotly, “I am the best archer you will ever meet, and I do it all without using Essence! Once I am able to cultivate, I can only improve.”

“Can you work as a team? Can you follow orders? Will you duck when I say duck? Have you ever been in combat or just shot at stationary targets?” Dale was brutal in his questioning. “These are the same questions I needed to face when I first became a cultivator. The others knew the answer and took the time to train me for months. You know the first job I had in the team? I quote: ‘Don’t die, that is your only job until you become useful.’ My team will not be experienced and strong like theirs was, so I can’t protect you like they could me. So I ask you again. Why should I risk my team’s life and my own for you?”

Rose’s face was burning, and Dale knew his questions had hit their target. Like arrows. Ha, because she was an archer. Anyway. “I can be a good teammate,” Rose quietly promised. “I am a fast learner and know the stakes. Just give me a chance to prove myself! No one… no one else will even look at me without that stupid look on their face!” She pointed at an affronted Father Richard.

“Okay then. We’ll see,” Dale made his decision with finality. “I’m going back into the dungeon tomorrow morning. Meet me at the mess hall at dawn, and we will make a temporary place on the team for you. If you can’t handle the dungeon, I will take no blame for the outcome.” He looked at Madame Chandra when he mentioned this; she nodded gravely.

Rose’s face cleared, and she soberly nodded, not trusting herself to speak. She was teetering between jubilation and fury with this man who talked to her like a child. She left the room without another word.

“Thank you, Dale?” Chandra halfway questioned, thinking that maybe things had gone well.

Dale shook his head. “That was how Craig taught me. That and letting Josh beat me on the sparring grounds for hours at a time. This life is not for the faint of heart, which I am sure you know. I’m nervous about this whole situation. Not only about going in with an untested team, but her attitude really worries me. I know that I could have handled that better, but I needed to know if she would react professionally. Make no mistake, I intend for my team to be exceedingly professional.”

“I was worried about her reaction because I feel like people have either only treated her one of two ways—giving her what she wanted and not spoken harshly to her out of pity or given her nothing and despised her for shortcomings that are not her fault. If she could not control herself here when it was only harsh words, how could I trust that she would care what I had to say mid-battle? Her lack of experience with other people and teamwork could seriously hurt us.”

“Still. Thank you, Dale. Is there anything I can do to repay you?” Chandra motioned to the food still on the table.

Dale was quiet for a moment. “Yes. I hate to admit it, but I am ignorant of the world. I may have made a very bad business deal recently because of it.” He thought of the Dark Elves. “I can read the trade language, I can do my figures well enough to count small amounts of money, but I have no other administration skills. I just found out that my purchase of armor had interest on it and have no idea how to calculate that or even look for it on future deals. If Frank had wanted to ruin me, all he would have had to do was give me a document ceding my rights to the land and told me that it was a Guild application form.”

Dale looked at Chandra. “I’ve been flying by the seat of my pants, going with the flow and listening to others. My council makes major decisions without me, and I have no idea if those are ideas that I would agree with. I need to find a way to take a stand and really know what I am doing. Can you find me some teachers? If I am going to live as long as they say, run my own team, and build this camp into a city, I need to do better in nearly every aspect of management.”

Chandra was impressed by his forethought. “I can think of a few people. I’ll make some arrangements, but it won’t be a cheap or fast process. We could speed your understanding of words and numbers with the use of memory stones, but the cost is even more astronomical.”

Dale perked up. “I hadn’t thought of that! How much does it cost?”

Chandra laughed at his shift back into the young man she thought she had known. “The spoken and written languages are always sold apart from each other—fifty gold each. The finest counting system is provided by the Dwarven Underkingdom and is roughly one hundred gold.”

Dale’s mind boggled at that cost. Who could afford that kind of expense?! Then he remembered that he could, given enough time. He supposed that it was normally reserved for nobles or other wealthy people. “Why is that number system so expensive by itself?”

Chandra nodded at his question; it was a good one. “The number system is very complex. It consists of more than simple concepts like the others—adding, subtracting, and dividing. What sets this system apart is their advancement into higher mathematics, which gives answers to questions such as: how many loads of gravel do I need for a road? What angle does this building need to be built at for the road to have the correct size? What is the compound interest rate of loans from multiple banks? How much weight can a support of this size hold if it is placed horizontally? Believe me when I say it is worth the cost.”

Dale nodded slowly. If he wanted to be trusted to make large decisions, he needed to make the sacrifices now to learn what he needed. “How about other things? I’ll need to know history, how to argue, and trading skills.”

“I’ll see what I can do. Might I make a suggestion?” Chandra raised a hand to slow him down. Dale nodded, surprised by her subdued question. “Work to open the pericardium meridian. It is known as the guardian of the heart and will allow you to function normally with half the amount of sleep you normally will get. If you want to learn quickly, you will need to devote a substantial amount of time to your studies. Opening that meridian will allow you to do so without interrupting your current work schedule.”

“Thank you.” Dale warmly smiled. “How about a teacher to explain the meridians as well?”

With a laugh, they turned back to their meal and discussion.

Chapter Twenty-six

<Well, what do you think we should do next?> I questioned Dani, thinking I had all my preparations complete.

She thought for a moment, looking around the room. “I don’t know, Cal; it looks like it is ready. Should you just activate it?” The once smooth floor of the Boss room was now intricately patterned, the Runescript of hundreds of matching Runes deeply scoring the floor.

I had planned this out well, the pattern of each Rune interlocking seamlessly to the next. I had adjusted my walls to allow enough space for the large pattern to end perfectly at the entryway of the room, to maximize the amount of Essence pulled in. I had not yet explained to Dani the steps I really wanted to take.

<Here’s the thing, I told you I wanted the Rune to be big, right?> I started nervously.

She answered brightly, “Well yeah! Look at them! That is the most beautiful, largest Runescript I have ever seen! You should be proud! I know I am.”

I ‘blushed’, <Aww, thanks, hun. But… I’m not done.>

“What do you mean?” Her voice took on a tone of exasperation.

<I want it to be BIG, Dani.>

She snorted. “That’s what every male says.”

<…Huh?>

“Nothing. Explain.”

<I want to adjust my floors so that the floors themselves are massive Runes.>

If she had a jaw, it would have dropped. “Cal! I don’t know if you will be able to activate this Rune. How would you possibly activate one so large?”

I quickly laid my plan out to slow her tirade. <I know, I know. It might be the work of years to save that amount of power, but I figure I will make small adjustments to my dungeon every night until I finally get the configuration I want. Until then, activating it won’t matter anyway, right?>

“I… guess,” she doubtfully allowed. “Seriously, though, you should try activating just this one soon. We don’t want you too weak to join in fights when people get here if it fails.”

I braced myself and followed her advice. I reached out and touched the activation sequence, beginning to funnel Essence into it. Faster than a chubby kid eating cake, the energy began to flow out of me. Faster and faster it poured, and soon, the loss began straining my reserves. This was the way of Runes; if you activate one, it will try to take every drop of needed Essence out of the person activating it. If you did not have the necessary Essence, it would drain you—to death. Quickly, I reached out for the Cores I had filled to the brim with Essence, draining them dry as I channeled the potent power though myself.

Too quickly they ran out, shattering as I took even the Essence binding them together. One after another, the cores around me fell to pieces, making me hope I would not soon be among them. As the last one broke and my internal light began to dim, the Rune flared to life! With a rush like wind in a thunderstorm, loose Essence in the dungeon began flowing into the Boss chamber. The huge Rune that began at the door of the room began to glow! Slowly at first but then with increasing light and speed. As the shining power became too bright for the human eye to see, like a blacksmith’s welding tool, the Rune found an outlet for its stored power.

The next Rune in the link activated under the power of the first and pulled Essence of the heavens and earth to itself. The first Rune had now absorbed all of the loose Essence in the room and was still pulling from the hallway. I felt parched, as though I had a throat and had not had a sip of water in decades. I held the Essence in myself as closely as I could, shepherding it in its pattern as even it reacted to the potent Runescript.

One after another, the linked Runes activated. The light of their combined patterns formed fully around the room—a spiral around me. When the light suddenly stopped, an imperfect Rune in the sequence suddenly exploded into an unintentional activation! I watched in horror to see what would happen when it became fully active. The Essence was still pouring into the Rune from those before it, the failed Rune taking in a terrifying amount of power as it began to activate.

<Um. Dani?> I squeaked, fear pouring off of me in waves. I quickly formed a large amount of acid on the Rune in an attempt to destroy it. The acid began its work, but it was too late.

The room shuddered, and a black disc grew upward from the broken Rune. A powerful leg stepped through a newborn hole in reality almost… tentatively. The black, fur covered paw extended claws which dug deep into the floor; the unknown creature began to pull itself into the room. The disk didn’t get larger, but the form was able to slink through the opening.

The paw alone was nearly twenty inches wide, the claws lengthened that by seven inches when fully extended. The leg revealed that it was connected to a large, cat-like form. The powerful body was half again as large as a tiger and pitch black. A tail twitched back and forth in anticipation, the creature obviously excited by this new hunting ground. Along its back, four tentacles extended from each of its leg joints; each of them had its own mouth and was tipped with a sharp, claw-like stinger which dripped venom.

Its head was very similar to a mountain lion but had no mouth. Instead, it had an extra eye in the center of its forehead, the only bright spot on its body. It moved around the room, sniffing at the new scents and enjoying the scenery. A hiss of acid made it flinch, whipping its tentacles with their gaping maws into an attack position. The Rune was finally destroyed, and the black disk vanished silently. The Essence slowed its travel through my dungeon as the other Runes slowed their collection with nowhere to deposit what was already gathered. Dani was huddling in my puddle near me, both of us terrified as to what we had unleashed into the heart of my being.

It padded toward us sniffing the air like there was a great delicacy nearby. It looked right at the area under the Silverwood tree where we were quietly hiding. From the tentacles, tongues flicked out, licking their sorry excuse for lips. It crouched, silently stalking us and getting closer an inch at a time. A thundering noise made it halt as Raile exploded on to the scene. Raile ran directly at the creature while shadows filled the room, collecting heavily within a ten-foot perimeter of the Cat.

Lucky for Raile, I knew where everything in my dungeon was at any given time. He charged unerringly at the Cat, who lightly leaped over Raile, casually whipping him with one of its tentacles as it spiraled in the air. Raile was slammed to the wall with enough force to shatter several feet of it from that light strike but doggedly returned to his feet. He charged again, this time following my attack pattern, jumping as the Cat jumped. It seemed surprised as they both flew at the wall but recovered fast enough to wriggle itself around Raile’s body. It pushed off his back to double the force of Raile’s jump, slamming him into the wall hard enough to fully shatter his armor.

The Cat attacked, two limbs pinning Raile to the wall as he whimpered for a moment. Obviously savoring Raile’s helplessness, the pointed stingers on the great Cat’s tentacles pierced my Boss’s body repeatedly, perforating him five times each in two seconds. Effectively pincushioned, Raile died, still held against the wall as the Cat disemboweled him. The Cat ate a bit of meat, then dropped the body in disinterest, turning back toward Dani and me.

It hissed at us, ignoring the chance for a massive meal. I realized this was a creature that killed for sport. Obviously hating all other creatures, it didn’t even bother to eat its kills beyond what it wanted at any given point. It stalked back to our position and started to slither a tentacle down to where we cowered. For some reason, it had completely ignored the Silverwood tree, a poor judgment call. As its tentacle brushed a root, a line of fire raced out from the long-dormant enchantment the Elf had placed on the tree many months ago. The fire sliced the tentacle clean off, making the Cat yowl and sprint away, vanishing into the tunnels of my dungeon.

“C-c-c-cal,” Dani stammered, fear invoking a physical reaction. “I-i-is it still moving? Away, I mean?”

I didn’t answer her right away; I was far too focused on a dark mass. The sliced off tentacle was still writhing toward us, intent on finishing us before it perished. Luckily for us both, before it could perform its dark deed, I felt a small burst of Essence as it expired. Information on the animal flooded my mind with its death.

<It’s okay, Dani,> I soothed her as best I was able. <It’s gone for now.> I was tracking the Cat as it moved along my dungeon, slaying Bashers and leaving their corpses to rot, though I quickly reabsorbed them. Actually, I was glad to regain some Essence; I was far closer to empty than I was comfortable with.

“What was that?! What just happened?!” she cried out hysterically.

I thought of everything I now knew about the animal. <That was a Beast. It is called a ‘Distortion Cat’. I didn’t get the information I need to replicate it because it seems the tentacles are a different creature. They are a parasite that forms a symbiotic relationship with the Distortion Cat. Becoming bonded with the tentacle parasites causes it agony every second until they are fully dependent on each other, making the Cat’s mind descend into hatred for others.>

I kept up my flood of information to give her something to focus on, <It is an amazing hunter. When it feels threatened, it thickens the darkness in the area to hide. If it is too bright, it distorts the light—bending it around itself, effectively becoming invisible while an illusion forms a few feet away. Then it attacks with its tentacles, the illusion and real thing hit the same spot to lend credence to the illusion being the real Beast.>

“Stop telling me how cool it is!” she demanded. “Where is it now? Is it going to come back in here?”

<It’s already on the first floor. It’s, uh, killing. Killing everything it finds. Well, I mean, it’s leaving the plants alone. Oops. Spoke too soon. It ate the mint plants.> I directed every Basher to hide as best as it could. I watched the Cat move closer to the entrance where even at this hour, a few intrepid souls were mining. It was a few hours till dawn right now. Watching the inattentive miners, I actually felt a little bad for increasing the quality of ore they could collect after dark. It had seemed like a good way to keep people in here. Ah well.

The miners shouted in anger and confusion as the room became pitch black, running for where they thought the entrance was. Not one of them made it out. The Cat was crouched next to the exit, and as each approached, the tentacles would flash out slashing throats, piercing eyes, even wrapping around a neck and killing one man by suffocation. These men were all in the F-rankings; they had no chance to defend themselves from this killer. After its gory fun, the Cat poked its head out of the doorway through the ‘bubble’ in place which increased the Essence density, its face meeting fresh air. If I didn’t know better, I’d swear it chuckled as it scented all of the prey above.

It ran up the steps and was lost to my senses. <It’s gone, Dani. It went outside.> I was digesting the Essence that had made its way to me from the slain miners. Turns out this wasn’t really a bad deal for me after all. A little fear, a lot of Essence. Dani shook, unspeaking, simply trying to take comfort in my presence. I turned my attention to the runes that had failed in the room. The large ones were still working correctly, but the one that had created a minor portal was burned off the ground and may have damaged the others.

I traced the remaining Runes, looking for flaws but found none. This worried me. I had not found any flaws the first time things went bad, after all. I smoothed the stone in the damaged area and began again, slowly cutting into the stone and creating the pattern I needed for the Inscription. Though somewhat recovered thanks to the miners’ deaths, I still had far less Essence than I felt I needed. I was sitting around two percent capacity, so working at all was exhausting. I went slowly, double checking every bit of the pattern, looking for any flaw. I found none, so I finished with the activation Inscription, watching as the pent up Essence from the large Runes filled this new one.

I held my ‘breath’ as the slightly smaller Rune activated and ‘sighed’ with relief as it worked as I had expected it to. Each Rune, in turn, activated, the spiraling activations coming closer and closer to me with each revolution. The last Rune activated, I braced myself to fill with the Essence which was howling through my tunnels to power this massive series of Runescript. Nothing happened.

<What the…?> It had worked for Dani! Why wasn’t I gaining any Essence?! I checked my work furiously, looking for anything that may explain why this was not working correctly. The Runes were glowing brightly; the Essence was there for the taking! Wait. The Runes were glowing… They were containing the Essence. Right, Dani had been able to cultivate only while in the output area of the Rune. It didn’t just release the Essence into the air; it held it in place. I could be moved over to the Rune, but that would put me in an awkward position, not to mention I was super low on Essence.

I cast about for a solution to my problem but only frustrated myself. Dani picked up on my agitation and quizzed me, “What is the matter? Is the Cat coming back?”

<No, it isn’t coming back, sweets. I’m upset because I can’t reach the Essence from those Runes.> The discouragement in my voice pulled her out of her fear, and she bent her mind to helping me. What a good being to be bonded to for life! We went through several options, but nothing seemed to fit my needs. Then Dani verbalized something that made just… just perfect sense.

“Well, why not use the inverse Rune? If these normal Inscriptions collect Essence, the inverted Rune should release it, right?” Dani shyly contributed.

<If I had lips, I would kiss you, you beautiful, shining orb!> I fervently exclaimed.

Dani blushed. “Oh, stop, you big ol’ flirt.”

I bent my will to the task, creating one last Rune in the set. It looked wrong, like a scar on the floor next to the perfectly formed non-inverse Runes surrounding it. Luckily, it was really small. We’re talking about an inch in diameter. The first Rune in the doorway had a radius of nearly six feet. The thick, condensed, pearlescent Essence that had been contained by the final Rune cascaded into the activation sequence of the inverted Rune.

Essence dripped out—literally dripped. The Essence had been collected in such a large quantity and forced into such a heavily purified and condensed state that it was in liquid form. Each drop was a shining gem and moved with a viscous swaying as it was pushed forward by the droplets forming behind it.

<Look at that, Dani.> My mental voice was a whisper as I watched the area slowly fill with flowing Essence. After a few seconds in the open air, the liquid seemed to steam and slowly moved back into a thick, mist-like state before dissipating into the air like humidity. Even with the Runescript then grabbing it and returning it to the center, the room was soon again dense with Essence. The air was easily two to three times as thick as it had been since the Essence couldn’t escape and just continued to become more potent.

“Cal, can you quickly make a drain? Let it sink down into a reservoir under us and the tree, so as it evaporates, it comes up through the hole where we are,” Dani directed me quickly. Her words pulled me from my stupor, my utter excitement had been holding me still. I formed the drain as she had requested, lining it with the tungsten I had found in my first attempt at making a tunnel. I wanted nothing breaking this reservoir, no sir! The condensed Essence slipped into the opening, flowing in a manner more befitting molasses, yet draining all the same. A tiny droplet was made every few seconds, but each one was purified Essence and therefore exceedingly potent.

The reservoir I made filled very slowly. In an hour, it had only collected about an eighth of an inch of Essence. Once in the open space of the reservoir, it again evaporated into the air of the small area. Soon, the air pressure made it try to go back up the drain. I opened a miniscule hole under me, allowing the Essence to flow up into where I made my existence.

<Bubbles!> I shouted joyfully. The pressurized Essence had agitated my puddle, resulting in—you guessed it—bubbles! Not only that, but I greedily cultivated the flowing Essence, quickly regaining my lost strength. I gained roughly half a percent of my capacity an hour, a huge amount. To put it in perspective, the seven F-ranked miners that had died had only given me roughly the same amount, half of a percent each that is. This means that if the rate continued, I would gain the equivalent Essence of a life per hour!

The amount I was able to take in was not nearly the amount the reservoir was allowing into the room at large as the released Essence gently blew past me, but I wasn’t worried. I’d get it all eventually! I was basking in the healing feeling of happiness when I felt a hole appear in my glee. Oh no.

<Dani,> I urged her to stop eating and pay attention.

“Hmm? What? This is nice,” Came her languid response.

<The Cat. It is back in the dungeon.> Instantly losing her cheerful attitude, the hunted feeling appeared in Dani’s manner again.

<It’s injured, though. It is bleeding heavily and limping. Still able to–> I winced as it wiped out the Boss Squad on the first floor in moments. <Still able to fight, it seems,> I finished. I watched as it went to the healing potion contained in the cistern and sniffed it. It shook its head and narrowed its eyes, then continued back down toward us. Dang, it knew I had poisoned that potion. Ah, well. That would have been helpful.

The Cat quickly wound its way through the second floor, wearily returning to my room. As it crossed the threshold it stopped, nostrils flaring as its eyes—all three of them—widened. It cautiously stepped further into the room, then rushed to where the most concentrated Essence was condensing. It stared at the liquid Essence like someone that had just been handed a baby, a bit uncomfortable and unsure of what to do—would moving it break it?

One of its three remaining tentacles gently moved down to hover over the few drops that hadn’t gone into the drain and flicked a tongue out, sucking in the concentrated Essence. The tentacle spasmed, flailing back and forth in pseudo-pain—like a human taking a bite from a lemon. The drop of Essence sped down its throat, moving into the stomach of the Cat’s main body. The Cat dropped to the floor, gasping through its nose as it struggled to absorb the potent energy. Successful after a few minutes, it got to its feet and reached for another drop. This continued, lick, swallow, spasm, repeat, for nearly half an hour.

Finally seeming to have enough, it lay down, contented. As if finally noticing my attention, its eyes flicked to where we were. Hiss. Well, I guess it still wasn’t friendly. It fell asleep facing the door, tentacles moving and keeping watch of their own volition.

<I don’t think it is going to go away,> I mentioned to Dani.

Exasperated, she looked at me. “Ya think? You just had to feed a wild animal.”

Chapter Twenty-seven

Dale awoke to a ruckus in the camp. Having slept behind the stone walls of the chapel on a soft bed, he could hardly make himself become concerned about what might be going on. He yawned, walking over to where Hans was sleeping.

“You know wha– Yawn, what’s going on out there? Festival?” Dale tried to rub the grit from his eyes.

“Nah,” Hans grunted uncaringly. “Might as well get up now, though. We still need to find some more party members.”

They started getting ready for the day, putting on armor and sharpening weapons. That reminded Dale to ask about the enchantments on this armor and weapon. Hans told him it was a standard protection and feather enchantment on his armor, meaning that it weighed next to nothing when it was equipped. For the morningstar, there was a stability enchantment on it that would push the ball and spike away from the shaft, increasing the range on the weapon by about a foot and making it very hard to block the attack.

Dale activated the enchantment on his weapon for the first time. “So it just… floats there?” He doubted the effectiveness in a nonplussed tone.

Hans waved his hand over the area between the ball and the hilt showing that there was no resistance. “Try and stop that with a sword and see what happens. The sword hits nothing, you hit their head. You can adjust the distance too and make it a surprise attack. Suddenly, you have range! In battle, surprise kills, yeah?”

Dale nodded. It actually seemed a much more interesting weapon now. They moved out of the chapel to see a roaring mob of people. Guild Master Frank was shouting them down, trying to restore order. A few people were crying as healers moved among them. Hans and Dale looked at each other, nervous only for a few seconds before they moved in to see what was happening.

“Listen!” Frank was bellowing. “We have no information right now! We believe it was a breakout, monsters escaping the dungeon. We don’t have any knowledge beyond the fact that a few F-ranked people were slain and several people were injured before a Mage blasted an area it was believed to be in. No, we don’t know what it was—it was too dark! Please, we have not seen anything in the dungeon that a proper group cannot handle! Go about your business. We will give you any information we can find.”

Hans tapped Dale on the arm. “We better hurry and find a group if we want to get in there. They might close it off while they look into this.” Dale was pulled over to the mess tent where they found Rose waiting for them. She was in leather armor that was obviously heavily enchanted from the glow coming off of her. Inscribed armor and weapons rarely glowed and only then if they were breaking down, allowing Essence to escape. Enchantments on armor were made of layered Essence and would, therefore, shine as it was consumed in order to power the Rune. In short, glowing enchantment? Necessary! Glowing inscribed Rune? Really bad.

“You made it through the night. Good,” Rose deadpanned. “Where are the others?”

Hans leered at her. “Well, my Rose, we have been unable to find anyone else worthy to travel in your company. Sadly, we must now scavenge the bottom of the barrel in our search.”

“I am not your Rose. What positions do we have filled? What are your specialties?” Rose looked back and forth between them.

Hans gave an elaborate bow. “Oh, how my heart aches to hear you say such words! I, ma’am, am a humble knife wielder. I specialize in ending threats before they become aware of me or my comrades’ presence.”

“An assassin. Just great.” Rose grunted in a very unladylike noise. “Swell company you keep, Dale. What do you do?” Hans looked a bit affronted.

Dale was unsure. “I’m, uh. I fight with a mace and buckler?”

Rose nodded. “A fighter. Good, hopefully, you’ll specialize soon. What are your talents in the earth domain?”

Hans intercepted the question smoothly, “He has not found the path he will walk yet. He has been focused too hard on getting to this level, I am afraid.”

“Fine, so we have an assassin, a fighter, and a ranger.” She drew her bow to explain her term. “That’s a good mix to start, but we need to fill our party out with some other people.”

Hans nodded. “Good thinking! Smart and beautiful!” He graced her with a wink as she rolled her eyes.

“I’m not into old men,” Rose denied him coolly. Hans pantomimed, clutching his heart as a massive form walked up to the conversing group.

“Did I hear thou art looking for someone to enter into the dungeon with thou and thine?” a gravelly voice boomed, the words giving off a feeling of near archaic speech.

Hans looked over, eyes flaring at the interruption. “Mmhmm, we are. I’m sorry though, lad, F-ranked aren’t allowed to the second level anymore,” Hans dismissed offhandedly, returning to his determined flirtation.

The voice corrected him, “Not if they are members of the Guild. I am not. Also, I have already proven my worth in combat, finishing the second floor with my previous compatriots.” The dawn broke at that moment, allowing light to begin flooding over the horizon. The young man came into view, an odd type of armor on him. Metal plates were interspersed with furs, leaving a large amount of flesh showing. That flesh was rippling with dense muscle, drawing their eyes up to an arm casually holding an oversized warhammer single-handedly. The man’s eyes were green, his long hair a deep red.

“Barbarian,” Rose breathed, eyes shining. Was her breath coming a little faster?

Hans smile genially. “Now the problem is that you can’t join a Guild group, can you?”

The man’s eyes darkened, his face stony as he set his jaw, nodded, and turned silently away. He paused as Dale called after him.

“Hold!” Dale commanded. “What is your name?”

The warhammer came to rest on the ground. “My name? I bear the name of my father and my father’s father, for generations uncountable. We are the mighty hunters of the frozen north, giants among the men of humanity. I am what you call a ‘barbarian’,” He lifted his chin disdainfully. “I am the warrior known as Tom.”

“Tom,” Hans sputtered. “Your name is Tom. All that build up and your name is Tom.”

Tom squinted at him meaningfully, “Is this an issue?”

“No, not at all… Tom,” Hans cheerfully denied.

Dale snapped his fingers. “You were the one who killed a teammate.” He remembered.

Tom’s face fell. He nodded. “To my great shame, it is true. Now, no others will allow me to join them in battle, as they fear I would turn on them as would a rabid dog.” He looked up, setting his features. “I swear to you, it was an accident, a moment of battle rage instilled in me over the loss of my comrades. I took out the fury of their deaths on the giant creature, Raile, with an untested weapon. His armor shattered, the shards impacting and killing my dear friend.”

Dale nodded. “That is what I had heard. Hans is correct, though. You cannot join us without joining the Guild. Would you be opposed to that?”

Tom looked at him, as confused as if Dale had sprouted a breast on his forehead. “If they would have me. I know of none who would willingly turn down that chance.”

Dale glanced at Hans. “It is customary that a man is tested before joining, yes? Can we call this dungeon run a test and deal with the paperwork tonight? His Essence is very pure.”

Hans groaned. “Fiiiine. Ugh.” He looked at Rose. “Wait, you are in the Guild, right?”

“Yes,” was her verbose response.

“Can I join you as well?” a small voice piped up. “I know you are good people, to believe in Tom and his innocence as I do. I can help.” A robed figure stepped into their midst. Dale looked at him, recognizing him as if from a long forgotten dream.

“You!” Dale exclaimed excitedly. “You’re the cleric who healed Josh when Raile crushed him!”

The cleric brightened. “You remember me?” he inquired hopefully.

“How could I not? You are in the Guild and,” Dale squinted for a second, “a D-rank four?”

“Five,” he responded proudly. “My name is Adam.”

Hans was less pleased. “Oh, sure, let’s just bring anyone who wants to go! We don’t need to test people, nahhh. Let’s just grab a few randos and charge on in!” he grumbled, moving off toward the dungeon entrance. “Thought I was going to be part of choosing the team, but noooo.”

“Works for me. Just remember that right now this is on a temporary basis, okay everyone? We don’t know you yet.” Dale shrugged. “Let’s go then! Unless anyone needs some time to prepare?” The shaking of heads announced their readiness. They moved as an excited group to begin their incursion to the dark and desolate depths of the dreary dungeon. They climbed down the unguarded stairs, ignoring the crowds of people milling around, no one seemed to mind that they were moving down anyway. Just before they entered, Hans pointed out that blood had poured out of the entrance. Beyond the drying blood was a perfectly straight line on the floor, after which the ground was perfectly clean.

“This is the line where the dungeon really begins.” They stepped across and began their descent.

Just after they entered, Guild Master Frank made an announcement to the gathered people, “We are going to build a wall around this entrance today. The entrance and exits to it will be guarded at all times to prevent this sort of tragedy in the future. Until then, the dungeon is closed! We will send a team to check on it after the wall is built, but until then no one goes in! The Guild will be providing food to anyone who wants it free of charge until this event is concluded.”

While that didn’t get any reaction, his next announcement that freshly imported beer and ale would also be free for the event certainly got a loud cheer.

Dale

“This is weird!” Dale shouted, smashing his morningstar into a Basher. “They have never been so aggressive before!” The Bashers were absolutely throwing themselves at the group, heedless of their losses or injuries. Tom swung his hammer back and forth, crushing several with each swing. If the Rune on it had not allowed for it to be light enough to swing around like a small branch, he would have been overwhelmed already.

“Stop whining and kill faster!” Rose shouted back. Arrows were leaving her bow at a prodigious rate, so many in a short time that Dale was wondering how she hadn’t run out.

“Anything for you, my sweet Rose!” Hans chimed in, suddenly vanishing from sight. Unleashing his true ability for the first time Dale had ever seen, nearly a dozen Bashers suddenly fountained blood and dropped to the ground.

The fight unexpectedly over, each of them sank to the ground to catch their breath. All except Hans who was watching Rose, hoping for a hint of approval. They were only in the second of the four main rooms and already nearly exhausted. The Bashers were far more numerous than they ever had been, a veritable swarm of life that tried to crush others beneath an onslaught of flesh and bone.

“What is going on here?” Adam panted as he held his knees.

Dale shook his head. “No idea, but we can afford to go slowly. I say we take our time, get to know each other, and cultivate. Then we come up with a plan to deal with all of this.”

Rose got a very uncomfortable look on her face. Dale noticed and tried to guess at the reason behind it. “Rose, try to cultivate in here. I need to as well. The sooner my Essence is fixed from that shattering, the better. I think it would benefit you as well.”

All except Hans—who was on lookout duty—sat in the lotus position and began to draw in the power of the heavens and the earth. A shocked look passed Rose’s face as if she had thought this chance would be too good to be true. Essence filled her, being drawn in twice as fast as anyone else, as Dale watched in shock.

“Do you have a really good cultivation technique?” He smiled at her. “That is amazing!”

Rose shook her head, her voice coming out dreamily as her main focus remained on her cultivation. “It’s because I have a dual affinity. I have two open paths for Essence to flow along, but they both have to be used in parallel; else it sticks in my meridians, and I cannot get the Essence to my center.”

Dale realized his own focus had faded, so he quickly began drawing in more of the Essence. All of the people in the D-rankings drew in massive amounts of Essence, yet still, Tom’s center was filling faster than all of them. He bragged for a moment to tease them, then realized that it simply meant he could hold much less Essence in his center than them. He was only in the F-rankings, after all.

“Is the Essence… fading in here?” Rose curiously examined the surroundings, unused to the effects cultivating might have on the dungeon.

Dale nodded. “It usually takes, I don’t know, half an hour? This was ten minutes, at best!” He looked at Hans for confirmation.

“Look at this! The Essence in here is… moving?” Hans questioned, his eyes bright enough that Dale knew he was using Essence enhanced vision.

“It is going deeper inward!” Adam exclaimed in amazement.

Hans nodded gravely. “That’s what she said.”

“Rose did not utter a word,” Tom corrected him, confused by this turn of the conversation. “Where is the Essence going?”

“I guess we are going to have to find out!” Hans jauntily began strutting deeper into the deadly dungeon. They all stood up and resumed their journey, moving into the tunnel that connected the rooms. Dale had to pull Rose out of the path of traps several times.

“I don’t suppose you have any open meridians?” He was a bit exasperated as he pulled her away from another rock fall she had almost triggered. “Can you cycle Essence to your eyes?”

“I know how…” Rose flushed. “I’ve never done it, though. I’ve just never had a way to replenish my Essence if I used it.”

Dale nodded. “We’ll explain it when we clear the next room.” They stepped around the corner and went very still. Row upon row of Bashers blocked their way across the room.

“This should be interesting,” Hans noted, slowly drawing his daggers. As if that was a signal, the swarm bounded toward them with deadly intent.

Chapter Twenty-eight

I watched the Cat until it finally awoke. Stretching powerfully as all cats seem to do, it exposed a regrown tentacle that the enchantments on the Silverwood tree had sliced off. It glanced at the tentacle and purred, pleased by what it saw. The tentacle reached down and pet the Cat, reminding me that they were separate creatures. The huge Cat glanced up at the celestial glass above and hissed. Apparently, it did not like the brightness of the room. A few people had gathered and were looking down, commenting on the unexpected sight of the Cat. It gazed around the room, all three eyes again locking on the space where Dani and I cowered under the Silverwood tree.

It padded over and peered down at where we were. The night before had taught me caution, however, and I had reduced the size of the opening as well as lined the space with poison and spikes. No one would put their hand in this jar without losing a chunk of it. I could feel the malevolent gaze of the Cat as it tried to determine if hunting me was worth the trouble. In the disconcerting way of all cats, it seemed to lose all interest and instead walked away and resumed basking in the thick Essence, occasionally lapping up a small droplet of the super-concentrated Essence.

I was also getting stronger and was back to near thirteen percent capacity. To achieve my next rank, I needed to strain against the bounds of my current capacity until they weakened enough for me to achieve a breakthrough. If I had a week or so, I could easily move into D-rank four, possible even D-five if I had uninterrupted time to cultivate. The sun had risen, though, and soon, I felt the steps of a group coming to try their luck. I turned my attention to them, as the Cat didn’t seem to be threatening me anymore.

I no longer felt the need to hold back. With this influx of Essence, I had enough to fully devote my creatures to attacking and could restore them to full strength without the worry of running too low to defend myself. Right now, it was far more important to me to get every drop of Essence I could in an attempt to force a breakthrough. If that meant cannibalizing my troops, so be it! I’d rather use them to take out the humans, though. I called every Basher out of their hidden warrens, forcing their minds to the breaking point as I ordered all of them to fight to the death. The heavy pressure of combat that I was going to apply was now just beginning in the second room of the first floor.

Dale’s group had new people in it. I recognized a few of them from their time in my dungeon, but the female was entirely new to my depths. I caught their names as they talked and prepared to give them the fight of their lives—a real battle. As they wasted their time cultivating, I arranged all of the remaining Bashers of the first floor into ranks in the next room. When they attacked, they would move as a wave, the first rank jumping, then the second directly after. The third rank would start charging as soon as the first hit and jump to attack when the second wave landed their attacks. Then they would reform in their lines to do it again, over and over until the humans were pulp.

The lazy adventurers made their painfully slow way to the third main room of the first floor, stopping in shock at the arrayed forces. They reached for the weapons they had foolishly put away… which was when I gave my command to attack. The waves of Bashers charged forward, flying recklessly toward the uncomprehending adventurers. With a sound reminiscent of a drumline being played, the smooth horn of each of the Bashers found a home somewhere. Some were dodged and hit the tunnel wall, many hit the front line adventurers. A few hit those in the rear, Rose and Adam, who cried out in pain louder than those standing on the front line. Those cries drove my Bashers into a frenzy.

My lines of Bashers kept up a constant battering of the adventurers, even as they began to counterattack. A warhammer I had gifted Tom some time ago came into play, the enchantment releasing a shockwave of force with each successful hit that was enough to burst the eardrums of the nearest Bashers if not kill them directly. The Bashers actually hit would vanish in a spray of viscera, the force of the strike quintupled by the potent enchantment. The roaring barbarian was soon covered in gore and began laughing as the blows seemed to not affect him. He charged forward into the room, leaving his companions behind as he sought a glorious death in battle. I was more than happy to oblige him.

He spun his whole body in a spiral, killing a half dozen Bashers in midair. Their coats now sanguine where they were once white, the Bashers howled like dogs as they threw themselves at this lone target. Several were able to impact his knees from behind, driving him to the ground with an oomph. Racing toward his head from all sides, many were rebuffed as arrows slew them. A dagger attached to a swiftly moving Hans snicked into the battle, killing as many in near a second as Tom had managed the entire fight. Still, several Bashers landed their attack but were knocked away at the last second by a glowing barrier. The cleric had formed a wall of solid Essence around his kneeling comrade’s head, though the cost of driving his Essence so far from himself was making him shake and sweat.

Dale had also joined the melee, swinging his morningstar to deadly effect. The spikes on the ball, if they did not kill the Bashers directly, opened massive gashes that bled out the small bodies in seconds. Powering through arrows, Rose never stopped moving as she weaved amongst the attacks, firing at a speed which numbed the mind. If a Basher got too close, the hardened shaft of the bow would swing at them, most often crushing their spines. As many Bashers as there were, they still were simply no match for such a well-equipped team. I needed to increase my ability. This purge of creatures may actually be just what I needed to start filling the lair with more dangerous Mobs.

The party stood in the room—until they fell to the ground that is. Adam fell first, the strain of holding the barrier draining him to a paler color than was his norm. He hit the floor with a small splash as he fell into the lake of blood and bodily fluids. The others followed suit, except Hans who eyed the floor with distaste. Despite a few splatters on him from the wildly swinging warhammer, his clothing was still immaculate. The blood soon vanished, except in the areas where the human auras were too close. Small puddles of blood were soon the only remnants, but even those vanished as the party moved away from them.

They sat down and began cultivating in an attempt to recoup the expenditure of Essence they had used. Adam especially was working hard to swiftly condense the cultivated Essence, and color began returning to his face. The expended Essence had returned to him quickly. Well, technically the Essence had actually looped out from him, formed a barrier around Tom’s head, then returned to Adam’s center when the barrier was dropped. Still tiring, I assumed.

Dani asked me to explain what was happening, so I connected with her to allow her to see as I did. We closely inspected the group. The lanky, rangy form of the blond Hans was our first; we watched his blue and roving eyes inspect his surroundings for any threat.

Dani murmured to me, trying not to get the attention of the Cat, “You think he is about average for a human? I heard Rose call him an assassin under her breath, and I remember someone saying assassins tend to blend in.”

<I don’t know; he has a… well, practically a noble bearing, don’t you think?> I serenely murmured.

Dani whipped her attention to me. “Are you feeling okay?”

<Mmmm soooo much Essence from that. I’m having trouble absorbing all of it in one go.>

“Well, turn some of it into loot drops then!” she demanded. Oops. I had forgotten. I dumped a bunch of potions, poisons, and a few trinkets. Coins clattered to the floor, drawing their attention.

<Oh, that did help a lot.> I sighed in relief. <Good call.> We then returned to our inspection of the people as they took the bribe—I mean, collected loot. Rose was tall, raven-haired, and dusky, looking like she could blend easily into the shadows before ending her prey, a true hunter if I ever saw one. Adam was also tall but was very pale and had little musculature. Since his cheekbones were prominent, he had a noble, aristocratic look to him as well. Tom, the barbarian, stood over six and a half feet tall and was all hardened muscle and hair. His freckled face spoke of a life outdoors, and his wild, red hair was as long in its braid as was Rose’s. His chest hair was as long as the short hair on Adam’s head. I bet he could braid it if he wanted.

This brings us to Dale. Good ol’ Dale. He was a husky young man and had the look of someone who had transformed fat into muscle through hard work. While his muscles were not as well defined as Tom’s, I knew for a fact that he could land a hit with the best of them. He had the common look of the area, brown hair with a well-trimmed beard and mustache and common brown eyes. I was very familiar with Dale and looked forward to absorbing him. During our scrutiny of them, they had finished cultivating and began to move to the next room, planning their attack on the first floor Boss.

Dale

“That–pant–was–pant–insane,” Adam managed. The Essence he had forced out of his body was slow in returning, and cultivation had only been able to restore it to a certain point. “What the heck is going on?!”

Hans looked troubled, which had the effect of making Dale very nervous. To see Hans without a sarcastic grin felt like a true portent of doom. He had even stopped flirting. Hans looked startled when Dale lightly punched him to get his attention.

“What’s on your mind, big guy?” Dale prodded, giving Hans a look that conveyed his worry.

Hans shook his head. “This is making me remember a tale I heard a while back. I didn’t think it was true. According to legend, sometimes it seems that a dungeon is suddenly filled with danger, far more than is typical. There is always an event of some kind that sets it off, and the dungeon seems to be filled with raging creatures and sudden maliciousness.” He nodded at Dale. “We’ve had a taste of that when we came here to find the cursed earth blocking the entry. I think… I think we should leave.”

The others, especially Tom, cried out in surprise and negation. Hans, the strongest killer in the group, wanted them to leave? They argued with him furiously for a few minutes, though he eventually won the argument with a simple reminder.

“Tom, as a Guild hopeful, cannot enter the lower level without a C-ranked cultivator to grant him permission, and I will not grant it. He could enter if he were to forever leave behind his chances of joining the Guild. The rest of you I outrank, and I order you to stay out of the lower level,” Hans calmly stated with steel in his voice. He began walking back to the entrance. Tom was the first to follow, face as red as his hair as his anger threatened to engulf him.

“Well, dammit,” Rose muttered harshly as she joined them. Dale and Adam fell into the line. They continued picking their way back to the entrance with Dale pointing out each trap to Rose so she could familiarize herself with the features of them. Soon, her sharp eyes were allowing her to point them out before even Dale saw them, making him swell with pride at his teaching skills.

The normally Essence-filled air had very little in it currently, making Dale nervous. Something was very wrong in the dungeon, and they were running away from finding the source. The dungeon was everything to him, a source of wealth and power that he was only just beginning to taste. His rumination was interrupted as he walked into Adam, who had abruptly come to a stop in front of him. Startled for a second, Dale started to glare until he saw what had caught the group’s attention.

A wall of light stretched the span of the doorway, shimmering and seeming to whisper secrets that begged for the attention of the listener. It was… seductive. Dale found himself drawn toward it, his mind lost in the pulsating glory he beheld. He was jerked off of his feet—to his great protest—and placed facing away from the entrance along with the other members of the group. His mind was filled with rage at the treatment, soon washed away by confusion.

“Wh–” Dale paused and cleared his throat. He was so thirsty suddenly. “What just happened?”

Hans was the only one looking back the other way. “Barrier spell,” he answered shortly. “Touch it, get fried by Mana. We may be screwed.”

“Someone trapped us in here?” Adam whispered, eyes getting round.

Hans shook his head. “No, someone locked everyone out. I think we must have missed something important. Frank wouldn’t just lock this place down without good reason. Something must have spooked him beyond a minor breakout of Bashers. Dammit! Why didn’t we wait for more information?!” he shouted abruptly, startling the group.

“Screw information, why did we skip breakfast?” Tom groaned, his stomach realizing it had been forgotten. His reminder made everyone realize they had not planned well for this dungeon dive. Stomachs rumbling all around, tempers started to flare. A few minutes of arguing got them no closer to a solution, forcing them to make decisions.

“Hans,” Rose started, “how long until this barrier is removed?”

Hans shrugged, knowing where this would lead the conversation. “Likely, they are building defenses around the stairwell. Normally, this would take a day, maybe two, but the earth Mages that would do that quickly are all tied up building a sewer system at the capital. It could be a week before the door is open again.”

“Well, then our path is clear,” Dale announced. “Hans, there is no way but onward. We need to clear the dungeon and leave through the Boss room.”

Hans began to worriedly fret. “Listen, if there is something that spooked Frank enough that he would close the place instead of fighting it right away, I don’t think it would be wise to charge in blindly. It is very possible this will end with all of our deaths. Are you okay with that?”

“Of course not, Hans! We need to try, though. We won’t last a week in here without aid. I’m betting no one brought more than a few sips of water, for one. Next, we have no food and no shelter. We can either face whatever the problem is now, as healthy as we are going to get or wait until we are weak from hunger and thirst. What say you?” Dale challenged him.

“I say it is still a bad idea. Sadly, it is the best we’ve got unless.” He looked around to see if anyone else had ideas. “No? Onward then, I suppose.” They shrugged and turned toward the deep dungeon, retracing their steps until they stood outside of the Boss room on the first floor. They shared their knowledge of the normal tactics, getting into formation as best they were able. Moving cautiously into the room, they prepared to fight.

Cal

Only the normal number of Mobs stood in the room, the five members of the Boss Squad. I had cycled out the normal squad with the Alpha Squad that I used specifically for ambushes I knew would succeed. The Alpha Squad had grown and were easily the oldest Mobs in the dungeon at this point—the only group that had not died. Intelligence shone in their eyes, showing me that if they had a Beast Core, they would be sentient by now.

The Essence that they absorbed from each kill had increased the potency of their attacks, adding their affinity as elemental damage. Their bodies were now striped in the colors of their Essence as well. This would be a win-win battle for me—either I rid myself of these persistent interlopers or I reclaim the upgraded patterns of the Alpha Squad. In both situations, I could only get stronger. Dale’s group entered the room, ready for battle.

I was actually taken by surprise. Before I could send the attack signal to my squad, an arrow accurately flew across the room and sliced the jugular of one of the two Oppressors, effectively reducing the number of my multi-attack Bashers to one. With a cry of rage, the remaining squad left their bleeding, twitching brother to his fate. The Alpha Squad was well used to working together at this point, which showed in their movements and tactics. Utilizing its ability to its fullest, the remaining Oppressor leaped off the earthen affinity Smasher and unleashed his attack from a distance. A blast of air as sharp as a blade raced away from him in a horizontal line, aimed downward from a high point of the jump to slash at an angle.

The blast hit the ground in front of Dale’s group, blasting shards of stone into the party—who lost sight of the charging Mobs in the resultant dust cloud. The impact of the Smasher’s feet on the ground allowed for the humans to successfully dodge when the massive Bashers tried to ram Hans and Adam during their momentary blindness. The infernal Impaler slipped into a hidden tunnel and began to circle behind the group. A warhammer landed on a Smasher, shattering its armor downward, literally shredding the animal’s insides with what had previously been its greatest protection.

A bow, acting as Rose’s staff, slammed into the other Smasher, but its hard armor made the attack ineffectual. The Smasher turned and battered Rose to the ground with a heavy attack; she cried out as she fell. Tom’s hammer descended like the judgment of god on to her aggressor, blasting the dying Basher into a mess of flying gore with the power of his attack. Hans was attacking the final Oppressor, dodging its rapid attacks while barely seeming to touch the ground. Soon, his flashing blades overwhelmed the poor creature, allowing it to join its brethren in death’s release.

No other assailants visible, the group tried to catch their breath and began to sit down. I watched a flash of fear cross Dale’s face as a memory impacted him. Eyes flashing silvery-brown, he glanced around the room. Raising his morningstar, he ran at Adam, who was working to heal Rose, her leg shattered. With a primal yell, Dale swung at the cleric, the morningstar on a crash course with his midsection. I watched in glee, having no idea what was making Dale attack his friend but glad to see it happening.

Mid-swing—just as Adam’s eyes began to widen with the realization that he was under attack—the top of the morningstar released from the shaft of the weapon, traveling out in the same, smooth arc the weapon’s hilt was traveling in. The spiked ball missed Adam by a foot, yet buried itself in the skull of the Impaler just as it left the hidden tunnel, horn blazing with infernal fire. Skull shattered on the first hit, the hellfire then raced along the Impaler’s body, consuming it absolutely.

Chapter Twenty-nine

The head of the morningstar came back to the hilt, resuming its place with a click. Adam returned to healing Rose but had to ask how Dale had known what was about to happen. Dale was exceedingly relieved that he had made the correct call.

“A while back, a guy in my old group, Steve, was standing in that spot and got skewered by a smaller version of that thing. I didn’t see it except right when we came through the door, so I knew it was trying the same trick,” Dale tried to say nonchalantly, still shaking from battle reaction.

Hans came and clapped him on the back. “Nice work! You’ve been practicing with that weapon then? Worked out the enchantment? I’m impressed by your control there. If you hadn’t known exactly what you were doing, you would have crushed Adam’s ribs! When did you start working out the kinks of it?” he babbled excitedly.

“Erm,” Dale sheepishly looked around, “I, ah, that’s actually the first time I’ve really used it…”

Hans looked on in shock as the others laughed a bit bleakly. “He’s mad. I’m stuck in the dungeon with a madman.” Hans was near inaudible as he passed judgment on Dale.

“Hey!” Dale yelled as the others laughed harder. “Better than skewered!” The group ignored him as they settled in to cultivate. Thanks to Adam, Rose was already healed from the fight.

“You do good work, Adam,” Rose praised him, “Thank you for fixing me up.”

Adam blushed furiously; he was very unused to female attention, regardless of his aristocratic looks. Perhaps because of them really. No commoner wanted to worry that their child would be slaughtered on suspicion of being a Royal bastard. “Um, anytime. Really. Sorry I’m not more… useful… in a fight.”

“A fight is not over until you are fighting the next one!” Tom declared what was obviously ancient barbarian wisdom. “Healing is as much a part of this battle as was my turning of those bunnies into flying orbs of goo!”

“Thanks? I think?” Adam muttered, trying to parse what Tom had declared. Tom looked very pleased with himself for some reason.

The Essence in this room was still fairly dense, so the group was able to recuperate much of their lost energy. Even Hans joined this time, needing a bit of a pick-me-up. A few minutes into this, Rose suddenly cried out and clutched at her chest.

“What? Rose, what’s wrong?” Adam shouted, by her side in an instant, preparing to heal her.

“My Chi!” Rose gasped, tears in her eyes. “It’s healing! Get back, I need to cultivate!” The others took a step back as she drank in Essence as a sponge takes in water. Switching to his enhanced sight, Dale watched as the trillions of shards and imperfections in her spiral began to smooth, the natural flow being restored. Tears were pouring down her face as she smiled a real smile for the first time since Dale had met her; he watched as her center became whole.

As the last of the broken Chi threads fixed themselves, the Essence around her increased the speed of refinement, howling into her center as her body took in the Essence it had been denied for over twenty years. In only a few minutes, the loose Essence in the air was depleted to the point that she could not pull another drop, though her entire being cried out for more. Her center being restoring had an interesting effect on the rest of the group. Her smile had increased morale, and the relaxation in her stance told of her release from decades of pain. Determination solidified, the group resumed their dungeon dive, descending into the second floor.

Dale led the way, determined to clear the sub-level and heal his own center. The difference in speed between Rose’s cultivation before and after healing proved that his increased speed was but a fraction of what was possible. He threw himself at the first roaming squad of upgraded Bashers they found, killing two in as many strokes. His sudden violence and initiative shocked the others, and they became caught up in competition.

Arrows—missing teammates by fractions of an inch—thudded into weak points in the Bashers. A warhammer moving faster than it had any right to transformed bounding bodies into jelly, splattering the barbarian with gore. Dale’s morningstar cracked bones and rock armor, and a well-placed dagger from Hans severed the thread keeping their enemies tenuously attached to life. Adam watched the laughing, blood-crazed team he was a now part of and began nervously praying.

Soon, they were standing in the first room breathing deeply as they attempted to calm themselves and replenish their stamina. The gore from the groups of Bashers in the room still dripped gently from the ceiling, intermittently splattering them with viscera. They dropped to their meditative poses and began cultivating, Dale working as hard as he could without sacrificing purity or density. Easily outstripping even Adam, Rose cultivated with the force of a tornado, drinking in Essence through two open channels of affinity.

They relaxed a bit as the room drained of Essence, flowing unnaturally fast out of the room and deeper into the dungeon. They stood, preparing their cooling muscles for more fighting and entered the tunnel. Only one other time had the path to the final room been so clear, though this time the Essence was rushing toward the Boss room, not away. Rage abated, they moved with more caution, skirting around traps carefully instead of recklessly. The enemies Dale’s group fought against had tactics used against them instead of just force and anger. Soon, they stood in the third main room, looking at the odd loot they had just found.

“Is this arrow type even usable?” Dale handed the items in question to Rose. The metal shaft was weighted at the tip, round and heavy.

Rose inspected it, held it to her ear, and shook it. “It has some kind of liquid in it?” she whispered wonderingly. “I… could use it, but I have no idea what would happen. What about those daggers, Hans?””

Hans had an odd look on his face, a nearly sickly grimace. “Yeah, these are usable. They are the weapon of a killer, not a fighter. I’m… not sure I want them. Look at this.” He held up the daggers, pointing at the tiny Inscription on the hilt directly opposite the point.

“If I am not mistaken, that is the inverted liquid Rune we’ve seen previously. If I do this,” here he twisted the dagger hilt, opening a small, hollow compartment, “and fill it with poison,” which he did, a vial of poison having recently dropped as it had in every room thus far, “when I activate the Rune, the poison will be injected into whoever gets stabbed, depositing it deep inside their body. That will make it spread very quickly.” Hans actually shuddered. “I think something is going on here.”

Dale looked at him sharply. He had learned to trust Hans’s instincts. “What do you mean?”

“It is almost like the dungeon now wants us to succeed, which makes me nervous. Earlier, it threw everything it had at us in an attempt to stop or kill us. Now, it is outfitting us with poison and odd weaponry. I think… I think we should make sure to use this stuff.” Hans fiddled with the new assassin’s blades.

Even Adam had found a weapon he could use, an oaken staff banded in tungsten. It had the Inscription to become light as a feather on it as well as a spiked end at the base that could be used for walking or stabbing. The top held a fist-sized topaz stone, which would allow him to focus his celestial Essence away from his body better than even a diamond would. With the staff being so light, he could weave it through the air like a baton, and the heavy weapon would still hit as hard as normal.

Dale looked at a glass vial he had found at his feet, trying to determine what it could possibly be used for. The shape of it was fanciful—an odd rounded shape on one end, while flat with a small convex part at the base. The vial would never stand on a shelf, the cylindrical shape and odd ends would make it roll around. Plus, there was no discernible way to open it, making him assume it was intended to be thrown or smashed. The conundrum made him scratch his head, the blood drying there was making him itch. He glanced at his weapon, and a thought occurred to him.

He activated the enchantment to allow the head of the weapon to move away from the hilt and placed the vial there. The odd, flat-then-grooved pattern of the bottom fit on to the hilt, and the head came back to rest on the curved top. It was now obvious that if he hit something, the vial would shatter, coating whatever he struck with the liquid contained within. He pointed this out to his group, and they decided to try and use it after he promised he would dodge the liquid.

Tom got nothing else that was obviously for him. They supposed the warhammer was enough as it was. Feeling left out, he coated his hammer in poison, grumbling about not having a new toy. Feeling as prepared as possible, they made their way through the oddly empty tunnel, entering the Boss room to a strange, frightening sight.

Cal

“Cal,” the whispered voice of Dani pulled my attention away from Dale’s group. I had just dropped them the gear I felt would help them kill the Distortion Cat prowling in my Boss room.

<What?> I refocused my attention on her, then upward, to where the Distortion Cat was staring directly at us. <Ahh!> I shrieked in surprise! When had that thing gotten so close? I had thought I knew its every motion. It narrowed all three of its eyes and began threading a tentacle down the shaft, carefully weaving it among the hundreds of roots between us. The tentacle seemed to stretch, growing thinner and allowing it to skirt around the spikes I had placed around the perimeter.

“Oh crap, oh crap, oh crap, oh crap,” Dani whispered as the tentacle drew ever nearer.

The end was drawing close, so I tried to comfort her as best as possible, <It is going to be alright, Dani. I’m… I’m so sorry I couldn’t protect you.>

The tentacle drew nearer, the maw opening and a tongue flicking hungrily around, forked like a snake. The gaping maw reached for Dani, wanting no more than her death.

“Well, that is new. Looks like it’s stuck. Hit it quick!” a voice directed softly, but in the silence of our impending death, they may as well have been shouting. The tentacle quickly began retreating, trying to escape while not touching the roots. It sliced poorly along a spike, opening a shallow wound as the Cat hissed. I turned my attention out of my immediate surroundings, watching the unfolding battle. Dani softly cried in relief.

Dale

The heavy hitters of their group were charging, and an arrow was already in the air. The Cat hissed again, and shadows began billowing out of it, darkening the room as the front line slid to a stop, unsure of this new ability. The arrow missed the Cat as it dodged, but the modified tip shattered at its feet, making a puddle of brilliantly shining light that the Cat accidentally dropped a back paw in. Now free of the shaft under the Silverwood tree, the Cat started to move—oblivious to the light shining with each step it took.

The room was now fully darkened, the light from above stopping against a wall of umbra only a foot below the celestial quartz. The furious Cat sprinted silently to the edge of the room, then charged at the group from their left, trying to catch them off guard. The shining paw was the only reason Tom noticed the pouncing animal. With a great shout of intermingled fear and adrenaline, he swung his mighty warhammer to intercept the Cat’s path. The Cat spun in midair, a tentacle snapping out and impacting the ground, throwing it out of the way but interrupting its own assault.

It faded back into the darkened room as the group moved to form a defensive half circle. Hans, Dale, and Tom stood with their backs to Adam and Rose, who, in turn, stood against a wall. Dale began calling out orders, telling everyone to begin using their Essence viewing abilities. Unfortunately, the darkness in the room was created by Essence so this vision could not penetrate the inky darkness. Rose pulled an arrow halfway back, squinting into the shadows and preparing herself. Adam looked around, trying to find any way to help. He looked to the heavens as he prayed, and an idea wriggled into his brain.

The Cat decided to end this farce of a battle and used a potent ability, a powerful sonic wail. The maw on each tentacle opened wide and shattered the still air with a pandemonium of noise. The roar was quadra-tonal, each maw having a slight variation of sound. Laced with infernal energy—the source of darkness itself—the noise hit the group as a physical blow, stunning them and paralyzing their muscles as the Cat charged in for the kill. Dale could feel the death of his new friends approaching but could not struggle away from the bonds the sonic wail had imposed on his mind and body.

Dale’s mind went into overdrive; the word ‘bonds’ had triggered a memory. The Cat appeared out of the darkness, now sauntering toward his helpless victims. Dale forced himself to reach out to the pendant he was wearing, infusing it with Essence. A ripple of golden light whooshed out of the pendant, destroying the infernal bonds placed on him. Dale leaped at the startled Cat, swinging his morningstar at its head. A tentacle blurred, moving in to catch the blow, shattering the glass vial and dumping the contents on to the massive Cat.

As the liquid poured across the front of the Distortion Cat’s body, light began to glimmer on it, increasing to a brilliant shine. At the same time, the liquid that had made its way on to the fur and skin of the Beast began melting anything it touched. The Cat howled and bounded back into the darkness, though its shining form and loud hissing gave its position away. The effect of the sonic wail ended; the rest of the group was able to spring into action. Rose began firing arrows as fast as she could line up the shots, Tom, Dale, and Hans charged the shining Beast, and Adam started an incantation.

Incantations were the verbal form of releasing Essence or Mana. Using an incantation tended to be frowned upon if a Rune was available because it permanently used up a person’s Essence for an instant, single use effect on the world. This allowed cultivators to shape their Essence or Mana—aided by hand gestures or movement—into the form they needed at that moment.

Incantations were especially powerful because they used all of the Essence provided in a single, massive burst. The Mages who had opened the portal recently had used incantations to quickly and evenly distribute power to the Runes inscribed on the portal obelisks, for instance. Heedless of the battle continuing, Adam carefully added his Essence to the spell forming from his words and actions.

The Cat was too agile to hit easily, each blow of Dale’s morningstar or Tom’s warhammer easily dodged while the tentacles smacked arrows out of the air. Hans stopped moving, concentrated for a second, and seemed to vanish into the darkness as he took a single step backward. He moved as quickly as the wind, hovering over the floor by a quarter inch. He suddenly shot high into the air and dove down, timing his attack for when the Cat was dodging a series of blows from the other fighters. The Cat moved too quickly, and while he was unable to land a killing blow, he did manage to stab his daggers into the Cat’s flanks and activate the Inscriptions, injecting poison deep into the wounds.

The Cat whipped around and focused entirely on Hans for a moment. Three tentacles slammed into his torso while the other dropped to the ground and provided stability for the attack. Hans braced himself as best he was able, crossing his arms in front of his face as the attack landed. Now flying through the air for an entirely different reason, he felt both of his arms break at odd angles and something inside him ruptured as his torso was impacted. He collided heavily with the wall and fell on his face awkwardly, unable to arrest his fall with his unresponsive limbs.

Tom landed his attack for the first time in the battle, crushing the tentacle that was providing stability to the massive Beast. The tentacle vanished in a gout of black blood, being ripped by the roots from the body of the Cat. Screaming, the Cat turned on him lashing out with its paws. The only thing that saved Tom from having the arteries of his neck severed was the acid which had destroyed two of the malice filled eyes and reduced its depth perception. The sharp claws tore open Tom’s chest, spraying the area with red blood over the black. Tom fought on, doing his best to ignore the potentially fatal wound.

Several arrows had found their mark, and a second tentacle now hung limp, connected to the body only by a scrap of flesh. Dale swung at the main body of the Cat, dealing some small damage but not enough to seriously hurt the Cat. The spikes only penetrated half an inch; its thick fur and tough, leathery hide underneath protected the Cat from real harm. The glow on the Cat was beginning to lessen, so it took an opportunity to vanish back into the shadows, a now-soft glow the only indication of its position. It charged at the wounded Tom when Adam finally finished his incantation.

Adam held up his staff, celestial Essence pouring from the topaz in the top like a sieve as his face grew far too pale. A beam of light shot upward, entering the celestial quartz far overhead. With this sudden influx of Essence, the Quartz above glowed stronger, flooding the Inscriptions with Essence which rebounded the energy downward, greatly extending the power and range of the Runescript placed upon it. The Runes, similar to the pendant Dale wore, tore through the veil of darkness below, dissipating it all at once. The Cat—which had leaped at Tom—was smashed to the floor by the massive pressure of the celestial Essence, while the others took a deep breath with feelings of hope filling them.

Tom did not waste the moment and swung down at the prone Distortion Cat, landing a blow even as it twisted away. The massive force behind the hammer shattered the spine of the Beast just beyond its back legs, rendering them useless. It roared and used the remaining tentacles as legs, dragging itself into the brilliant light—vanishing entirely. It appeared again a few feet away, running this time at Adam who had collapsed to the ground in exhaustion. Rose stepped in front of his fallen form, firing arrows wildly at the Beast charging her, but every attack seemed to either miss it or move right through its body without causing damage.

Rose screamed in frustration and terror as a tentacle raced toward her, tossing her aside with bone shattering force. It mauled Adam, vengefully tearing open his legs with vicious attacks. Dale and Tom reached the Cat, simultaneously swinging at it. Both missed, though the warhammer continued on and clipped the real form of the Cat, launching it away with a yowl. A lightly glowing silhouette was visible, though the illusion in front of them didn’t move. Tom took another step after the Cat but stumbled and fell to the floor, too weak from blood loss to continue. His hammer clattered to the floor as he fell unconscious.

Dale grabbed the warhammer and nearly fell over trying to lift it. “Right,” he thought, “it is bound to Tom.” Dropping the hammer, he raced after the Cat, viciously swinging his weapon into its acid eaten torso. With contemptuous ease, the Cat sent him flying in the same manner as it had Hans before.

Chapter Thirty

“Cal, we have to do something!” Dani frantically demanded, “If they die, we are screwed! It’ll come back here and… and…” She was unable to finish the thought.

<But what can I do?> I demanded. <Almost everything in here is dead—all of the creatures, Raile, and…> A thought hit me like a thunderbolt from on high. <I’ve got it, Dani.>

Dale

The Cat half-limped, half -dragged itself toward Dale, its single working eye fixed on the heart beating in Dale’s chest. Dale tried to struggle into a defensive position, but his limbs were broken, each small movement causing excruciating pain. He gasped for breath as a tentacle raised up above his body, plunging down directly into his heart. Although Dale’s heart had been reinforced by opening a meridian, the sharp point of the tentacle went directly through, leaving a perfectly round hole in his body. The hole began at the skin of his chest and exited his back where the talon had driven deep into the stone below him. The tentacle slowly receded, twisting as it did so as to inflict maximum pain to the dying man.

The Cat lowered its ruined face to his and hissed evilly, watching for the last bit of life to drain away from Dale. Dale stared into its eye, even as his own vision went dim. The bleeding hole of the Cat’s neck poured black blood on to him. Wait, what?

The huge body flopped over on to its side, head torn clean off. Tom stepped into Dale’s view, chest seemingly fully healed; only shiny scar tissue was present to show that he had been mortally wounded.

“Adam! Get thyself over here, ‘tis bad!” Tom boomed, dropping his warhammer to the ground as he cradled Dale’s still form. Dale’s vision darkened entirely as his body was filled with celestial light.

“It’s too late,” Adam whispered, tears streaming down his face. “I fixed the damage to his heart, but it is just… too late.”

“No!” Hans ran to his fallen friend. “I refuse to believe this! Work harder!” His voice broke on the last word.

“I have nothing left to give.” Adam sobbed. “I’m drained to near death myself.” He shook, his body wracked with sobs.

“Here!” Rose ran over to them, vials in her hands. “Pour this down his mouth!” She held out a healing potion.

“Rose, he is gone… It won’t help,” Adam informed her morosely.

SLAP. Her hand rocked Adam to the side; he looked at her startled and astonished out of his depression. “You will do what I say! Now!” she screamed in his face.

He took the vial, handing it to Hans, who poured the potent healing potion down his fallen friend’s throat. No effect was visible, no miracles appeared.

“Now you drink this!” Rose directed, handing Adam another vial that blazed with concentrated Essence. She gave another to Hans, directing him to administer it to Dale. Reluctantly obeying her, Adam drank the contents of the vial. It never reached his stomach, the potent Essence being absorbed directly into his center, lighting it up like a dawn forcing away the hold of night. The Essence rushed through him, filling him to his maximum potential and then continuing, the overflow of Essence beginning to burn out his meridians.

Quickly—full of panic—Adam returned to Dale and attempted to revive him. The Essence in Dale from the vial was now sitting in his center like a lump, unmoving. No matter what technique Adam tried, it refused to move, to connect to Dale’s life-force. His ministrations restarted Dale’s heart, but the man refused to regain consciousness.

“I’ve done… all I can.” Adam slumped. “He is alive, but… I think not really. Let’s get him out of here so we can at least give him a proper burial.” The stunned, sickened members of the team gathered his body and prepared to leave.

Cal

“He isn’t all the way dead, though!” Dani gasped. “You won’t get his Essence anymore!”

<I got all the stuff in his center, but you are correct; I didn’t get his life-energy. They must have revived him somehow.> I looked at them wonderingly. I couldn’t absorb him since he was alive, so the others had placed him near the exit as they moved to take a trophy of the great Beast they had slain. With the human auras no longer blocking him from my sight, I was able to inspect Dale carefully. Since he was dead—but not really—I was able to learn everything about his body near instantly, as I had with Dani. I was quickly able to determine what the issue was and corrected it in his body, as I would a stone in my walls.

This did not bring him back; the Essence in him was no longer funneling into his quickly dimming life force. Even the liquid Essence in him began to sputter and make its way out of his body. There was still more Essence in him than there had been; truth be told, the overdose they poured into him would have made his chest explode if his body were alive to contain it. Now, it was just dissipating into the air.

<Dani, if he gets out of here before he dies, I don’t get that rush of energy. If I fixed his Essence, do you think that would wake him up? I want another chance at his death Essence,> I explained, looking at the residual Essence in Dale’s body. <I think I could do it.>

“Will it cost you too much Essence?” she reminded me, to which I responded with a negative. She kept asking questions, the primary being, “What will happen if it doesn’t work?”

<It may kill him, which isn’t really an issue I suppose. It doesn’t feel sporting to just kill him, though. He did just do us a huge favor, even if he doesn’t know it. Plus, well, I want to see if I can fix him. If I don’t do this, I may never get another chance to know if I could do it. You know me, I have pride in my work. If I try this, I want to do it right.> I bent my will to the task at hand despite her protests. I extended Essence into him, trying to reestablish normal flows to his life-force. I tried dozens of different things, but the thick Essence in him refused to stay in a cohesive pattern. It seemed that it wouldn’t unless he were to apply his own will to the task. I could make it stay—if I were to always have him in my dungeon—but the group was already preparing to leave. He showed no signs of waking up nor of being damaged enough to die properly.

I was getting frustrated. <Dani, nothing is working! The Essence is just… floating out of his body! It won’t stay where he needs it! Too fast to be good for him and too slow to kill him before they leave! What can I do?>

Dani had no idea either, obviously. “You know his pattern better than I do, Cal. If you don’t know what can help him, there is nothing I could do.”

<His pattern? His pattern! That’s it!> I compared his pattern with the things I was able to create and found a single match. Me. One of the first things I had ever really understood was the body that I resided in. A soul gem, not just a Beast Core. Dani had told me that this was as large as I would ever become. From here on out, the Essence would be poured into me like a dimensional pocket, always able to be filled but never being full.

I shifted Dale’s intestines around a tiny bit; creating a perfect soul gem around his center, just below his heart and almost against his spine. The Essence which had been escaping him was quickly drawn back into what had been his center, now a highly refined Beast core—a Masterwork soul gem. Now, the issue was that no Essence was able to leave the gem and all the Essence contained in him was being slowly drawn into it. Working quickly but carefully, I surrounded the gem with a perfect layer of Runescripted diamond.

Diamond, I had found through exhaustive testing, allowed for all Essence types to move through it well. It was a spectacular conductor for all of it. Each type had a gem that allowed for perfect flows but needed to be purely that type of Essence. For instance, the topaz head on Adam’s staff allowed celestial Essence to flow perfectly but would greatly impede all other types.

Where his cultivation had drawn in the Essence of the heavens and the earth, I made a Rune—which would activate by cultivating—to draw in that power to his center and now core. At each place around his meridians where energy would flow out into his body, I placed that same Rune but inverted it in order to send energy out. At each corner of the new soul gem, I placed tiny yet powerful Beast Cores which would absorb only the corruption his cultivation produced. With luck, I would be able to use that for something in the future.

I had done all I was able for his body; his mind would need to heal on its own. Luckily, everything I had created was small, therefore quick and easy to make. His organs were repaired, and drawing in Essence should be really easy for him now. The only question I had was, would this work or kill him when everything became active? I was really excited to find out! I kick-started the fractal pattern of the Essence and forcefully activated every Rune within him. Then I moved my mind back to enjoy the show.

Dale

Hans turned back to his fallen friend and began walking toward him. From the dead Cat, they had gathered each tentacle, the last good eye, all of its teeth and claws, and a few other samples of strange organs. The Cat weighed nearly half a ton; they certainly couldn’t carry everything. Hans’s eyes were shining with the light of Essence, which he used to find the important bits of the Distortion Cat. He definitely wasn’t using it to hold back tears. He glanced over at his fallen friend and saw Essence streaming around Dale in an incredibly advanced, incomprehensible pattern. With a shout of rage, he started to run to Dale’s rescue but pulled up short as his eyes followed the trail of Essence to its source.

It appeared to be coming from the… Silverwood tree? Hans knew that Silverwood trees were powerful and mysterious, but what was it doing? He stood away from Dale, motioning the others back when they tried to move to Dale in panic. Hans watched the barely breathing body as closely as he could, but the thick Essence dancing around Dale prevented him from seeing what the pattern was creating. Several minutes later, the light finally stopped flowing, though Dale’s form remained unmoving.

They walked over to his body, realizing that even the mysterious forces of the dungeon’s Silverwood tree could do nothing. They tried to inspect Dale for recovery but could detect no Essence whatsoever in his center. With a sob, Hans realized his comrade, his student… his friend… was truly dead.

Chapter Thirty-one

Adam reached over to close Dale’s eyes but stopped as they shone a brilliant, molten silver. With a gasp, he tried to move back, falling awkwardly on to his butt. Dale started convulsing, his entire body shaking in the sudden onslaught of muscle spasms.

“Hold his head!” Adam immediately took control of the situation and shifted his thoughts back into a healing mindset. “We need to keep him from damaging himself! He’s alive!”

Hans was by Dale’s side in a flash, keeping his head from bouncing around on the hard rock. “What is happening?!” Hans shouted at Adam, who was trying to recover from his position on the floor.

“Besides Dale having a seizure? No idea,” Adam stated grimly, lying perpendicular across Dale in an attempt to hold him against the floor. “All I know is his heart is beating, and he is breathing again.”

The group piled on to Dale, holding him in different places. Adam, being so light, was nearly thrown as one spectacular shake tore through Dale’s body, tearing muscles and popping blood vessels. Hans was watching everything closely and suddenly cried out.

“Look! Look at that! His Essence is… pouring through his body!” Hans was flabbergasted. “It’s going through his meridians… He hadn’t opened those ones yet!”

“What?!” Adam looked with Essence enhanced sight, worried that this was Dale’s death throes. “Is the Essence escaping his body?”

“No. No!” Hans shouted, realizing what effect the Essence was about to have on Dale’s body. “Everyone, get off of him! Now! Trust me!” Listening to his order, the others reluctantly let go while only Hans remained to hold Dale’s head. A rancid, waxy discharge started finding ways out of Dale. Through the pores in his skin, his eyes, ears, mouth, and less… pleasant… orifices came this loathsome fluid. It drained out of these exits as fast as liquid removed itself from the vicinity of a liquid repulsion Rune. Dale’s body seemed to deflate as the seemingly endless torrent continued. After what felt like hours, it did eventually stop, and Dale finally stopped shaking. Now in what seemed to be a natural slumber brought on by exhaustion, the group tried to get close enough to help carry him away. Unfortunately, the smell made all but Hans retreat as far away as possible.

Dale opened his eyes, blinking in the bright light of the room.

“Buddy?” Hans cajoled in a broken voice. “You there? Are you… Can you tell me your name?”

“Hans?” Dale looked up into Hans’s beaming face. “Wha…?”

Hans looked at him with sad eyes, smile vanishing. “Oh, no. Dale… Hans is my name.”

“Oh. My. God. Be serious for once, you shit!” Rose shouted at him, braving the reeking odor to smack him on the head.

Hans’s smile returned as he looked down at Dale. “You all there, buddy?”

Dale nodded as best he was able. “What happened? And who,” he grimaced and spat out some foul fluid, “who let that Cat shit in my mouth?”

All but Dale started laughing as the tension of the past few hours caught up with them. Eventually, Dale tired of scowling and joined in. A few moments later, wiping a tear from his eye, Dale sobered a bit. “So seriously, though, what happened?”

“You died!” Hans replied cheekily. The others glared at him, making Hans mutter, “What? He got better.”

“Before that, please.” Dale released a strange chuckle/sigh at his incorrigible friend.

Tom took over, “When I fell, and you charged the Cat in a suicide run, I was losing blood faster than I could regain my will to fight. I tried so hard to join you, but could not muster the strength to continue.” His face was downcast and ashamed. “Seemingly, my prayer to die in battle was rejected this day, and I was flooded with the berserker energy of my forefathers. This energy healed my wounds and allowed me the chance to finish our foe. I beg of you, forgive my weakness.” He bowed towards Dale’s prone form.

Rose pushed Tom aside, shaking her head. “Not what happened? Not even close. When you charged the Cat and held its attention, those golden rabbits snuck out of hidden tunnels and infused us with healing energy. There were dozens, Dale. All of our wounds righted themselves nearly instantly before they ran off, but I think we will carry these scars forever.” She nodded at the slashes across Tom’s chest and Adam’s legs, which, by rights, should never have had the chance to heal.

“Wow.” Dale’s head flopped back, and he looked enviously at the huge slashes of scar tissue on Tom’s chest. “The ladies are going to love those scars.”

Hans laughed deeply and evilly. “Finally! My teachings are starting to take root! No worries, Dale, you have some very impressive scars yourself.” Dale glanced down at the raised circle of scar tissue directly over his heart.

“Well, that can’t look good on the inside,” Dale muttered anxiously.

Hans shook his head, still somehow amused. “I don’t think it will be an issue, m’boy! I do think you need a long bath. Maybe… two. Or three.” He sniffed and shuddered.

“Yeah, what is this stuff? It seems to be coming from me, and I can’t seem to stop… smelling it.” Dale’s attention was now back on the clinging fluid, bringing the horrid smell to the forefront of his senses. “Seriously, normally you acclimate to horrible stenches, yeah?”

“Unless I am mistaken, it seems that all of your meridians were opened simultaneously. If you were awake for that process, it likely would have shattered your mind with the pain. Obviously, this must have taken a huge amount of Essence. While you had some in you, it wasn’t nearly enough to account for everything that happened,” Hans informed him. “It seems the Silverwood tree is what supplied the Essence and—I think—it revived you as well.”

<Oh good, they don’t realize it was me.> Dale shook his head at the unexpected sound. A strange, flat, tonal voice had sounded in his head.

“What?” Dale was looking around.

The Silverwood tree–” Hans started, concern showing on his face.

“No, I heard that. What was that other voice?” Dale interrupted him with a wave of his hand.

<Dani, did he hear me?> the voice rang in Dale’s head again. <Is that possible? I am not projecting to him!>

Hans was looking at him, very concerned now. “Another voice? No one else talked, Dale. Let’s get you a nap, huh buddy?”

<Good idea, Dani. They always seem to forget things when they have new toys.> Dale whipped his head around, trying to find the person speaking. A sudden clatter of metal sounded in the room as loot dropped around them, closer than to his body Dale had ever seen appear. Normally, loot seemed to fall in an area well away from people.

“Holy crap! Look at these!” Rose shouted, peering at the pendant she had just picked up off the ground. “This is a Runed item! Anyone recognize it?” They all looked at the pendant but did not recognize its Inscription. There was one for each of them, but they were loath to use them without it being inspected.

<Oh, come on, Dani. If they use those outside of here, I’ll at least be able to get more Essence if they die in here. Plus, I want to see if it works. All they should have to do is have it pressed against their skin near a meridian.> Dale was sure there was an invisible person standing behind him and whipped his demolished weapon around. He glanced at the remains of his morningstar. It had been mostly destroyed by the acid and shattered by the Beast they had fought.

<Fine, fine! I have a better version for him anyway.> Dale was starting to panic. A thunk at his feet made him jump and yelp. A shining, pristine morningstar lay underneath him. There were a few differences from the original. For one, the head of the weapon seemed to be crystal with electrum filled Runes forming a powerful Runescript on it. Electrum was a mix of gold and silver—both soft metals—so Dale was unsure of its usefulness in combat. Next, the hilt was also covered in Runescript, but this time in a way he somewhat recognized. The Rune was the same he had on his—it would send the head of the weapon out a few feet from the shaft, giving him range in combat.

The most noticeable difference, though, was the ridiculous size of the thing. Where his hand would go was normal sized and long enough that he could use both hands to swing it if he gave up his shield. From that point upward, the shaft was three times larger than he was used to, looking like a large sapling or small tree. The crystal head of the weapon was twice the width of his head if you included the spikes. Dale picked the weapon up. More accurately, he tried to. Still weak from freaking dying, he could barely shift the weapon. He looked at the hilt and saw the same Rune there as Tom had, which would make the weapon feather light.

Dale reached for his Essence which was instantly available to him. The ease with which it moved at his command was startling in itself. Maybe it had to do with all of his meridians being opened? With a small burst of Essence, he activated the Rune, unknowingly also binding the morningstar to himself. Now easily lifting the massive weapon of war, he gave it a few practice swings. He remembered that he should test the range of the activation that moved the head away, so he pointed it away from his friends. He aimed at the wall roughly ten feet away and activated the Rune.

The shards of stone flying through the air and the thundering of rock being shattered made the entire group dive for cover. Shock covered Dale’s face as blood from a new cut across his cheek dripped down into his mouth. He deactivated the Rune, and the head of the weapon returned to him, affixing itself on to his hilt.

“I feel rather tired of unknown weapons killing my friends in here,” Tom calmly stated, brushing rock dust off of his arms. “Very interesting, though.”

“I think we should do our cultivating and leave.” Rose directed in a deceivingly calm manner. Locks of her hair had been sheared off by the razor-sharp stone, and it was obvious she was working hard not to attack Dale. Face pale, Dale nodded, and they all sat in a meditative pose in the center of the massive Runescript on the floor, near where Essence was appearing in liquid form. They each agreed not to drink it after hearing Adam’s account of its use. Though it would fill them with Essence, Adam warned that it would make their Chi spiral unstable, possibly burning them, making their centers explode, or damaging their meridians beyond repair. The only reason Adam had survived its use was that he had been almost entirely out of Essence, and even then he had had to use most of it as fast as possible.

The highly purified Essence in the air still allowed them to cultivate for far longer and with greater gains than they ever had been able to before, stretching the bounds of what they could hold at any given time. Dale had another shock as he began. As he opened himself to the heavens and the earth, Essence flooded into him in a titanic wave of energy. He gasped and tried to understand what was happening.

In a flash, he realized what was different. He had only ever pulled in Essence along the most open channel, his earthen affinity. After waking up, all of his affinity channels were open. He was pulling Essence in from every possible source simultaneously. The wave of energy blasted along his spirals, refining deeper and stronger Chi threads.

The fractal pattern in his center, which had become even rougher and more splintered after dying, smoothed itself, repairing every flaw along the millions of spirals. When this process finished, his cultivation speed became even faster. In a short time, he had broken into D-rank one, shattering his previous boundary to advancement at a speed that should have been impossible. By the time they were finished cultivating for the day, he was halfway into D-rank two. Dale decided to keep the information to himself as they began their ascent into the world above.

Cal

“What a day!” Dani said, sagging with relief. The tension in her voice was finally receding.

<No kidding! You would not believe what I got out of that Distortion Cat. First of all, I reached D-rank five!> I bragged while shining in pleasure as she happily chattered at me. <Also, I have enough information to make that Distortion Cat if I want. Well,> I coughed as she looked at me in horror, <a young version of it anyway. A D-Rank three at best, but with this Essence well,> I directed her attention to the liquid Essence, <I think they can rank up quickly. No tentacles—those were what made it insane. Without that parasite, though, it’ll have a mouth and could be altered with corruption like the Bashers were!>

“Maybe… Maybe we wait a few days? Before trying new things again?” Dani pleaded. “Let’s just relax some? Maybe a month or two?”

<Anything for you, Dani. Um. There is one little issue.>

“Oh lord. What did you do now, Cal?”

I thought hard on my answer. <So, you know how I can feel all of my creatures, experience what they do, and influence them? If they were created by me, they are always Mobs…>

Dani looked extremely nervous. “Yes…?”

<And when I use my Essence to give them life or whatever they also come under my influence, they become dungeon born? Though if they are smart or strong enough, I can’t directly control them, but they can hear my commands and experience what they do?>

“Spit it out, Cal.”

<I think… mind you I am not certain, but I think… I may have made Dale, um, dungeon born.>

 “… Damn it, Cal…”

Epilogue

Far to the south, a stinking hole of a swamp denoted the boundary between the Lion and Phoenix Kingdoms. Each spring, the snow melts of the Phantom Mountains would wash through here, thickening the sludge with fertile silt. This always caused a population boom for the insects, as they found places to lay their eggs and fed well off drowned animals. Deep in the swamp on a plot of land only accessible by the brave or the knowledgeable, stood an ancient fortress.

There was nothing about the fortress that seemed out of place; it was a mold covered ruin beneath the notice of any well-groomed noble, and no commoner would willingly come into this swamp. If someone did manage to stumble upon this place, they may remark on the grotesque statues and carved work on the walls. They may see the shrunken skulls on spikes every few feet along the battlements with burning eyes that seemed to follow them as they walked. The same people may feel compelled to mention the odd lights, the chanting, and screams of pain and horror that intermittently escaped this place. The only issue was, those people never seemed to survive long enough to warn others.

“Finally,” a dark voice pulsed, sounding raspy from lack of fresh water. “I want a drink, a bath, a woman, and a hot meal. I don’t care what order.” The man who had months ago attacked Dale—followed by being forced off Dale’s mountain—squelched the remaining distance through the clinging mud to the entryway of this lost fortress. He looked into the burning eyes of a skull and sneered. “Oh, hurry up and open the door. You know who I am.”

The skeletal grin mocked him and chattered a few times, its jaw chittering as the trapped spirit attempted to attack him. With no body to extend its reach, it finally sent a mental command to the undead manning the gates, and the drawbridge started opening. The rusted, screaming hinges slowly pried themselves outward. The man groaned as he thought about what was coming, then walked into the courtyard. Undead of every type bustled around, completing the tasks assigned to them. Workers and warriors all, each fervently awaited the moment their commands would allow them to feast on the flesh and Essence of the living beings of the castle or outside world.

A sibilant voice caressed his soul as much as the man’s ear, speaking to him and his deeper self, “Welcome home, little morsel, the Master has been waiting for you. I do hope you have good news for him. He has been ever so… agitated, recently.”

The man looked up in disgust at the demon looking down over the courtyard, expertly enforcing his will on the undead below. A ‘taskmaster’, the demon excelled at creating perfect order. The decade-long restoration of this fortress would not have gone nearly as smooth without its expert direction.

“Stay out of my head, and don’t speak unless I tell you too. Bad enough that I have to smell you and be on the same plane as you. Hearing you is just too much filth for my mind to bear.” The man then arrogantly turned his face away, stopping with a startled yelp as he found that the demon was now directly in front of him. It grinned, satisfied by its small victory, mockingly bowing out of his way. Speed increasing, the now apprehensive man rushed to the inner sanctum to make his report. The demon had never before done anything like that.

He hurriedly knocked at the door, trying to get his breathing and mind under control. He had no opportunity to clean or rest; the Master had demanded his report as soon as possible. The demon would never have interrupted his Master otherwise. The door swung open into a perfectly silent room. As he stepped across the threshold, all outside noise died. Even the light that dared enter here seemed muted, the color leached out of it. Passing through shades of grey and black, his pulse accelerated, roaring thunderously in his veins, the sound of it threatening to burst his eardrums.

He stopped a dozen yards from the Master in front of him. The Master was sitting in a lotus style meditation pose. Not out of reverence or respect did the man stop his forward movement. No, it was the dense Necrotic energy thick in the air which forced him to remain where he was.

“Master,” he murmured, being as meticulous as possible in his presentation of manners as he genuflected. “I have come with news of the newly formed dungeon. As you predicted, it is already becoming a place thick with life and treasure. The acolytes sent there with the soul gem you created some time ago did not completely fail, it seems. Their sacrifice created the dungeon, though they were unable to nurture it as they had been ordered. More than that… a Silverwood tree has bloomed within it!” He remained as he was, head pressed to the ground long enough that he began to wonder if he had been heard. Perhaps the Master was resting? He began to sweat harder.

“You did well, my child,” a modulated, honey-sweet, deep voice responded. “For too long now the light has been burned into the world, forcing it to give more and more to the greedy children of the sun. It is time to return the soothing darkness to the land and allow it to rest. The creation of the gem took but a moment. We need not concern ourselves with a small dungeon on the edge of the world.”

The prone man nodded as best he was able, unable to speak with the power of the Master’s voice ringing in his body. The explosive power contained in that voice knocked dirt from his clothes and shook dust from the ceiling. The deep shadows, swirling with tortured faces, wailed soundlessly as the Master stood. It had been five years since he had moved from the spot he was sitting. The floor below now crumbled to dust, reduced from once beautiful marble.

“Gather the acolytes,” the Master commanded. “Meet me by the tar pits. We have slaves to… awaken.” He faded away like the morning mist as he began to complete his goals. “Also, bring me someone with a soul suitable for becoming an infernal dungeon. It is time to build an arsenal.”

The bowing man tried not to cry out as the infernal aura surrounding his Master brushed past him, scalding his arm from this distance although it was his own affinity. He stood and rushed off to obey, not a complaint—nor any thought except instant obedience—crossing his terrified mind.

DUNGEON MADNESS

Book Two of THE DIVINE DUNGEON Series

Written by Dakota Krout

Table of Contents

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-one

Chapter Twenty-two

Chapter Twenty-three

Chapter Twenty-four

Chapter Twenty-five

Chapter Twenty-six

Chapter Twenty-seven

Chapter Twenty-eight

Chapter Twenty-nine

Chapter Thirty

Epilogue

Prologue

Roughly Twenty-three Days Ago

A sibilant-yet-melodious voice sounded in the predawn darkness.

“Prepare, my acolytes. It is time to begin. For too long, we have suffered injustices at the hands of the children of light. Each time we have worked to better the world for those like ourselves, we have been forced once more into obscurity and degradation. This is truth, yes? Our time has finally come!”

As one, hundreds of men and women of multiple races stood to attention, then briskly and properly genuflected toward their dark leader.

“Hail, Master! It is as you say!”

Their timing—beat into them—was perfect. Their voices were synchronized. Necromancers were bowing to another being! The entire fighting force showed a discipline and level of training that had not been seen in a military since before cultivation became widespread so many millennia ago.

Black eyes flicked between the bent forms, studying posture and ensuring proper respect was given. Slowly, a smile appeared on the face of the Master. It would have made any sane man shudder. “Lovely. And well done. It is far past time to give you all your orders. Rise.”

The people straightened their posture as one, trying to never show a hint of discomfiture in their Master’s pernicious presence.

“As I am sure you remember—those of you who survived—the last time we tried a plan of this magnitude, we were stopped. We were rushed, unprepared for our true opponents in the world. We were defeated… because of one simple fact. We stepped into the scorching light before we were ready. We allowed ourselves to be goaded, to react to the fear and hate, the propaganda spread against us.” The voice paused, savoring the moment. “Now, we are ready. We prepared the caverns and the altar. Our brother sacrificed himself to become our arsenal, and all he now needs in order to provide us with an unending stream of weapons and minions—all we need—are sacrifices!”

Monstrous creatures stepped forward, falling into ranks behind the rigid horde of Necromancers. “Go. Take your creatures, your minions, your slaves. Take them, and do what no army of the undead has done before. Return with captives.”

The Master gave a minuscule nod to his troops, and they began to cheer fanatically. The undead moaning and clattering joined the noise, and soon, the terrifying laugh of demons and abominations joined in as well.

The hordes marched into the night. They would bring captives as ordered… after they had their fun.

Chapter One

Dale’s group wearily began ascending the stairs that led to the surface. Covered in dust, blood, and other foul substances, their main goal at this point was to clean themselves up and go to bed. They began moving upward, but Dale nearly missed a step when a voice sounded in his mind.

<Can you still hear me?>

“Son of a–” Dale whispered as his eyes darted around.

The others in his group took no notice of his odd behavior; in their minds, there were plenty of reasons that Dale might be talking to himself. He had just died, after all.

<I’ll take that as a yes. Try something real quick. Instead of speaking aloud, try thinking your words at me,> I eagerly directed him.

Dale’s mind spun as he tried to think of something to say before finally landing on the obvious. “What are you?” he thought as hard as he could.

<Dani, I’m not getting anything from him. What should we do? I think talking aloud will make people think he is mentally damaged, so… Oh. Is that it? Yeah, I’ll tell him. Dale! Hi. My name is Cal. I am the dungeon, so kind of ‘aim’ your words at me.>

Dale again tried to use his thoughts, pretending he was talking to this ‘Cal’, “Hello?”

I responded in a very excited tone, <There we go! Listen, Dale, I don’t really think you should tell other people about this. We don’t have time for explanations since you are about to meet up with a bunch of powerful people, but we will talk later.>

“Hey! You can’t just suddenly pop into my head and then not give me any infor–” Dale began thinking indignantly at the voice. At that very moment, they reached the top of the stairwell and opened the door to find a sea of cheering people… sprinkled with a handful of furious faces.

“You irresponsible little shit!” Madame Chandra stepped forward and started aiming a slap at Hans, who had the highest cultivation rank of Dale’s group and was their de facto advisor.

Rose smoothly stepped in and blocked the blow, shock on her face. “Grandma! What is wrong with you?”

“We just saw you fight a Beast, Rose!” Chandra hissed at the young Half-Elf. “He was supposed to protect and guide you all! Not lead you directly into a death-trap!”

Rose stayed firm in the face of the High Mage. “He did everything he could! That Beast was something none of us could have expected, and it broke almost every bone in Hans’s body when he attacked it, giving the rest of us a chance!” Rose was flushed and furious. “We would all be dead right now if he hadn’t been able to inject poison with the daggers he found! That Cat was moving too fast for us to land a single hit until Hans basically sacrificed himself for us!”

Several healers voluntarily stepped forward and offered their services to the weary group as Rose tried to calm Madame Chandra down. Most of the healers subtly avoided Dale; he was covered in a foul, waxy substance that stunk like rotting meat dipped in a latrine. Rose slapped away a few hands that got a bit too liberal with their ‘examinations’, while the hulking barbarian of their group—Tom—allowed the hands of blushing ladies to roam freely.

Hans chose that moment to collapse into unconsciousness, quickly followed by Adam, their cleric. Adam had used a large portion of his cultivation base to create a powerful incantation during the fight with the magnificent Beast, a Distortion Cat. Using his Essence in such a manner had permanently dropped him a full rank, reducing him to D-rank four. If his cultivation rate continued as it had in the past, it would normally take him a year or more to attain his former power. Luckily for him, he was near a high-density source of Essence and should be able to rank up much more quickly.

Hans’s issue was more basic; he had recently had many of his major bones broken as well as suffered major internal damage to his organs. The intervention of the Glitterflit type Bashers in the dungeon had healed him enough to escape the dungeon, but after a cursory examination from a healer, he was rushed off to surgery. Several of his bones had been shattered, and when they were repaired inexpertly down below, they hadn’t aligned properly. Hans would need to be shaped by a flesh Mage to fix all the damage correctly and would be out of commission for at least a week.

The other members were also properly examined after that announcement. Luckily, all of them were deemed healthy. Dale was given several odd looks, likely because he was far healthier than the others and he had recently died. Although, obviously, he had gotten better. Several people tried to grab his attention, but immediately upon catching a whiff of his rank self, they all made appointments to meet him later. As soon as he was deemed healthy, Dale rushed to the river to get cleaned up. Frank had sent a runner to get him soap and clean clothes, refusing to allow Dale to walk through highly populated areas.

Dale pulled off his armor at the edge of the river, diving in as the last bit of clothing fell to the ground. He surfaced with a gasp, the ice-cold mountain water shocking his system. He looked around as the water darkened and quickly began scrubbing himself as hard as he could with some sand to break up the crusty mess on his body. The slow current carried the foulness away; a fish bobbed to the surface a few yards downstream, stunned by the high concentration of toxins dripping from Dale’s body. He had never seen a fish gag before…

The young man shuddered as he remembered the sadistic Beast that had skewered his heart, how it had stared into his eyes practically laughing as the light faded. He tried to remember what had happened next, but there was a blank between that and waking up again—a very unexpected outcome. He was shaken from his dark thoughts when a young man ran up with a basket containing a robe and toiletries. Dale thanked him and promised a tip when he got back to his tent. The freckle-faced boy grinned and ran off to his next task. Dale had a reputation as a good tipper.

After scrubbing at himself for nearly ten minutes, Dale realized that no matter how much effort he used, he couldn’t seem to get rid of the odor. With a start, he realized his mistake. He quickly found a toothbrush and crushed-mint paste in the basket. While he enjoyed the feeling of his teeth returning to a normal taste and coloration, a small crowd of people gathered at the edge of the river. These people were his current council: Father Richard to represent the Church and its interests, Guild Master Frank of the Adventurers’ Guild, High-Magous Amber of the Mages’ Guild—specifically the smaller subset of the portal guild, Madame Chandra to represent the… well, her own interests, Dale supposed. To round out the group, there were a few people that came with these esteemed individuals to take down notes.

“What,” Dale croaked around the toothbrush, letting some foam drip down his chin, “never seen a dead man take a bath?”

One of the note takers gagged.

Father Richard’s eyes flickered with some dark memories. “Hmm. Of all the things I have seen dead people do, I have to admit that bathing is a first for me.”

Dale snorted, sending tears to his eyes as the mint in his tooth cleanser burned his nostrils, though he welcomed the pain. It was the first time he had smelled something new since he woke up.

“No, Dale. We are here to make sure that you are… okay,” Madame Chandra spoke gently.

Dale snorted again. “Am I okay?” He pondered a few moments. “Yup. Just dandy.” He spat out the toothpaste and dunked under the water again, rinsing himself off one last time. He walked to the shore, tired enough that he was willing to ignore the fact of his nudity as he came out of the water to collect his armor. He grabbed it and unceremoniously began scrubbing the accumulated filth off his breastplate.

Amber gasped at him.

“Dale! Your body! Oh my…” Tears sprang to her eyes as she looked at the previously husky man. His body looked emaciated, the flesh sagging around muscles that no longer pulled his skin taut. All fat had been burned away, leaving a very thin man with haunted, blazing blue eyes.

“Your eyes used to be brown, didn’t they…?” Richard muttered under his breath.

Madame Chandra took a more direct approach. “Dale, what happened down there? We saw only the last bit of the fight when the darkness cleared away. We saw you get killed… but then you got up for some reason. How? Actually, no. Leave the armor here, and I will have it cleaned professionally. You are just swirling that goop around. Put on that robe, and we will go to the Pleasure House. You obviously need some food with high nutritional density. As much as you can eat—on the house as usual. Come with us, Dale.” Her speech ended on a pleading note.

Dale nodded, dropping the armor and stumbling toward her. His stomach more screamed than growled as it was reminded that food did—in fact—exist somewhere nearby. Frank wrapped him in a robe and led him toward the restaurant with the others following behind.

Cal

I had tried communicating with Dale again several times after he had left my dungeon, but as soon as he stepped fully out, either he could no longer hear me or was simply not responding. Well, fine! I had more important things to do than keeping tabs on a low-level adventurer anyway.

<I’m having some trouble here, Dani,> I told my faithful Wisp.

“Anything like the Cat that nearly killed us?” Dani chuckled sardonically.

I thought for a moment, just long enough to make her grow nervous. <Um. No, nothing like that…>

Dani nodded fiercely. “Good! Because you promised me that you would take a week off experimenting, right?”

<Well, a few days… would a few hours be sufficient?> Doing my best to ignore her glare, I quickly continued, <Let me explain the problem? When Dale’s new group came through here, I threw everything we had at them. Everything. There are no living Mobs in here except a few Shroomish, and with the barrier over the entrance, we are not getting any influx of Essence from outside.>

She began to look a bit concerned. “Oh, I hadn’t thought of that… “”

I tried to ease her stress, <I don’t know if it will be too much of an issue. After all, they will most likely open the door in a few days. The Essence gathering Runescript in here is pulling in every drop from the dungeon and keeping it here while I work to absorb it. What I wanted you to consider is adding a new floor and possibly changing how I do a few things.>

She looked at me querulously. “Change a few things? Like what? I like the idea of adding a new floor, but will you have the Essence to do that and make changes and respawn every Mob in here?” Every time she said ‘and’ like that, it made me a bit more nervous that I was giving myself too much to do, but I felt that these things all needed to be done.

<Well, I might not get it all done right away, but I will over time. Shall we go over the changes I want to make?>

She acquiesced to my request a bit grumpily, but I didn’t hold it against her. We had spent the last day being closer to death than we had ever come before.

<Let’s start with the first floor. The mining area is annoying to me, but it brings in a lot of rather weak people every day. I want to expand that room so more people can work at once and widen the entryway so that a full contingent of miners and tools can come through if need be. Right now, two people can squeeze through the archway at a time, and I want to make it wide enough for at least five.>

Dani thought for a moment and nodded. “That’ll be fine if you are going to add another floor anyway. Can we get rid of Shroomish and other weak things on that floor? Oh! Can we add a flower room there? Maybe grow some herbs in a more concentrated spot? I want a garden!”

I laughed at her sudden enthusiasm. <Sure! I know you have been bored recently, so how about I give you total control over what goes where in there? In there, you say ‘do this’, and I will follow all your orders!>

“About time!” She playfully frowned at me. “Thanks! It’ll be the prettiest room in here…” She turned misty-eyed at the thought.

I looked at her form. <Wow, you can shape your body? You literally look like a human eye that is tearing up.>

Dani haughtily informed me, “There are many things that I can do that you’ve never bothered to ask about!”

<Oh? Like what?>

She scoffed. “I can’t tell you. How would I be able to remain aloof and mysterious?”

<…>

“What?”

<This sort of response is why I never ask…>

She squeaked with outrage, flashing crimson.

<Anyway, I was thinking that we leave the Bashers on that floor with a squad of enhanced Bashers as the floor Boss. We leave the Shroomish—they are our only ranged attackers—sorry about that. On the next floor, we have only enhanced Bashers with the old Alpha squad’s upgrades, keeping Raile as the floor’s Boss. Good so far?>

“Yes, but I feel like you are about to make me mad again for some reason,” she muttered her dark premonition.

<Good guess!> I chuckled at her glowering. <I want to make the third floor a mix of Distortion Cats and advanced Bashers, with a Cat as a Boss if I can manage it.>

“Cal! We just got the Distortion Cat killed, and you want to make more of them?! Aren’t you going to have bad memories, seeing them all the time?” Dani demanded. If she had feet, she would be stomping around throwing a tantrum.

I tried to soothe her, <No, I think that making them our guards will help us get over it quicker. Plus, we survived just fine, didn’t we?>

“Not the point!” She sighed loudly, “Fi-ii-ne. What else?”

I smiled, knowing she was as interested in these changes as I was, even if she pretended otherwise. <Well, you know how I sometimes get distracted when battles are going?>

Dani snorted. “What? You? Distracted?”

<You think that you are sooo funny. Back to my point, sometimes people don’t get the loot that they should because I forget to drop it for them. What would you say if I wanted to instead have a place in the room for loot? A place where all the loot goes that they should be getting? That way, I can just refill it when a group empties it. Oh! Better yet, I can set one of these Essence collectors to a seed pattern! Then it will automatically refill!> I was nearly shouting in excitement by the time I finished.

“Hmm. I thought you liked giving personalized loot?” Dani reminded me of the fun I had messing with people.

<Well, I still can, right? If I see something really spectacular or learn about a glaring weakness, I’ll reward them for it,> I promised her. <I’m thinking a box? Maybe a hole in the ground?>

Dani rejected those options, “No, it needs to be something obvious. How about we make a treasure chest?”

<A what?>

“It is essentially what you are describing—a really fancy box that swings open on hinges. We can put it at the exit to the room, so groups will have to survive and travel all the way across the room to collect their rewards.” Dani was getting excited that she could use her experience from before she bonded to Cal. “Kantor did something similar, but I never knew why—so I never brought it up. Now it makes perfect sense!”

<Great! You will help me with the design, right? I’ve never seen a ‘chest’ before.> I was excited to start, but there was more to discuss. <Now, since we are getting larger again, I was thinking that instead of only allowing the people on the second floor to leave the dungeon on the stairwell,> I paused for dramatic effect, <I could arrange the Boss Rooms so that after every Boss they could choose to leave! That way people will be more confident in fighting the Boss immediately.>

“I don’t understand what you mean. Do people not feel confident when going into the Boss Rooms?” Dani queried with a frown. “Why do they bother to come in here then?”

I explained my reasoning as succinctly as possible, <I should hope they are worried every time they fight! What I mean though is that some people will turn around and leave instead of fighting the Boss because they are worried that they will be too injured afterward to get out of here. If there is an option every level to make a quick escape, the Bosses will get a lot of kills, much faster than they normally do. If they get enough kills, they may be able to evolve naturally without my help. That is my hope at least.>

“Smart!” Dani exclaimed. “That’s a good plan. Where should we start?”

<Let’s change up the first floor, then populate it. After that, we will make the small but necessary changes to the second floor and finally add on the third level. If I work hard, I think I will be able to get everything done before they unblock me.> I chuckled at the thought that I would soon be able to fight again.

Chapter Two

Dale woke up flailing, reaching for a weapon to throw off the shadowy figure stabbing his…

He sat up, shaking off the nightmare. Grimacing, he attributed the night of tossing and turning to eating like a pig right before bed. Certainly, it couldn’t have been because he was stabbed through the heart the week before. He almost started drooling at the memory of the huge steak and sides of vegetables, although they had barely satisfied him. With all his meridians opening at the same time, his body had used all available resources to purify himself and supply Essence to the tissue throughout. A week to heal and recuperate wasn’t enough, but it would have to do for now.

Thinking back to how no one had an explanation for how it happened without his knowledge, he felt a little better. If no one else knew what had happened, maybe it actually was the dungeon who had fixed his body. Maybe he wasn’t going insane and hearing voices that weren’t there… He shook himself, refocusing on his body.

His Essence was pouring along the open meridians, constantly infusing his flesh with health, strength, and resilience. His body looked ruined, emaciated to a skeletal frame. He looked down; his ribs were prominent enough to be countable, and his waist looked positively nonexistent. Despite his outward appearance, he had never been stronger. His muscles were permanently infused with the Essence that now flowed through them, strengthening him beyond what his body had been capable of before. Dale could arm-wrestle a small bear and easily win right now, and his new body was at its weakest point currently.

While he would be able to put flesh on again, he would never need to worry about gaining fat. His body now processed food very quickly, burning through all the calories and protein he could take in. When he was again well fed, his muscles would be like steel and his skin like hardened leather! His stomach chose that moment to remind him to go eat, so he reached for his armor… only to find it missing.

He looked around wildly, then shook his head as he remembered how Madame Chandra had told him that she would have it cleaned and he could pick it up today. This also reminded him that he could eat at the restaurant for free for the next week, since he had saved Rose. He perked up; the Pleasure House served breakfast! He got to his feet expecting stiffness or pain, but his body moved as smoothly as if he had just had a light workout. Must be a side benefit of all the Essence sloshing around in him.

Before stepping out of his tent, Dale started cycling Essence to his eyes so he could see the flow of power in all things. With this enhanced vision, he could see blots of color moving around outside, denoting moving people. Seeing no one near his door, he cautiously stepped outside, feeling naked without his armor.

“Boo!” a harsh voice shouted next to him.

“AHH!” Dale whipped around, raising his fists, only to see his friend Hans laughing at his terror.

“Ha-ha-ha!” Hans laughed, slapping his knees as he doubled over. “You sounded like a little girl! Oh, man! Whew! I needed that. Thanks, buddy!”

Dale glowered at him. “Hans! You should be resting! Also, don’t you think that you should be a bit nicer to me? I died last week!”

“What? Nah, that isn’t something to get worked up about. Happens to all of us. You are fine now, right?” Hans stopped laughing once he saw the serious look on Dale’s face.

“Dale,” Hans sounded deadly serious now, almost angry, “you can’t let this affect you so much. Yeah, that sucked, but are you going to give up on cultivating? Are you going to stop fighting in the dungeon? Should I? I owe over six hundred gold to a flesh Mage for all the re-sculpting of my body. Should I just tell him ‘too bad, I’m done fighting because it is dangerous’?”

Dale looked like he had been slapped. “I… I don’t…” he stammered.

“The correct answer is abyss no!” Hans shouted, getting angry now. “Dale! Look at you! Sure, you look like shit, you smell, and it is likely you won’t get a woman until your eighties, but what else is new? How do you feel? Do you feel like a warrior, a champion that slew a monster way above his cultivation rank, or are you going to allow yourself to feel like giving up so you can keep acting like a victim?!”

Dale flushed, “I’m not acting like–”

“Oh really? Then why have you been all weepy and pouty this whole week and so far this morning? Yeah, I heard how you were acting, and I’ve been watching you for almost a whole day to see if the information was accurate! I was embarrassed for you! You are acting like a spoiled little brat that has a bunch of people to run his life for him. Did you even realize that the entire council was there last night? Why do you think that was? You think just maybe they might be getting together to see if you are mentally fit to continue owning this land? You think they might be plotting to petition the king for a writ that will allow them to take the land from you if that is the case?”

Dale’s face paled; he hadn’t realized that was even a possibility.

“You need to start going to council sessions and stop letting people you barely know make all of your major life decisions for you! Now, tell me that you were acting stupid because you were tired, and you will be the strong, assertive Dale I know you to be!” Hans nearly shouted in his face.

“I… I’m sorry, Hans, I have been acting stupid because,” Dale swallowed, “because I was so tired out. I’m good now. I’m all ready to get back to the team.”

Hans’s demeanor changed like a whiplash. “Oh great! Good morning, Dale. How are you today?” He went in for a hug, acting like he hadn’t been about to start slapping the man.

“I’m… good?” Dale licked his lips nervously.

Hans shoved him away, spitting.

“Gah! I know I was standing close, but you didn’t need to lick my lips! What the heck?!” Hans spit to the side. “You need to brush your teeth.”

“Well, your morning breath isn’t fresh and minty either!” Dale shouted back. They both stopped for a second and looked at the other. The tension lasted only a moment as they both started laughing hard enough that their sides started to hurt.

“Ugh… C’mon, Chandra owes us breakfast. I’d rather not go back to the mess hall. I hear the head cook has been on a rampage because no one is bringing him herbs anymore.”

“Free food at the Pleasure House? I’m so there!”

They started walking toward the towering restaurant that had savory smells wafting from it, collecting their teammates Adam and Tom on their way. They exchanged pleasantries as they made a bee-line for the food; that is, they took many unnecessary turns and side routes in order to avoid the early morning traffic. By the time they reached the doors, Adam looked ready to faint from hunger and Tom was getting loud.

Tom boomed at the now-nervous host, “Hello, tiny person. We need a table as presently as can be arranged. As a boon from the owner, Madam, we have been offered a place to eat as often as we are able to find the room in our stomach. I have found the room, have you yet found a table that can seat us?”

The stammering host tried to get in a few words, but as soon as Tom stopped speaking, a side door slammed open, revealing Rose in a set of comfortable robes. “Tom! Keep it down. It is barely light out, and if you keep the noise going you are going to wake up Grandma! She will literally slice your face off!”

“I highly doubt that she would…” Tom began loudly, just before Hans slapped him lightly across the face.

Hans whispered, wide-eyed, “I’ve seen it happen. She is strong enough that she replaces it and heals you, but you really don’t want that to happen. It is rather unpleasant.”

Tom flushed, then went pale. Mutely, he nodded

They were led to a table as far from the ground floor as possible, into a room where the highest quality food was served. Quickly, a server appeared with a selection of exotic fruits and fried meats for an appetizer. More courses were laid upon the table each time one was finished, so there was no point in time when they did not have food readily available. Finally, groaning, they had to beg the server not to feed them anything else. He smiled and bowed, vanishing into the kitchen as they prepared to leave.

“Well, what should we do today?” Adam polled the group with a loud burp. “Oh, more room!” He finished a small scrap of meat on his plate.

Dale shrugged noncommittally. “No idea. The dungeon is going to be closed until they finish the walls and stuff around it. They don’t want to take any chances that the Mobs will escape and attack unprepared people again.”

“Just when I was finally able to start cultivating…” Rose sighed in frustration.

As a chaos cultivator—a person who had dual affinities in celestial and infernal Essence—she had never been able to properly cultivate before going into the dungeon. Even after the trauma of the last few days, she was eager to get back into the dark depths.

Hans looked around, seemingly offended. “Ugh…? What do you all mean by ‘we’? I thought that we had decided that we were a temporary party?” When everyone looked at him in shock, he chuckled, “I’m just playing! There are some things we should do today though. Tom, you need to come with me to the main Guild tent. I’ll sponsor your entrance to the Guild and make our team official.”

Hans glanced at Adam next. “Adam, you should get with Father Richard about the best way to strengthen yourself and learn to use your staff to its best effect. Rose, you should get your bow checked out and get ready for this evening. Dale, you know what you need to do today.” He gave him a significant look, which made Dale nod and look away in shame.

Rose looked at Hans with a raised eyebrow. “What is happening this evening?”

Hans grinned lecherously. “Our second date, of course!” He waggled his eyebrows.

“In your dreams, old man.” Rose crushed him without a second thought, walking away. “I have my own plans for the day. See you all later!”

Adam hadn’t said anything, but his face was pale. Dale nudged him, “What? You okay there, buddy?”

Adam nodded slowly. “You want me to train with Father Richard? Is this Richard Demonbane? The man trained by Cardinal Kere Nolsen the Slayer of Shades?” His voice was frantic and rose in pitch to an uncomfortable level as he spoke.

“I’ve never heard that title before, but I only know one Father Richard, so… most likely?” Dale smiled at his pale friend. “Don’t worry, he is really nice. He does sometimes take over conversations, but otherwise, he’s a really good person to be around.”

Hans joined in smoothly, “Well, I mean he would have to be, but meeting your childhood hero isn’t often an easy task.” He grinned slyly at the now blushing Adam. “Is it, Adam? Eh? Is it?”

“Leave the cleric be, my mentor! Allow us to tarry here no longer. My heart races at the thought of joining the Guild! A childhood dream is what thee wishes to acknowledge? The Guild and being one of its members has always been my dream. I have held this dream dearly for years and…” Tom’s voice faded in the distance as a sour-faced Hans was pulled along toward the Guild tent.

“Heh. C’mon, Adam. I will introduce you to Father Richard. I have to meet with him anyway.” Dale started leading his friend away when the host for the restaurant yelled for him. He turned back. “Yes?”

Chapter Three

“Dale?” the host asked to make sure of his identity.

“Yes…?” Dale leadingly prodded.

The man nodded. “I have some gear that was left for you by the Sword Polishers.”

Dale did a double take at the name. “Uhhh. What? I’m not sure I should be associated with… oh! My gear! They are the professional cleaners, then?”

“Yes, please gather this up. I can’t lift the morningstar more than…” The host trailed off and blushed as he realized that he had said more than he intended.

“No problem!” Dale stepped into a small side room and put on his armor, smiling at the familiar weight. For the first time since he had purchased it, the armor didn’t stink, have any blood on it, and was rust-free. It also didn’t fit quite right, but seeing as his body was several sizes smaller than it had been the last time he wore it, this made sense. Leaning over, he picked up his bound morningstar. The massively oversized weapon weighed almost forty pounds. Without the Runes on it that allowed for it to be nearly weightless in his hands, he could have never used it in combat.

When he supplied a bit of Essence and activated the Rune, he could swing it as easily as a thin stick—without losing any of the destructive force its weight afforded. Truly, it was a potent weapon. He stopped admiring himself and looked around for the shield, not seeing it. He stepped outside and asked the host where it was.

The man uncomfortably informed him that the shield had been destroyed in the dungeon, and the scraps that he had brought back were unable to be salvaged. Dale nodded; he had expected this but had been hoping it was not damaged so extensively. It was a rental, after all…

He met up with Adam outside, and they moved toward the only other permanent building currently in the area, the church. Walking into the coliseum-style area where Father Richard gave his sermons, they admired the solid quartz floor that normally allowed people to see into the dungeon’s Boss Room. To their shock, instead of the Boss floor below them, all they could see at the bottom was a purplish rock that Dale recognized from previous encounters.

“Cursed earth?” Dale gasped, dumbfounded at the sight.

A morose voice sounded from across the open area, “It appears so… It seems the dungeon has blocked the view until we open the front door again. Why dungeon? Why do you do this to me?”

Dale looked up and saw Father Richard standing from his morning prayers. “Oh, just who I was looking for! Father Richard, this is Adam. He is a cleric that joined my group recently, and we were hoping that he could come to you for training in the celestial arts.”

Richard sighed, eyeing a blushing Adam. “Why not? It isn’t like anyone comes here for a sermon unless they can see the fighting going on below… I suppose I could use an acolyte or two. Come along. We will start immediately.” He turned away, Adam hastily following, but he stopped when Dale cleared his throat. “Yes?”

“I’m going to be calling a council meeting today, and I was wondering if you have a room that we could use to stay away from prying eyes and ears?” Dale delicately informed him, looking around at the empty building.

“I’m sure we could manage that for the right price. Let’s–” Father Richard began earnestly.

Dale cut him off before he could finish, a bit of steel in his voice. “Surely in this very large church, you could find a room the council could occasionally use?”

Father Richard looked confused for a moment, then began to sweat as he realized what Dale meant. When he had built the building, he had only been given one lot of land to build on, but the final construction took up three full lots. The price for using the land had yet to be… negotiated.

“Oh, yes! Of course, anything you need, Dale! Let me say how good it is to see you taking an interest in the work going on in the area! Come along, young Adam. Let’s go see what you can do and where we can start your training!”

Dale chuckled under his breath as a nonplussed Adam was whisked away. He turned around to look for the other members of the group that he needed to talk to. Hopefully, they would all be as willing to participate as the priest. He thought about the order he’d go talk to them. Dale eventually decided to find Chandra at lunch, Frank right away, and Amber just after Frank. Amber was likely a morning person, right? He would have to find out. Dale walked to the Guild tent, entering directly into Frank’s office—past an indignant secretary that tried to make him wait his turn.

“Some of us have been waiting for a meeting!” a voice called out. Dale looked over his shoulder to see Hans tapping his foot with arms folded in front of his chest. Dale grinned, made a rude gesture, and pulled a rope to close the cloth they used for a door.

“Good morning, Dale,” Frank cordially greeted him. “Can… whatever this is… wait? I have meetings all morning.”

“It’ll be just a moment, sir,” Dale promised him with a dismissive hand wave. “I’m just letting you know that I am calling a meeting tonight. We will be holding a council meeting at the church.”

Frank looked up from the invoice for defenses he was reading. “Hum? A meeting for what?”

Dale nodded; this was a new thing for him, so he could deal with a bit of confusion. “A council meeting—we have things to discuss. I’ve let things run on their own for too long, and I need to remind everyone that this is still my land. Dinner will be provided. Please be there at five o’clock.” He turned on his heel and walked away without waiting for a reply.

Frank frowned and looked back at his invoice.

Chapter Four

Dale walked directly across the well-worn path in front of the Guild tent, stopping in front of a light purple tent that was roughly half the size of the one he had just vacated. There was a post driven into the ground in front of it that had a wooden plank attached. He rapped on it—assuming it was a knocking post—in an attempt to call out a representative of the portal guild. When no one appeared, he started knocking louder and faster, not stopping until he heard shouting. His new cultivation rank allowed him to hit the post impressively hard.

“What?! Why?!Is the sun even out? Why are you bothering us this early? If there is still someone out there when I get there, I am going to turn you into a newt…” The tent flap was thrown open, but the angry face of the inhabitant quickly settled into a neutral expression. “Oh. Good morning, Dale. What?”

“Good morning, James. Is Amber available?” Dale replied, making James pull in a breath with a hiss as he looked around.

“Dale, it is very important to follow protocol when talking about people in public,” James noted severely. “You need to call her ‘High Magous Amber’. Also, no. She is not some floozy available to you whenever you feel like having a chat.”

“Fair enough. I will try to remember the titles. Please tell High Magous Amber that I am holding a council meeting tonight at five o’clock in the church. Dinner will be provided, and anyone not in attendance will lose their temporary seat on the council. Have a pleasant day, good sir.” Dale nodded at the demanding man, walking away whistling as James fumed.

Having nowhere else to be until lunch, Dale walked into the area that had been set aside for shopping and began browsing the shop kiosks that were beginning to open for the day. Pleasantly surprised at the variety of goods available, Dale weighed the thought of spending his coin against the thought of needing something and not having it. He had just decided to look at the potions available from the apothecary when the sounds of a scuffle reached his Essence-enhanced ears.

“Please! This cost me thousands of gold! I’ll be ruined! Please, just take my money!” a voice begged from the shadows of a tent that connected to a kiosk. Obviously, the merchant that was here had rented a small plot of land and set up shop. The sign out front showed a pair of the crossed pickaxes that miners used in the dungeon.

“Well, then it’ll be worth taking, won’t it? We’ll take you up on the gold as well. Thanks for the idea!” A couple of voices chuckled at that comment, which was followed by a meaty thud, a small grunt of pain, and a sob of frustration. Soon after, the tent flap was thrown open, and three hairy men walked out of the tent laughing darkly. They froze momentarily when they noticed Dale looking at them, but then tried to nonchalantly walk away.

“Stop right there, criminal scum!” Dale called harshly. He immediately felt like a moron for his word choice, but what were you supposed to say in these situations?

They stopped, but not for the reasons Dale wanted. “What did you just call us?” They rounded on Dale, the biggest one gripping the shaft of a familiar pickaxe.

“You heard me,” Dale announced boldly, walking toward them slowly. “Drop the pick and the stolen money. Do so, and I will let you leave the mountain gently, after you gather your gear and supplies. If you don’t… I won’t be so gentle.”

“What are you gonna do? Pass out on us? Bleed all over me? You look more than half-starved! Where did you get that armor? Your dad give it to ya? It’s three sizes too big!”

The big, hairy man swung the pick a few times as though he were warming up. Dale was watching him and saw him pass Essence into the pick to activate it, unwittingly binding it to himself.

Dale’s eyes narrowed. “That was a mistake. You just bound that pick to yourself!”

The man looked at Dale in surprise. “So? It’s my pick.” He let the pick swing into the ground, blasting away a huge shower of dirt and small stones as the force enhancement Rune activated. “Leave off, or that’ll be you, pipsqueak.”

“Well, now you have two options. You are going to have to either pay for the pick, or we will have to unbind that pick from you. There is precedent for people to die to make that happen—please make the smart decision.” Dale looked at the others, reaching for the hilt of his morningstar which peeked over his shoulder. “And you two?”

“Shoo, brat!”

One of the muggers was clearly getting nervous. “Hey… I’m really not looking for trouble. I didn’t know what they were planning to do in there…”

The big one growled at him. “Shut it. You’re in this with us!”

Dale nodded at the reluctant man. “Please lie down and put your hands on your head.” The man did so, while the others jeered at him.

Dale grasped his weapon and swung it to the side to bring it in front of him. The men’s eyes widened in shock as he held the massive weapon in front of him with one hand, pointing it at them. “Last chance.”

One scoffed, while the other spat, “Fat chance! That’s obviously not real, so how about you fu–”

Dale moved forward, taking an aggressive combat stance. The thieves sputtered and moved to attack before he could take the initiative. The largest brute swung his pick with a grunt, forcing Dale to dodge. The weapon hit the ground, spraying up another shower of dirt and gravel.

The second attacker pulled out a short sword, truly little better than a long dagger. It was rusted from having blood left on it after battles. The blade was serrated by hand—it was likely he had taken a file to it. That would cause nasty wounds and lots of bleeding if Dale was cut, so he gave the weapon as much respect as the Inscribed pickaxe. The blade licked out at Dale, but he dodged backward, turning the maneuver into a tumble as the pick came at him again.

The two took turns attacking, working together in a way that spoke of long familiarity. They should have been able to easily overpower the smaller man, but… there was a factor in Dale’s favor that the two men didn’t understand. Dale had been fighting to the death daily for months. These slow, broadcasted attacks were fairly easy for him to avoid so long as he didn’t panic. He was also trying to incapacitate them without killing them since he had no wish to become a known murderer. The blade of the short sword came at him, but Dale stepped past it, closing with the surprised killer. He lashed out with his fist, and his newly strengthened muscles allowed him to break the arm at the elbow, twisting the bones into an unnatural shape.

Thinking the man was out of the fight, Dale dodged another slow attack from the pick-wielding man. A scream that didn’t sound like pain behind him made him duck. He dodged a wild blow just in time. The man with the twisted arm was swinging his sword with his off hand. His broken limb flailed around, obviously causing him pain. He didn’t seem to care and continued slashing wildly at Dale.

Dale rebutted by finally bringing his weapon to bear. He swung and impacted the man in the leg, the force behind the spiked head causing the unprotected flesh to burst like an overfilled waterskin. He swung again, catching the man in the head as he dived at him. The dying man was able to tackle Dale to the ground before fully expiring, leaving him exposed to the man with the pickaxe.

With a strange look on his face—a cross between the sick elation of an impending kill and the loss of a longtime friend—the brawny miner stepped forward and reared back with the pick for a powerful attack. Dale braced his weapon on the ground and activated the Rune, sending the head of the weapon flying forward. The oversized spiked ball tore through the side of the man, leaving a gushing, gaping hole. The miner caught his breath, gagging and vomiting before collapsing. The blood poured from him unabated for a few moments before slowing to a crimson trickle.

Dale shakily deactivated the Rune and the head of his weapon whooshed back to settle on its hilt. He felt stunned; he had never killed a human in combat before.

It… it was too easy. The overgrown rabbits in the dungeon were harder to kill than this! Sure, they didn’t have the sheer strength of these two, but they were harder to hit and avoid.

Dale had to fight to hold down his gorge.

“Oh god. Oh man. Pl-please, sir… d-don’t kill me!” The man lying prone begged, half gasping, half gagging as a puddle of blood sloshed over him.

Dale looked away from the sight, almost in shock. It was disturbing how this man thought that Dale would kill him as he had the aggressive thieves. “I’m not going to. Do you have any money that you haven’t stolen?”

“Not much… sir!” the man belatedly added, fearful that Dale would take offense.

Dale sighed, swinging his weapon sharply through the air to get the gore off it, frustrated that it had just been cleaned and was now filthy again! “Keep ten silver for the portal fee, and go somewhere else. You have an hour to gather your non-stolen items and go to the portal. If you try to take anything else that you stole, you are to leave my mountain immediately. If you take more than an hour, walk off my mountain and travel without the use of a portal.”

“Y-you. You’re him. I’m s-sorry, I’ll go!” The man scrambled to his feet and ran, leaving Dale wondering what the ex-thief meant by that last comment.

Chapter Five

Dale grunted and gathered the stolen pick and money the men had on them, then went over to the shop and knocked on the wooden kiosk. Soft sounds of weeping reached his ears, quickly cut off as the man heard the knock.

“I’m closed,” a miserable little voice floated out to him. “Permanently.”

Dale had a grim little smile appear on his face. “You may want to come out anyway.”

“Dale?” The man shocked him by recognizing his voice. He scrambled out of his tent as Dale waited. Noticing the pick, the man fell to his knees and tried not to cry in front of the man who had given him a plot of land for so cheap. “You got it back! Thank you, Dale, thank you!”

The man was familiar to Dale, but he couldn’t place him. “Here you are. I think this is your money as well. I’m sorry to say I cannot remember your name. It has been a while, and we only met briefly…?”

Accepting the proffered goods, the now smiling man waved away Dale’s concerns. “My name is Tyler. I am a merchant that currently specializes in general goods and pickaxes for miners. I used to be an antique dealer, but rare coins and decanters are a very niche market. I also dabbled in identifying unknown items such as Runes, but the Spotters’ guild is far more knowledgeable than I.”

Dale smiled as well. “I’m just glad I was able to help. You bought this pick then? When?”

“Just this morning!” A small glint showed in Tyler’s eyes. “Are you interested in getting into the mining business?”

“Not so much—my team was the one that sold it! I was just thinking that I may have some spare income for once.” Dale laughed at the crestfallen look on the merchant. “Don’t worry. I am sure someone else will want it as soon as the dungeon is open again.”

“I certainly hope so!” Tyler fervently agreed. He looked just a bit past Dale and went a pale. “Oh. I see how you were able to… reacquire… my lost goods.”

Dale looked back at the bodies behind him. “Yeah, I’ll go get someone to take care of those. Who oversees security around here? I’ll have to report this to someone, I’m sure. Hopefully you will testify that this wasn’t murder?”

Dale’s question got him a strange look, and Tyler told him something he hadn’t considered. “No one does security here. Since this is essentially a campsite right now, no one has bothered to put that kind of infrastructure in place. Also, no one can get the materials for constructing permanent buildings since there are no trees here, so instant justice is the norm; we have no prison of any type. Well, there are trees at the bottom of the mountain that we could use… but hauling those would take way too much effort for most people to bother. Since the portal is open, most people that can afford it are going home at night. Hence, this stays a campsite.” Tyler was babbling a bit, but to be fair, he had had a very trying morning.

Dale’s brow furrowed; he apparently had more items to add to the agenda for that night’s meeting. “I take it that since the main population that is staying is only merchants and people too poor to afford to leave, the crime rate is beginning to increase?”

Tyler nodded sadly, glancing at the bodies again.

“Why haven’t I heard anything about this?”

Tyler grimaced. “The people that are too poor to leave are also not strong enough to fight past the first floor in the dungeon. Look how easily you dealt with those men.” He pointed at the dead thieves. “Now, if you spend most of your time with the Guild—strong men and women—you should have realized that this sort of thing is far beneath their notice. The philosophy of the Guild is that the strong prosper. If you lose your property, it is your own fault—for being weak.”

Dale was disgusted by this fact, a side of the Guild he had never seen before. “They just let it happen?”

Tyler nodded again.

“Okay, Tyler, you seem like you have a good head on your shoulders. You also seem business savvy, and you are the first person I’ve talked to that doesn’t seem to have a grudge against me. Would you do me a favor?”

“For you? Anything!” Tyler exclaimed proudly, reaching into the secret compartment where he stored the majority of his money, obviously thinking that Dale wanted a reward. He was very glad the thieves hadn’t found this drawer.

Dale grinned. “Great! I am having a council meeting this evening to discuss the problems in the area. I would like you to take a position on the council. You would be there to represent the miners and low cultivation-ranked people in the area. Would you accept such a position on the council, as a favor to me?”

Tyler slowly dropped the fistful of gold coins back into the storage chest. To his credit, he did not answer right away. He carefully weighed his options and thought about the responsibilities and paperwork a job like that would entail. Eventually though, he winced, mumbled under his breath, and agreed to join.

“Wonderful! We meet tonight at the church, five o’clock sharp, please.” Dale waved and went on his way, returning to the Guild to find someone to dispose of the bodies. After a few coins changed hands, two men ran off to collect the bodies and place them in a small wagon near the dungeon entrance. Apparently, dumping bodies into the dungeon was a convenient way to get rid of them. No one wanted to go out of their way to bury them after all. Dale was disturbed by how easily their murder was accepted, as well as how easily they would vanish without a trace.

When it got closer to noon, Dale hurried over to the Pleasure House and met up with Madame Chandra, quickly explaining about the plans for the evening before meeting his friends for lunch. Chandra agreed to bring the food if Dale paid for it, which was fine with him. At lunch, he talked with his party and ironed out a few strategies for what he should say tonight; they gave him a few good ideas and conversation topics to discuss with the group.

After lunch, Dale went to his daily training with Craig. His mentor had him practice his combat forms with Josh to get used to using his new and oversized weapon in combat. Luckily for Dale, the Rune on it that allowed for him to lift it didn’t reduce the power it had when it struck an opponent. The increased size did make it a bit more unwieldy but also increased the range he could strike his foes with. At the end of the session, he was very happy with his new morningstar as well as very grateful for the tips his instructors gave him. He went to towel off when he noticed that he hadn’t broken a sweat.

He thought for a moment and realized that he was also not sore or tired from the full-speed fighting; he also realized that the benefits of opening all his meridians were beginning to show.

Craig nodded in approval when Dale mentioned this and informed him that over the next few days, he would only get stronger. When his body finally got used to the changes, he would only need two hours of sleep a night, be much stronger and tougher, and even his capability for learning would increase.

Dale took this all in stride, having heard this explanation before. He moved on to the next phase of his daily training, sitting down to cultivate. He opened himself to the Essence of the heavens and the earth and began drawing it in.

At least, he tried to. When he tried cultivating from the earth around him, instead of Essence, a thick corruption began to flow into him, forcing him to stop cultivating immediately. Worried that he had just damaged his Center, he looked within himself… and was shocked by what he saw.

He had traced the flows of Essence through his meridians since coming back to life but hadn’t really looked at his Center-well, not beyond a cursory check to feel his ranking. Now looking closely, he found that his Center was contained entirely in a Beast Core! Inspecting it mentally, he found Runes delicately carved in the gemstone which allowed his Essence to flawlessly integrate with his body, sending and receiving Essence to and from his meridians. He searched for an explanation, but the only solution that came to mind was that the dungeon truly had messed with his body. He needed to find answers, but with a start, he remembered why he was inspecting himself in the first place.

He searched for any hint of the corruption that he had absorbed but did not see anything in his meridians, Center, or Core to show that he had absorbed any of the taint. Frowning, he opened himself up and began cultivating again—and again, only received corruption for his efforts. Quickly stopping, he tracked the corruption as it raced to his Center, but right before it entered… the taint vanished.

Frowning, he focused harder on his meditation and realized that there were several tiny Beast Cores around his Center! One of them had a soft, brown glow, and he realized that this tiny gem had absorbed all of the corruption he had taken in. For a moment, he was tempted to run and ask Craig about this development but ultimately decided to keep it to himself. He tried a slightly subtler question first, just to test the waters.

“Craig, why couldn’t Rose cultivate before going into the dungeon?” Dale asked his mentor, explaining about Rose’s dual affinity channels when Craig asked who she was.

“Oh, that explains it.” Craig nodded sagely. “To cultivate with multiple affinities, you need to draw Essence from a source containing both of them at the same time, else you will only draw in corruption. If she had tried to cultivate before, she would have shortened her lifespan a good deal. Let me amend that a bit—I say ‘same source’ which could mean getting fire and earth from molten metal or lava, but a high enough concentration of both in an area would allow for cultivation.”

“I see. So, if someone somehow opens an affinity channel, they would need to cultivate both types at the same time. Therefore, if it were earth and fire, they’d need to be around burning earth such as lava or melted metal? There isn’t a way around it?” Dale was drawing on his recollection of a half-forgotten conversation that took place months ago.

“Correct, but opening a second channel is unwise as it can ruin people. Increase your rank too fast, and it can lead to health issues or an unstable Center. Also, increasing your rank can hurt you if you do it too fast. If you keep smashing through your limits without giving your body a chance to acclimate to the new power, your flesh may not be strong enough to contain it,” Craig informed him ominously, making Dale remember his rapid—forced—advancement to the D-ranks.

“That is why Nobles—with their cultivation techniques that draw in so much more Essence than the average person—need to constantly train their bodies at the same time. Typically, the young ones spend ten hours a day exercising or fighting and have healers on hand to fix torn muscles and damaged flesh when they overdo it. They actually only cultivate an hour each day but can absorb as much Essence in that time as most can in a month. Also, they are the only cultivators that bother with the E-ranking.”

Dale was dumbfounded at the effort that Nobles had to put into their cultivation. “How old are they when they get into the B-ranks? Wait, E-rank? I haven’t seen anyone in that rank that I know of…”

“Ah yes. The ‘echo’ rank. The E-rank—obviously between the F and D ranks—is the process where a strong cultivator—usually their parent—‘echoes’ their cultivation technique into the target person. This ‘attunes’ the new cultivator’s body to Essence and allows for more rapid growth since there are fewer impurities for the body to purge as a cultivator increases their rank. Of course, this process has its own risks. As for the rest… hmmm.”

Well,” Craig thought a moment, “ascending into the B-ranks is not as easy as breaking into the D or C-ranks. Just absorbing Essence is not enough; you need to make a connection to a fundamental law of the universe. That is, you need to learn the true name of a concept to channel your Essence through and bind your aura and cultivation base to it. This binding has to be compatible with the Essences that you use so that you can exchange your varied Essences for Mana.”

“Let me guess,” Dale muttered dryly, “it really hurts.”

Craig looked at him admonishingly, then grunted and nodded slowly. “Nothing in our world worth having is gained without pain and effort. This process, in particular, is quite punishing, which is why there are so few Mages ascending each year. The connection allows Mana to flow through you, replacing all bonds of Essence with bonds of Mana. The Mage ascendant is literally ripped apart at the smallest level and rebuilt with Mana. I’m told there is nothing more painful known.”

“Naturally.” Dale shook his head. “Back to my point then—how long does it take them to reach the peak of the C-ranks?”

“They begin training their bodies at age five. They are shown how to cultivate very pure Essence at six, just so they don’t become corrupted as they grow. At fifteen, they are tested to see if their bodies can survive the harsh conditions needed. Most fail and are tested again at age twenty,” Craig began his lecture, settling into a familiar cadence as he talked.

“From fifteen to twenty, they begin to open their meridians, and their physical training is doubled. Twenty hours a day. When they are tested at twenty years old, those who are deemed acceptable are given their family’s cultivation techniques. Those who fail… well. They are given what are known as ‘branch family’ techniques. These techniques are intentionally, deliberately not as powerful as the main family’s technique. It is meant to keep them subservient to the main branch. By twenty-two, they are expected to reach the D-Ranks. By the age of twenty-five, the C-ranks, at which point they are considered adults in their families. By thirty, they are usually almost ready to ascend into the B-rankings.”

“Considered children until twenty-five?” Dale was aghast. In the mountains, the average lifespan was forty years. By twenty-five, most couples had several children. He was considered odd back in his old village for not going out to find a wife, but he had been too busy—and that was before finding the dungeon. Now he was busy for other reasons.

Craig nodded. “Not quite. They are considered children until they reach the C-ranks, but some geniuses have been known to do this in their early teens. What is wrong with being considered a child, though? When you are going to live for several hundred years and you don’t need to worry about income, food, or health issues… why not?”

“Wow. I cannot even imagine that kind of life! I had always seen royals as pampered, spoiled brats,” Dale muttered a bit too loud, making Craig wince and look around, muttering worriedly under his breath about treason. Dale looked up and noted the position of the sun, realizing that he needed to leave if he wanted to make it to his meeting on time. “Thank you, Craig. See you tomorrow then.”

“So long.” Craig waved. “Careful with the almost-treason…”

Dale made his way to the church, avoiding stumbling drunks that seemed to be everywhere. The Guild was providing free beer and ale while they built defenses around the dungeon entrance, and people were certainly enjoying and taking advantage of this benefit. Walking on to the stairs, Dale was greeted by a pale, sweaty, and exhausted looking Adam.

“Adam! Are you alright?” Dale asked his friend, concern evident in his voice.

“Yeah… just… exhausted…” Adam panted. “This… way…” He led Dale into the church, stopping at a door and waving him through. He seemed to fold in half as his head sank down, trying to catch his breath.

“Um. Thank you, Adam. Don’t die.” Dale walked into the room, ignoring the glare sent his way. The other members of the council were there, including Tyler—who looked very nervous around these powerful individuals.

“Thank you all for coming. We are here to discuss the growing population around the Dungeon and what steps we need to take in order to make this a successful settlement and not just a work camp,” Dale announced, taking the chair pointed at by Madame Chandra. “Dinner should be on the–” He looked over as the door swung open to reveal covered platters. “Ah. Dinner is here. Thank you, Madame. Let’s eat, and then we will start our discussions.”

After the last plate had been cleared and everyone was sufficiently stuffed, Dale asked all non-council members to leave before resuming the conversation. “I have been failing myself and my people by foisting the responsibility of running the city on to other people. Today, I was reminded that allowing others to run my life could only lead me to ruin. Not that I think my counselors don’t have my best intentions in mind, of course,” he qualified his statement as a few frowns appeared on the faces around him. “I simply think that it is time to start making this into a safe, secure settlement.”

“Dale, I hate to have to be the one to bring this up,” Frank cleared his throat, “but you are hardly qualified to run the area as a camp, let alone a city. If, on the other hand, you were willing to sign a few of the landowner rights over to me, I–” Frank was cut off as the others jumped in loudly, denouncing Frank and trying to explain how they were the most qualified to run the place.

Father Richard was almost shouting, “This place needs the moral guidance only I can provi–”

“I can plan the organization easier than anyone! My access to logistical–” Amber hissed.

“I am stronger than all of you–” Chandra smirked belligerently.

“STOP!” Dale released a roaring growl. He continued speaking to the room full of surprised faces, “I will not be ceding my rights to any of you! Or to anyone else! This is my land, and I’ll fight to the god-blasted death to keep it!” He stared them down until they looked away, blushing at their behavior. “I have already taken steps to correct my deficiencies as an administrator. Madame Chandra, I have recently come into enough money to purchase the memory stones, so please order what we discussed.”

“What?” Frank began, then coughed as he realized his constant interruptions were starting to make him look bad, as though he had ulterior motives. “I mean, didn’t we discuss that I would provide any teachers you needed?”

“You did,” Dale agreed, “but I need more than just fighting instructors. Madame Chandra is taking care of the details for me, so please don’t worry that I am going to pass the cost on to you. Now, if all personal concerns can be set to the side, there is some business to discuss.”

“Go ahead, Dale. I’m fairly certain you have our full attention,” Amber chimed in ruefully.

Dale nodded. “Good. I have had some major issues come to light today. Walking around, not looking for trouble at all,” Father Richard snorted softly at these words, “I came across a merchant being robbed. Tyler, our newest counselor, can attest to this firsthand. I took care of the bodies after I stopped the thieves, but it never should have been allowed to get to that point.” Dale looked around at faces that were rapidly turning to boredom.

“Also, I have been noticing large piles of garbage and waste. The paths, such as they are, turn to mud if there is so much as a hint of rain. Living quarters are erected haphazardly, and there is almost no organization. I need to find a new path to breakfast almost every day!”

The others shrugged a bit; most of this had no effect on their lives. No one would dare try to rob them, and a simple cycle of Essence made mud fall away from their feet. Sure, breakfast was important, but they all had it delivered to them in the morning. To top it off, they were nearly immune to disease due to their power. Dale looked around, shocked that the entire council—except Tyler, who was nodding along—seemed not to care at all.

Dale powered onward, “We need a guard force that protects the people here, someone that knows about sanitation to take care of our issues, and a city planner that can lay the groundwork for buildings and roads. Also, we need to designate areas for bathing and cooking. Drinking fouled water again really isn’t particularly high on my to-do list.”

Frank started talking a bit condescendingly, “Dale, I think you are putting too much thought into this without really thinking at all. For one thing, finding people to do those mundane jobs will be rather difficult around here. Also, how are you going to pay for this? Your personal wealth may be rather high for someone your age, but it isn’t enough to fund a city.”

“I may be able to allay your concerns, Guild leader,” came a voice that sprang from the shadows of the room. The Dark Elf Brianna stepped into the light, pulling a chair out and seating herself. Only the shock of not noticing her until this point kept the others from attacking her.

Frank’s eyes narrowed. “Oh? Who are you, and why should I not kill you and throw your corpse in the dungeon to rot for interrupting us, Dark Elf?”

A nimbus of Mana-powered light had appeared around each of the Mages in the room as soon as Brianna’s presence was known. Dark Elves had bad reputations after all.

“To answer your questions in order, I am Princess Brianna of the Huine nation, the ambassador charged with securing good relations with the person in control of the land a Silverwood tree is growing upon. Also, a full member of the council.” Shocked faces looked at Dale, who nodded. “As for the second question,” her eyes flashed, and Frank found himself blind while a blade tickled his neck; Brianna breathed softly into his ear, “because you can’t.”

Vision returning, Frank looked at the Elf who had not seemed to move from her relaxed position on the chair. “You’re a god’s-blasted Moon Elf.” He spat on the floor.

“Hmm,” was her uncaring reply. “Sorry I’m late, Dale. No one told me about the meeting. I just happened to find out about it.”

Dale nodded, trying desperately not to show that he had forgotten she existed. “Thank you for finding out and attending. Since I had been unable to get notice to you, I wouldn’t have held it against you. You mentioned you may have some solutions to our problems?”

“I do indeed. I would be more than happy to provide a guarding force—one that will patrol the grounds unseen. That way, there will be no interruption to business and crime will be handled… quietly. I already have several contacts on the way to fill the positions of city administrator and sanitation officer.” Her slouched, relaxed position never changed during this speech.

“Pah! And what will this cost us?” Frank barged into the conversation again.

Brianna eyed him like a tasty morsel. “Oh? Now it is ‘us’? I do believe that you were attempting to drop the entire cost on Dale a moment ago just so you could ignore the issues.” Frank paled a bit without looking at Dale. Brianna continued, “No, we care little for gold and such nonsense. We will need a small area to set up a barracks, an administration office, and an embassy if it won’t be too much trouble.” This last phrase was directed at Dale.

“You will have it. Let’s allow the city planner to plot the best locations for that,” Dale agreed, speaking slowly in an attempt to appear as if he were actually considering the offer. “I don’t want a haphazard layout like I saw in the capital a while ago. I want clear line-of-sight down streets and easily defensible areas. To that point: defenses. We need walls, stone roads if possible and maybe areas where people will be able to take shelter if caught in the weather. Winter is fast approaching.”

Dale cut off Frank as soon as he started blustering again, “Yes, I know it will cost money, Guild leader. Anyone have an idea about how to raise the funds?”

There was silence for a moment; then Chandra spoke up, “Well, I have been wondering why you have not been collecting a fee from people living here. That, and you have not been taxing those who enter the dungeon. The Guild is charging their members, but there is a huge amount of money leaving—without any going into your coffers.”

Dale almost knocked himself out slapping himself in the forehead. “Seriously?! Why has that not been…?” He took a deep breath. “Well, I seem to recall being told that the council was formed to protect the area and that it would have my best interests in mind. That has been proven false on yet another issue. Thank you for bringing it up now, at least.”

The other members winced, fearing that they were about to lose their chance to influence the area. Or worse, be told to leave. Instead, Dale surprised them. “From now on, council meetings are going to be an open discussion, as we’ve always done in the mountains. Anyone with an issue—anyone who has a stake in this future city’s success—will be allowed to speak to the council without retribution.”

Dale sighed as the people around him made faces. “This means landowners, merchants, and people who live in the area and enter the dungeon. People who only show up to challenge the dungeon get no say and will pay a heavier tax on goods taken from the dungeon. My council will hear the complaints of the people living here and bring a plan of action to the city administrator to try and fix as many issues as possible. Never forget—please—that the final say will always be mine, and I hold the right to revoke any decision.”

“I know it is not possible to please everyone, and that is not my intent. If there are real issues that have an impact on people, we need to address them. That is my focus. Start collecting a fee from anyone who exits the dungeon, and make sure they sign a simple contract before they enter that will compel them to pay a fair amount. Unless there are other items to discuss, we are done here for the evening.” Dale looked around, but everyone else was shaking their heads. “Anyone want off the council after hearing this new information?”

More fervent headshakes and a few people murmured ‘no’.

“Great! Chandra, Brianna, may I speak with you in private, please?” Dale shooed the others out. “Madame, I need those stones as fast as possible. Brianna, I need to hash out the details of our agreement with you and have us sign a Mana sealed contract. Just words between us will not be enough.”

Brianna snapped her fingers with a grin. “Drat.”

Chapter Six

The restructuring of the floors had taken a couple full days; moving them into the positions I wanted was Essence-intensive. Adding a very basic third floor took another day on top of that. The third floor had been interesting to design because I found an underground stream that was icy cold and flowing dangerously quickly. Originally, I had planned to use the water for traps, but Dani had come up with a better idea.

“Cal, what we are looking at there is a generator for water Essence! The faster it moves, the greater the amount of Essence that will be released by it as it flows! If you can constantly add a bit of dungeon soil to it as it flows downstream, animals and magical Beasts can potentially get addicted to the Essence if they drink enough! Over time, that will draw them in from hundreds of miles away!” Dani bubbled as cheerfully as the stream.

<Wow! I didn’t know that was possible! …Obviously. So, moving water generates Essence?> I threw a question her way as I began to change the course of the water a bit.

“Yeah… kind of. There is a bit more to it than that. I’ve never really taken the time to explain that to you, have I? There are two kinds of Essence around you: ‘loose’ Essence and ‘bound’ Essence. I started calling the Essence in the air ‘loose’ and you just kinda went with it.” She giggled.

<I can’t be curious about everything; I would never get any work done! So, what is it?> I playfully admonished her.

“Fair enough, yup. So ‘bound’ is what you can pull directly from the element that contains the Essence you are after. It requires a lot of cultivation to become refined enough to move into a being’s Center. You remember how it is pretty difficult to pull Essence from stone, right?” she bounced a question back to me.

<Yes, and I would rather not have to do it ever again, if that is okay. I really like my new Runes.> I looked fondly at the Runes that pulled in Essence and condensed it for me. <Automating tedious tasks is awesome.>

She laughed. “Actually, that’s a really good lead-in. The second type—‘loose’ Essence—is released from its ‘bound’ state by interacting with another type of element. For instance, steam Essence is not really its own type; it is intermingled air, water, and fire Essence that are all tightly woven together.” She paused for a moment to let me think about her words. “Since the water here is flowing so fast, it is interacting with the rock around it and releasing lots of mud Essence. That loose Essence is what is being collected and purified by your Runes!”

<So I don’t need my door unblocked to gain more Essence right now?> I thought about how best to use this new information. <What if I use just a little for traps? If I draw some water into an enclosed space and heat it up a lot. The interaction would accumulate loose earth, water, and fire Essence, right?>

“Hmm. Well, yes, I suppose–” she started.

I cut her off to finish my thought, <When the trap goes off, it would blast steam outward, adding air to the Essences!> I finished gleefully.

“Interesting! I wonder what type of Essence that might produce? Air, fire, water, and earth. Hmm. I like it, though. Solid plan, Cal.” She paused a moment. “Oh! Instead of a trap that only goes off when someone sets it off, why not make steam vents that blast as soon as the pressure gets to a certain point? That would add a puzzle-like area to the dungeon since anyone passing through would need to find the pattern that steam shoots out of the vents!”

<I like the way you think, pretty lady. How about a tunnel for that, which groups will have to go through? Or,> I paused, thinking as she blushed, <we haven’t set up the third floor yet, just cleared some of the area. How about we make the third floor one huge puzzle? Instead of tunnels every which way, then individual rooms, why not one big room made of twisty, turn-y paths?>

“Like a labyrinth?” Dani offered a word that I hadn’t heard before.

<… A what?>

“Labyrinth. It is a big, dangerous maze. I don’t know, Cal. That seems like a huge undertaking. Not only do you need to decide on a pattern for the room, but you would need to connect the walls to the ceiling and floor and make them so hard and dense that people couldn’t just smash their way through.” She considered it, then turned on me suspiciously.

“This isn’t… you aren’t… you are, aren’t you?”

<I have no idea, but would love to be a participant in this conversation,> I stated blandly.

“You are trying to turn the floor into a giant Rune, aren’t you?”

<… I had considered it.> I sheepishly muttered, somewhat upset that my master plan had been caught out so early.

“You are gonna get us killed,” she groaned. “Fine, but under no circumstances will you activate it until we both agree to do so. Deal?”

<You got it, pink sugar!>

“Mm. No. Just no,” she shot down another attempt at a nickname.

<Ahem,> I pseudo-coughed. <So have you decided on a pattern for the chests? I’d like to make those and place them as soon as possible.> I was already starting to shape the stone on the third floor into a rough estimate of the Rune I was after. After I had it correct, I planned to raise the stone to meet the ceiling, but for the moment, I left it an inch high as a marker for expansion at a later date.

“I think I have finally settled on a design, but I reserve the right to change it at any time.” She sent an image along our mental link, and I quickly made a small version for her to examine.

<That look about right?>

She seemed happy with the result. “Yes! Also, I think we should show which ones hold special gear. The low-level, average chest should be dark stone. As they become more difficult to find or the monsters guarding them get stronger, we make the chest out of better material and put better stuff in them.”

<So like the coin system humans use? Make the second-tier copper coated, then silver, gold, and… on the super rare ones, how about I make it gold and splash some of that potion on it that makes things glow?> I ticked my ideas off on my mental fingers.

“Perfect! I also particularly like the idea of hidden chests. Let’s make them waste a bunch of time looking around if they are greedy. More chances to kill them. Maybe we put chests in the walls that only miners will find as well as increase the danger? Maybe if they hit the wall in the wrong spot, it’ll open a steam vent?” she offered, already planning out where to place them. “Or maybe an acid vent? I’m imaginative too!”

<Oh, that’s good,> I agreed maliciously. <We can decide on the loot to put in them later. Are you about ready to start creating the Dungeon Cats?> I had decided to call them that instead of Distortion Cats in the hopes that Dani would like them better. It didn’t really help.

“You know, do we really need them? I feel like some of your Bashers could use Beast Cores at this point…”

She was trying to forego the Cats again!

<Dani, we have been over this,> I gently prodded her. <The Bashers are only… less than decent… fighters. They came from prey animals, so I basically need to force them to fight. Predatory animals are ideal; they have natural weapons and the instincts to go with them. The Cats are even better! They are Beasts! They are intelligent! I can set them up with a Beast Core! Even if they die, they will be able to have memories transferred to new Cores, and I can push their spirals into a new Core instead of absorbing them, allowing them to return to full strength as soon as I respawn them.>

“I know.” Dani sighed heavily. “You are right. You’ve told me all this before… just do it, and let’s get it over with.”

That was all the permission I required, so I set about creating a new Cat right away. Pulling the pattern of its aura from memory, I energized it with the subtle combinations of Essence it needed in order to produce flesh, veins, nerves, tendons, bones, and, after a few minutes, fur. In just a few minutes, standing six inches tall, a white-coated Dungeon Kitten stood on shaking legs before us.

*Mew!*

Dani screamed, breaking my concentration, “AHHH! I love it! Hi, kitty! You. Are. So. Fluffy!” She zoomed around it so fast that it couldn’t keep its eyes on her. It tried to bat at her a few times but, after a moment, flopped to the floor and curled up. It was only thirty seconds old, so I felt it was acceptable that he was a bit tired.

“Cal, this has to be the third-floor Boss. We’ll evolve the others first—let me play with the kitty!” she begged. “I name you Snowball, and all who face you shall feel your wrath!” she told the kitten seriously.

It tiredly purred back at her.

<Snowball? C’mon. Imagine this place in two weeks,> I pleaded. <‘Look out, it’s… Snowball! Yeah, ol’ Johnny got mauled by… Snowball.’ Heh. That… that’s actually hilarious. I’m in. Snowball it is.> I created a few more kittens, being careful to keep the fluffiness to a minimum. I did not want a repeat of Snowball. I was happy that Dani seemed to have gotten over her fear of cats, though.

I inspected these new kittens and decided to try something slightly different than my norm. First order of business was to move them into another room, since, well… let’s just say I didn’t want to hear about it for days if they, um… exploded.

The Cats should be strong enough to accept multiple types of Essence, by my calculations. And, well… I was going to find out if they were, anyway. Instead of pulling Essence from my own Core, I redirected the dense Essence in my room into the Cat. Mainly just to see if I could. I added one part water, one part air, and three parts pure Essence. The test subject, ah, kitten tensed up at first, trying to escape the intrusive injection of power, but as it started to grow, it relaxed and laid down. Pulling Essence from the surroundings worked, which made me very happy since I did not have to deplete my Chi spiral, which creating things always had before. This had the added benefit of not depleting my store of corruption either.

The Cat stopped growing when it reached D-rank two. It was sixty-five pounds and four and a half feet long from nose to its haunches, ignoring the tail. Waiting for a disaster, I watched as it stood and stretched, testing out its body. It suddenly shimmered, becoming almost insubstantial and leaping into the air. It floated along, slowly descending to the ground thirty-six feet away. That was a leap from a standstill! If it were running, how far could it go? I decided to call it a Cloud Cat after its mixed Essences. I let it walk around, quickly spawning some rabbits for it to hunt. Not Bashers, of course, I didn’t want to start bad habits. It hunted them by pouncing and silently gliding toward them, then lashing out from above with quick, efficient strikes. I grinned. Silent but deadly.

Next, I tried fire and earth. I wanted a Magma Cat! I would have called it a Lava Cat, but we were underground. Therefore, magma! I directed the combination of Essence into it, but soon after, the Cat started hissing and burst into flame. Within moments, it was ash. I was glad Dani was otherwise occupied since that was originally the combination I had wanted to try on Snowball… I digress. Maybe I just needed to alter what I added a bit? I directed fire and earth Essence into my next attempt but with earth Essence outweighing fire by a factor of two to one. The Cat’s body seemed to accept this combination, and it began growing. At its full size, it was two hundred and ninety pounds, five feet long from nose to haunch.

I looked closely at it, not seeing what advancements might have been made until it decided to stretch. Its claws appeared to be solid steel, and they gouged huge chunks of stone out of the ground with casual ease. It yawned, showing that its teeth had also gained this enhancement. It spotted a rabbit bounding across the ground and got ready to pounce. It launched itself like its spine was a coiled spring, shooting across the distance in a blink of the eye. That concept struck me, and so I named it a Coiled Cat. I was very pleased with the outcome of this experiment.

Now that I had realized that varying the ratios of Essence could produce different effects even with the same elements, I felt more prepared to create variations. The next, um, successful creation I made was a combination of water and earth with water just a tiny bit more prevalent than earth. The one before, I had used… just way too much water. I glanced at the puddle of ooze and fur off to the side and shuddered. This new successful model grew to full size but then started losing all its fur. It glared into the darkness around it. Totally hairless, the Cat certainly looked harrowing.

I sent a rabbit its way, and the Cat hissed and swiped at it. Six inches before touching its victim, the rabbit’s fur and skin split as if the claws were deeply embedded, eviscerating the small animal with contemptuous ease.

<Celestial feces!> I exclaimed, half in disgust and half in anticipation of using this against heavily armored foes.

It cuddled up to the other Cats, and I was very happy to see that it had a sweet disposition despite its disturbing appearance. It started feeding the kittens with the shredded meat, and I decided on its name.

<You, my not-so-pretty kitty, are a Flesh Cat.>

I wanted more! I kept going, failing over and over until I finally found another viable combination. I poured infernal and water Essence into this Cat, happily watching it grow. Its body took on a mangy look, the fur falling off it in clumps; its coloration shifted to black speckled with unhealthy-looking white, and when it meowed, it was more of a yowl. The other Cats still seemed to have no issue with its appearance and accepted it quickly. I made a rabbit for it to hunt, but it ignored it in favor of a nap. Guess I would need to see it in combat to see what it could do. Based on how it looked, I named it a Wither Cat.

Dani had been trying to catch my attention for a few minutes, so I finally focused on her. “Look, Cal! Snowball is dancing!”

Dani was hovering just out of the kitten’s reach, and it was on its hind legs slightly jumping as it tried to swat her.

I burst out laughing. The mental shift from creating deadly monsters to watching a kitty dance was just too much for me.

<Oh my goodness, Dani!> I laughed and laughed. <You can just keep him if you want. I don’t need to upgrade him. I could keep him a kitten… basically forever.>

Dani smiled but refused, “No, he needs to be a big strong Boss Mob.” Then she sank toward the kitten and continued, “Yes, you do! Who’s gonna be a big kitty? You are!”

<…Right then.> I focused on the Cat and started pushing in fire and air Essence. I had barely begun when it started to hiss and shake.

Dani’s voice was dangerously calm. “Cal? Did you… test this combination yet?”

<…> I was frantically adjusting the levels of Essence.

“Do not kill my kitten,” she hissed venomously.

I tried to find a solution as quickly as possible and struck on an idea. I already knew that I could combine more than two types of Essence, so I quickly added one more. Water Essence flowed into the mix, balancing the other two as the Cat settled down, breathing heavily. The Essence flowed into it, though I was careful to leave it a rank below me so I could still fully control it. At D-rank four, the Cat was as large as its progenitor and twice as fluffy. Its size was deceptive; it weighed only two hundred and ten pounds, though it was eight feet long. The tail brought his total length up to fourteen feet.

It started exploring the room, luminous white fur bouncing as it explored its new body. Dani watched it to see if it would display any unique abilities, but it seemed content to frolic around the room. After a few minutes of watching it in admiration, Dani asked, “What type of Essence does it have?”

<I think it is ‘steam’ type,> I answered uneasily. Try to calm down, Cal; it survived, Dani won’t shatter me.

“Really? Open up a steam vent in here. Let’s see what happens,” she directed me.

I quickly obeyed, glad she had seemingly forgotten that I nearly made the Cat pop. In moments, a steam vent allowed a dense fog to roll across the ground, the superheated vapor settling on every surface. Snowball looked at the steam, head cocked to the side as it took in this new phenomenon. It reached its paw into the fog as if it were playing with a new toy. Where the fog landed against Snowball, he blended perfectly and vanished, his hair moving in the same waves as the vapor. A perfect camouflage! I could not tell where he was without looking for the disturbance in the air and Essence around him.

Snowball stepped fully into the steam, and within seconds, only his three eyes were still visible. Even then, I could only see them because I knew where to look. He went over to the vent and stood directly in the hottest part of the steam. After a moment of staring at it, he started licking it like a salt block. I made a few rabbits in the room, and Snowball eyed them hungrily. Running across the room, Snowball had no need to attempt to remain stealthy. His charge made no noise or disturbance as long as the Cat stayed in the steam. He pounced on a rabbit, and where his claws penetrated… the flesh cooked.

Snowball hissed at the dying rabbit, releasing a narrow stream of superheated vapor. The rabbit cooked, dying instantly as its flesh boiled and popped. Snowball ate the tender corpse, blood marring his white coat only until he reentered the fog, at which point the red stains either vanished or were bleached into invisibility.

<I have enjoyed my day today,> I mentioned to Dani.

“Ha! I wonder why.” She chortled. “Come on, let’s go work on my plant room. I want to see if we can whip up some kind of catnip.”

While she fussed over her flower arrangements and herb placement, I slowly built walls in the third floor and populated it with Cats and advanced Bashers, then sprinkled traps and treasure chests throughout the gigantic labyrinth. We were deep enough that I could take as much horizontal room as I wanted, allowing me to make the floor fully half a square mile.

My Boss area was at the direct center of the maze. I had sunk my Runed area and the Silverwood tree downward slowly, then formed a clear layer of quartz over it that would magnify the view from above. Adventurers looking in from above would not be able to tell that the tree and I were lower in the Dungeon until someone made the trip. Also, this way, the people in the area above would be able to see two Boss fights without fear of dying themselves, and the tree would still get sunlight and moonlight.

The chests were ready, the dungeon was populated, and the aesthetics were pleasing. The walls in the maze weren’t quite ready, but they were growing.

When a light breeze laden with Essence suddenly moved in my depths, I realized the door was open!

We would see how far people were willing to go for their greed…

Chapter Seven

Dale’s team was working hard under Craig’s tutelage, practicing moving as a unit without interfering in one another’s attacks. After a little more than an hour, Tom was gasping for air—although his oversized warhammer was feather light. Though the amount of Essence he had to constantly supply to the weapon was minuscule, the strain wore him out quickly. The others in the group were in the D-ranks, and several of them had multiple open meridians. Dale—a rarity—had all of his open, making his endurance and control of Essence much more refined.

“You need to break into the D-ranks, Tom,” Craig informed him. He mercilessly continued, “Look at those around you, still working hard while you gasp and pant, holding your knees. Are all of those muscles for show?”

“I—pant—apologize for my weakness,” Tom gasped. “I shall work harder on my cultivation. I shall not rest peacefully until I am able to stand beside my team through all of our trials.”

Craig nodded while the others rolled their eyes. “Good! In that case, I do think that you are ready to open a meridian.”

Tom looked up hopefully. “I have heard this term several times and have seen the effects of opening several at a time with Dale. Will it shrink and collapse my body as it has with him? What does this process involve?”

Craig snorted, the first time Dale had heard anything approximating a laugh from him that day. “No, that was a result of his Essence suddenly blasting every impurity out of him at the same time. If he had been conscious, it would have shattered his mind and permanently ruined his body.”

Dale choked on his laughter a bit at this revelation.

“I want you to strip as much as you feel comfortable with, whatever you keep on will need a professional clean… or to be burned,” Craig warned.

Tom stripped so fast that the others didn’t even have a chance to think about looking away before they saw dangling bits. Barbarians clearly did not have the same social norms of decency, and he had no issue being nude, even in combat.

Craig chuckled. “I should have been clearer. This is fine, but… next time perhaps you keep on your smallclothes?”

“Nothing small there,” Rose muttered, blushing at the shocked look the comment earned from Hans.

Craig directed him to open his heart meridian—the same one Dale had started with. After several minutes of intense concentration, Tom gasped and became pale as Essence rushed through him. He clutched his chest as the wave of Essence wrapped his heart, spitting up blood and filth as his Essence met his lungs. Black sweat collected over his body, and the air took on a tang of foulness. When he finally looked at his friends, his eyes were a deep red from broken capillaries. The blood was filling one of the sclera, giving him a frightening visage, especially with the other gore and filth on him.

“That felt horrible,” was Tom’s understatement of the day. “The worst kind of heartburn imaginable, then as if I were breathing dry, overheated air from a forge.”

“You are a fire cultivator, yes?” Craig inspected Tom for damage as he talked. Tom nodded, so Craig continued, “You need to work on the purity of your Essence. For the next month, cultivate nowhere but in the dungeon. The purity of the loose Essence in there will dilute the taint you have absorbed. If you keep pulling in the amount of corruption you have been, there will be serious issues when you try to break into the D-ranks, not to mention the C-rankings.”

Tom stepped over to the river to clean himself, and a Dark Elf appeared to Dale’s right. He bowed, ignoring Dale’s startled yelp.

“Your Grace, I have come with a daily report for you, as per instructions. Would you like to hear it now or in private? There are no matters of particular sensitivity.”

Dale cleared his throat and ignored Hans’s pantomime of him squealing. “Here is fine, good sir. If you are going to be bringing the report regularly, might I get your name and ask that you reveal your presence at least five feet—maybe ten feet—away from me? Also, why are you calling me ‘Grace’?”

The bow deepened. “This one thanks you for your kind regard! My name in the human language will likely be easier for you to pronounce—it is Jason. I am calling you ‘Grace’ because your dealings with the Lady Brianna—as well as your holding of land—have allowed you to be granted a title from our Queen, and you have been named a Duke.”

Jason hesitated in order to choose his next words carefully. “Understand, please, that you hold no rights to inheritance, but we acknowledge that you have quite a significant influence on our future. You control the land upon which a Silverwood tree grows, after all. Hence the title, as an offer of goodwill and a form of diplomatic immunity from other kingdoms. Although, to that end, I believe you also now hold the honorary title of Baron with both the Lion and Phoenix Kingdoms.”

Dale was nonplussed as Hans’s face clouded, looking like a storm was about to break forth from him.

“And now he is a Noble too,” Hans grumbled. “Of course. His head is going to swell to the size of a–”

“And… what are the benefits of this position?” Dale apprehensively questioned the bowing Elf.

“To ensure that there are no misunderstandings when dealing with our culture, I have been given a memory stone that will grant you our language, political knowledge of our courts, and the customs of our people. This alone would be worth several hundred gold, but our Queen feels it is necessary for future dealings… as your life has been in jeopardy sixteen times while conversing with our Princess. Since you have been unaware of some… cultural differences,” Jason clarified for him, voice never varying from an even cadence since he had begun speaking, even when discussing the near-executions.

Dale started sweating a bit now, a feat that over an hour of constant combat training had been unable to replicate. “I would like that stone very much,” he rushed to say. The Elf grinned slightly and held up a small stone. There were motes of light moving in it, not unlike a Chi spiral’s, but they obviously held a specific thought pattern.

“Your discretion regarding our politics will of course be… appreciated,” Jason muttered in a slightly threat-promising tone.

Dale nodded and pressed the stone to his head. The light from the stone shot into his skull, creating pathways and memories in his brain that may as well have been there from birth since they melded with his own so well. The stone shattered to glitter, and Dale stood still for several minutes while the information became a part of him.

Finally, he shook himself and looked at Jason, who was still bowing. “My deepest apologies! Please stand, Lord Jason. I am sure you realize that I did not understand that you were waiting upon my command to rise.”

Rose took this moment to close her hanging mouth with an audible click. “Dark Elves? Here? And Princess Brianna is here as well?”

Jason looked over at her, and in a barely civil tone, he nodded at her and responded, “Yes, she is here, half-breed.”

The others looked shocked, but Rose—and now Dale—understood how poorly Elves viewed mixing of the races.

Dale didn’t want to give him a chance to further offend anyone or have someone attack him. “Report.”

The Elf launched into his report, detailing several crimes that had been stopped and how fights had nearly started when the Elves moved on to their new land and evicted those living in tents from the area. They had redirected many people along the riverbanks so that cooking water was pulled from upriver, clothes cleaning was farther downriver, and bathing was done at an even greater distance downstream. Sanitation was still an issue, but the position of sanitation officer had been filled. Garbage and refuse were being collected. The current plan was to begin dumping it into the dungeon as soon as it was open, as it would all vanish shortly afterward. Perfect solution!

Dale nodded as the Elf spoke, asking what had been done with the people committing crimes. He was informed that they had been delivered to Protectorate Cole, who had been appointed by the council to give judgement to criminals. Originally, Magistrate Acman—a Dark Elf—had been offered to fill the position, but it turned out he was obstinate and hard to work with. Even Jason had to admit—internally of course—that even such an illustrious Elf as Magistrate Acman may not have been the best for this position. Even in the short amount of time he had been there, Protectorate Cole had proven his worth repeatedly. Cole had worked at honing his abilities in aura reading to the point where he was able to discern between truth and lies at a glance. Therefore trials were short and efficient and justice meted out quickly.

Tom came back, dripping from the quick scrub in the river. As he dressed, he curiously eyed the Elf.

Jason glanced at him in return—noting his sodden state—and grimaced. “Apologies, Your Grace, it seems we missed a bather.”

Craig smoothly joined the conversation, “My fault, I had not heard about the new rules and sent him to bathe after opening a meridian.”

Jason bowed again. “I should go and warn any who were collecting water. I shall return on the morrow.”

He vanished and—Dale assumed—left. Dale’s team went to lunch, eating with their usual calorie-desperate gusto to the slight—yet poorly hidden—disgust of their server. After finishing, they stepped outside, where they were met with both excited and angry shouting.

“What’s going on?” Adam wondered aloud, his mind clouded with exhaustion. Father Richard had begun training him in earnest, and the mental fatigue of the training was horrendous.

Dale squinted at the milling crowd. “I don’t know. I haven’t heard noise like this since they first opened the portal. Shall we look into it?”

They walked at a fast-yet-measured pace, staying in formation as best as possible. Craig had drilled into them that if they made combat tactics a part of every daily routine, it would be easier to keep their bearing and formation while in battle.

They waved down a man who was running toward the Guild tent. “What is going on?”

A happy grin flashed across his face. “The dungeon is open!”

A sour-faced man near them overheard and growled, “Yeah, but they are charging everyone fifteen percent of their earnings if they want to go in. Fracking council put it out this morning. So long, single-run retirements!”

Dale looked at Hans as the complaining man walked off. “What did that mean?”

“Most people who live in the middle of nowhere—like you used to—can earn enough by going through the dungeon a single time to retire, either from the coins they collect or by selling other things they bring out. Those whiners will still get wealthy; they just don’t want to give up any money for the greater good of the people living here.”

Hans shook his head. For the first time, Dale fully understood the political ramifications of what he had been doing, and the conversation devolved into the pros and cons of several nuances of the situation, much to Hans’s delight.

They chatted for a few minutes until Hans asked a very pertinent question, “Did you get all of this political savvy from that memory stone?”

Dale considered. “I must have. I mean, I have been trying to learn faster, but I had been getting better at it only very slowly. Now it feels as natural as breathing to have an in-depth conversation concerning the taxation benefits of a high-yield resource center such as a low-corruption dungeon.”

Hans laughed. Never had he imagined that Dale would become a true contender in political and economic debates. It normally took years of study to be able to hit the finer points of the conversation they were having! Dale wouldn’t have understood half the words they were using even that very morning. They walked to the entrance to the dungeon, noting the queue of people waiting in front of the new fortifications.

The walls were hardened stone, seamless even if they had been put up in haste. There were many kill slots in the stone; these were places for weapons, arrows, or magical effects to pass through to kill any monsters that tried to escape the dungeon. The doors were stone banded with metal—obviously made by Mages as there were no seams or welds in the work. Unlike normal fortifications, these were built to keep things in and kill them, not keep things out while defending the location.

There was at least one spectacular benefit to owning the land; Dale’s group bypassed the line waiting to get in and went directly to the clerk.

She looked up, bored. “Guild or standard?”

Dale looked at her as a troubling idea crossed his mind. He hoped he was wrong about what she was about to say. “What is the difference?”

She released a long-suffering sigh. “Oh my gawwd… Non-Guild need to pay a fifteen percent tax to the landowner so he can throw a party or something. Guild rate is the standard flat twenty-five percent.”

“Throw… a… party?” A vein on Dale’s temple began to throb. “No, there is a fifteen percent tax on everyone, and the Guild takes twenty-five percent of the gross amount after that. Also, the tax is in place to build this campsite into a city so you won’t have to wade through feces on your morning commute. Who sent these orders?” Dale was trying very hard not to yell.

She made a very unladylike noise. “You have a problem? This came straight from GL Frank.” She finished her sentence like he was an idiot, and with that, the conversation was over.

“How… interesting.” Dale had a maniacal grin on his face. “Oh Hans!” he said in a sing-song tone. “Be a dear and send a runner for the Guild Leader, please. Or GL Frank, as she calls him.”

“…Dale,” Hans began worriedly.

“Now, please.”

Hans sighed and motioned to one of the messengers who were near the entrance. He sent him off with a sad look.

“Who do you think you are?” The clerk looked pissed off. “You don’t summon the Guild Master like he is a common thug.” Her face looked troubled when Frank appeared next to Dale moments later. He had moved so fast that he was invisible until he stopped.

“What?” Frank barked at the clerk. Then he noticed Dale. “Oh. I thought there was an issue with the dungeon. What is the matter, Dale?”

Dale explained about the tax rate, and to his credit, Frank looked confused.

“I sent the orders about the tax rate this morning.” He looked at the clerk, who gulped. “Where is the memo?”

“S-s-sir, it was just a misunders–” she began but was quickly cut off by Frank.

“I didn’t ask for you to talk, I asked where the memo was,” he growled. “Hurry up. I ran out of a meeting for this. Literally.”

She rummaged around in her papers, obviously stalling. Frank made a noise and stepped in, pulling out a paper hidden under her logbook. He showed Dale the proclamation, then held it close to the clerk. “Are you trying to make the Guild look like a bunch of greedy, self-serving shakedown artists? Or can you just not follow orders?” He tore into the despondent clerk.

“Sir, I just thought that–”

Cutting her off again, “Obviously, you didn’t think. This is the second time you have been caught disregarding orders. I shudder to think about all the times you must have gotten away with things if you have only been caught for these gross infractions! I know that you aren’t technically part of the Adventurers’ Guild, but do you think you will keep your job if I go talk to your master at the Scribes’ Guild? Your job isn’t exactly labor intensive, and it pays well. I’m sure we could find someone trustworthy to fill it if you do something like this again! Give me a count of the reported incomes of the Guild members who’ve entered—by the end of the day.”

Frank turned back to Dale. “I’m sorry about this, Dale. The Guild will cover the differences in reported incomes today. We can’t charge the people who already went in, after all. They didn’t agree to the rate.”

Dale smiled. “Frank, my real worry was that you had a hand in this. Seeing that you’ve so quickly resolved the issue renews my confidence in you. I am very glad that my choice of you for the council was the correct decision.”

Frank nodded but wondered if Dale understood that what he had just said was as much a compliment as a warning. Probably not. He knew Dale didn’t have the understanding of political subtleties to make that kind of remark, so he took it at face value. “I certainly hope my loyalties are never again called into question and that I keep your confidence for a very long time.” He glared at the quailing clerk and removed himself at high speed, returning to his meeting.

Dale looked around at his nonplussed team and the suddenly silent line of people waiting to enter. The clerk was nearly in tears at her public admonition. Her newfound realization that professionalism was the only thing allowing her to keep her job forced her to hold back the waterworks.

“Well. Shall we enter?”

Chapter Eight

Dale’s group walked into the much larger entrance and looked around, whistling at the bustling mining activity. Whereas before, the door had entered into a shallow cave entrance and only eight or nine people had been able to mine at a time without injuring their neighbor, now it seemed like half the population of the camp was chipping away at the stone.

“Excuse me, could I get by you there?” a man asked them politely.

Turning to let him pass, Dale exclaimed in wonder—he was meeting a nonhuman half-breed for the first time in his life.

“Of course! Hello, my name is Dale. It is a pleasure to meet you, sir. Can I ask your name?” Dale almost stammered in his excitement.

The man was built like a Dwarf, having the beard and the height, but his features were distinctly Orcish. He was also in full plate armor and wore it with an ease that spoke of constant use. The man eyed Dale for a moment, looking for disgust or pity, then broke into a wide grin, revealing disturbingly pointed teeth.

“Well, some of the asshats around here call me ‘Gnorc Gnorc’ like I have damn gnome blood, but I am a Dwork—and proud of it!” He roared at a couple of miners nearby who had been making rude comments about him. He held out his hand and shook Dale’s in a powerful grip. “The name’s Evan.”

“A dork named Evan?” Hans failed to hide his mirth at the subtle taunt. “A Half-Dwarf, Half-Orc… with a human name.”

“It’s pronounced Dwork.” Evan eyed Hans. “I don’t know if we will get along well, you and I. It has been a pleasure to meet you though, Dale. I need to get to work. I have a month to make my first payment on this beauty.” He hoisted his pickaxe, the same one that Dale had rescued from thieves recently. Evan stepped over to an unoccupied area along the wall and put on a helmet.

“That is an odd piece of gear to wear,” Tom commented. “Matter of fact, I have not seen any other miners wearing any armor, let alone full plate.” His curiosity was sated moments later when Evan gave a mighty swing of his pick and the wall in front of him shattered with a thunderous roar. Splintered rock bounced off the Dwork’s armor, sending him staggering back a few steps. Instead of moving forward again for another blow, he waited a few moments. The fallen rock in front of him started to vanish, leaving behind chunks of pure iron ore.

Evan collected the ore into a large bucket and smiled. “Best job I’ve ever had.” He swung his pick again with a mighty grunt.

Dale’s group had had enough of the noise and so started walking into the dungeon’s depths. After the first turn, most of the natural light vanished, leaving them in a blue-tinted gloom. The groups allowed in the dungeon were spaced a minimum of twenty minutes apart, which would allow for Mobs—dungeon monsters—to respawn and Essence to re-accumulate in the air.

Dale felt the Essence around him with his enhanced senses, remarking that it was a little less concentrated than usual for the first floor. He asked Hans for his opinion but was told that since they were usually the first to enter the dungeon each morning, the Essence had usually been able to build up. Also, the Mana barrier over the door had likely blocked Essence production, lowering Essence in the dungeon further. They moved quickly through the area, overtaking an F-ranked group that glared at Dale’s smiling group as they returned to the surface. The people in that group were sweaty and dirty. Obviously, they had worked hard and decided to cut their losses and leave before dying.

In the second room, they found things greatly changed. Dale’s first impression was that they had stepped outside; there was lush greenery all around, and the room was brightly lit. They had to squint as they looked around, unaccustomed to the brightness after walking through the tunnel. Feeling relatively secure, Dale looked up and saw that the ceiling had a thin layer of glass over it which held glowing fluid between it and the rock, accounting for the bright light. There was no path. The room was completely overgrown in what could almost be called a beautiful arrangement of flowers and herbs.

“Wow. It is beautiful,” Rose breathed in deeply, smelling the combination of herbs and flowers.

<She said it is beautiful!>

Dale heard my smug voice in his mind; he looked around for the source and swore softly.

“So, you are real then, Cal? Not a figment of my imagination brought on by stress and trauma?” Dale thought hopefully at the dungeon.

“None of these flowers compare to you, sweet Rose,” Hans poetically promised the uninterested female.

Rose glared at him. “You are old enough to be my grandpa.” There was no response from Hans, just a pained look.

<Yes, I am real. Sorry about this. I have no idea why you can hear me. You really shouldn’t be able to… It must be a side effect of my experiment. I can kill you if that would help?>

“Experiment? What do you mean?” Dale ignored the offer of death for some unknown reason.

I thought about how much I wanted to tell him. <Well, I wanted to see if I could fix a human, and then you conveniently died after helping me out. So, I figured, you know, might as well try to see if I can do it.>

“There is no other reason? You didn’t want an ally, a slave, or anything like that?” Dale thought heatedly.

<Nope, just wanted to test myself. Plus, you did help me out, so I feel it was justified if you survived. It won’t happen again. Nothing personal, but you humans are fairly tasty. Can you try and invite some different races in? I haven’t tried Elf yet, but a few have poked their heads in here so, you know, I am getting excited,> I assured him.

Dale shook his head. “What the hell is going on?” he muttered. Then a Basher slammed into the side of his leg, leaving him no more time for questions. “Ow!”

They tightened their formation, protecting their less well-armored members in the center. Tom stated the obvious, “I cannot see a thing through this underbrush. Where are they?”

Hans nodded at the question. “The Essence in the plants makes them too dense to see through, and so I can’t tell where the Mobs are based on their auras alone. Look out; I am going to open up some space. Otherwise, look for moving plants!”

The knives in his hands took on a soft shine, and he swung them in a slow arc. The plants in front and to the side of him fell over, clean cuts separating their stalks. Several Bashers were also torn in half, adding thick, red blood to the runny sap dripping to the floor. With a clear kill zone, they made short work of the weak Bashers in the area.

“No loot dropped,” Adam noted after waiting for the familiar clink of coins.

Rose’s keen eyes spotted something. “What is that?” She pointed at a rock-like formation that was tinted green to blend in with the plants.

Hans’s eyes gleamed. “That, my dear, is a treasure chest!” He rushed over and caressed its surface, rubbed his face on it, and then lifted the lid. Inside laid several thick copper coins and a potion containing a syrupy light source. “Score! I can pour this on myself and pretend I’m a ghost tonight!”

“Are these typical in here?” Rose looked around for danger as she awaited an answer. She had only been in the dungeon once before, and that traumatic experience had her on edge now.

“Nay, ‘tis a new occurrence,” Tom informed her gravely. “Though I must say, I prefer collecting from a single area instead of scrambling along the floor on all fours chasing a rolling copper.”

<Heh. I do miss that aspect of things. It was always fun to put them just far enough away from each other that people would have to bend over and reach like twenty times. Remember that handsome book writer who tagged along with a group for ‘inspiration’—what was his name? Dakota? When his team was distracted, I kept making slow, chubby Bashers attack him. He started swearing and sweating at the same time! He squealed every time a Basher came close! I don’t think I’ve ever laughed so hard before.>

Dale steadfastly worked to ignore the voice talking in his head.

They debated stopping to cultivate but decided that it would be better to get to an area where the Essence in the air was denser. They continued onward, now on the lookout for treasure chests as well as monsters and traps. Dale was directing his friends around what his enhanced vision saw as thin stone in the wall—when he heard a giggle in his mind. His eyes narrowed, and instead of bypassing the section, he smashed the wall, revealing a bright silver chest.

<Aww, how did you know?>

Dale opened the chest, finding several shining bars of silver and a few healing potions. He distributed the potions, keeping one for himself and ignoring Hans as he was the least likely to get hurt. The others looked at him oddly so Dale tried to justify his actions without letting the dungeon know how he actually figured it out.

“The size of that space was a lot smaller than the traps normally are, as well as being shaped differently.”

The others nodded, cheerful at their good fortune. Those bars of silver would bring in a good chunk of money, roughly twenty silver coins per bar. They continued past some obvious traps and into the third room.

This room was similar to how it had been arranged in the past with a few blatant differences. The very large open space had lots of Bashers, but they were mainly clustered in large groups with only a few wandering the areas between them. As they studied the room, the rationale became obvious. The thicker clusters of Bashers were around small chests of various colors. The rarer the coloration, the higher the population of Mobs. At a few points they normally would not explore in the room—such as midway and far to the right—there were even advanced Bashers that they only normally saw in the Boss Room and on the lower floor.

Hans whistled when he saw why they were there. “Look! They are kind of hiding that chest, and it is glowing! Can we go open it? Pretty please?” He batted his eyelashes at Dale as if he were trying to be seductive. “I’m greedy and owe a flesh Mage a lot of money.”

Dale chuckled; he was glad that Hans had asked and didn’t try to undermine him as the leader of the team. “Really hard to report what we don’t know about, right?”

That was the phrase they had always used to make Craig give in when they wanted to explore.

“Aww, yeah.” Hans maliciously unsheathed his daggers, and the team got ready to fight.

They moved forward, killing the Bashers in their way and taking no hits from the—fairly—predictable attacks.

They learned to fight monsters in the order they came across them after Rose loosed an arrow at one a good distance away. The arrow struck its target, a Basher, who squealed and limped toward them. The group it was in—as well as every group they passed—joined in the charge, until a wave of bounding fur was sprinting toward them.

“Oops,” Rose muttered as the team glared at her. Tom stepped forward, swinging his hammer down to lightly graze the stone floor and then continuing toward the Bashers. The weapon impacted the floor at an angle and sent shards of broken stone flying forward at high speeds. These shards shredded the small bodies like crossbow bolts. Easily a half dozen were killed, while others were badly wounded, bleeding out in moments in a few cases. The rest continued onward, ignoring their fallen comrades.

Rose began releasing arrows while Dale stepped forward to attack. Since there was still some distance between them, he activated the enchantment on his weapon and started swinging. The spiked head of the weapon stayed in perfect alignment with the shaft, which meant that it moved far faster at a distance than the shaft of his weapon. Physics.

At its maximum range, he could swing the shaft of the weapon slowly and the ball would blur through the air, greatly increasing the amount of force applied to whatever it hit. Any of the Bashers that were struck lost flesh in chunks and usually died, but they were small and nimble while the weapon was unwieldy at range. He missed far more than he hit when he was trying to mash the scurrying creatures at any greater range than he was used to.

Still, they were able to finish off the Bashers with little issue, though Hans groaned as a bit of blood landed on his otherwise immaculate clothes. They certainly planned on collecting the contents of the chest the group had been guarding, but first, they attacked the advanced Bashers to get to the glowing chest. Hans stepped forward, then suddenly appeared behind them, stabbing two Mobs through the brainstem before they could react. One heavily armored Smasher bounded toward the main group of humans, but Adam braced himself and thrust the pointed end of his staff toward it in a panic, skewering the Basher through the eye and into its brain with a lucky attack.

They stopped, breathing heavily due to their pumping adrenaline, and started chuckling. They were so excited! The group hadn’t taken any injuries, and it was obvious their practice of formations and teamwork were starting to pay dividends. They opened the chest, revealing two Runed holy symbols and an Inscribed dagger. Working exuberantly to clear the room and open all the chests, they moved on to attack the Boss Room.

Cal

Dale’s group seemed to be doing fine. Ugh. Too well, as per usual. Some of the other groups in here were doing less than perfect, and Dani and I decided to watch them for a bit. Specifically, we focused on a group that I had taken a personal dislike to. They called themselves ‘The Collective’ and had stolen a live Glitterflit a few weeks back. I had no idea how it was doing; after it was taken out of the dungeon, I could no longer sense it. I assumed the poor bunny had either died or was dying since most of the Mobs in here needed the Essence rich environment to survive for long periods of time. I thought for a moment; maybe the Shroomish would be fine in the wild… but who knows?

‘The Collective’ had just defeated Raile and were opening the chest in the room. As per usual, they complained about the amount of money as well as the quality of items. To be fair, I had started intentionally creating weapons with flaws so they would break after enough uses. I had learned my lesson after giving Tom what basically amounted to an unbreakable warhammer that he swung around all the time. Now, Runes were typically hard to break after Essence had gone through them at least once. Therefore, I introduced intentional flaws. Plus—hee-hee—Dani told me that if a Rune broke while Essence was moving through it, ‘interesting’ things could happen.

This group of six finished collecting their loot and looked downward, where they could see the Silverwood tree through the glass at their feet. After a brief argument, they found the stairs, one set leading up and connecting to the surface and another leading down into unknown danger. The argument they had was simple; it was based on whether or not to smash the glass and jump down. Eventually, they made a decision and walked toward the stairs; this wasn’t because they wanted to do things in the proper order, ohhh no! The reason they deigned to find the stairs was that they tried to smash the floor. Heh. Good luck with that. I had reinforced it with Runes and powered it with earth corruption. To smash through, they would need to supply at least an equal amount of wind Essence—and enough force to break the hardened, glassy surface.

They walked down the stairs, and I started to get excited. Soon, I would get to test my new creatures in combat! The stairs continued at a forty-five-degree angle downward to the north, which meant they would have to come into the labyrinth very far away from the center of the room—which they would need to find in order to fight the Boss. They paused in the small, six-by-five-foot room I had created at the bottom of the descent, looking around critically. There were four doors in the room, excluding the stairs back out. Above each of the doors, I had carved small pictures: a drop of water, a flame, a stone, and a whorl to represent wind.

They stared at these, then determined that they were representative of the trials they would face down each hallway. Heh. They actually had no meaning! I put them there to confuse people and make them think there was a pattern to things. They stepped boldly through the ‘stone’ doorway and started walking down the narrow hall. Unlike the tunnels above, there was not even a soft glow to see by. Also unlike the floors above, these halls were straight and had many, many branching paths. After they were a few turns in, I sealed the door they had entered through by quietly lowering a slab of stone. Unless you had seen it happen, it would look like just one of the many dead ends.

The majority of this group were D-ranked, with the leader a bold C-rank. They walked along without light, using their Essence enhanced vision to see. This allowed them to see and navigate using the Essence in the air, but they did not count on how thick the Essence actually was in this room. Using the loose Essence to see by on this floor was like holding a bright lantern in fog. You could see directly around you but not through it. The cost of their arrogance came due quickly—and with compounded interest.

As they passed an open connection in the tunnel, a Flesh Cat silently lashed out at the member in the rear. The highly armored man started squealing—unaccustomed to pain as he was—and the Cat retreated a few feet, readying itself to pounce. The other members of the group quickly formed a perimeter around the fallen man, and their healer tried to diagnose him.

“He… It is like a sword ignored his armor and laid open his gut! I need a potion, now!” the healer barked. The man guarding the doorway reached into his bag and started fishing for a potion. The Flesh Cat took advantage of his inattention, pouncing forward and furiously mauling him, swiping back and forth almost a dozen times.

The man’s screaming died off quickly, and he fell to the ground, dead with no obvious marks on him, but blood flooded out of the joints in his armor. The leader of the group flashed forward, skewering the Cat and concurrently landing a blow that snapped its neck.

“What in the abyss is that? Pull a potion from his pack; I need to finish the healing! ...Ugh. Too late.” The healer shook blood off his fingers with a grimace.

The leader gave a grim smile. “It’s an unexpected windfall! The Guild pays very well for new Mob corpses to study.” He pulled out a small sack and started stuffing the corpse into it. Somehow, he fit the eighty-ish pound, four-foot-long Cat into it and put the small bag back in his pocket. Callously, they rummaged through the corpses’ pockets and took their expensive armor, then left the dead men on the floor and continued exploring. The remaining men—bizarrely—seemed happy with the outcome, as it meant they would have a larger cut of the profits.

<What in the heck?> I turned my mental attention to Dani. <Did you see that?>

“Yeah… I can’t believe they just left their friends like that!” Dani commiserated with me.

<Huh? No, that’s fine. They stuffed a whole Beast into a tiny little bag!>

“Oh. Sure, I’m fairly certain that is a dimensional bag. They are made from heavily enchanted and inscribed standard Beast Cores.”

<What kind of Beast Core? What do you mean by ‘standard’?> I was always happy to learn new things.

“So, you know how I told you about the different ranks of cultivation?” Dani prodded. She continued after I mentioned that I did, “At the different cultivation levels, Cores gain different properties. There are flawed, weak, standard, strong, beastly, immaculate, luminous, and radiant Beast Cores. Essentially the Beast’s diet, age, and strength of cultivation affect the quality of their stone. Immaculate Cores are usually only found in B-ranked or higher Beasts and are extremely receptive to enchantments.”

<What kind of a Core am I?> I plaintively wondered. Not because I wanted to be the best kind, certainly not. It wasn’t like I worked at being the best, most beautiful, or most dangerous dungeon that exists.>

“I am fairly certain that you started out as a ‘beastly’ Core. Your configuration is categorically different though, so now it is hard to tell where you fall in the rankings. Remember, you were altered with—what I can only assume—was Spiritual energy, and it shifted around what makes you a cohesive whole.”

<You mean my molecules were shifted into a non-standard configuration?>

“…Sure.” She looked at me like I had started spewing Orcish. “An-n-yway that is why you were able to make a soul stone to house Dale’s Center. While the configuration had been set by Spiritual energy, the pattern was easily replicable as it was a physical change. It all comes back to the fact that you are a very different type of Core. I’d say one of a kind, but, well, Dale.”

<Right. Well I’m just going to go ahead and call myself ‘radiant’.> I preened a bit.

“Knew you would,” Dani muttered, grinning as I huffed at her.

Chapter Nine

Dale smiled happily at how his bag clinked as he walked along. “Today has been a good day.”

The others agreed, as they had each made exceedingly good money. After finding several chests, both standard and hidden, they had to slow down and adjust their pouches so they would stop banging against their sides. They were just coming to the end of the fifth main room on the expanded second floor. Sitting down, they began cultivating with as much focus as possible.

Tom was drawing in as much at a time as he dared, his open meridian helping by drawing off a good portion of his Essence and keeping it circulating. This allowed him to pull more into his Center without worrying about damaging himself. Remembering Craig’s orders to not cultivate outside of the dungeon, he pushed himself even harder.

“HA!” Adam shouted, making the group collectively reach for their weapons. “Did it!” He looked around with his grin slowly fading as he saw the sour faces looking at him. “Oh, uh… Sorry. I just regained my D-rank five.” He had dropped a rank by using too much Essence in an incantation during the fight with the Distortion Cat a week ago.

“That was way faster than expected!” Hans clapped him on the arm. “Great! Easier to get to a rank when you’ve been there before, isn’t it? Don’t worry, it happens sometimes.”

Adam looked at him curiously. “You have lost a rank in the past?”

“Yeah… everyone wants to try enchanting at least once, ya know?” Hans ruefully sighed. “Let’s just say there is a reason you should buy them and not make them.”

The others fell silent as they thought about his words; they had all considered enchanting in the past.

Rose shook off the sudden melancholy first. “Well! Are we ready to hit the Boss Room? Raile is waiting for us, and I promised Grandma Chandra that I’d bring her some fresh Raile steak since we are eating it so often. She’s losing money.”

They all jumped to their feet and got into formation, cheering themselves on and getting mentally prepared to fight the massive Basher. They cautiously marched into the final room of the floor, noticing differences immediately.

Adam informed them of the most obvious one. “The Silverwood tree is gone!” he called in a shocked tone.

Dale started sweating with unadulterated fear; if the tree was damaged, the Dark Elves would most likely kill everyone in the area—after torturing them for a few weeks. He looked around the open, flat room for any sign of its whereabouts, noticing the new, glassy floor just as Raile charged them.

“Here we go!” Hans whooped as they tensed their knees, throwing themselves out of the way and scattering. “Our first real Boss fight as a team!”

Rose responded as she began launching arrows at the presumed weak points in Raile’s armor, “What, the Cat didn’t count?”

“Nope!” Hans did a cartwheel over Raile, avoiding getting trampled by inches. “That was some kind of wild monster that got in here. This is a real test from the dungeon.”

“A test? Hardly!” Tom roared. “This rabbit should be cooked well and served to me, not disgracing this dungeon with its weakness!”

This statement shocked the others so much that they paused a moment too long, and Dale paid for his inattention by taking a light blow to the edge of his breastplate, heavily denting it as he was thrown aside. Ignoring Dale, Raile turned slowly and stared directly at Tom, pawing at the ground just before charging. Tom stood still in defiance, not moving until Raile was almost in striking range. Then he swung his mighty warhammer back and around, bringing it down on Raile’s head with enough force to shatter the protective armor and send shards of stone into the soft brain below.

Raile’s momentum was transferred downward as his head stopped moving, and his body flipped. It began coming down on Tom, but he braced himself and dodged almost entirely out of the way, losing only a bit of skin as the rough armor met his unprotected flesh.

“Ha! I was certain of my ability to defeat this foe alone; this validation of my increasing skill pleases me greatly.” Tom looked at his teammates with a huge smile on his face, bleeding from small cuts where razor-sharp stone shards had sliced him.

“Did you just … taunt Raile?” Hans unbelievingly exclaimed.

“Just so!” Tom nodded. “I was under the impression that he was an intelligent foe, and it was a pleasure and honor to defeat him. My insults do taint my victory, but I felt a great need to know my progression for certain.”

<See if I fall for that again.> Dale ignored my quiet voice by force of will.

“This was way more fun than fighting that demon Cat was!” Rose was flushed with victory, already spending the rewards in her mind. “Is there another chest in here somewhere?”

“There it is!” Dale shouted exuberantly, jumping in the air and whooping. The others turned in excitement, ready for treasure but were disappointed to see Dale looking downward.

Adam raised an eyebrow. “The treasure is under the floor?”

Dale shook his head. “No! The tree! There is another floor, and the tree is below us! We’re gonna live!” This comment earned him a few odd looks.

“Oh. Well.” Rose spotted the treasure chest tucked away on the far side of the room, its exterior a bright but not glowing golden color. “There is the chest!”

All of them moved to collect their rewards, and even a highly relieved Dale peeled himself away from his view. They pulled open the chest, finding it filled with silver coins and potions. There was another pickaxe in the chest that appeared to be inscribed as well as a set of arrows that glowed with bright enchantments to their enhanced vision.

“Dibs!” Rose called, pointing at the dangerously barbed arrows. She lifted them out and let Hans scoop the coins into a bag he had with him. “Shall we sell the pick, or is one of you feeling like taking up mining as a hobby?”

“Let’s sell it. I know a guy who would be happy to get us the best price for it,” Dale said, thinking of his new friend Tyler.

Hans eyed him. “Don’t forget that the Guild still gets a cut, no matter who you sell it through.”

“Of course! I was just thinking we could bypass the listing fee that they make you pay at the Guild auction house. If we go directly to a merchant, we’ll get more,” Dale assured his friend.

Tom was eying the stairs leading down into darkness. “Dale, how would you feel challenging the next floor? After such a fast fight with the glorious Raile, my blood screams out for battle.”

Dale went silent. “Well… we have no idea what is down there. Should we wait for a report?”

Hans nodded. “That would be a wise plan.”

“I’m up for it,” Rose offered as she tested the balance and flexibility of her new arrows, ruffling the fletching to inspect the craftsmanship.

Adam made a noncommittal noise when the others looked at him.

“Perhaps… just a peek to see what awaits us?” Tom pleaded, edging toward the stairwell.

Dale looked around; each of them nodded, and Hans shrugged. “We can at least see what the next floor looks like, I suppose.”

They walked down the stairs for several minutes, the angle making them seem to walk a far longer distance than it actually was. At the bottom, there was a small room with three doorways spaced oddly far apart.

“What do those symbols mean, do you think?” Adam pointed to the carvings above the doors.

Hans grunted. “No idea, but unless I miss my guess, this is also a doorway but closed.” He pointed at the square stone-like symbol. “Maybe it is the exit? It opens from the other side, you think?”

“Well, let’s take a look. Which one do you want to go in?” Dale put the matter to a vote.

There were three votes for the ‘fire’ door, hardly surprising as two members of the team were fire cultivators.

Hans clapped Tom on the arm. “Go team hot stuff!”

“Hot stuff?” Tom considered the words. “If you mean the fire of battle with which we temper our souls, I agree to this team name.”

Hans blew out a lungful of air slowly. “You know… you just… let’s just go, Dale.”

They all stepped into the darkness and took a few steps when Hans stopped them. “Wait. Do you see that?”

They looked about them, but Adam was the one who answered, “I see nothing. The Essence is very dense on this floor though.”

“Exactly. Too dense. Stay here.” He walked forward a few feet and vanished to their enhanced vision. “Where did I go?”

“Didst thou… find a tunnel, perhaps?” Tom called uncertainly into the darkness.

“Nope!” Hans was in front of them again. “Stop enhancing your sight. Watch and learn.” He reached into his pack and produced a light potion. He shook the vial without opening it, and it began glowing brightly. Within moments, they were able to see as far as the tunnel extended, at least until it took a sharp turn. “Now, enhance your vision again.”

They did as instructed, and their range of vision suddenly dropped to a few feet.

Rose broke the silence, “How strange.”

“Agreed, this will make it much harder to watch for traps.” Dale mentioned as an afterthought, “And monsters.”

“On the plus side,” Rose smiled as she suddenly plopped to the ground, “our vision is being impaired by free-floating Essence.” She began cultivating, causing a small competition as they all attempted to clear the air in the tunnel.

Cal

<Huh. That was unexpected,> I muttered to Dani.

“What’s that? Sorry, I was looking at my garden; another group chopped all the plants down,” Dani told me sourly.

<Oh? Let’s do something about that tonight.> I directed her attention to the adventurers on our level. <Look, they just… sat down! They normally try to clear the rooms first, don’t they?>

“Yes, but to be fair, they aren’t being attacked, and they are getting a lot of Essence. It makes sense to me.” Dani looked at the other group in the area. “At least they aren’t getting a chance to relax.”

I had been haranguing ‘The Collective’ since they first reached this floor. Luckily for them, I didn’t have fine enough control of the Essence in the room to make and control large groups of Cats. I could either make a few and control them well or make a swarm and let them run rampant in the dungeon. Since I didn’t want a large group of uncontrollable Cats in the area…. Whoops! Back on topic. I had intermittently been sending squads of Advanced Bashers or individual Cats at the group, and they had slowly begun falling to my war of attrition.

I had just had a successful sneak attack! While they had been focused on the Bashers, a Cloud Cat had gracefully drifted down the long, straight hallway behind them and savagely torn into their healer. The screams of the healer had only lasted a moment, but it was long enough to distract the other members. They had each taken a few wounds from the Bashers, including one nasty burn from the hellfire on the horn of an Impaler—not enough to take them down but more than they were prepared to deal with without a healer.

Soon, their leader was gritting his teeth to steel himself against the others’ complaints. So far, he was the only one mostly undamaged, and he had resolutely stuffed the body of the Cloud Cat in his bag and marched onward. Now it was obvious they were looking for an exit, and they retraced their steps as well as they could. They even had found where they entered but thought they were wrong since the door was closed and seamlessly blended with the stone around it. They had been wandering for nearly an hour when I noticed they were approaching Dale’s group and the open doorway behind them.

The leader of the group cocked his head and motioned for his minions to be silent. He looked around the corner carefully, drew a blade, and motioned for his team to get ready to attack. A tap on his shoulder made him wave his hand in a shooing motion as he gripped his sword.

“Ah-hem!”

The leader furiously started to turn, glaring at the offender who had made the noise, only to find a gleaming dagger pressed to his Adam’s apple.

“Well hello there, sunshine.” Hans smiled blithely at the quickly paling man. “You weren’t really going to attack a group from the Guild in here… were you?” He fluttered his eyelashes sweetly.

The man began to bluster, “What? No, of course not! I was just… preparing in case this turned out to be another trap! This dungeon is devious, and we have lost two… three of our group! These two have taken serious injuries.” He waved at his underlings, who helped his case by looking extra pathetic.

“Hmm. Well, you are always welcome to leave peacefully.” Hans stressed the last word and stepped to the side, narrowly missing a Wither Cat as it lunged at the group. It swiped its claws deeply into the arm of one of the members of “The Collective” before running to a safe distance, hissing and retreating back into the concealing darkness.

“What in the abyss was that?” Hans shouted as he watched the retreating feline figure.

The leader looked away from his bleeding subordinate. “That’s one of the new Mobs. They are on an entirely different level than the ones above. The Essence in the air… I can’t even tell their ranking. They die a lot faster than the armored Bashers, but the wounds they inflict…” He waved at the downed man.

Hans moved in for a closer look. He frowned at the man who was writhing on the ground and beginning to scream, “Cut it off! Oh, gods, cut it off!”

“It looks like a shallow cut… Is it poison?” Hans spoke over the screams.

“The name is Nick, by the way—headman of ‘The Collective’,” the leader said with a worried look at his downed man. “I don’t think so, but I can’t tell for certain. We lost our healer earlier on this cursed floor.”

Dale’s group had come closer when the noise became audible, so Adam was quickly motioned over. He immediately sent healing light into the wound and gasped, sweat forming as he waged an intense battle. The screams died down, and the man began thanking Adam profusely.

“No, this is not over. I merely delayed the infection until a more powerful healer can fix it,” the cleric informed his now nervous patient.

“What happened? What did it do?” Dale quizzed his friend.

<Yes, what did it do?> I asked with a quiet chuckle, making Dale look around in quiet fury at the surrounding—seemingly empty—dungeon. I had a few Mobs turn their heads so light bounced off their eyes at him, just to freak him out a bit.

Adam turned serious eyes on his group leader. “Whatever that thing was injected infernal Essence into the wound. The corruption wrapped the meridian, pulling it closed. Then it started forcing its way in, attempting to climb the meridian through a non-infernal affinity channel. I had to wrap the whole thing in a layer of Celestial Essence, and… I slowed it and eased the pressure, but it will gain strength again soon. It is already dismantling my barrier. He needs a powerful cleric if he wants to live, let alone regain use of his arm.”

They lifted the man and exited the labyrinth with Hans and Nick providing rear security. Quickly climbing the stairs, they exited my awareness only a few minutes later.

<Dang. I did not realize it would be so effective!> I turned my joyful thoughts and attention fully to Dani, who hovered in the air with a line of worry coming across our link.

“Cal, I think that maybe this floor is too powerful for the majority of the people that typically come into the dungeon… Do you think that we should tone it down a bit?”

She seemed a bit nervous.

I certainly considered her words but ultimately decided that I disagreed with her. <I… think that this is the best course of action. Having a new floor should warn the adventurers that it will be far more dangerous, and I know for a fact that the loot on this floor is far better than what is on the other two.>

“You think they will agree that the rewards justify the risk then?” Dani queried me seriously.

<I do. Also, I never liked the fact that so many people were able to get right next to us. I seem to remember you telling me a long time ago that it should be insanely hard to get into the heart chamber.> I wondered where this was coming from; she had always been the biggest proponent of eating as many people as possible.

“Hmm. Okay, that is fair… I just worry about drawing in people that you can’t handle. For instance, that powerful Mage that walks in every morning, avoids everything except Raile and then tears his armor off and butchers him. Do they eat him up there?” Dani curiously wondered.

<I assume so. He is just a glorified rabbit after all. Plus I have absorbed some jerky people dropped that contained a bit of his Essence.> Dani shuddered when I mentioned this, so I tried to change the topic. <So, you were getting upset earlier when people cut down all of the plants in the garden room?>

Dani took the bait. “Yes! Not only that, but I have come up with a way to solve the problem.”

<Do tell.> She sounded vicious and furious, making me get all excited!

“A Mini-Boss.”

My enthusiasm waned a bit. <A what? Are you making up words again?>

She laughed. “You are going to like this! There is no real reason to cut down all the plants, right? So, we punish them for doing it! If they cut down a certain amount—let’s say more than half—we allow a Boss to spawn in the room.”

<I’m in. Did you have something in mind, or should I try and make something?>

She was silent a moment before answering shyly, “This is the part you… might not like.”

<Go on. I said you had total control of that room, right? I won’t go back on my word,> I assured her.

“I want you to put Banes in there,” she informed me to my great disgruntlement.

<Dani. I thought we were finally done with those,> I whined.

“Hear me out! That wasn’t the part you won’t like. I want you to upgrade them… and use the tentacles from the Distortion Cat,” Dani directed me.

I looked at her in great surprise. <Dani! Those made the Cat go insane! They are horrible parasites!>

“Right, right, right. But they made the Cats insane because the Cats were moderately intelligent. On the Banes, they should just be an appendage. Then the Bane will have a long, medium, and short-range attack! They might actually be useful! Think about it, revamping an old Boss that never got a kill…” She trailed off tantalizingly, watching for my reaction.

I was almost salivating at the thought of amending what I saw as a failed experiment. <Not fair. You know all of my weaknesses! I will try, but it is a moot point unless the patterns will mesh.>

“Just promise to give it your best shot, okay?” she muttered with concern. She knew how much I hated the mind-altering effects those tentacles used.

<Offensive! I always do my best for you!> I focused on the patterns in my mind, pulling them together and hoping that they wouldn’t… I sighed. I tried the tentacle pattern with a different creature, then another…

“Well?” Dani demanded.

<Oh yes. They work with the Bane. Actually, the tentacles work with almost everything. Every different type of living creature I have ever made. I tried rocks and swords, but no luck there.> This garnered me a strange look. <What?>

“You tried on rocks…? You know what, never mind. Can you tie them to the room so that they spawn when plants are killed off?” she exasperatedly pushed the conversation forward.

<Yes… There we go! So, I redirected the Essence in that room into spawn ‘seeds’. When about twenty-five percent of the plants are cut or destroyed, their Essence will spawn a new-style Bane. Basically, up to four can spawn in the room at a time. Now we just need to increase their rank and give them a new name,> I informed her, much to her delight.

I had kept my hidden ‘failure room’ on the second floor and was excited that I would get to play—erm—experiment again so soon after a large upgrade to my dungeon. I had made some upgrades to the room, basically what amounted to an acid waterfall that I could pour on to whatever was in the room. Then I could light it on fire—a very beneficial upgrade which allowed me to absorb my new creations right away.

I grew the small ‘Bane plus tentacle’ in the room and studied the G-rank nine creature. I was looking for signs of insanity or incompatibility and heaved a small sigh when there were no apparent negative effects.

<If this is what you were thinking, do you want me to use pure Essence or add in some combination of corruption?> I prodded Dani who was enraptured by the small Bane with a waving, probing tentacle.

“Oh! Um. If I have been correctly understanding what you’ve been doing recently, a combination would be best. Now, this has earth and water Essence, a bit more earth than water, creating a ‘plant’ Essence combination. With the tentacle, it has a large portion of infernal as well, so how about you try adding a mix of those three, keeping the ratios roughly the same?”

I looked at her in amazement; I had not realized she was paying that much attention when I babbled on about what I was doing! I needed to return the favor more frequently.

<On it. What Rank do you want it to be?>

She dithered a bit. “Well… the typical Mob on the first floor is an F-rank two or three, but this is a Boss… though there might be four of them…”

<Let’s set them to be about the same rank as the first-floor Boss Squad. Most likely, they won’t have all four show up at the same time, right? I say F-rank five or six, really punish them for damaging your herbs and flowers!> I got thoroughly enthusiastic about this idea.

“You just want more Essence,” she grumbled with a chuckle in her voice.

<Well, yeah! If someone dies, I get all their refined Essence in one go! Otherwise, I need to cultivate just like the unwashed masses.>

I started directing Essence and corruption into the Bane, and it rapidly began to grow. At F-rank zero, a second tentacle sprouted; at F-rank four, a third appeared! I stopped it at F-rank six as promised and watched as it probed the air with the newly grown tentacles.

Remembering how the Distortion Cat attacked, I released a rabbit into the room. The tentacles went still, then the maws on the ends opened and tried to release a howl that would stun the small creature. They did roar, but there was no Essence in this howl. The wiggling weapons hissed in frustration. The rabbit tried to run away but didn’t get far as the main body of the Bane released a thorn that killed the terrified creature from a dozen paces away.

<I’ve seen enough. I think it will work out just fine on the first floor.> I poured my favorite acid—etching solution—on to the Bane. It roared, coated in burning fluid, and slapped the tentacles on to the ground, uprooting the plant and throwing it out of the acid.

<Wow!> Luckily, the damage was done. After allowing a few moments for the acid to do its job, a new pattern flowed into my mind. Over the next few minutes, Dani and I worked out a plan to set up the Mini-Boss in the garden. Night was fast receding by this point, so there were no auras in the area to interfere with my work. Even the majority of the miners had left by this point, but there was one in full armor still banging away at the walls.

<All set, Dani. That’ll be a nasty surprise for people tomorrow.>

Chapter Ten

Dale woke up and stretched, still amazed by his new body. He had only been asleep for three hours or so but was so well-rested that he had no choice but to get up and do something! He walked around until he grew bored, then he peered around the darkness and called out softly, “Any Elves nearby?”

“Right here, Your Grace.” A form stepped out of the shadows. Dale hadn’t met this one.

“Oh. Wonderful. I was wondering if you had… well first, what is the guard group here called?” Dale altered his tone and position to match the stance of a Noble talking to a respected elder. He assumed that almost any Elf was going to be older and wiser than him, so it should be a politically savvy move.

The Elf seemed to smile at him somehow, without his mouth moving. “We liked the title of your appointed judge, so we are currently going by ‘The Protectorate’ so human mouths can form the syllables of our position correctly.”

Dale nodded. Though it seemed a bit derogatory, that was just how Elves acted. “Thank you for thinking about the people you are protecting. I need to speak with Princess Brianna. Do you by chance know if she is available?”

“She is. We require even less sleep than your people, so we have extended working hours. If you make your way to the Grove, I will go ahead of you to inform her of your impending meeting.”

“That would be fine. Dismissed,” Dale gave a ritualistic order, and the Elf vanished. “That wasn’t too bad.” He started walking toward the Elvish embassy—or ‘Grove’ as they called it—when a distinctly non-Elvish form stepped from the lee of a large tent in front of him.

“Really, you shouldn’t be out and about at this time of night, Your Grace,” a rusty voice sneered condescendingly as Dale drew his oversized morningstar. “Haven’t you heard that night air is bad for your health?”

Dale opened his mouth to demand answers—specifically why he was being stopped by this man—when a club hit him in the side of the face, knocking out teeth and breaking his jaw.

A dark chuckle came from the man in front of him. “Can’t have you ordering us to leave, now can we?”

Delirious with pain, Dale still held to his training and began fighting the men that had appeared from behind buildings. He whipped his morningstar around him in tight arcs, blocking weapons and breaking bones. In moments, two attackers were dead, but the remaining men attacked without hesitation, beating Dale until his limbs were broken and he lay on the ground unable to fight back.

“Whew! Had a bit of fight in you, huh?” The first man laughed, grabbing Dale by his ankle and dragging him toward the entrance to the dungeon while the few other surviving men gathered the dead.

“Whhhhuuuu?” Dale moaned, face bouncing against a few rocks.

“What’s that, dead man? Why? Well, it just so happens that you pissed off the wrong person. She’s gonna waive the “tax” you put in place, and we get a bit of revenge. Ya see,” he stopped and kicked Dale in the side, grinding broken ribs against each other, “fifteen percent tax means we haveta go in the dungeon almost ten times more than we should if we want. To. Retire.” He finished the sentence calmly, kicking Dale at each pause. “You die, we get a bit on the side, and no taxes! Win-win-win for us, not so much for you.”

The dragging continued, and Dale had a spark of hope as they approached the clerk checkpoint. The spark turned cold as the clerk that had gotten yelled at earlier stepped forward, grinning.

She looked up at the men. “Any trouble? Anyone see you?”

“Nope, all set here. Lost a few, but that was expected. More money for us if we don’t have to split it, right?” The man grinned lecherously back at her. “I’ll be back to take the other reward you offered later. Don’t worry about the Guild. We will be able to honestly say that we didn’t kill ‘im.” They started down the ramp—luckily for Dale’s face, it was no longer a staircase—and quickly entered the dungeon.

They were just getting to the far side of the room when a miner stepped out from behind a corner, freezing as he saw what was happening. “What the abyss is going on here?”

“Don’t you worry about it, half-breed. This don’t concern your type.”

The miner lifted the visor on his helm, revealing Evan the Dwork. “This be murder most foul, and I’ll go to the abyss before I stand aside.” He raised his pick and prepared to fight. It didn’t go well for him. The other men were better armed and outnumbered the Dwork. They quickly rendered him unconscious and took his inscribed pick.

Laughing, the men went all the way to the first Boss Room, stripping Dale’s armor before tossing him in alone. They debated a moment on whether or not to keep his weapon but ultimately decided that it was too easily recognizable. They threw his morningstar across the room, where it swiftly vanished into the floor. When the Boss Squad appeared, they chuckled and left, retracing their steps out of the dungeon.

Dale considered the unpitying eyes of the Bashers, desperately screaming through his swollen mouth.

<It isn’t personal, but I’m also not going to turn down a free snack. It’s been a pleasure matching wits with you, Dale.>

“Wait! Wait, please hear me out!” Dale thought desperately.

The Bashers paused a moment, then settled on their haunches. <What, Dale? I already told you that rescuing you was a one-time deal. I refuse to get a reputation as a soft dungeon or as one who plays favorites.>

“Please! I’ll owe you a favor. Almost anything I can do, I promise to do. As long as I don’t have to betray my friends,” Dale sent, hoping he was being heard.

<Not worth it.> The Bashers moved in closer, preparing to pounce.

“Isn’t there anything you want or need that you can’t do yourself?” Dale thought piteously, closing his blackened eyes as the Bashers rushed in. There wasn’t any additional pain, so after a moment, he opened his eyes as best he was able. The Bashers were sitting again.

<So… you want to make a deal?> Dale heard. <Interesting. There is something I want. Many somethings.>

“Name it!”

<How about this. Once every two weeks, you bring me something new. I don’t particularly care what it is, but the first thing is going to be one of those dimensional folding bags I see people use occasionally. I want new items, enchantments, Runes…. whatever. If you fail to do so, the next time I see you or one of your friends, you will see every Boss in this place attacking you at the same time. Deal?>

“Only me,” Dale sent resolutely. “Don’t end my friends. If it comes to that, I will go alone. Otherwise, I accept your terms.”

<Oh, how noble. It is all the same to me, Dale. All life ends, righteous or vindictive. Everything eventually ends. But for now, try to cultivate.>

“Wha…?”

<Open yourself to me fully, Dale. Let your aura be a two-way path.>

Dale tried to do as instructed and felt a sudden spike in pain as his bones were forced back together and began fusing into their proper place. Some teeth were regrown, and the others were twisted as Cal took the opportunity to straighten them all, giving Dale a perfect smile. The small, accumulated scars and acne pocks vanished as well. In minutes, Dale was able to stand on his own again.

<I suppose you want me to give you back your morningstar?>

The dry tone made Dale flush; then his features hardened.

“No,” Dale relished the feeling of properly moving facial muscles, “I want to tear them apart with my hands,” he uttered darkly.

<… In that case, there is something I have been wanting to test.> I chuckled. Dani seemed hesitant.

“Cal…” Dani whispered to me, even though Dale was nowhere near us, “should you do this? You never let anyone go before…”

<I know, but I think that I am getting the better end of the deal here. For one thing, he hasn’t increased in rank, so I will have a net gain of a negative amount of Essence if he dies right now. For another, getting new stuff from him means that it will be gear or items beyond your capability to reach since you need to stay near me. Also, I want to see if my experimental weapon works how I think it should,> I assured her my intentions were good. Well. Beneficial. To us at least. <Oh! Also, Dale, if you would be so kind, kill them in the dungeon. Otherwise, it is just a big ol’ waste all around.>

“Okay… Who are you talking to?” Dale looked around nervously at the sitting Bashers.

<Don’t worry about it.> I turned to Dani, who was trying to get my attention. <Yes?>

Turns out she was just curious. “What is the weapon you are going to make?”

<Well… I know about a dozen Runes, twice that with their inverse. I need to expand my capabilities and see if I can weaponize some of the Runes that seem to be more… utility? Non-weapon?> She stared at me patiently as my tangent came to an end. <Right. Well, I have been thinking that the ‘fluid repulsion’ Rune that I have could be useful as a weapon, but it doesn’t seem to affect living tissue. It is my belief that this is because of the aura that surrounds living things.>

She sighed. “Get to the point, Cal.”

<Well,> I paused dramatically, <I think that if the Rune were to bypass the aura, it would affect them!>

She stared at me, nonplussed.

<Trust me. If it works, it will be an amazing weapon. So, I’m going to make a cloth wrapping for his hand. It has high-steel threading in it like chainmail. At the knuckles are small, spiked metal plates. The plate has a force enhancement Rune on it so he can hit a lot harder, and the spikes have the fluid repulsion Rune.> I thought a moment. <You think it needs anything else?>

“He does keep losing his gear. Is there a way to make it harder to lose?” Dani chuckled quietly, laughing at her joke.

I gave it serious thought, though. <Maybe… oh… this is a delicious idea.> I gave a wicked ‘grin’.

She stopped laughing abruptly. “Oh no. What?”

<Wow! How about a little faith in my abilities?> I pretended to be hurt. She didn’t buy it.

“Yeah, sure. What?” Dani demanded, tapping her non-existent toe.

<Fine, ruin the surprise. Humans have no use for corruption, right? What if it drew their corruption out of them and fed it to the weapon? It would make it harder to break, and if my door was any indication, no one could move or replicate it! Then when they die, I don’t need to clean up all their taint!>

I was raring to go, the schematics in my head swirling into a cohesive whole. This… would be fun.

<Let’s experiment.>

Dale

Nearly a half hour later, Dale climbed the stairs from the Boss Room, ascending into the predawn light. He clenched his fist, feeling the cloth tighten around his hand. He was wearing the new weapon—which doubled as the only piece of armor he had on—but Dale didn’t trust it one bit. The dungeon, Cal, had called it an ‘experiment’, and looking at it made Dale a bit queasy. The armor was wrapped cloth, and had an almost slimy, oily texture.

Dale had been assured that activating the weapon would give him greater protection than plate armor, but the dungeon-creature—Cal—warned that there may be ‘side effects’. Dale shivered, whether from the chill morning air against his almost-nude body or the dark thoughts, he was unsure.

The weapon that Dale had been given worried him. Would he really use this on another human? He thought for a moment. Yes. Not alone and certainly not without any other armor on. Dale started walking toward the Elven embassy, his original destination of the morning. He had not yet been there, and the amount of construction surprised him. Dale had thought that Elves would grow buildings or something—there were a lot of trees in this area now—but instead, it looked like workmen were constructing around the clock.

The buildings were masterfully created and were obviously built with defense in mind. Dale stopped in front of the only completed building, the sight forcing him to draw in a breath. The entire building was covered in Runes! He carefully looked at each individual Rune, trying to determine its purpose, but was stymied as he had never seen them before. He looked at more and realized in puzzlement that all the Runes were exactly the same. He thought about what this could mean as he was ushered in the door by the dangerous looking guard.

“Well! I didn’t realize this was that kind of visit.” Brianna stepped into the center of the room, looking at him oddly.

“What?” Dale was thinking about the Runes on the building. Maybe Cal would take a sample as payment?

“You are… um… in a state of undress, Dale.” Brianna chuckled as Dale made the connection and flushed a bright red color. “Well, that blush goes deep! Did you need something?”

“Yes… I have forgotten why I was originally coming here, but I need a contingent of guards to come with me. A group of non-Guild affiliated adventurers and a clerk tried to kill me. That is why it took so long to get here. I need to round them up,” Dale flatly informed her, ignoring his embarrassment.

“What?!” Her eyes scanned him, noting again the lack of armor and lingering on his hand. “You seem fine, so they clearly failed. Did they rob you?”

Dale shook his head. “No, they broke all of my bones and my jaw so I couldn’t order them to leave my land. Then they dragged me into the dungeon and threw me into the first-floor Boss Room after tossing away my armor and weapon.”

Fury colored her cheeks. “They will not survive the morning, but… how did you?”

Dale had agreed not to reveal that the dungeon was sentient. “I forced my Essence to flow and constrict quickly, allowing me to move myself like a puppet. I killed the monsters and found a healing fountain. I drank… almost the whole thing, re-aligning my bones with twists of Essence as they started to heal. There is no way I could do that again; I’m not really sure how I did it in the first place.”

The words shock-and-awe did not adequately describe the look on Brianna’s face as she paled. “Dale…” she began to question him.

“How about those guards?” Dale demanded loudly, ignoring protocol.

Brianna nodded, called in some guards, and personally joined them as they exited, intent on finding the failed assassins. As they left, a soft robe was wrapped around Dale, who nodded his thanks. He ignored the fact that it was bright pink.

They walked stealthily toward the clerk barracks, a large tent pitched between the Guild tent and the dungeon. There were rotating shifts for the clerks, so they usually had plenty of free space when off duty. As luck would have it, the majority of the men that attacked Dale were standing near the tent, softly chuckling at the sounds coming from inside. Looks like their leader was in the process of getting his ‘extra bonus’. Dale pointed at the men and nodded; the guards around him blurred and there were suddenly several unconscious forms on the ground.

Without the noise, the sounds from inside were louder. A moan drifted out, making Dale blush a bit. The Guards lined up outside the tent flap and charged inside to a roar and a scream. In moments, the man and woman were led out with only a thin blanket covering them. The man blustered while the clerk cried, both of them pretending innocence. They saw Dale standing in front of them and went nearly silent.

“Oh shi–” the man spoke before being knocked unconscious.

“Wait! Wait, wait, wait!” the hysterical woman screamed. “How are you here? If you are alive, we did nothing–” She was placed on the ground as well, after a light clubbing to the head.

“I assume they are why I was woken up so rudely?” a wry voice spoke. Dale turned and noticed Protectorate Cole—his appointed magistrate—walking toward him, escorted by guards and shivering. “It is starting to get pretty cold up here.”

“Your honor,” Dale nodded at the man, “these people attacked me with no provocation, removed all of my Inscribed armor and weapons, broke my bones, and left me for dead in the dungeon.”

The Judge studied his face, nodding after a moment. “I see no lies in your aura, and yet, here you stand, seemingly unharmed. Explain?” he politely demanded.

“I made my way out of the dungeon without dying after the ordeal,” Dale hedged, refusing to say more.

Cole stared at him and nodded slowly. “Fair enough, though we will talk more on this later. Wake them up. I will question them and give my sentence.”

Soon, there was a groaning, pleading, and self-righteous mass of people on their knees. One by one, Cole asked them questions and seemed unsatisfied with their answers. Grimly, he walked back to Dale.

“Well. Before I make an unalterable decision, what was the total worth of your armor and weapons?” Cole quizzed Dale.

“I purchased the armor for several hundred gold at a Guild discount but never had the weapon appraised. I would place its worth around three thousand gold, as it had two powerful Inscriptions on it,” Dale morosely informed him, trying to be professional.

Cole winced and patted him on the back. “Ouch. Well, that certainly decides it. They do not have enough money combined to repay that amount, but everything in their Guild accounts is yours as well as all personal items—which will be sold off. The attempted murder and placing of bounties against a Noble is enough for them to be skinned, salted, drawn and quartered, then burned.”

The group started wailing, all but the woman. Cole looked at her and shuddered. “There was more wrong in her than just this would account for. I think being caught has broken her mind.”

She looked up and gave a twisted grin. “Cole! Judgey! Let me speak!”

He stared at her and slowly nodded. “If you have something to say, out with it.”

“Well your judgey-ness, all I have to say is this.” She started laughing very creepily. “If you are what you eat, I am an innocent man! Haahah!”

Cole froze and looked coolly at the guard behind her. “She is not lying. Silence her. She will die first. Though I’d keep my hands away from her mouth if at all possible if I were you.”

The guard being spoken to jerked his hands back.

Cole turned to Dale. “Is there a specific way you want this carried out, or should we use the standard I described?”

All eyes suddenly on him, Dale looked over the group with hard eyes. “We will give them the same chance they gave to me. Bring them to the dungeon.”

Chapter Eleven

<It is a little early for most people to be coming in here, but there is a large group approaching,> I told Dani, concerned that a small army might be planning to attack me at once.

Before she could respond, I noticed Dale walk inside wearing a fluffy pink robe. Dani started laughing for some reason.

<Dale? I don’t know what kind of fabric that is, so if you give it to me, I will give you a month to get me that bag that is bigger on the inside.>

Dale gave a subtle nod and loosened the robe as more people walked in behind him. There were a few men and a woman. After a moment, I recognized them as the people that had dragged Dale in here this morning.

<See, Dani? I told you he would keep his bargain.>

The men and the woman were stripped of all gear and pushed into the mouth of the tunnel. They started pleading—a few tried to run, but sharp swords blocked their paths. The leader of the men went red in the face and charged at Dale, who used this excuse to toss his robe to the side and take up a fighting stance. I quickly ate the fluttering robe, of course.

The man swung his beefy arms in an attempt to batter Dale to the floor but gasped in surprise as Dale easily blocked his arms. Dale reached back, then swung a wild yet powerful blow into the man’s chest, activating his—I called it a battle gauntlet—for the first time.

The spikes on the knuckles penetrated the unprotected flesh while the force enhancement helped drive them in powerfully. As soon as the spikes had broken the skin and driven in a bit, the liquid repulsion Rune activated perfectly—as I knew it would! The fluid in the man—water, fatty tissue, blood—was driven away from the impact site. Suddenly, there was no blood for the heart to pump, and the organ went into shock and quickly died. The pain must have been terrible. His muscles were no longer hydrated, which would have felt like a muscle cramp in every affected portion. Luckily for the man, the pain was as short-lived as he was.

The dying man had broken blood vessels and arteries along his entire body as the liquid was forced back against its normal flow. He slumped in Dale’s arms and fell to the floor unmoving. A rush of Essence assured me he had died. Seeing their leader mutilated so, the remaining men stopped trying to get past the ring of guards and slowly walked down the tunnel. The woman skipped.

A small groan startled both Dale and me as a form stood up a few feet to the side, hidden by shadows. “Ugh. Dale? Izzat you? You’re alive? You ‘scaped?”

“Evan!” Dale cried, grabbing the Dwork and pulling him into a hug. “You survived?!”

“Obviously,” the blushing armored man muttered. “They sure knocked me out good, though. I am so surprised I woke up. May as well not have, though. I’m thousands of gold in debt now… and my pick is gone. Should just throw myself to the Bashers.”

Dale laughed and slapped him on the back, unfortunately using his right hand. The Dwork was thrown forward while releasing a startled shout. He stood up and glared, brushing off his dented armor.

Stupid aura protecting his fluids.

“Oops,” Dale muttered, deactivating his battle gauntlet. “I have your pick outside! You will be just fine, my friend.”

The Dwork broke into a sunny, toothy grin. “Oh yeah? Well, thank you. Friend, huh?”

“Of course. Anyone who tries to save my life while not standing a snowflake’s chance could be nothing less,” Dale assured him.

“In that case,” Evan grinned, “I hear your friends eat at that fancy-shmancy restaurant out there. Got room for one more?”

“Anytime you’d like, my treat! Forever.” Dale led them out, leaving a few guards to watch for the convicts.

They needn’t have worried.

The unarmored group had stopped in Dani’s garden, forming a few crude weapons out of some wood they tore off of small saplings.

<Four percent,> I muttered. They continued, pulling fruit and vegetables for a light breakfast, unconcernedly swinging their sticks at the grass and herbs to get to the crop-bearing plants. <Twelve percent.>

They sat in a half ring, their backs to the wall. The woman ignored them, dancing around and gathering flowers while humming and singing nonsensically. Forgetting that they had no way to start one, they built a small fire pit and gathered plants to burn.

<Twenty-four percent,> I muttered in frustration. A small argument broke out; then one of the men with fire Essence grimaced and released a burst of Essence into the pile. Soon, they were sitting around a fragrant fire, watching for Bashers.

“Ohh! Pretty!” The woman reached out and plucked a heavy rose.

<Twenty-five percent,> I said with malicious glee.

The room went still, the Bashers no longer moving in the underbrush. A lump of earth began to bulge up from the ground, dirt cascading away from it as tentacles burst from the cracked soil. The men began to notice the lack of sound and reached for their makeshift clubs, and—in one case, someone brandished a burning log.

“What?”

“What do you mean, ‘what’? Can’t you sense the room? Something just changed.”

“La-la-la.”

“Someone shut that crazy broad up!”

“Ahh! Something got my leg!”

Yup. A tentacle, good sir. The man was yanked from his feet and dragged into the underbrush as his friends yelled and leaped to his aid. They crashed through the plants, only to stop in terror as a human-sized Shroomish with waving tentacles opened a massive maw in its stalk and bit the struggling man in half. Intestines and gore splashed to the ground. The remaining tentacles were petting the Shroomish like a human praising a small animal with a treat.

“What in the abyss?” one of the men gasped.

The tentacles suddenly stiffened, orienting themselves toward the new sound and lunging forward. One of the men was skewered by an undulating tentacle and pulled in, but the other dodged and began to run. The maw on the tentacle that had missed roared and stabbed the ground, uprooting the main body and throwing the entire plant at the fleeing man. The combined weight of the Shroomish and two dead bodies crashed into the man, driving him to the floor where he died quickly from thorns and poison.

The woman had ignored all of the commotion, continuing to gather flowers and singing broken melodies. A tentacle reached out and almost gently drew her toward the main body. An infernal maw crooned, and the Shroomish paused in its feast and appeared to consider the woman. It shook itself suddenly, releasing a cloud of spores which settled on her before the tentacle pushed her away—deeper into the dungeon.

<What in the crap just happened there?> I watched as the giant mushroom came to the end of its lifespan. I had designed it so that it would die five minutes after reaching full size; I didn’t want swarms of Mini-Bosses running the place.

“Obviously, it is more effective in combat than we thought it would be,” Dani murmured. “Keep an eye on the woman, see what happens.”

<Oh! We never named that Boss. What do you want to call it?>

Dani looked at me like I was crazy. “Now? That is what you are thinking about?”

<…Yes?>

“Fine. How about… Glade?” she suggested after a moment’s hesitation.

<Um. Okay. Why?>

“Well,” she blushed a bit, “my other suggestions have been cute or pretty, but this one is more to do with its… existence. A glade is an open space in a forest, and these spawn when a space is opened due to chopping plants down. An ‘open space’ or ‘glade’ as it were.”

I radiated approval. <Awesome! A play on words! Two things I love, words and puns. Nice work. I hereby name them ‘Dire Shroom: Glade’ or Glade for short.>

“Now, back to business?” Dani prodded me firmly.

<Yeah, yeah, I’ve been watching her. She is just sort of stumbling around… oh. There. She fell. She is in a tunnel though and… not dead. Nope. Just lying there with mushrooms sprouting all over her body. They aren’t pushing through the skin, but they are certainly mushrooms.> I noticed her starting to panic—Dani that is—<No, they don’t have tentacles, but her aura is hiding the details enough that I can’t tell what they do to humans. We are just going to have to wait and see. I don’t think they are the reason she collapsed. She is just exhausted from the night I think.>

“Tell me right away if she does anything. I’ll want to take action.”

<I will. I promise.>

Dale

Dale got to know Evan a bit better over breakfast, and they made plans to meet up again soon. Unfortunately, they didn’t have too much in common. While they enjoyed their conversation and parted friends, there was no real impetus to prolong their meal. Evan had his Inscribed pick back and wanted to get some sleep before re-entering the mining area of the dungeon, while Dale had several people to talk to about the events of the evening. Talking to the Guild and telling the Elves the full story took until lunch—when he had planned to meet his group.

“Oh look! The emperor deigns to speak to the little people!” Hans called as Dale walked into the room. They were at the Pleasure House of course.

“Oh, whine more. Pff. At least you entertain us by varying what you complain about,” Rose chastised him.

Tom nodded seriously. “Verily, I have heard that the events of this early morning provide sufficient cause for Dale to receive lenient treatment from us.”

“You doing all right, Dale?” Adam looked at his unarmored friend.

That Dale was out of his armor was strange enough, but coupled with his fiercely burning blue eyes and emaciated form, Dale looked downright frightening.

Trying not to scowl, Dale sat down and angrily cut into his steak. “Yeah, this morning sucked. Let’s hurry up and get to the dungeon. I feel the need to kill something.”

“About that…” Hans had all eyes locked on him as soon as he finished these words.

“Yes?” Dale drew the word out warningly.

Hans raised his eyebrow at the tone. “We can go in and fight, but I think that the third floor is going to have to wait a good long time. The team that we rescued had all D-ranked members, and three were killed while one was severely injured.”

“How is he, by the way?” Adam interjected.

Once a patient, always a patient.

Hans tossed his hands in the air and made a noncommittal gesture. “He is stable, but they took too long to figure out how to fix the damage. I don’t think he will ever get full use of that arm back.”

“I thought they were just unprepared?” Rose contritely confessed.

“Just let me finish!” Hans ordered. “The Spotter report on the new Mobs was released this morning, and they were found to be D-rank two. They also obviously have some nasty abilities, and… they have Beast cores.” The final comment made everyone wince.

“What? So what?” Dale looked at the faces around him.

Rose took pity on him. “It means that they are intelligent. We are talking at least near-human levels of intelligence. They have accumulated enough Essence that it began to crystallize and formed a central area for their Essence to accumulate. They are now Magical Beasts and far more dangerous than simple animals.”

“There is that much of a difference?” Dale was unconvinced.

Hans took over the conversation, “Let me offer an example. You got ambushed this morning, yes? I read the report—when they were caught and sentenced, one of the men attacked you, and you easily stopped him although he was much larger than you… correct?”

Dale nodded, unsure of where this was going.

“Well, that man was in the upper F-ranks and had only one of his meridians open. The Boss on the second floor, Raile? That big bunny is F-rank nine and is already hard for us to beat unless I were to take it out and didn’t bother to let you fight at all. Those men were weaker than Raile and were still able to beat you. Yes, it was because they snuck up on you, but well, they did. Not a criticism, but you really need to learn to control your Essence so you can better protect yourself. As it stands, I—that is, just me—could go to the third floor and likely be okay, but you would all probably die if you tried it.” Hans finished his ominous speech by eating a scoop of iced cream.

Dale considered his options but finally agreed that Hans was correct. “Fine, what do we need to do?”

“There are several things to do, thanks for asking!” Hans exclaimed joyously, obviously uncaring of the somber mood. “Firstly, we need to get Tom into the D-ranks. Second, you should go collect the Essence techniques you were promised by the Elves. Third, you all need to learn to control your Essence. Finally, we need to get into the dungeon and cultivate until we go mad with boredom.”

Dale’s eyes bulged a bit as he remembered the memory stones the Dark Elves had promised him. “Dang it. Right, I’ll go get them. How do we learn to use our Essence better?”

“You have a tutor show you. You have Craig. Adam has Father Richard,”

Adam shuddered at those words.

“Rose has Chandra, and Tom… I’ll teach Tom.” Hans sighed at the thought of long hours with the overly formal young barbarian.

“Huzzah! I had hoped that you would take me under thine tutelage but had thought the dream was only that. I am ready to begin my training forthwith, Master.” Tom stood from his seat and bowed at Hans.

“No. Sit,” Hans barked at the man towering above him. Tom complied, making Hans laugh. “See? He takes well to training.”

This prompted a round of chuckles from the group and a blush from Tom.

The meal ended, and Dale made his way to the Elven embassy. He arrived in front of the highly Runed building and asked to see Princess Brianna. After a short wait, he was ushered inside to find her lounging at her desk with a box in front of her.

“Finally remembered these, I assume?” Brianna laughed at Dale’s reddening face. “We had a bet going to see when you would. I had said tomorrow, dang it. I’m down ten silver! All is well, though. Ready to learn some of the most highly kept secrets of earthen Essence?”

Dale nodded again, not trusting himself to speak without his excitement breaking his voice. Brianna pointed out the stone that contained the Royal cultivation technique, and he reached for that first. A better technique would allow him to gain ranks much faster. He touched the stone, and the cloth wrapping on his hand suddenly parted, grabbing the stone and binding it tight.

“Hey!” Dale yelled at his offending armor. “Give me that!”

Obviously, the gauntlet didn’t respond. The cloth wrapped bulge remained perfectly still.

Brianna looked at his gauntlet seriously for the first time. “What in the world? Dale, can I see that gauntlet?”

“Sure.” He held up his hand for her to look at his new… weapon? Armor? He realized he didn’t really know what to call it.

She arched her brow at him and asked him to take it off and hand it to her. He tried to do so, but as soon as he started unwrapping the layers, they tightened enough to stop the flow of blood in his arm.

“Ow!” He retracted his hand, and the wraps loosened to their normal tightness. “That hasn’t happened before…” he muttered worriedly.

“You were able to take it off before?”

“Yes, I had tried it on my left hand, but it didn’t fit. Then I took it off when I was wearing the robe…”

“When did you activate it? Before or after you took it off?”

With dawning horror, Dale realized what she meant. “I took it off before I activated it…”

Brianna nodded slowly, face far more pale than usual. “Dale, you are wearing a piece of cursed armor. I’ll send a report to the Spotters, but you should be careful with that. While very powerful, they tend to damage the person using them.”

“Of course they do.” Dale sighed, waving away her concerns. “So, I am down one stone already. Any way to take this off?”

Brianna reluctantly nodded. “A strong enough flesh Mage could remove it by… well. They basically need to skin your arm. They take the top layer of skin and draw the whole construction off you. Very painful and very expensive. Also, with those wraps… I am uncertain that would work. They may just wrap themselves higher up your arm.”

“Destroying it maybe…?” Dale tried to sound hopeful, yet was very unconvincing.

“That carries a high risk of taking the arm but is possible. You could also cut it off,” Brianna reassured him.

“…Yay. Let’s just do the other stones?” Dale reached for a memory stone—very intentionally using his left hand—and pulled out one that had an earthy look to it.

He placed the stone against his head and was mesmerized as the memories of a powerful earth Essence user flowed into his mind. He watched as the Elf discovered how to use his own Essence and how he pushed it out and looped it, forming the needed pattern in the earth and reabsorbing the Essence used, forming a continuous loop until the process was finished.

Dale knew with certainty that if he forgot to loop the Essence back to himself, it would be gone forever, and he would need to re-cultivate it. This particular memory was only meant to teach him how to use a movement technique, but it did so much more since Dale had never used his earth Essence for anything but activating a weapon before. The memory taught him about affinity channels, the pathways that were open to allow a specific type of Essence to move along them. The Elf had the earthen affinity channel open fully and fire open only part way.

Dale came out of the momentary trance he had fallen into and did what anyone else would have. He tried to use the technique, looping out his Essence and allowing the earth itself to propel him along. Instead, his Essence rebounded against his aura, lashing back into his body and making his muscles spasm before—vindictively?—pushing the muscle aside and flowing into his meridians. Dale fell flat on his face while emitting a rather rude stream of expletives.

“Dale!” Brianna tried to admonish him while also trying very hard not to laugh. “Just because you know how to do it doesn’t mean you can. You need to practice that slowly! The Elf this came from was a master of earthen Essence and had mastered this technique over years of experience.”

Dale groaned miserably. “I thought the whole point of memory stones was to be able to bypass that whole process…”

“No, they allow you to bypass the years of trial and error that go into creating the technique. You still need to practice it! There will be many failed attempts before you are able to use it at even a fraction of its strength.” Brianna looked at Dale’s nonplussed face.

“Look, if you picked up a sword, it would take years to create a sword form, build muscle to wield it, and practice enough to use it casually—not to mention using it in combat. If you got a sword art memory stone, you could bypass learning the forms and stances, but you would still need to build your own way of using it, muscle, and muscle memory. Get it?”

“I do. You are saying that this was not a pointless deal and I should be grateful that I don’t need to spend years twisting my Essence in the dirt to see if something happens.” Dale chuckled. “Fair enough, but… dang. I really wanted to try moving that fast.”

Brianna raised her eyebrow with a grin. “You know, if you had actually succeeded in using that technique, it likely would have broken the bones of whatever limb you had touching the ground. You weren’t properly braced, and your legs would have flown forward while the rest of you stayed still for a moment. If you think about it, you got off rather lucky.”

“…I see,” Dale stammered as he tried to think of something intelligent to say. “How about I just use the next one? I think we are planning on going into the dungeon soon.”

He reached for the third stone and placed it carefully against his forehead. Memories of decade-long research flashed by. Dale saw—was—the Elf who created this stone. He remembered practicing by moving stones one at a time, moving on to making earth crumble at a touch, until finally learning and using the technique mastered in his old age... as he smashed Dwarven defenses from a distance, collapsing a mountain during a war.

Dale looked up finally, tears shining in his eyes. “Brianna,” he gasped, “there has never been emotion in a memory stone before this! Why? The Elf felt nothing but horror for the technique he had made! Why would you give me this without warning?! Why would you ever use this technique again?”

Brianna patted him on the arm. “Most people that make memory stones work hard to send along only the dry information. The Elf who mastered this technique was one of the greatest stone Mages in our history, and he thought that there should never be knowledge of how to destroy. At least, not without a deep insight into the horror that came with it.”

“Is there a reason I was given this stone?” Dale demanded, trying to shake off the feeling of killing a city—not an easy feat. They were now his memories; he may as well have actually been there doing the deed himself.

Brianna gave a weak grin. “Well… it is well known that this Elf makes stones that pass along his emotional state, so…”

“No one else wanted it, did they?” Dale cut her off.

“Pretty much. It is very powerful, though and should have given you techniques to use to build up strength until you can use the mastered version,” Brianna informed him.

“It did, but I can see why no one wanted to use it. Very sneaky of you. Look, I need to get going, but we will talk later?” Dale started marching out of the room.

“Hold a moment? You have no armor and a new weapon that you have not trained with. Are you sure jumping into the dungeon is a great idea?” Brianna questioned him.

“Nah, it is a terrible idea. I’m doing it anyway. I’ll see you later.”

Chapter Twelve

Dani groaned as the mad woman covered in mushrooms threw herself at yet another Basher. It seemed that the lady was filled with an unhealthy rage; anytime she saw movement, she ran at it screaming, attacking with her bare hands or anything else that she could find. After she killed whatever she attacked, she seemed to get her mind back, at least partly. She would alternate weeping and searching through small treasure chests. Already, she had found a sharp dagger and armor for her legs, which was all she needed to fight successfully against the waves of Bashers.

“It just doesn’t make sense! She is, what, F-rank five? There is no way she should be fighting all of those herself and surviving!” Dani despairingly groaned again.

<Dani, that is the fifth time you said that. I get it, I really do. I think that those mushrooms on her are driving her to attack. Look, she has serious wounds but is ignoring them. Anytime she sees something, she just has to kill it. Remind you of anything?> I queried her, trying to lead her to my own conclusion.

“The Distortion Cat?” She spoke after a few moments, “You think those are parasites like the tentacles were?”

<I do, and sooner or later, she will get killed, and I will know for certain. No worries,> I assured her.

Dani tried to focus on other things, but I could hear her muttering every few minutes. Finally, something changed. “Look! A group is coming closer to her! Okay… they see her. She is just crying right now. They look concerned…oh, dear.”

They had gotten close to the near-nude woman and touched her bare shoulder. The woman gave a bestial snarl, turning and plunging her dagger into the neck of the man beside her. Howling, she ran at the other shocked members and was able to stab one to death before the others stopped seeing her as a human and began to see her as a monster. She was cut down in moments, and I waited to examine her pattern.

<Huh. Nothing,> I muttered.

“What do you mean, ‘nothing’? Obviously, something happened there,” Dani responded angrily.

I was very confused. <It must be an effect of the mushrooms. If they had left her body, I would be able to break it down and see the physical component of things. As it is, all I can see is a way to recreate her original body, and they just put her current body into one of those bigger-on-the-inside bags. I can’t examine the changes if they aren’t here, and it looks like that group is turning around and leaving. I’m not getting a chance here, Dani. Right, first thing to do is alter the pattern of the Mini-Bosses so they don’t have spores anymore. I don’t want an unknown factor in here.>

“Smart. How about–”

<Then later we will get some Bashers infected with the spores to see what happens,> I stated gleefully.

“O-o-of course we will,” Dani muttered. “I rescind my ‘smart’ comment.”

<What? Why?>

Dani gave a short ‘haw’ of laughter, but I cut her off before she could respond.

<Hey! Dale is here! No armor today. Hmm. He seems a bit peaked. Feeling alright there, Dale?>

“You gave me a cursed weapon! No, I am not doing alright!” Dale thought at me furiously.

<What’s your point?> I watched as he ran forward and punched a Basher, the force of the blow coupled with the gauntlet’s Runes blasting most of the poor animal’s blood out of its body. The small corpse looked very different emptied of fluids.

“My point is that it is apparently killing me slowly and stealing my stuff!”

He definitely seemed a bit out of sorts. <What? Nah, there is no point for me to give you something that kills you outside of here. That battle gauntlet is tethered to the corruption in your Core. It will help purify the Essence in your Core as well… I’m not sure why you are upset, really. You’re acting like a spoiled child.>

Dale paused in his rampage, the massacre of small furry animals slowing for a moment. “Wait, you actually gave me something helpful? Did you intend for it to steal from me?”

I had no idea what he was talking about, so I looked closer at his arm. There was indeed a bulge in the armor that hadn’t been there before.

<Well, to be fair… while it may be helpful for you, it helps me out to not have to refine all the Essence you are going to give me when you die in here. Less corruption is good for me as well.>

“Oh, gee, thanks,” Dale thought at me wryly, but now his face wasn’t a mask of fury. Instead, he seemed contemplative.

I wanted to know what his armor had hidden, so when he gave a particularly wild swing, I gave a mental command to the wrap to release. To my surprise, it did! A shining Core flew across the room, shattering against a stony crenellation. I felt a small burst of Essence release, though it felt… different. It reached me, and my mind expanded.

I watched in silent awe—through eyes that were not my own—as hundreds of Elves sat in an ancient dungeon, meditating. I saw them all change the way they drew in Essence. Hundreds of patterns of fractals changed from one moment to the next as every feasible possibility was attempted. The memory sped up, and a time period of decades passed in mere moments. I felt the frustration of the stones creator as he worked day after day with no noticeable improvement in cultivation technique.

In disgust, the Elf pushed away his fractal, and to his amazement, Essence suddenly flooded him. Another decade passed as he toyed with this new concept, altering the flow one tiny bit at a time. The final pattern, the fractal he found to be the very best, stayed in his mind as he ran off to explain his new cultivation technique. Slowly, the memory faded away.

<That’s it? That is the secret? The product of almost a hundred years?> I laughed aloud, startling Dani and freaking out Dale. He looked around in terror for a moment.

“What is it, Cal?” Dani tore her thoughts away from another group gathering herbs in the garden room.

<It seems I have a new cultivation technique. I’m going to try it out.>

“You have what?! You thieving bast–”

<Sorry, Dale! I’m rather busy right now! I have… a… thing to do.> I turned to Dani. <It looks like I’ll need to focus on this for a bit, kinda like when I first made my fractal? Keep an eye out for me!> I didn’t wait for her to reply, although I am sure she understood.

I focused inward, taking the fractal within my Core and slowing it. As the flow of Essence lessened, I pushed with my willpower. The fractal rolled and split into damaged Chi threads. I grasped each of the threads and pushed, over and over. Soon, instead of a flat fractal that spanned my Core, I had an intricate sphere of fractals. The detail of it was mind-boggling, the quantity of fractals as numerous as the grains of sand in my walls.

When I was certain that I could hold the pattern without too much effort, it was nighttime and most of the population had retired for sleep or other assorted activities. The third floor was absolutely stuffed full of loose Essence; I had not used any nor cultivated for nearly half a day.

<Dani,> I mentally prodded her. <Dale is gone, right?>

“Hmm? Yeah, welcome back. Everything working out for you?” Dani sleepily murmured at me.

<Yes… I’m going to try to cultivate right now. Watch and see if you can tell a difference?>

When she acquiesced, I opened myself up to the Essence of the heavens and the earth. Like lightning had struck, the air in the room shifted and vibrated violently. I screamed as Essence was ripped out of the air and forced into me. Only the billions of pathways that the Essence needed to traverse kept me from exploding from the massive overdose. I stopped pulling, rather cheerful with the test run and feeling a bit full for the first time in days.

“What. The. Abyss,” Dani gasped. “If I notice a difference?! What the heck was that? It sounded like the mountain was collapsing!”

<I think it is called a ‘master level’ cultivation technique. It looks like it took about a century to create and a decade or so to refine into its current form,> I told her cheerfully.

“You set it up in only a few hours? How?” Dani demanded in excitement.

<Here is the cool part, Dani. I’ve made this pattern before now. All I had to do was apply the fractal of Essence to myself with slight alterations.> I was keeping the key bit of information from her, and she started grumbling hard enough that I finally relented with a laugh, <Dani, look at the pattern. Recognize it at all?>

She stared for nearly ten minutes—almost giving up—when she had a breakthrough. “Cal! Is that… the same…? That is the same pattern as a Wisp!” She gasped in fear and amazement.

<All but the parts that make it living and thinking!> I crowed. If I had feet, I would have been dancing right then. <Do you know what this means? I knew Wisps were pure Essence, but now it makes sense how you can survive without a body! Wisps are incredibly Essence efficient. All you need is a little bit, and it keeps you going! You are a thought form surrounded by a cultivation technique, like how I am a thought form surrounded by crystal!>

Dani seemed dazed, the information a huge shock. The history of Wisps and how they came to be was one of their race’s greatest sought-after secrets. This information was a huge leap forward to her knowledge, and she felt like she could be the first of her kind to learn why they existed and how they came to be.

“Cal… this is huge. You have no idea.”

<Right?! I’ve been sitting on the edge of D-rank five. Is this the kind of knowledge I needed to reach D-six?> I plagued her with questions, not catching her mood.

“Uh… well, I suppose. Usually, moving into D-six requires you to learn how to store your Essence in your aura—further strengthening your body and such—but this will work just as well. You will certainly need to know by the time you break into the C-rankings, but I think that you can probably break through your barriers to advancement right now. Cultivate away!”

<Will do!> The air tremored again as I drew hard on the dense Essence in the air, while Dani stared contemplatively into the distance.

Dale

Dale awoke to the sound of rolling thunder and stepped out of his tent expecting to be soaked in rain within a few moments. He looked up to check the cloud cover but was instead able to see a clear, beautiful morning. He frowned. Normally a clear day helped to cheer him up, but now, he was only suspicious. By the time he had eaten and gotten ready for the day, the intermittent sounds had faded to nothing.

“Anyone know what’s going on?” Dale asked his friends quizzically.

Adam looked up from a dauntingly huge plate of eggs. “Hmm? Well, I hear that a group of Nobles is going to be showing up today. I don’t really have the details on that.”

“Not what I meant, but that is certainly good to know. I was thinking more about that thunder.” Dale gave a half-smile at his friend.

“Most likely no reason to worry.” Hans popped a Basher-sausage into his mouth.

Rose snorted. “Everything worries our fearless leader.” The dichotomy of the statement got a chuckle from the group. A knock at the door cut their merriment short.

Brianna opened the door and stepped inside. “Dale, have you heard that thunder? We were worried that–” Her mouth fell open as she saw Rose at the table. “Rosey? Little Sapling-Rose?”

Rose flushed and muttered, “Hello, Aunt Ironbark. Good to see you again.”

“Rose!” Brianna rushed to hug the uncomfortable young woman. “Why didn’t you tell me that you were here?! You look so well! Of course, you would be here, you can cultivate here!”

“You are babbling again.”

Brianna snorted. “I tend to do that when surprised! To my point, why didn’t you come see me?”

Rose blushed and looked down, mumbling.

“They did what?” Brianna roared.

Everyone jumped, and Hans looked around in confusion. “You could hear that? I couldn’t hear that. You?”

Adam shook his head, eyes wide.

“She said that she tried to come see me and the guard told her in no uncertain terms that a half-breed was unwelcome anywhere near me!” Essence was flashing in her eyes, and a buildup of unreleased Mana was tearing a hole in the visual world around her, distorting her visage. She growled, “Who were they? Heads will roll!”

Chandra bustled in at a sprint. “You! Stop that at once. Losing control of yourself like this… Oh. Hello, my niece. Calm yourself.”

“Pff.” Brianna seemed to drain of anger. “Just because your daughter married my brother does not make me your niece.”

A pounding on the stairs announced a new presence. “Hey! Whoever is throwing around highly concentrated Mana like that had better stop. You made my portal flicker. If someone had been in there at that time, they would have been sliced clean in half!” High Magous Amber burst into the room and glared at the occupants. “Who did this? Who woke me up at this ungodly hour?”

“Heh.” Hans whispered to Dale, “Look at that! We have Amber, Brianna, Chandra, and Dakota all in the same room! Go talk with them. It’ll be a conversation between A, B, C, and D!”

“Who is Dakota?” Dale whispered back.

“What?”

“You said ‘and Dakota’.” Dale narrowed his eyes. “Did you just… You just got my name wrong! Hans!”

“You must have misheard.” Hans brushed him away. “You better go. It looks like we are about to have some bloodshed otherwise.”

Dale glowered at his friend still but stood and addressed the deadly women glaring at each other, “The situation is over and done with. Please act like the adults, business leaders, or heads of state that you are. Thanks.”

Hans gaped at Dale as he sat back down and started eating. “Very political. Smooth even.”

Dale shrugged. “They aren’t fighting each other anymore, right? Acting professional again?” Dale was facing away from them as they stalked closer, ready to start yelling again. “After all, I would hate to order them to leave. We can’t have people that could single-handedly destroy a city acting like spoiled brats. People would get nervous.”

The ladies paused, passed a considering look around, and straightened themselves. Dale turned around to see them starting to make polite conversation.

“By the way, High Magous, I hear we are going to have some Noble visitors arriving soon? Do you have any information about that?”

She looked for a moment like she was not going to say anything. “Ah well, they will be here soon, and everyone will know anyway. Yes, there is a full entourage of Nobles arriving. There will be a Prince and Princess, but mostly, there will be… how to say, non-main branch family members?”

“Ah. I see.” Dale paused. “Non-main because they were born into those families or because they failed to achieve ‘greatness’ in a fast enough time?”

Amber looked surprised while Brianna smirked. Amber responded slowly, “I would say born into the family. I would also remind you not to ask them that question if you meet them. Most are in their mid-twenties and therefore not at the end of their trials as it is, and it would be considered the height of rudeness. Actually, since you are here, I was hoping to go over some land issues and building areas for the Nobles’ contingent. Obviously, they won’t want to stay in tents, but…”

Dale waved her down as his team gave low groans. “No, sorry, no city business right now! Get it approved by the council, then the city planner, and then me. We talked about this. We are just about to head into the dungeon. The team is getting a bit anxious to go.”

His group looked very relieved upon hearing this.

Brianna piped up, “Still no other armor, Dale?”

“It is rather expensive to–” Dale began when Tom cut him off.

“Ha! As if he needs armor! Not a full day previous, he stood amidst the foes in the dungeon and battered them down with his bare hands. The carnage he blissfully brought down upon his foes was glorious to behold, and he stood like a true warrior! Barely armored, he weathered the storm. In my culture, he is at last considered a man!” Tom boasted on behalf of his leader. A shocked silence followed his words.

Brianna recovered first, “Well, I am sure he appreciates that. Moving on—quickly—does this mean you are planning on changing your entire fighting style?”

Dale nodded. “All of that armor weighed me down, and I still needed to dodge almost everything or I got seriously hurt. Don’t get me wrong, I am glad I wore it in the past—I have muscles I never expected—but without it, I can slip past most of the attacks that come my way and counter them much easier.”

“Hmm. Well, talk to Craig, your mentor,” Chandra joined the conversation out of the blue. “He is a master of hand-to-hand fighting techniques, and I am sure he would be able to teach you.”

“I plan on it. We have a training session after lunch and–”

Brianna broke in, “He is a master of human hand-to-hand fighting, but if you want a true martial art… I know a guy. You could be the first ever human to learn the Moon Elf style. You are entitled to it as an Elven Noble after all.” She ended tantalizingly.

Stunned silence met her words. Hans broke it with a drawl, “Yeeeah, I would go with that one. The Moon Elves are considered the deadliest fighters without weapons in the world. More deadly with weapons, of course, but you know.”

“What is the catch, Aunt Ironbark?” Rose rejoined the conversation with evident suspicion.

“Not so much a catch… as a commitment. Once you start training, you cannot stop for five years, and you will not master it for at least a decade. You must promise not to teach another the style unless given permission,” Brianna spoke seriously.

“I would need to go there for five years? I can’t do that,” Dale reminded her. “I have too many commitments as it is!”

“You would not need to leave, but you would need to commit two consecutive hours to training per day, seven days a week, for at least five years. The only cost would be the standard fee for a memory stone,” Brianna promised with a half-smile.

“So, with a memory stone, it would take a decade?” Adam spoke for the first time. He looked exhausted. Apparently, the training he was receiving from Father Richard was intense.

Brianna nodded yes. “I explained to Dale yesterday, just because you know how to do something does not mean that you can do it. The flexibility training alone takes a year, but it is worth it—if you know what I mean.” She winked at Hans as she said this.

“I don’t. It is good for you? Allows you to dodge easier?” Dale muttered. “Doesn’t matter. The important thing is that I have been working hard on long-term investments into myself, my team, and this area. If this is just another thing that is a big payoff eventually, then it is worth it to do.”

“It is very worth it. I will set up the training.” Brianna gave Rose a kiss on the cheek and a promise to catch up, then walked off briskly.

“I have a kitchen to run. Have a good day!” Chandra turned to leave but was stopped by Dale.

“Madame! Any word on those other tutors or information memory stones? I remember that the funds had been transferred to you, but have heard no word.” Dale watched for her reaction carefully.

Chandra turned back. “They are on the way, but when they heard where they were going, the representatives insisted that the tutors deliver the stones personally. I am unsure why, but you can expect some visitors in the near future.”

“I see. Thank you. High Magous Amber, before you run off, could I ask you why the Nobles are suddenly rushing here en masse?” Dale turned to the other member of his council. He tried to hurry as his team was starting to fidget.

“Why not? The rumors have started already.” Amber gave a frustrated sigh. “There are rumblings of war, of an undead army overrunning the northern borders and killing small towns. There is no proof of this yet, but the Nobles near the border are sending their children to… shall we say, neutral locations? The High Nobles—the Princes and such—are coming here as a show of solidarity, as a temporary measure.”

“Bleh. Nobles suck,” Hans muttered not quite quietly enough.

Amber gave him a pitying look but ignored him. “As it stands, I need to go and oversee the portal. Have a pleasant day, and please try not to die.” With those words of ‘encouragement’, she took her leave.

“Well, that was fun. Let’s go kill some angry rabbits,” Hans suggested shaking off the chill Amber’s look had given him.

Rose chuckled. “Good plan, but I was hoping to stop by the job board first. I could use some extra coins.”

“Job board?” Adam politely wondered. “I haven’t heard of this?”

“Yes, it is fairly new. It is a simple concept—people who want something specific from the dungeon post their requests. That way they can get around the brokerage fee that the Guild takes by going directly to the supplier,” Rose informed them all. There was a resounding round of nodding as the others agreed to take a look.

They walked toward the dungeon, and sure enough, there was a large board near the clerks’ stand that had drawings and postings for equipment and materials. There were offers for weapons, armor, potions, fur, meat, and so much more.

“It appears that we have been rather inefficient with the usage of our time in this place. Look at the standing offers for unrefined Beast Cores! A dozen gold for the lowest quality!” Tom amazedly recited the offer.

“Have we seen anything with a Core?” Dale looked around, but the others shook their heads. “That makes me nervous. They must be in there… the Cats, maybe? I’m wondering more about the herbs, personally. Look at this! They are paying silver for a large enough amount… why so much, and who is offering it?” Dale looked at the requestor’s name and where to deliver goods to, paling as he did.

“Dale? What? Who is it?” Hans poked him in the ribs.

“HE LOOKS LIKE THAT BECAUSE HE–” the booming voice startled them all, then softened after a moment, “because it used to be his job to bring good spices to my mess hall, and he suddenly stopped without so much as an ‘I am done’.”

They turned to see the massive cook from the mess hall glaring at them. “Oh, you are so lucky you haven’t had to eat the gruel that I’ve been forced to serve recently! Now there is some issue in the dungeon that is stopping my other suppliers from gathering enough! Tell you what, fill my order and I won’t start telling people that you are the reason they got food poisoning the other night.”

“So good to see you a-again,” Dale stammered. “Of course, I’ll get some. It would be my pleasure to help you out.”

“Mmhh hmm,” grunted the cook, eying Dale critically. “See that you do soon, oh fearless Baron.” He turned and walked off in the direction of his slacking kitchen help. They needed to learn how to properly make that porridge.

“Why is he so terrifying?” Dale muttered softly to Hans.

Hans patted him on the cheek, not very gently. “Yeah. Let’s go.” He started walking down to the dungeon entrance.

“That isn’t an answer!” Dale shouted at his retreating friend.

Chapter Thirteen

<Hmm. Dani, correct me if I am wrong, but war is where humans and other races fight each other or their own race, yes?> I thought at my floating friend. She was playing with Snowball again.

“Yes… Why do you ask?” I was about to respond when she answered her own question, “Oh, you must have heard someone mention something.”

<Mmhm. They are talking about how this place is about to go downhill because there are Nobles coming. I like my floors to be nice and flat. Do they know a way to make me sloped?> I was a bit nervous, though I was certain I could correct any damage they managed to do.

“When they say ‘going downhill’, I am almost positive they mean it as a colloquialism.” A moment of silence passed. “As a figure of speech, Cal. Not a literal reshaping of you. If there are Nobles coming, there will also be a lot of other people tagging along, either taking care of them or trying to flatter them.”

<So, what you are saying… is that there is a better chance for high-quality food.> I was already almost drooling.

Dani grinned. “Almost certainly. Along with that, Nobles have access to weapons, armor, and items that other people simply do not. This could work out well for–”

She had ignored Snowball during their play session, and he was able to land a blow for the first time ever. It was certainly a play attack, but Dani instantly vanished!

<Dani!> I screamed in horror. <Dani, are you alive? Did he kill you?>

Snowball was looking around in confusion, then peered at my location and cocked his head to the side. While I was frantically looking around for my beloved Wisp, Snowball took a few wobbly steps and fell. This caught my attention, and I peered closely at the gigantic Cat. His eyes were pink!

<Dani,> I whispered. <Are you in Snowball?>

The Cat nodded, a distinctly non-catlike movement. He stood up and began circling the large open space, Dani obviously getting better at having limbs. Soon, the Cat was leaping into the air and spinning, then making complex motions and occasionally vanishing into the steam that permeated the room. After a time, the Cat came near the tree and fell, panting. He sat on his haunches and closed his eyes. Essence streamed out of its head, accumulating into Dani’s normal form.

“Wow. That was intense,” Dani slurred, flying toward me drunkenly. “Is that how you always feel?”

<You can possess Mobs now?> I assumed wonderingly. <That is amazing! It seems like it takes a lot of Essence, though. Let me fill you up. Did my reaching D-rank six allow this to happen?>

I directed Essence from the room into her, and she quickly perked up.

“Not sure, but that was so fun! Is that why you join in during battle?” she enquired excitedly, back to her old self after a bit of food. Did Wisps get something like low blood sugar when they were low on Essence?

<Well, that and I have a better chance of getting a kill if I don’t leave it up to a rabbit. For obvious reasons. Dani! This is so fun! Let’s make another Boss so that we can fight together!> I was so enthusiastic that she was reluctant to interrupt me, but she eventually did.

“I need a lot of practice, and right now, Snowball can use his body a lot more efficiently than I can. Let me practice for a few weeks while you think about a Mob that would work well in here. We already know that Glitterflits just get eaten, but maybe something along those lines?”

<I can try. Oh, look! Dale’s group is gathering herbs. That is new. What a strange human! Seriously, why don’t they get into a routine or something?> I snickered condescendingly.

“You know I can hear you,” Dale thought at me.

<Don’t care,> I replied flippantly. <You are already at twenty-four percent. This should be… stimulating.>

“I’m at what?”

<Twenty-five percent,> I breathed smugly, watching a Glade form near the group of gatherers.

Dale was wary, but the others were unaware of the danger as the Mob reached its full growth. Rose turned around just in time to see a spiked tentacle flying at her. She dove to the side, crying out a warning. The Mini-Boss roared, furious that its prey had momentarily escaped. Barbed thorns began launching from its body, seeking to impale the adventurers.

I had to admit that without armor, Dale was far better at avoiding attacks, but I was excited for the first blow to land. Surely he would not last long once he started losing blood! The party attacked, throwing themselves at the Glade. The tentacles were far smarter than the main monster, and it showed in battle. Daggers and arrows penetrated the soft mushroom body but did no real damage. When Adam or Tom—especially Tom—swung, the tentacles would do their best to dodge the blow. Watching a tentacle contort at the last second to avoid the enhanced force Inscription on the warhammer was a thing of beauty.

The wild blows were having another effect, and I was cheerfully taunting Dale as it happened, <Forty-one, no, no, forty-three percent!> They were smashing plants left and right!

The Glade had large chunks torn out of it, and one of its tentacles was severed. It was still fighting strong; the mushroom didn’t feel pain. Half of the plants in the room had now been destroyed as the group ducked, dived, swung, and fired at the man-sized mushroom. I giggled softly as a new Glade sprouted, quickly growing to full size and joining the battle. It fired a thorn, tearing a hole in Adam’s unsuspecting arm and lodging deep into the muscle. Ouch! That barbed tip would be a real pain to pull out. If he got the chance, that was.

The group divided their attention between the two Mobs, trying to get into a cohesive formation. The tentacles continuously foiled their plans, and thorns forced them to stay defensive. The first Glade—beginning to reach the end of its life cycle—tore itself from its location and launched itself at the group. Well used to the tactics of Raile, the group easily dodged the large body. Adam swung his staff while the two remaining tentacles were engaged in combat and tore a huge chunk out of its side. The Mob stiffened and fell, its writhing appendages slowly coming to a halt.

The other Glade seemed to become angry, and the tentacles started cracking like whips. Since there was no one in Dale’s group that was heavily armored, they had little choice but to dodge the flailing lashes. Hans began to get impatient and strode forward, activating some form of wind-based movement technique. He dodged each attack with barely a hair’s breadth between them, swiping out with efficient cuts. Soon, all three of the tentacles were much shorter, and the main group was able to attack the body of the Mini-Boss. It quickly fell, though it valiantly attempted to pincushion them with thorns.

<I’m gonna have to warn you, Dale. If he does stuff like that often, I’ll have no choice but to make you fight stronger opponents.>

“That was new,” Hans glibly offered.

Adam was focusing intently on his arm, and with a concentrated loop of celestial Essence, he removed the barbed thorn from his arm and healed himself. I was suitably impressed; most of the people I had seen attempting to self-heal were unable to focus enough past their pain. He looked up at the group watching him and gave a weak smile. “Anyone know where those came from?”

Dale opened his mouth to speak, but Rose beat him to it, “They were guardians. When a certain portion of plants was damaged, they appeared. I say we cut down more and kill any that show up. There is certain to be a great reward for killing off such a mighty group of non-standard Mobs.”

<…Crap. Dani, we need to make a treasure chest really quick.>

Dani and I decided what would appear in the chest and where it would be found. It would push up from the ground when all four Mobs were defeated, and the reward would vary based on how long it took to beat the Mobs, the ranking of the group, and if they planned to use the plants they destroyed or if they damaged them only for potential rewards. Dani came up with that last requirement.

Dale’s group methodically started chopping, focusing on opening a space to fight in formation. They quickly hit the benchmark of major plants destroyed—I didn’t count weeds like grass and whatnot—and a new Glade was formed. Prepared this time, they were able to efficiently cut down their foe without allowing this one to ambush them. The group rested a few minutes, replenishing their stamina and catching their breath. When they were ready, they spawned and destroyed the final Glade.

Dale looked at the Mini-Boss as it rapidly wilted into mulch. “Let’s make sure we gather all of this up. This amount of herbs should keep the cook happy for a long time, and I am sure we can find a use for all of these flowers as well.”

“What? We’re going to leave? We just got started!” Hans whined at Dale as his group leader resolutely gathered the herbs.

“Just for a few minutes! It isn’t like we have gotten to the third floor. How would we carry all of this?” Dale grunted as he lifted a mound of herbs. “Every little bit helps, and this quantity of potent herbs will be worth some good silver.”

Rose was thrashing around, kicking plants out of her path. “Where is it?! There has to be a chest around here somewhere!”

“Easy on the herbs!” Dale called angrily. “And who is gonna buy those flowers now?”

A soft sound of earth being pushed aside made Rose’s head snap to the side. Her eyes locked on a slowly appearing treasure chest, and she threw her fist into the air. “Yes! I knew it!” She rushed to the chest and opened it, gazing intently at the contents. “Okay, looks like some poison, a few gems, one of those vials that might be either poison or a healing potion, and a couple… ohh! Gold coins!”

“Nice!” Adam cheered, walking over and taking a look. His brow furrowed as he looked at the loot. “Hans? Really quick, I don’t think that these are gems… take a look?”

Hans stepped over excitedly and held one of the gems in his hand against the light, appraising it like a master jewelry maker. “This is certainly… not a gem…hmm.” He was talking slowly as he examined every facet. “If I had to make a guess… I’d say it is a… half carat Beast Core with standard properties, possibly from a D-ranked Beast that had progressed with help from the dungeon. It may have been a metal-type as well.”

Rose snorted. “A shot in the dark, huh? You probably knew what it was as soon as you saw it. You just wanted to be the center of attention for a while.”

Hans looked hurt. “Rose, how can you say that? It is like you… know me better than anyone else, and we would be a perfect couple!”

“Keep dreaming. Why don’t you go after Aunt Ironbark? You elderly folk should stick together.”

Hans smiled salaciously. “Ah, but I knew that you were the woman of my dreams from the moment I laid my eyes upon you, and no other temptress could steal me away.”

“Creepy old man, go get eaten by rabbits.” Rose brushed him off irritably. “How much are these Cores worth?”

“Rebuffed again! Well then, I shall win you over by being a font of knowledge for you! The Core itself is likely worth a dozen gold or so according to the job board, but it has greater application as a power source for enchantments or Runes. If we brought this to an artificer, we could link it to Runes or create a dimensional bag for a fairly reduced price.” Hans’s voice turned contemplative at the end, turning the Cores over in his hand.

“Really? We can get that turned into a dimensional bag? At a reduced price, no less? In that case, I would really like one of those.” Dale trotted over to the group, trailing leaves as he walked.

Hans asked if anyone else wanted one, and of course, the entire group did. He took himself out of the running as he already owned a specialized bag, as well as Tom since he could not power a bag even if he owned it. There were two stones, and after flipping a coin—two wins out of three needed—Rose and Adam walked away with a stone apiece. Dale seemed to feel a bit down about it but was promised that he would get the next one.

<Let’s set off the explosion trap in there and bury them in rubble,> I growled at Dani.

She looked at me in confusion, but Dale quickly looked around in fear and ushered the group out to deliver the herbs and flowers. Hans and Tom worked together to carry out the body of one of the Glades.

“What was that about?” Dani was still confused as to why I talked about a non-existent trap.

<They were just standing around talking and being boring. I wanted to regrow the room so that the Glades will get another crack at groups going through. Three groups walked through there after the Mobs were defeated and didn’t get attacked at all!> I finished with a horrified shudder in my voice.

“Well then, let’s fix that!”

Dale

Dale was walking away from the mess hall, cheerfully whistling about the morning’s unexpected windfall. Not only had the huge bale of herbs been enough to get himself back into the cook’s good graces, but there was a standing Guild reward of ten gold per new Mob found. Even splitting that, he was two gold—or two hundred silver—richer just from carrying a mushroom to the surface.

His good mood was quickly soured as he was making his way back to his friends.

“Look, this one has hay in his hair. Ugh, this place is disgusting.”

“There is blood on him too! This whole place smells terrible, and everyone is unaccountably rude. Not a single person even bothers to bow properly, and they look directly into my eyes when they speak to me! You’d think that after I had the first one whipped word would have spread!”

Dale looked over and winced as the heavily shined jewelry the people were wearing dazzled him momentarily. There were two men around twenty-five years old that were looking around, loudly proclaiming their displeasure with everything that they saw. They were surrounded by a swarm of servants and steely-eyed guardsmen. Dale decided to let someone else deal with them and continued on his way. Or, that is, he tried to.

“You! You dare to just stare at us without speaking or begging our leave?” One of the men was flushed, walking toward Dale and shouting. “Were you looking at our armor? Finding weaknesses to try to exploit in the future? Don’t you know how to respond to your betters? Speak, peasant!”

Hans had come looking for Dale and walked up just as the Nobleman was walking forward and shouting. When he heard the bit about ‘betters’, he cursed and ran off. Dale—who had been trying really hard to ignore the belligerent, entitled words—came to a perfect halt and turned around, fighting to keep his face emotionless.

“I am assuming that you have just arrived here, so I will try to explain how very misguided you are if you think that you are going to go around whipping people or insulting them.” Dale’s blue eyes were swirling with silvery Essence. He examined the Noble, noting that with the density and brightness of Essence, he was certainly in the mid C-rankings.

The Noble’s face got even redder, and if he didn’t have such an abundance of Essence, Dale would have worried about him bursting a blood vessel in his forehead.

“You dare to speak to me like this? Kneel before me and prepare to be whipped for your impertinence!”

Dale crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow. “No?”

The Noble looked entirely flabbergasted that Dale was not on his knees. “How are you able to resist a command from me? I am Baron Michael Adams, thirtieth in line for the throne!”

“How nice for you. Doesn’t mean you aren’t an arsehole,” Dale ground out wryly, teeth clenched hard as he forced himself not to take a swing at the man.

Titters of laughter escaped a few of the onlookers. The Noble seemed about to begin frothing at the mouth.

“Easy, cousin! It is obvious that he must be from my land then, allow me! Kneel before me, Baron Thomas Adams, and present your hands to the guards. Your prison sentence will be short; I can guarantee you that,” the other jewelry-bedecked man ordered ominously, coming forward to stand next to his cousin.

“So, you are threatening to kill me, I assume?” Dale hissed darkly. “No, I am fairly certain I am not going to do that either! Who the abyss do you think you are, acting like this? Is this Noble courtesy? Is this how you live up to your family’s code of honor?”

Thomas took a step back, a flash of fear crossing his face. “Are you from another Kingdom? A peasant shouldn’t even know what that means! How are you able to resist our orders?”

“None of your god-blasted business! I assume that you were sent here and are not particularly interested in being here, but I don’t particularly give a damn! If this is the standard that you plan to keep, you will not be allowed to stay. Likely you are rather grumpy from your travels. I know that portal travel does not sit well with me.” Dale tried to calm his temper, tried to speak as rationally as possible… but was having serious trouble. “If you plan to stay, I want you to pay reparations to the person you had whipped. If either of you ‘imprisoned’ someone, release them as well. You did so illegally.”

“Pff! Not a chance. Obviously, you are an intruder in our lands, and we are well within our rights to have you arrested and summarily executed. Guards!” The man stood back with a self-satisfied smirk.

The guards near them took a few threatening steps forward, but Dale did not move. “Are you certain that this is how you want to begin your day? I get the feeling your parents will not be too happy if you ended up banished from here… or dead.”

“We will add threatening a Nobleman to the charges,” Michael pompously jeered.

“Interesting. My turn then.” Dale grinned and roared, “Guards!” A full contingent of Dark Elf guards interspersed with the easily recognizable tabard of the Moon Elves appeared around the group. Even Dale was surprised; normally, there were only a few within speaking distance. The effect on the Nobles was quite profound.

“D-dark Elves?” Thomas stammered. “This entire place is crawling with assassins? Cousin, it was an ambush all along! They are going to wipe out a generation of the ruling class!”

Michael’s anger seemed to have an unreachable peak, and his face was now turning purple. “You coward!” he screamed at Dale, voice breaking. He tried to run at Dale but, of course, was stopped by his guards.

Dale had allowed them to speak long enough. “Shut your food-hole! I am Duke Dale, owner of this mountain and liege-lord of this land! I also hold the title of Baron in both of your Kingdoms. Conversely, I am sure it is your parents who are Barons or Baronesses; therefore, you currently hold no influence in the Kingdom! Well, beyond what you apparently feel entitled to.”

He turned toward the highest-ranking Elf he could see. “Captain, escort these… children to a holding cell. Ensure their guards and servants are given proper food, drink, and an area to rest. They are not to leave. There is a Prince or Princess coming from their Kingdoms, yes? When they do arrive, please have them escorted to the Elven Embassy where we will discuss the future of these criminals.”

“Criminals?” Thomas shrieked. “What are you talking about? Based on what charges?”

Dale cocked his head and gave a half grin. “Why, threatening a ranking Noble. And insubordination, of course.” He threw their own threats against them happily. The furious men were led away as Hans walked to stand beside him.

“They will never forgive this, you know,” Hans murmured, appearing beside his friend.

Dale nodded. “I know, but it is better to stop this behavior before it can find a foothold in the area. I certainly won’t let them stay here, but I can smooth things over with their leaders and hopefully ask them to command the Barons to leave me alone.”

“Hmm. Seems like a dangerous gamble.” Hans squinted at his friend. “What if they decide not to help?”

A real smile graced Dale’s face. “That is why I am going to see the rulers together. That way they feel compelled to show off to each other and try to one-up the other in reparations.”

“Subtle. I like subtle.” Hans laughed. “When did you get so political? I remember blowing your mind with the idea of a capital city sewer. Did the memory stone give you this much political acumen?”

“The Dark Elves have been tutoring me a bit,” Dale hedged.

“A bit? Well, I’ll have to worry the next time we have a debate and you are fully trained.” Hans clapped Dale on the back. “Let’s go. The others are waiting.”

Cal

“Dale’s group just passed the first-floor Boss again,” Dani warned me.

<I know, but I’m kind of sick of Dale,> I muttered, continuing to focus on my project.

“Hey!” I heard from him.

<Heh. Nah, I’m more interested in the group that just strolled in. There is a party of fifteen freaking people. Are they planning to start a war?>

I was looking at this odd group, noting that there was an odd discrepancy in their gear and cultivation rankings. The highly-adorned, well-armored people were in the C-rankings, while the guards with them varied through the D and C-rankings but wore a standardized uniform.

<What in the world? What are those people carrying?>

“It… it is some kind of water container?” Dani was looking at the same object as I was; it was a large square of glass that was full of water. It also seemed to have creatures floating in it.

<I’m going to look at that closer…> I focused my mind more intently on that area, listening in on the conversations happening.

“My Lord, please!” one of the men in a uniform was saying. “I just think that this is bizarre. A dungeon is a dangerous place, and you are forcing two of your guards to carry around an aquarium. What would happen if you needed protection?”

“Nonsense!” a haughty voice drawled. “The movements of the jellyfish amuse and relax me. Also, this is a D-ranked dungeon. With a hunting party of this size, what could happen? I could traipse through here alone and be fine, so don’t question my orders again!”

This is about where I started losing my temper, but he did have a point. Every time a Basher or other minor threat appeared, it was wiped out without pause, never getting near the group. I focused my will on the treasure chests they were near, re-absorbing the treasures they contained. This huge, overpowered group would not be getting rewarded for their laziness.

Dani dreamily mentioned that the man had a point; the jellyfish were indeed fun to watch. That was enough for me to know that she wanted to keep a few as pets, so I started directing my Mobs at the tank. Soon, I was able to sneak a Basher past the vigilant guards, and he knocked the tank to the ground, where it shattered. The leader began screaming at his soaking wet men to save his precious fish, but the rush of Essence assured me that they were already dead. I inspected the patterns that flowed to me and found them to be incredibly basic, though they did have a natural paralytic poison.

<I don’t know how useful these will be, Dani. They need to be in a certain type of water to survive, and they have no real intelligence. The Shroomishes are actually more intelligent…> I didn’t want to tell her this because she had really liked the look of them, but facts are facts.

“Would it be difficult to make a few large fish tanks in the wall? Adding some scenery like that might be fun. Interesting to look at and not actually dangerous to people. Oh! I know! Make a few pillars that are glass tanks, fill them with water, and put the jellies in there!” She noted my hesitation and gave a frustrated growl. “Maybe make it have really high pressure, so if someone smashes the glass they get hurt badly?”

<Oh, yeah! That sounds like a plan. I bet the salt would hurt in the cut, too.>

She really knew how to get me to do what she wanted. Tonight, I would tear out some stone from the walls and make glass tanks that connected to each other. Then to make it look interesting, I would make small light potion pockets behind the tanks. Then the jellyfish would seem luminescent and pretty for Dani. Hmm. Actually…

<Dani?> I was comparing the jellyfish with another pattern in my mind and coming up with a match that made me nervous.

“Mmhm?” Dani was watching the huge, glittering group walk toward the first Boss Room.

<So, I did a thing…>That got her attention.

“What? You sound nervous. Is it loose in here?” She was looking around wildly, scanning the dungeon when nothing apparent appeared. “Where is it? What did you do?”

<I don’t want to say it because Dale is in here, but can I make something and show you real quick?>

Dale perked up and looked around suspiciously when I said these words. People were going to start thinking he was paranoid.

Dani winced. “If you feel you need to…” Of course, that was all the permission I needed,

So an Essence ‘seed’ of the new Mob combination came into being. I did create it in the ‘test’ room, of course. I made a small tank of water before it was fully formed, and after a moment, a small jellyfish plopped into the water and began drifting about.

“Alright, I don’t see the issue? You made a jellyfish.” Dani looked at me like I was going insane.

<Heh, um. Look closely,> I pressured her.

She focused in on it, looking at its body and pattern. “Did you…? It is a cross between a jellyfish and a Wisp? It has a Beast Core? But… but it’s in the F-ranks!”

<Yes, hence why I needed to talk to you first.>

“It is F-rank zero, I am not sure how this is useful. Plus, it is trapped in a tank.” Dani looked ready to squash my plan before hearing the details, so I spoke quickly.

<While you are technically correct, I think you should let me test this.> I began directing a bit of concentrated Essence into the stingers hanging below the body, and two of them lit up. The Essence in the creature began building, its rank shooting higher, faster than I had ever been able to do without detonating a creature. At F-rank five, it began rising in the water and soon broke the surface. It slowly floated around the room, staying at a constant height.

Dani was impressed and yet had not seen the worth yet. “So it can float, but it is still…”

I began forcing Essence into the creature, and its rank kept getting higher and higher. I didn’t use my personal Essence, instead opting to direct the unrefined and corrupted loose Essence in the dungeon into the creature.

“Cal! What are you doing?! It will explode or worse!”

It did not explode, so I stopped the flow of Essence when it had reached D-rank five, just at the edge of my ability to control the newly formed Magical Beast. It still had no intelligence and drifted slowly around. This is where I came into the picture! I imposed my will on the Mob that was full of every type of Essence and corruption and focused on the stingers hanging from the body.

Cr-r-ack! A huge section of the floor had grown into spikes, impacting the wall with enough force to shatter a large chunk to rubble. I focused on another stinger, and a massive gout of flame whooshed out, superheating the stone spikes. When they began to melt, I held two stingers close together and forced Essence and corruption through them. The air in front of the Mob shattered as the temperature dropped so fast that the minimal moisture in the air froze. The superheated stone spikes exploded, the temperature differential putting too much stress on the material.

I whooped in excitement; that last bit had been a happy accident!

Dani had stopped moving and asking questions, her body becoming a very pale light. “Cal… just… how?”

I waited to answer until I saw that Dale was distracted with a huge swarm of Mobs. I may have sent a few extra at them. A dozen or so. Hopefully, the terror would drown out my voice as I softly informed Dani, <The jellyfish portion allows me to control them absolutely with my influence. The Wisp in them allows me to just continuously channel Essence into them! Remember you told me a long time ago that Wisps can never take in too much Essence, as they are Essence?>

“Well, I suppose, but how are you able to use those incantations? The spells?” Dani desperately searched for answers, her world had just been turned on its side.

<Look at the endpoint of the stinger!>

Dani looked and gave a short laugh.

“Literally only you would think of this or be able to pull it off.”

Instead of a claw-like end of the stinger, I had created a growth that was the exact pattern of the inversed Essence accumulation Rune, an Essence release Rune.

<I direct one type of Essence down each stinger, then power the Rune with corruption, forcing the Essence through the tainted pattern. I told you I would be able to weaponize non-lethal Runes!> I chuckled smugly.

“Yes, you did,” Dani murmured. “How did you create an icy blast? Fire and water would make steam, correct?”

<Yes!> I crowed, proud that she had noticed the effect. <I used fire and infernal Essence! It pulls the movement—or ‘life’—from the fire and allows me to essentially reverse the normal effect!>

She was almost as excited as I was, but her next words dampened the enthusiasm. “Oh. What is happening to the Mob now, though?”

I looked at the jelly, who was slowly drifting to the ground. <Hmm. Looks like it used all its Essence. It is back down to F-rank four, so it no longer has enough cloud Essence to float normally. I am going to give it more and see what happens.>

I started pouring Essence back into the jelly, and it quickly rose in ranking. It was soon able to float again. It drifted around the room, uncaring of obstacles or other creatures that I put in its way. This was not a creature that would attack others unless I was in control; it was simply too unintelligent. On the other hand, when the creatures saw the floating jelly, they seemed to become mesmerized. They followed the floating Mob in a daze.

“That is interesting. They seem to have retained the Wisp’s natural defense mechanism,” Dani observed softly.

I grabbed on to this piece of information. <How potent is that? Will it attract humans and other creatures? Can I use these to lure people into traps?>

“I am uncertain… looks like you will have to find out in your favorite way—human trials!” Dani laughed at my reaction, which was of course glee.

<Bwa-ha-ha! Oh, looks like Dale is not fighting anymore, better keep the information limited,> I reluctantly mumbled.

“You are thoroughly insane, you know that, right?” Dale thought at me angrily.

<Untrue. An insane person is unable to process events around them in a logical manner or react appropriately to situations. I am simply doing what is best for myself in order to protect what I care about. At worst, I am a sociopath,> I rebutted, causing Dale to pause in his negative assessment.

“You kill people! What in the world are you protecting?” Dale furiously demanded.

I gave him a harsh reminder of the past, <You know, the very first time you were in here, you killed a human as well. Since then, you have killed hundreds of my creatures and sent other people in here to die. If I am insane, you are well on your way to joining me.>

Dale didn’t respond, but I did notice that he was attacking a bit more furiously.

Chapter Fourteen

<I really don’t have a plan in place for this, Dani,> I muttered with trepidation as the massive group of people worked to crush Raile. As it turns out, you only need about six people with tower shields to hold Raile in place while others beat him to death. <They usually only come in here five at a time. This is just stupid.>

“Well, they look like they are going to continue down on to the third floor. Here is what I want you to do, start mass-producing the monsters down there. If they are going to try to overwhelm us with numbers, we will do the same! Also, get a few of those jellies out there,” Dani angrily directed me.

<Yes, ma’am!> I joked with her to lighten the tense mood. <Also, we need to give them a name. ‘Jelly’ is too vague.>

“How about ‘Assimilators’?” she offered after a few seconds.

I was startled out of my focus, creating mobs of Mobs. Heh. Wordplay.

<Assimilators? Why, what does that mean?> I tried to divide my thoughts so I could listen and create but accidentally exploded a kitten by adding the wrong ratio of Essences. Oops.

She gave me a look, showing she had noticed the kitten. “To assimilate means to absorb mentally, and since you force them to constantly absorb and reabsorb…”

<Sounds good, a fitting name. I need to focus for a moment; they are almost to the bottom of the stairs.> I created more Cats and a few Assimilators intermittently through the maze, keeping the Assimilators well away from each other. It was difficult enough to power one at a time; two would be very slow. To the point of uselessness even. I completed my goal just as they reached the entrance, and I listened in on their conversations.

“What a useless dungeon,” the shiniest man was complaining. “First, I lose my aquarium. Then we find bare coppers no matter the power of opponent we face. I thought others had said that potent weapons were found here almost daily. All that is here is trash!”

“My Lord, the information we were given states that the rewards are often much higher for small or low-ranked groups. Perhaps we should simply be split into smaller groups?” a man in uniform offered. The others around him perked up; getting away from their pompous charge would be a huge relief.

The haughty man pondered these words for a moment. “No. The information also noted that this floor was unexplored and the variety of monsters unknown. Let us clear this area, and then we can consider moving in smaller groups on future excursions.”

They walked into the labyrinth, entering through the door with a drop of water carved over it. This hallway went forward for a short while before subtly curving to the right.

<They are almost to the first branching hallway. As soon as they are all out of sight of the entrance… now! Okay, the door is down, and they are sealed in!> I enjoyed my time by giving a play-by-play of the action to Dani; it got her all riled up and bloodthirsty.

“Woo! How are you doing on sealing the walls with cursed earth by the way?”

<Slower than I want, but it is coming along nicely, thanks for asking.> I was filling the walls with Runes, then powering them with corruption to enhance their durability. I did not keep Essence or corruption powering them at all times, but an activation as soon as it was ready would do two things.

One, it would ensure that the Rune was working properly. Two, it would allow me to activate it with a thought. Then if someone wanted to try smashing through the walls, I could easily make it a worthless endeavor. Unfortunately, Runes on that scale took quite a bit of time to perfect, even more so since I always rechecked and compared to Runes proven to work. I had certainly learned my lesson about activating hastily created Rune work.

<I have finished many of the walls surrounding the Boss Room, but it will be a few weeks until they are all complete,> I admitted to Dani. <It would be faster if I didn’t need to hide them in the walls, but if I did that, the overall strength would be much lower.>

“That sounds good, Cal. How do you want to handle this? If you need to focus hard on the Assimilators, you will not be able to control any other Mobs, correct?” Dani was in full battle mode.

<Right, here is my plan. I can supply you with plenty of Essence so can you direct the Mobs? Take ‘em over if you can. Then if you are defeated, just make a break for it invisibly. The Essence in the air is so thick that you should be able to blend in if they cannot see you with their eyes.> I trailed off as I noticed her staring at me.

“You want me to join in battle? What if I do exceptionally poorly? What if–”

I cut her off before she could scare herself, “Dani, there is no one that I trust more. Plus, you have been practicing, and I think you are ready. From here on, the only way to get better is to have actual combat experience. You ready? I believe in you.”

She took an unnecessary breath—she had no lungs. “I’m ready. Let’s go!” She flew off into the maze, just a streak in my senses. She latched on to a Cloud Cat, just like I knew she would. It had the most similar movements to her normal body.

I took control of an Assimilator and started slowly drifting toward a point in the maze the huge party would need to cross in order to reach the Boss Room. As I drifted, I continuously drew Essence of all types into the body and Core of the floating jellyfish. Now, this took a lot of my attention, but I was still aware of other things going on. I watched as Dani started her approach to the group, right as they were facing a massive swarm of Bashers. Dani leaped from wall to wall, pushing herself higher before the Cat became translucent and started drifting toward the unsuspecting group.

Dani passed over them, slashing with her claws and inflicting the first casualties to this group. Well. Other than their fish, but… anyway. Her first attack tore open the back of a neck as the man was looking down at the Bashers, exposing himself to the attack from above and behind. His arteries severed, the man dropped to the ground with a gurgle, splashing the Cat with a spray of blood. Her momentum continuing, she landed on the back of a uniformed man and leaped off him with a twist, snapping his neck and regaining altitude.

She was a beautiful specimen, landing on people and pushing off walls to maintain momentum and confuse her victims. She had just finished off her fourth target when a spear pierced the Cat’s body, followed by a sword. I was nervous for a moment until I saw Dani floating merrily toward a small pride of Cats.

<Everything okay, Dani?> I worriedly inquired.

“I am fine, but they killed Purrrrty. I want revenge,” she growled back to me.

<Was… was that a pun?> I was watching her in amazement. She had never been more beautiful to me.

She chuckled. “I knew you would like that.”

The humans were bemoaning their losses and tightening their formation. A flicker of fear even crossed the leader’s face when no one was looking. He directed two of his remaining guards in thick plate armor to stand near him, obviously hoping that their thick shields would protect them and—by extension—him.

Dani was about to take control of a Coiled Cat when I stopped her. <Dani, most of the remaining guys are in heavy armor. Try taking a Flesh Cat this time. That type can ignore some of the armor in the way.>

She agreed, and soon, a mangy looking Flesh Cat was slinking toward the group.

She never ceased to amaze me! Dani was able to switch roles so much more quickly than I was! If I tried to take over a Cat followed by another Mob with different abilities, I would often fail to use them to their best effect. On the other hand—not really my favorite colloquialism by the way, since I was a gem—Dani had to be physically present at the battles, which worried me. She seemed to be having the time of her life, though.

“Yeah! Take that!” she roared in my mind; an interesting side effect of our bond allowed us to communicate mind to mind when she was possessing a Mob. “Ha ha! Never saw me coming!” She had just taken down a heavily armored man, slashing at his unexposed leg. The armor quickly had blood pouring between the seams, and Dani took advantage of his distraction to open his chest entirely.

I was observing this and was able to see the total damage when the man died. The Flesh Cat’s ability only opened… well, flesh. It didn’t damage the bones or organs for some reason, except in weak points such as veins and arteries. I noticed this just before a huge mass of Essence impacted me, catching me completely off guard.

<Oof!> I grunted, distracting Dani enough that her ride was killed.

She rushed back to me, noting the glow of dense Essence surrounding me. “Cal, what is the matter? Did you break something?”

<I am… having trouble.> My mind was boiling as I fought to absorb the Essence.

She gasped in sudden understanding. “That last man was C-ranked! Oh crap, we aren’t ready for this.”

<Ready or not, here we go,> I grunted in reply. I had been under the misguided assumption that my new cultivation technique would allow me to hold a near-infinite amount of Essence but had not counted on my D-ranked Mobs being able to acquire the prolific, dense Essence contained in a C-ranked person.

“You can do this; it has happened before! Remember how I told you that dungeons can go from the F to the B-ranks in a matter of days with the right food? Well, you just got the right food to bring you into the C-rankings. This is going to be interesting!” Dani soothed me.

<I… like… interesting. You don’t, though!> I wheezed a dry laugh. <Walk me through this, Dani. I’m starting to vibrate!>

Dani began directing me carefully, and through the pain of holding my atoms together, I tried to listen. “Cal, within every dungeon there is one thing that holds true. There is a space in you that is always hungry, always yearning for more. Where fleshy people hold their Essence in their bodies and use it to feed their life-force, you pour it into that tiny hole that can never seem to be filled.”

Her words made sense—logically—but the meaning eluded me. <There is no hole in me, Dani! I’m perfectly formed!>

“Narcissism is going to be the death of you,” she mumbled before speaking at full volume again. “Not your physical body, your aura! You need to go deep, Cal. Down to the exact center of your Essence where the Chi thread is vanishing.”

I followed her words, then when I got to the center of my Core, I looked for a space. Not as a cultivator, not using Essence to enhance my senses, but as a Dungeon, looking at the patterns within my aura. Just as she had promised, there was a tiny void that an atom-sized thread was being sucked into.

<I found it! I think,> I jubilantly informed my partner. <Now what?>

“Start forcing Essence into the hole. Open it wider until there is a constant stream instead of an infinitesimal trickle.”

<You want me to open a hole in my aura?> I exclaimed in shock.

She literally growled at me. “No, I want you to widen it!”

Her tone of voice more than anything else convinced me to follow her instructions. She had never sounded as angry and scared at the same time before. I grasped the hole with all my willpower, pulling at the edges and stuffing Essence in greater volume into it. Of course, it resisted at first, but in a short amount of time, I was able to create a wider channel.

Essence started flowing into the hole, and my aura began blazing brightly as the huge amount of Essence from the C-ranked adventurer found a place to settle. I was worriedly watching the hole in my aura, looking for where the Essence was accruing. No matter how desperately I looked, there was no extra Essence in me or the air around me.

<Dani, where did it go?>

“Follow it!” Her voice had a playful tone that surprised me; her mood had been vastly different not moments ago.

I latched my consciousness on to the Chi thread spinning into the unknown and found myself surrounded by darkness. The only light came from a small orb of rapidly spinning Essence where the Chi thread was accumulating. I looked on in wonder, then looked around, trying to determine how large this space was. I could see no walls or barriers and, therefore, had no way to determine the scale of this space.

From a seemingly vast distance, Dani’s voice came to me, “Impose your cultivation technique on it!”

Again? Really? More of the same, just make it spin? Wow, what a great secret to the C-rankings. Almost grumpily, I reviewed my cultivation technique and began pulling at the orb of Essence before me. Unlike my Chi spiral outside of this place, this orb reacted faster than my mind could follow. Light arced away from me, the entirety of the orb vanishing into the distance as it opened into a galaxy of light around me. Each point of light looked as distant as the stars in the sky, and the threads connecting them were so thin as to be almost imperceptible.

Since the majority of the Essence had recently belonged to a human, I had as of yet been unable to remove the corruption. I almost did not want to. The corruption flowed along the strands creating a beautiful, shimmering kaleidoscope of colors. The final effect was like looking into a nebula, and it was undeniably beautiful. With reluctance, I moved upstream of my Essence, my mind refocusing on Dani and the dungeon.

<That was unbelievable.> I didn’t have words to describe everything I had just seen.

“You have a beautiful soul, Cal. Congratulations on breaking into the C-ranks!” Dani applauded me.

I ‘smiled’ at her. <Thanks! Now, what do I have to do to break into the B-rankings?>

“…” She just stared at me for a few moments. “You are unbelievable, you know that? No time celebrating, no time seeing what you are capable of, having just jumped four cultivation ranks…”

I waited a moment to see if any more information was forthcoming. <What are you getting at?>

“Gah! Cal… ugh. Fine. To break into the B-ranks… are you ready?”

She tempted me with hidden knowledge.

<Yes! What?>

“You know that place you just were? That mental construct that is actually a small hole into the void, basically a pocket dimension for your soul?” she began, slowing her words and turning the conversation into a hidden whisper.

<Is that what it was? A pocket dimension in my soul?>

“Shh! That place, basically a giant empty space? Fill it with Essence!” she told me in a very anti-climactic way.

<That’s it?>

“No! That is not it, but it is what you have to start with!” Dani glared at me. “As you approach filling it, you need to find a concept—a universal truth that meshes with your Essence. That will be the hardest part because your Essence is completely pure when you are done refining it. Your goal in life right now is to find a pure universal truth. It will likely be so profound that knowing the entirety of it at this point would break your mind and drive you mad! Don’t rush this.”

<Sorry,> I apologized sheepishly. <What happens if a B-ranked person dies in here? Something similar?>

“Not something you need to worry about really. Unless you had meshed your Essence with a concept, you would only get the Essence they had stored. I think. Usually, Mages don’t bother with Essence after they are able to accumulate Mana.” Dani thought for a moment. “Nah, don’t worry about it. Oh! Look, that group is almost to the last fork in the maze!”

I looked over, and sure enough, the much filthier group of people were close to solving the labyrinth. <Oh, good timing. Breaking into a new rank, and I get to try out my new Mob? Yes, please!>

I returned my attention to the Assimilator and prepared to take direct control. Much to my surprise, instead of requiring the huge amount of focus I had needed previously, a line of intent seemed to impact the floating jelly, and it followed my commands smoothly, like the Bashers above us. Able to ignore the movement and positioning of the Mob, I quickly began funneling tainted Essence into its being.

My new ranking showed its worth yet again, allowing me to funnel enough Essence into the Mob for it to reach D-rank nine—significantly stronger than the last time I had controlled an Assimilator. I felt confident that this would be a spectacular event. The party rounded the corner, ignoring the swirling Essence in their haste or arrogance. They walked down the narrow hallway, blinded by the Essence in the air but not realizing how beneficial a simple light would have been.

The entire group was sweaty, dirty, and covered in gore of some kind. The ten remaining people were arguing furiously about the next bend they should take and whether or not to try turning around and retracing their steps.

I found their conversation annoying; they had already tried going back and found only a dead-end. Now it was time to form another ‘dead-end’. Shameless pun! The only question now was what kinds of Essence to use… I wanted to try another combination but had no idea what would happen. Selecting earth and wind—two types that were opposites—struck me as a good idea. Either they would cancel each other out or something fun might happen.

I began building the Essence in the Runes attached to the hanging stingers, allowing it to reach almost critical mass before interlacing them and adding just a touch more Essence. The results shocked me, but not nearly as much as it shocked them.

Z-z-zap! A huge bolt of plasma—commonly referred to as lightning—shattered the air, flying uncontrollably toward the first metal object in its path. The sword that it first touched was instantly white-hot, glowing and slightly melted. The man holding it was dead before he even began to fall, but the lightning was still traveling. It flew into a heavily armored man, the personal guard of the little Noble.

I expected the lightning to bounce again, but it instead arched back and forth between his armor, fusing it into a solid mass of metal whilst cooking the man inside. The rest of the party stood in shock—get it? I am hilarious—for a long moment, which I used to examine my Assimilator. I had brought him up to D-rank nine, but after that bolt of energy, he had been reduced to D-rank three. Yikes. That was a huge amount of power for an underwhelming effect. I could do that one more time before the Assimilator began running too low to sustain flight, or I could use other, more effective, abilities.

I started funneling more Essence into the Mob, hoping to re-empower him before the humans attacked. I had just begun when they launched their counter-attack. As a unit, they rushed forward, grouping tightly together so they could protect the person next to them. Too easy. I just couldn’t pass up this chance! I funneled infernal and fire Essences down the stingers, layering them on top of each other and releasing it just before the humans reached my Mob.

A blast of air as cold as the void snapped outward, the water in the air crystallizing and falling as shattered ice.

The three people closest to my Mob died very quickly as the blood in their brains froze, sending shards of ice deep into the gray matter. The people not caught directly in the blast began exhibiting signs of hypothermia but were able to reach the floating Mob before I could release more Essence. Blunt weapons impacted my Assimilator, but if they did any damage, it didn’t show. Not having a brain to rattle was a definite boon in this case. Just as I was getting cocky, a sword lashed out and left a gaping wound. The Noble zipped forward, his hand entering and exiting the wound with blinding speed. He was clutching something, and my Mob dropped to the ground with a wet splat.

“It had a Beast Core.” The Noble showed the glimmering gem to the few surviving members. “We were not told that there were Cored Beasts in here. When we get out, heads will roll!” He was shaking in fury, clutching the Core hard enough that I was surprised it didn’t shatter.

<Dani, look! They are down to a regular sized party finally. Five people, better rewards. Not great rewards, these guys are all C-ranked, but you know. Better.>

I was watching the Noble throw a tantrum, kicking his charred, dead guard and ordering him to return to work. The others exchanged cautious looks when the Noble was not looking their way. An unhinged, powerful person was not who they wanted to be near.

“Fine! You lazy…” The Noble let out a tiny shriek of frustration. “Let’s finish this stupid dungeon.”

<Rude. I am quite intelligent, I think,> I muttered, making Dani laugh at me quietly.

“A bit biased though, aren’t you?” Dani whispered to me as the humans made it into the final Boss Room.

“Great, even less visibility.” The furious Noble looked around the steam filled room, sweating as the heat and humidity began to take its toll.

A low growl began to reverberate around the room, the tones rising and falling. The primal portion of the humans’ brains took hold; they scooted together, goosebumps raising on their skin while fear flashed across their faces. Their eyes were darting around, trying to pierce the wall of steam around them.

“No. I’m done with this.” The Noble raised his hands, chanting a few words as he moved Essence through the air. He pulled his hands, and the water in the air condensed into droplets. A hot rain fell to the ground with a loud pattering, revealing a now-furious, wet Cat.

One of the men shook slightly. “That is a big Cat.”

The Noble looked at the speaker coldly. “Kill it.” The group raced across the sodden ground, weapons at the ready.

Snowball took a deep breath, exhaling a fast-moving cloud of superheated steam as a tremendous roar! Able to see clearly for the first time since entering the third floor, the humans easily dodged the attack. Snowball moved in a whirl of motion, claws flashing out and trailing light-distorting waves of heat. A shield caught the blow, throwing the person holding it back and on to the floor. The shield had five glowing points on it where the claws had touched.

A staff came at Snowball, scoring a direct hit. Most of the damage was mitigated by the thick layers of fur covering his body, but he still yelped like a struck dog and flinched.

“Poor Snowball!” Dani whimpered, watching the Cat intently.

The Cat counterattacked, landing a blow on the offending staff. The metal-shod quarterstaff superheated where the claws touched, making the iron banding glow cherry-red and igniting the wood. The staff was thrown away, but the focus was on the greatsword the Noble was swinging haphazardly with a wild shout. Snowball ducked under the horizontal slash, losing a few tufts of fur to the razor-sharp blade. He reared up, head-butting the wild man and tossing him away like a ragdoll.

Another man stabbed from behind, driving a dagger deep into the muscle on the Cat’s left-side back, eliciting a yowl. Snowball whirled around, landing a solid blow to his attacker and dragging him to the floor. He latched on to the arm the man threw up to protect his neck, savaging the armor-clad limb. Another stab from behind made the Cat run forward, each of his paws landing on the prone man as he did so. The multi-hundred-pound Cat, along with the force of his bounding, snapped many bones.

Snowball raced to a covered steam vent, arriving there just before his pursuers. He lashed out, and a blast of steam erupted into the room. The men behind him started screaming as the boiling air washed over them, cooking them in their armor like a lobster in a pot. They got out of the steam, blisters formed across almost every inch of skin. They stumbled around blindly, their eyes—from the sclera to the retina—solidified like hardboiled-eggs. Snowball struck out, slicing the neck of one of them. There was only a small amount of blood, the wound otherwise cauterized near instantly. Snowball tried for the second blind man, only to have a greatsword swing down, parting his head from his body in one clean swing.

The Noble shimmered into view; he had apparently been using a high-level ability, using a thin layer of reflective water to shield himself from Snowball’s sight.

“Gotcha, you brute. Skin this Cat, and crack its skull open. I am nearly positive that this is also a Cored Beast, so find me the Core it is hiding.”

“Skin it, my lord? How do you want us to do that?”

“What do you mean? Take its fur. I want this as a cloak! Do it the way you normally would.”

The man looked confused; he was concussed quite badly. “But, my Lord… there is more than one way to skin a Cat.”

The Noble sighed. “Just… lengthwise? Is that understandable in your limited mind?”

He walked over to the blinded man and used his Essence to form a thin layer of water over the destroyed eyes and exposed skin, keeping his body lubricated until they could get to a cleric. They quickly moved toward the exit, stopping as they noticed a golden, glowing chest.

“Likely not worth it.” The Noble tried to continue onward.

Licking his lips, one of the men dared to go against the statement, throwing open the chest. Inside was a dagger, a sword, and a massive tower shield. I made that happen by extending the chest deep into the ground, only actually showing a portion of its size above ground. Each was well-made but had subtle flaws that would force them to break like a standard piece of equipment. I had promised Dani that I wouldn’t give out unbreakable Runed items anymore, after all. Not recognizing that the items were Runed, the Noble scoffed and started guiding his blind subordinate up the stairs. The other two men grabbed the items and followed closely behind.

<What do you think, Dani? Do we need to worry about Mobs for a while or just focus on expanding?>

Dani laughed as a young version of Snowball appeared in the room and began growing quickly. “I think we are all set on Mobs for now, Cal. Let’s hollow out the entire mountain range!”

Chapter Fifteen

“Dale!” A server who worked at the Pleasure House was running up to Dale. “Madame Chandra sent me to let you know that the High Royals have arrived and are waiting to talk to you.”

“Thanks! This is pretty good timing actually. Would you let her know I will be there as soon as I bathe?” Dale asked the waiting server.

“Absolutely, m’lord.” He didn’t leave, seeming to be expecting something.

Dale raised a brow at him. “Yes?”

The man coughed lightly. “Well, this is really outside my normal duties…”

“Yes, thank you.” Dale started to turn away, but Rose caught his arm.

“Dale,” she whispered, “he wants a tip. Money.”

“What? Why?” Dale returned in a normal tone, making her wince.

“Because he came here at a run when he could have dawdled and taken his time, making sure that you had no time to clean up or refresh yourself. The term ‘tips’ is an acronym for ‘to insure proper service’. If you aren’t a generous person, the people who can make your life easier will find ways to make it much harder instead,” Rose explained in a hurried hiss.

“I see. Got it. I had just never heard of that before.” Dale turned back to the waiting man. “Sorry for the wait, here, please take this as a token of my appreciation.” He flipped him a silver coin, making the server’s eyes go wide. The man caught it with a grin, running off the way he came.

Rose rolled her eyes. “Way to overpay, Dale.” She sighed. “Ah well, at least you know he will always rush to you. You may have forgotten, but a silver is still about a week’s worth of pay for people who don’t risk their lives every day. A hundred copper? You remember, the little coins that you used to dive after in the dungeon?”

Dale rolled his eyes and broke off from the group, making his way over to the designated bathing area. He stripped down, quickly scrubbing himself and getting as clean as possible in the frigid water. Feeling much more awake and slightly shivering, he made his way to the restaurant. Along the way, he called for a small group of guards to shadow him, making sure there were no Nobles lurking nearby looking for revenge.

He walked to the doors of the restaurant, being stopped by guards with wicked-looking blades. “Halt, good sir. This building is closed for a private event. I apologize, but I must ask you to take your luncheon elsewhere.”

Dale paused, surprised by the politeness shown to him. So far, all of the Nobles he had encountered—and their guards—had been exceedingly rude and pompous. “Thank you, but I was actually summoned to this event. My name is Dale. I am the owner of this land.”

“Ah! Excellent.” The guard smiled at him. “Well, come on in then. Be warned though that the guards in there are rather jumpy, so please don’t make any threats or threatening motions. People have been accidentally skewered for sneezing too abruptly.”

Dale watched him to see if he was making a joke, but the guard certainly seemed serious. “Duly noted. Thanks for the warning…?”

He stepped inside, walking into the main dining hall. There were only two people at a table with a smattering of guards around the room in various poses as they watched different angles. Normally, this room was bustling; people usually were here the moment the restaurant opened.

The man sitting at the table looked up. “Pardon me, may I ask why you are here?”

To Dale’s surprise, though the man’s body looked to be in his early twenties, his face was haggard and drawn. There were lines on his face and circles under his eyes that only came from extreme stress and lack of sleep, and the woman next to him had a similar visage.

“Pardon my intrusion.” Dale tried to match the formality and suddenly realized that he had no idea what to call them. While he had amazing insight into the Dark Court of the Elves, he had little to no idea how much would translate to human politics. “Um. Your… Highness?”

The man sighed. “Please, I am really trying not to be discourteous, but if you are here to stare like the others were, I would really like you to leave. I want a nap so badly that…”

Dale rallied, slipping into his most politically professional mindset. “No, I am here to introduce myself and discuss matters that require our combined attention. My hesitation was due to not knowing the proper title to address you. My name is Dale, Duke of the Huine nation, Baron of the Lion and Phoenix realms. I am the owner of this land.”

The man at the table blinked, a fast motion that turned slow, as though he were fighting to keep his eyes open. He opened his mouth to reply but was saved from answering by the other table occupant smoothly taking the reins of conversation.

“Hello and welcome. Please, be seated. I am Crown Princess Marie of the Phoenix Kingdom. This is Crown Prince Henry of the Lion Kingdom.”

She continued, introductions complete, “Thank you for taking the time to offer your respects as soon as you were able, and please join us so that we may discuss the issues you bring. Also, please be aware that neither of us have slept since the rumors of war have begun, so our meeting must be a short one as we still need to find an area to sleep.”

Dale sat down. “I can take care of that. I have quarters in the temple right now, and there is plenty of space available. A stone building, easily defensible,” he nodded at the nearby guards as he mentioned this; they obviously appreciated the gesture, “which is well-appointed and spacious. I hope it will serve until we are able to find sleeping arrangements more befitting you.”

Prince Henry waved away his concerns. “That will be wondrous; I have slept on nothing for long enough that anywhere is enough for me. I’d take a stable. Or the dungeon.”

“Agreed,” Marie intoned tiredly. “Thank you.”

“Please, think nothing of it.” Dale looked between these two. They were nothing like the other Nobles he had met thus far. He wondered if their politeness was simply the difference between main and branch families? “The first thing I need to bring to your attention is that I currently have the Barons Adams—one from each of your Kingdoms—under lock and key.”

That woke them up, sharpening their gaze as they worked to keep their emotions in check.

Marie spoke first, “May I ask… why they are under arrest?”

“Currently just being held, pending your judgment of course. Their first actions upon entering this area were to accost anyone nearby that happened to look their way. They had someone—at least one person—whipped for not knowing how to address them properly. My guards are still looking for him, as they told me he was being held for some reason.” Dale looked at the stony faces of the Royals.

“And?” Henry explosively sighed. “Until we come into our own inheritance, we cannot change the laws of the Kingdom. They have the right to act like the entitled snobs that they are. So their people will eventually revolt and potentially overthrow them. There is less a chance of that happening if these selfsame snobs reach the B-rankings, I suppose. Dale, every Noble is master of his own land until they break crown law.”

“They also set their guards on me and threatened me with execution, if that means anything to you,” Dale offered, aghast at the casual acceptance of random beatings.

Henry caught his breath and looked at Marie; she shrugged. “Well,” Henry was glancing around, “what do you want to happen to them? Executing them, or even beating them, would start a war with the Baronies that we could ill afford right now.”

Dale shook his head. “Nothing so drastic. I want permission to create my own charter, a set of laws that visiting nobility will need to follow, else I can punish them. I intend to build this area into a city, and I don’t want people to think they can show up and attack my people! I would also like you to order them to follow my laws, on my land at least.”

Marie chuckled ruefully. “Your people, huh? Well, Henry, we have been wanting to change the way peasants are treated, and he is offering this to us on a silver platter. If his area prospers, we can use him as a precedent for change.”

Henry nodded. “I’m with you. Sounds interesting, Dale. Since you already have an honorary title, I can make it a real title and bind your authority to this land. Unless superseded by my Father’s direct orders, I name you Baron Dale Phantom of the Barony Phantom.”

“As do I, Crown Princess Marie, name you Baron Dale Phantom of the Barony Phantom.” Marie laughed and looked at Henry, who was squinting at her. “It is contested land after all.” She turned her attention back to Dale. “I would like to see the charter you propose and offer my services to help fill potential, ah, gaps in your laws that others may attempt to take advantage of.”

“I offer my services as well!” Henry promised earnestly.

“Me too.” Princess Brianna faded into view, sitting at the table. The guards did not appreciate this.

“Treachery!”

“Assassins! Defend the–”

Brianna yelled over them as the guards began to move, “Oh, calm down already!” The guards stopped moving, cold sweat trickling down their brow as knives glittered against their throats. “Everyone! Stand down.” Dark Elves stepped away from the guards and vanished from sight. “Sorry, they were here to ensure there were no… misunderstandings as we met.”

Henry replied surprisingly mildly, though his face was ashen, “As you did not assassinate us, I am rather pleased to meet you. It is not every day that a Royal meets a Moon-Elf, and the Princess at that if I am guessing correctly. More rare to survive the encounter…” He finished with a question in his voice.

The guards were not as pleased as the Prince pretended to be, closing ranks around the human Royals and glaring at the lounging Elf, who grinned and twiddled her fingers at them, trying to rile them up. From their prune-colored faces, she was succeeding.

Her demeanor shifting, she sat up and became serious. “I am very glad that you have granted Dale the powers of a landed Baron. He is a good man. You though,” she eyed the Royals carefully, “from what I hear about you, you are working to downplay the power of Nobles, taking away their near-omnipotent power in their own lands. I hear that you are planning to give peasants similar rights to the Noble classes and plan to educate them on our cultivation techniques and abilities so they can live longer as well as do more than live their lives simply and peacefully. Is this true?”

Henry looked pained, so Marie again took the lead and nodded. “Yes,” she said simply.

“Excellent. You are taking the same step that Elves took long ago.” Brianna’s lips twisted into a genuine smile. “There are risks and side effects to this plan of action. Once a critical mass of the population cultivates heavily, reproduction rates slow. When they realize this, they will cultivate more, trying to solve the issue. Eventually, your people will not be able to survive long without a constant influx of Essence, but they will be stronger, smarter, and healthier than ever before.”

The known and well-explained consequences of their plans seemed to take the Royals by surprise, but they also seemed heartened by the cheerful outlook Brianna had painted for them.

“I will have my people draw up a charter with Dale’s direction and present it to you in a few weeks for you to ratify or amend. Is this reasonable to all?” A few glances between the humans and a nod followed. “Lovely. Now, if you order the Barons to apologize and make amends, they must do so, yes?”

“That is so,” Henry affirmed. “We can also order them to seek no revenge in any form. When we are done with them, they will only be able to sing your praises, no matter how it pains them.”

Marie laughed tiredly. “I’ve been looking for a reason to put Adams on a short leash ever since he had a maid executed for refusing his bed.”

Dale looked at her oddly. “Wait, people can refuse orders? The way they looked at me when I told them ‘no’ made me think that orders were unconditional.”

“Only legal orders. Submitting to arrest or bowing when you have broken a law, even if it is a stupid law, is different. Rape is illegal no matter what Kingdom you reside in, and trying to use your position to force another into bed can be nothing else.” Henry had to take a deep breath to calm his emotions. The others looking at him forced him to explain, “I hate seeing my people abused. It is my duty to protect and provide for them, and every failure to do so is another stain on my soul.”

Dale nodded happily; he liked these people. “I feel that you would enjoy the company of my teammate, Tom. You have a similar manner of speech.”

“I would be pleased to meet him! The only Tom I know that speaks like me is a northern barbarian, a giant, red-haired Prince.” Henry chuckled at his memories. “Dale, while we are in town, I’ll make sure to keep the other Nobles on a short leash. You likely won’t even see them for a week or so.”

Dale looked at Henry in horror; he had gotten caught on one part of the conversation. “Tom is a prince? Oh no… and I have him training with Hans. I need to leave. Please make your way to the temple. I will arrange accommodations on my way.”

Cal

<Ah, night-time. When the majority of miners are gone for the day and people aren’t picking medicinal herbs while dodging angry rabbits.> I sighed happily as I began refreshing the dungeon, removing scarring on the walls and floors from traps, missed attacks, and successful attacks. I glanced over at Snowball, who was doing very non-catlike things. <Having fun, Dani?>

The Dani-possessed Cat stilled and looked at me. “Very much so. How are things going up above? Is that Half-Dwarf still at it?”

I looked; sure enough, the Half-Dwarf was merrily swinging his pick, blasting holes in the rock face. If he continued for another few minutes, he would be outside of the dungeon and into the mountain proper.

<Yup. On the plus side, he is helping me expand horizontally. Too bad for him, whatever he finds is likely going to be subpar. I can’t really be expected to give him treasure outside of myself.>

The intrepid miner swung again, the force of his blow creating an opening outside of my influence and, therefore, my sight. He gasped, eyes going wide. He fell to his knees, and tears sprang to his eyes. He reached forward with one hand, dropping his pick. Apparently, there was a buildup of some sort of gas—yup, now that it was in my influence, I knew it to be methane. The pick hit the ground and threw sparks, creating a minor explosion. Really, it was just enough to throw the miner to the ground and shatter a few rocks.

He stood back up and stepped into the open area, outside of my vision. I watched for him for several moments, hearing his murmurs of glee and the pounding of his pick. He left within a half-hour or so, gleefully chuckling the whole time. I extended tendrils of influence into the area, widening my range as soon as was possible. I looked for anything that could have made him behave so out of character, but I found nothing. He must have done a very good job collecting whatever it was.

<Dani, what do you think was in there?> I was still frantically searching.

“No clue, sorry. I am going to keep training. Snowball is a little harder to control than the other Cats.”

<Fair enough.> After we had found out that Dani was good at fighting, she had been training constantly to get better. I didn’t really have the knack for it; I was more of the idea man. I made things that could fight so I didn’t need to.

I turned my attention to filling in the tunnel—where the Half Dwarf had been mining—with fairly porous stone that didn’t shatter as easily as normal, which would reduce the efficiency of the blasting pick, making it far less effective.

While I was absorbing the rubble, a glint of metal caught my attention, and I looked at it closely. Aluminum? Was that what had excited him so much? There was so much aluminum in the stones and dirt that I had never bothered to give it out. Surely, it was exceedingly common, right?

I pondered on this all night whilst repairing and upgrading certain portions of the deeper levels.

When daylight started trickling down from above, and I felt the stirring of restless feet at the entrance. I turned my attention to the first group to step in. Dale and his people of course.

<Well, good morning there, sunshine. I hope you slept well and are ready for a fun-filled day of excitement and adventure,> I sent toward Dale.

He flinched, looking around for new or sudden traps. “Can’t you just leave me alone? I’ve been doing what you ask. Can I at least not get bothered by your incessant nattering?”

<Fine mood you are in today. I think that you are getting a bit too much of an ego, been bossing people around recently?>

Dani had been spying for me recently, as well as mutterings from other dungeon divers mentioning Dale. <What are you anyway? People seem to have a bad opinion of you.>

Dale looked a bit hurt at these words. I think I may have struck a nerve. “If you must know, I own the mountain. I was a sheep-herder when I found this place and was given enough money to purchase the land for a pittance. Now, people are magically forced to listen to me when I tell them to leave.”

<Interesting, you own the mountain, and I own you. Funny how the world works,> I teased him.

“You do not own me. I am a free man, and I will not–” Whatever he would not do was interrupted as I shut down the nerves running to his legs, and he bonelessly toppled to the floor.

Nice, I hadn’t been sure I could do that!

Returning control of Dale’s legs, I waited for him to make an excuse to the others before continuing to talk.

<Since I enclosed your Center in a Soul Gem and essentially saved your life again, I have a bit of power over you. Also, since you opened yourself to me fully the other day…>

“Oh, right,” I heard Dale mutter under his breath.

My connection to Dale slammed closed, only a tiny tendril of power remaining between us. If I had eyes, I would have blinked in surprise.

<Well.>

“I can still hear you. Damn,” Dale thought with deep overtones of exasperation.

<Can’t really get around that—we are connected. Well fine, be that way. How did you do that?>

Dani was now listening in on our conversation through me. This was more exciting than making a Cat low crawl across a room with only its front paws apparently.

“Why should I tell you? What do I get out of it?”

Greedy little human.

<How about a trade? I’ll ask you a question, and you can ask me something,> I offered generously.

“No thanks.”

What the…? <You don’t have questions?> I was mind boggled at the lack of curiosity.

“I have many, but I feel that giving you any information would be a bad deal for me.”

Dale went back to trying to ignore me. That wouldn’t do at all.

<How about we chat when you aren’t busy, and I won’t send every creature in here to overwhelm you?> I threatened. I think he could hear my bluff. Mind-speak can be annoying like that.

“Oh, you are finally going to give up your pretense at being neutral? I bet Hans would survive, and the first time I felt you weren’t playing fair, I would tell him. Then they would find a way to come and kill you permanently. My understanding is that dungeons who do stuff like that are destroyed quickly,” Dale rebutted, making me almost growl in frustration. I could tell that he wasn’t bluffing.

“Dale, look out!” Tom cried, making Dale spin around with his weapon at the ready. His team looked at him in confusion, and he blushed, murmuring something about hearing a noise.

“Did you just fake Tom’s voice in my mind?” Dale thought at me.

<Mayyyybe.> I laughed at the swear words he thought at me. <What an angry person you are! Tell you what. I’ll let you go first—ask a question. I’ll choose to answer it or not. If I choose not to, I’ll put better items in the next chest you are sure to find. Either way, I then ask you something.> I waited for a response, but none seemed forthcoming.

<If you don’t answer because you don’t know, fine, I wasted a turn. If you don’t answer because you don’t want to, you will get worse loot. If you do answer, you get another turn, and so forth. You must answer as fully as you can.> I thought that was a fair deal, and Dani confirmed it for me when I glanced at her.

“This is an agreeable compromise for now, I suppose. That is, as long as you swear to do nothing to distract me or create unfair situations for me or my team,” Dale sent thoughtfully. “This deal continues permanently, I assume.”

<Yes it does! My turn!> I chuckled, feeling good about that trick.

“Nope, if you think about that, I asked no question. You just supplied me with information.”

Oh dear, it seems someone has been teaching Dale how to be crafty; now I was worried.

“My first question is this: Do you actually have no control over me right now, or are you playing with my head to get answers?”

<I really have no direct control; all I can do is try to influence you with my words and needs. My turn, why do I have no control? You did… something. What?>

“Something that Dark Elves in political positions are taught early on in their career is that people can be controlled or influenced by others that are trained to do so. I tightened my aura, leaving less room for outside influences to penetrate.”

Dale didn’t make it sound easy, but I was still a bit worried about this. Is that the real reason I shouldn’t create reasoning Mobs in here? Because if they worked out this method, I would lose control of them totally? Hmm. Something to think about.

“I’ve heard you talking to someone else, who is it?” was Dale’s next question. I looked at Dani, who gave me a look that clearly suggested I answer in the negative.

<Can’t tell you, sorry. You earn a boost to your next treasure chest,> I ignored his muttered frustration. <There is a Half-Dwarf that comes in here and mines. He left with something that made him happy enough to bring him to tears, but I don’t know what it was. What was it?>

Dale seemed surprised but covered it well by punching an exceptionally fluffy bunny in the face as he contemplated his answer. “Evan? I heard from him this morning—you really don’t know? He had found some rare metal—he called it aluminum. It is worth more than platinum—per weight—and holds Essence so well that the metal itself becomes stronger. When enchanted, it becomes something that he calls ‘Mithril’. My turn, how did you not know what he had taken?”

<He was outside of the dungeon at that point. He tunneled in a straight line for so long that he was outside of my range. That area is now inside my influence,> I murmured while I thought over the implications of his last comment. <Okay, why is aluminum so rare? It is stupidly abundant. It is seriously everywhere. You have some on your boot right now.>

Dale paused, considering. “I guess I don’t know. My guess is that it accumulates in mineral deposits rarely, and there is no known method to extract it from everything else? If it is all around like you say, that is the only logical explanation that I can think of.”

I grunted; he had answered as best he could so I had nothing to call him out on, dang rules. Why did I always set rules for myself?

“I’m going to save my question for now. We are coming up on a Boss Room, and being distracted while fighting Raile is a bad idea. I hope you remember our non-interference agreement.” He carefully phrased his words so that they weren’t a question; Dale was getting clever.

Dale

The dungeon was getting to him. He had been distracted the entire time they were here, and the others were starting to catch on that he was not paying attention. A Basher had gotten past him and landed a damaging blow on Adam’s leg when Dale was supposed to be watching out for him; even now, it was darkening into a deep bruise.

Hans was looking at him closely. “You back with us now?” he asked directly in the tactless way Hans was known for. “It looks like you’ve been arguing with yourself for the last hour, and if you aren’t done, we should prolly just wait. You know, instead of fighting a bear-sized, armored rabbit that tends to squish people.”

Dale flushed; he hadn’t realized he was being so obvious. “Yeah, sorry, Hans. Sorry, Adam. I’ve been thinking about other things. I know we are suffering for it. I am now fully focused. Let’s go kick this pig.”

Tom cleared his throat. “Um. Art thou feeling proper? We go now to kill an overgrown rabbit, not a pig. If hallucinations or a fever are afflicting your person, we should seek a healer.”

“He is fine, Tom,” Adam interjected, “That was a saying, and it means that he is ready and willing to go.”

“Ah. That does make more sense now.”

They stepped into the room, and Raile wasted no time in making his attack. Sometimes he came from a hole hidden high in the wall, and sometimes he tried to hide, blending in with the wall. Today, Raile just seemed ready to kill and was dashing at them even as they stepped into his territory.

Raile ran at an angle to the wall, then jumped and pushed off it to maintain momentum whilst changing direction. Midair, he flipped just before landing, increasing his momentum and creating a much larger area of damage than Dale had previously seen. Stone shards went flying from the ground, chipped off and sent at high speeds from the impact site. Small slivers pinged off weapons, while others opened small cuts wherever they touched.

Tom roared and stepped forward, swinging his warhammer at Raile with deadly intent. This had worked the previous day, easily slaying the Boss, but today, Raile leaned back on his haunches and swung his paws like a boxer. The huge warhammer caught the blow just behind the head of the weapon, sending it flying across the room.

<Yes!> Dale heard in his head.

Expecting that the warhammer was gone, the rest of the group rushed to land their own attacks. The large Basher ducked and weaved, avoiding some blows and catching others on its armor. It threw a one-two punch that tossed Tom across the room, dealing damage—but not nearly as much as a charge would have. Rabbits are not built to be boxers, they are built to use their hind legs to supply power. The way it was acting right now was entirely out of the norm, making Dale wonder if Raile had gotten stronger or possibly higher ranked.

Rose landed a few arrows into the flesh around Raile’s neck, prompting a Glitterflit to zip across the room and boop him with a powerful influx of healing Essence. Hans executed the Glitterflit with a cartwheel in midair, turning into a surprisingly effective whirling succession of blades.

Raile bounced, jumping straight up and coming down heavily, making the standing members of the group flinch, almost losing their footing. His armor fell off him as his ability—Avenger—activated. His head suddenly had a crown of jagged granite, and Raile was furious. While the humans were off balance, he dropped to all fours and rushed Rose, as she stood in front of his real target—Hans. She easily dodged out of the way, and Tom was suddenly in front of Raile, swinging his warhammer in a fury. Raile dropped, head mangled beyond repair, and the others sat down to catch their breath.

“What was that?” Hans questioned the others. They shrugged, so he shook his head and skinned the Glitterflit.

“I heard he had an ability, but I’ve never seen him fight like that before.” Rose considered the slowly melting form of Raile.

Adam looked at Tom who was shaking, trying to come down from his fury. “You okay over there, buddy?”

“I… I have too much of the rage of my ancestors. If I had… it would be easier if I had more to kill.” Tom ground out through gritted teeth. His hands were white where he held his hammer in a too-tight grip.

Hans looked at the deeply breathing man and nodded. “That clears that up at least.”

“What?” Dale looked between the two, and Tom seemed suddenly ashamed.

“I… there is something I must explain,” Tom began. “I was born the crown prince of the Wolf Kingdom, but when it was found that the taste of blood sends me into a rage, I was disowned. The blood rage is an outdated remnant of a time in our history where those of us with the fire-infused blood were the only real defense against the ice giants. Now though… who would trust a man that can barely control his bloodthirst to be a leader of men? I was disinherited by my father, refused the cultivation techniques that were my birthright, and sent out to find my own way in life. Now… here I am.”

“Is this why you took that extra swing at Raile that killed a member of your former team?” Hans’s tone was laced with barely controlled anger.

“It is,” Tom admitted shamefacedly. “I had taken a blow that tore my lip, and the fury raced through me. I could find nothing else to attack besides my friends, so I released my anger on Raile’s corpse.”

Hans barely waited for him to finish speaking before beginning to yell, “So you are telling us that a small injury to you may cost us our lives, and you never thought to warn us?!”

“Hans, maybe you should–” Dale tried to interject.

“No!” Hans shouted him down before turning back to Tom coldly. “I thought I was your mentor, a person that you trusted to teach you everything you needed to know. Why would you not tell me about something this important? If you can’t control your body’s reaction to fire Essence, we need to fix that. It isn’t hard to do!”

“I am sorry.” Tom was staring at the ground. “It is not so much a secret as a shameful… wait. What?” His head snapped up, eyes bulging with confusion and a touch of hope.

“I mean, it is a slow process, but it is just tedious, not difficult.” Hans looked at the odd expression on Tom’s face. “What?”

Tom swallowed, clenching his jaw as he tried to formulate a question, “There is a cure to the Blood Fire?”

Hans nodded. “Yup. It is such a rare condition that I suppose that it isn’t widely known, but it is easy to learn.”

“Hans, if you are jesting, I will be hurt beyond measure,” Tom pleadingly informed his teacher.

“I am quite serious.”

“I… can’t believe it.” Tom looked at the ceiling, his height and the angle hiding that his eyes were misty. “I could go home.”

Chapter Sixteen

I watched Dale’s team leaving the dungeon after cultivating for roughly half an hour. <Dale? Can you hear me?> There was no reply, and no feelings of frustration from his end, so I knew that he was out of range. He was a big, seething ball of brain chemicals churning with barely controlled emotions under that tough front he put forward. I turned my attention to Dani, who was practicing her fine control of the big Cats down here.

<Question for you, if you have a moment.> I waited for her full attention. <I had a chance to absorb that warhammer I gave away, but when I tried… nothing happened. Thoughts?>

She separated from Snowball, who sank down to the ground, exhausted. “Hmm, that is odd. You had it far enough away from him?”

<Yes, he had to run across the room to retrieve it. I had plenty of time to work on disintegrating it, but he was still able to get his weapon back intact. Trying to solve the issue in a logical manner made me hesitate. I would have warned you that he was coming at you otherwise. Sorry, Dani.>

She ‘shrugged’, more of a conceptual thing than an actual movement of body parts. “I had lost control of Raile by that point anyway. As soon as his ability triggered, he went into a blind rage and charged. I was just along for the ride.”

We spent a little time thinking. I casually fixed a wall that had cracks along it before Dani spoke again, “Well, the warhammer was bound to him, correct?”

<Yes, I made that a built-in function… oh. You think that it being bound to Tom and making it circulate his Essence imparted a portion of his aura on to it, therefore blocking my influence from breaking down its pattern. That makes sense. Dang it. So if I want it back, I need to get to it as soon as he dies and before someone else activates it. Hmm. Didn’t seem to be a problem when getting Dale’s weapon back…> I hadn’t even thought that this would be a possibility; I had never even considered the effect that binding an Inscribed item may have.

“…Yeah. That is what I was going to say.” Dani coughed. She looked over at Snowball, who was sound asleep. “Well, there goes practice.”

<You could help me decide what to do. You may have been right a few days ago. I’m thinking that the third floor may be just a little too… what is the word? Overpowered? There was a group of fifteen people that I was unprepared for, and together, we killed off two-thirds of them, including a C-ranked guard.> I paused to see her reaction.

“Well, what did you have in mind, then?” Dani prodded me, obviously trying to get me to the point.

<We just found out that aluminum is rarer than gold. Why not change the way we do things a bit? We have gold right next to iron on the first level, and there are some miners up there that have been getting richer than people coming in to fight. That must be skewing the economy a bit. Let’s put in a second mining area and move the current third floor down to create a fourth floor, then the third floor will be a mining area with monsters.>

“Interesting. That way, there will be a higher chance of growth for you. Currently, only about a third of the groups that enter the dungeon continues all the way to Raile. Usually, those are the people that are sure that they can fight Raile and win or, at least, survive.” Dani pondered for a moment. “If only a third of the groups can make it down to the third floor, that means they will need to pull double duty, guarding and escorting as well as fighting. Then they are stuck until the miners are done and likely need to help haul ore outside.”

I watched her in awe. <Wow, you came up with that on the fly? I’ve been thinking about this all day and night, and you still hit a few points I hadn’t considered.>

“I am very intelligent,” Dani noted breezily.

<And humble as well,> I replied dryly.

“I am afraid that virtue does not exist among my many talents.”

Dani laughed at the strangled noise I made in response.

<At least you know your limits,> I muttered. <The question for me becomes: what Mobs do we put on that floor? Also, should it be a fairly open area, or should it be tunnels? And after it is going, do–>

Dani decided to cut off my thoughts at that point. “Why not worry about that after the floor is made? I know you have been extending downward with your influence, so let’s take a week and lower the third floor far enough that you can grow that new mining floor quickly.” She paused, gathering her arguments. “That way you can save on Essence by not using it in a big burst, and people may not notice for a while that there even is a new floor. No one has come to this one after that huge party got destroyed.”

<Sounds like a plan to me. Then I can decide how to make the layout. Oh! What if we…>

Dani listened to me chatter for a few minutes about how I wanted to make the floor plan, oohing and ahhing in all the right places. She tended to be a really good audience. We had just decided on the ratio of gold to aluminum when I tensed up and focused on a point high above.

“What is the matter?” Dani was seriously concerned. After all, I almost never got this concerned; I was basically a laid-back people-eater.

<Three… Elves? Just entered. They are moving really fast. We are talking… I am only tracking them by the disruption in airflow. Already at the first Boss Room. Past. They haven’t killed anything yet, which worries me. The Bashers haven’t had time to react to anything,> I told her tensely.

“Do you want to drop the panic doors?” Dani was trying to keep a brave face, but when I was nervous, Dani always became even more so. The panic doors were her idea; after the Distortion Cat incident, she told me that I needed to put more direct defenses into high-traffic areas. The panic doors allowed me to drop five-ton cursed-earth granite doors, which should be sufficient to at least slow overly powerful people.

<I…> I hesitated; the doors took a huge amount of effort to reset, even for me. <They haven’t done anything overtly hostile. I don’t think I should just yet.>

Dani nodded, accepting my answer. Sometimes, I think she trusted me more than I deserved. “Where are they now?”

<Almost to Raile. Wow, watching their progress is ridiculous. They didn’t even bend a blade of grass in the garden room. Oh…>

“What?”

<They bypassed Raile. He was still mid-air when they started down the stairs.> I strategically began moving the Assimilators around the third floor. Ugh, they move so slowly! Luckily, the third floor was not as straightforward as the others. The fast-moving Elves paused and began moving through the labyrinth, seemingly frustrated every time they hit a dead-end. Still, they were making good time through my tricks and traps, easily avoiding the attacks made by my Mobs.

They reached the final approach to the Boss Room and began moving down the straight corridor. My Assimilator raised two of its stingers to chest level on a human, and the air vibrated a bit as the Essence I was directing into my Mob passed through. The Elves never paused, actually increasing their speed forward. I had my Assimilator release as much Essence as it could channel, a huge burst of fire pushed through a focusing lens of celestial corruption.

The fire that poured outward was white tinged with gold, hot enough that a shock wave formed in front of it from air being burned and displaced. The rock walls in the fairly narrow hallway glowed cherry-red as the wave of fire moved past, some of it cracking or shattering from the huge temperature differential. Any shards of rock that fell off stuck to whatever they landed on, fused together.

This at least got the Elves’ attention. Their eyes widened for a moment, then narrowed with intense focus. The first of them stepped forward, making a motion that displaced air but had no other noticeable effect. The second swept forward with her hands, forcing dirt and dust into a thick wall of particles in front of them. The third halted entirely, making motions that caused a band of—infernal?!—Essence forward, wrapping around the particle wall just before the wave of fire reached it.

I was watching the interplay of Essence as closely as possible to see what they had done—it was quite ingenious, really. The infernal Essence counteracted the celestial in the fire, and though the fire was still intense, it no longer burned like a bar of magnesium. The particle wall absorbed the force of the blast, and, apparently, the first of them had done something to the air that reduced the potency of the flame. The fire raged against their efforts for a moment, but when it subsided, a pane of clear glass stood in the hallway, allowing them to view the fiery landscape just beyond.

The first one punched the glass, shattering it and allowing a blast of heat to escape. The influx of oxygen made the hallway glow brighter for a few moments. Oh! That is what the first person did; the air must have had the oxygen removed from it in a small space. That would greatly reduce the potency of fire. I wonder if I could do something similar… oh damn, the people moved again.

They ran directly at the glowing area, right when I thought they would get third-degree burns on their tender feet. They began walking two inches above the floor. My Assimilator—completely wrung out—fell to the floor and cooked near instantly, cracking and spitting like bacon.

Oops. Forgot to replenish its Essence.

“Nice work on the air-boots, Minya. You do decent work for a human,” one of the Elves offered a backhanded compliment.

“Thanks. Sure would be a shame if they suddenly failed over this molten floor, wouldn’t it?” a raspy, distinctly human voice answered. I had heard similar voices on adventurers that smoked heavily.

The Elf in question looked at the bubbling floor, suddenly nervous. He swallowed. “It would at that.”

The final Elf in the group spoke up, “Enough you two. Minya has a reputation as the best dungeoneer in the business, and you,” she pointed at the condescending Elf, “have a reputation as a bigot. Who do you think Brianna would listen to if it came down to a complaint?”

“Whatever. I… where is the tree?”

They had turned the final corner and were now facing a thick wall of steam.

“I’d assume,” Minya rasped, “that it is beyond the sauna.”

“How helpful,” the Elf sneered at the human’s back.

“Stop it. This is a Boss Room. Be on your guard. Remember, non-lethal.” The mediator Elf barked.

Poor Snowball had no chance. As soon as he appeared from the fog the earth under him turned to sand, and he sank under his own weight into the now-rapidly solidifying stone.

“Done. To the tree.”

They walked away from Snowball, who was snarling more furiously than I have ever heard. Walking into the next room, they blinked as the air was instantly clear of fog and steam. I had separated the Boss Room and my room after I noticed that the Silverwood tree was wilting in the high heat and humidity environment. Marching right up to the tree, they looked it over and tisked.

“Ugh, look at that. An Enchantment. How droll. It is weakening and obviously High-Elf workmanship,” the male Elf muttered.

Minya appeared curious. “How can you tell?”

“Because it is hastily and poorly done but artistic.” The male chuckled, lost in his examination of the Enchantment around the tree. “Ah. Found it.”

He reached forward and plucked with his fingers, and the pattern of the Enchantment started glowing, bleeding Essence into the air.

“Now we can put a better series of protections into place,” the female Elf informed Minya in response to her arched brow. “What? This area is important to us.”

“To me as well. We had an agreement, yes?” Minya folded her arms.

The female blushed while the male rolled his eyes. “Look, we can’t just leave you in here by yourself, especially without the protections in place.”

“So, you are both planning to ignore the agreement?” Minya began to glare, tensing her hands.

The male gave a cocky half grin. “Well, I am.”

He had barely spoken the words when Minya was behind him, delivering a strike to the base of his neck. He choked a moment, then fell to the floor. Not dead, sadly. This close to taking a B-ranked amount of Essence!

“What about you?” Minya breezily questioned, gazing casually at her fingernails.

The female sighed and nodded. “I’ll watch him in the other room.” She collected her fallen teammate and dragged him away.

When the room was cleared of Elves, Minya turned her attention back to the tree.

“Dungeon,” she called softly.

<Is she talking to me or making a statement?> I asked Dani, who just glared at me.

“Dungeon. Dungeon!” Minya got much louder on the second word. “Answer me! I know I’m not crazy!” She cackled a little after that, which led me to disbelieve her a tiny bit.

<I’m not talking to her,> I muttered to Dani. <She’s freaking me out.>

“I just have some questions for you, Dungeon.” Minya narrowed her eyes. Her next words were far rougher, nearly a snarl. “Last chance, Dungeon, or I’m going to reach in there and take your Core. I know you have a Wisp in there. I heard you talking to her. Feel like gambling with her safety?”

<Oh crap, she can hear me? How many people can hear me now? This is getting annoying!>

Minya blinked. “There are… others? Other people can help me prove my sanity?” Her expression had turned introspective.

<I take that as a yes. Um. Hello, Minya. Please don’t kill me?> I began talking to her hopefully.

“What?” Minya refocused on me. Well, mostly. Her attention was seeming to wander a bit. “Oh. No, if you are talking to me, I won’t hurt you. Never ignore me!” She snarled the last part.

<I will not ignore you,> I fervently promised.

“Good. I hear…” she swallowed, “I hear that the Essence in here is pure. That anyone can use it. But upstairs, it certainly had taint.”

<It did? Dani?> My Wisp slowly moved into the open so Minya could see and hear her.

“Hi, human. Please don’t kill me either.” Dani was trembling a bit.

“What? Oh, no. I won’t. I’ve seen what happens to dungeons that lose their Wisps. Hello, by the way.” Minya’s attention seemed variable. “Why isn’t the Essence pure upstairs anymore?” she demanded with a demented stare.

“I would assume because we are slowly getting farther away from the surface,” Dani soothingly told her. “Essence is flowing in from outside as well, and away from Cal, the pure Essence has a chance to mix with what is already there.”

“Well, fix it! It is inside your influence. You are just getting lazy and fat with this Rune feeding you like a hedonistic emperor.”

Minya spat to the side. I absorbed it from force of habit.

<Hey!> I looked at her and realized why she could hear me. <You have a broken aura!>

“She has a what?” Dani muttered, obviously not hearing me correctly.

I was examining Minya. She had a similar setup to Dale but poorly done and with a sub-standard Core. The Core wasn’t even around her Center—it was in her stomach!

<Wow, that is a lot of corruption.>

Minya snarled and took a threatening step forward. “If I feel anything funny, I will destroy you.”

“What is she talking about?” Dani whispered as she eyed the crazy lady.

I didn’t keep my voice down, and Dani winced at my conversational tone. <I assume she is warning me away from messing with her anatomy, as she has only a very weak aural protection. I’m assuming she is here because she wants to make a deal, so,> I turned the conversation back to Minya, <out with it. What are you offering and what do you want?>

Minya looked downcast at losing her upper hand and took a seat on the floor. “I’ve never heard a low-level dungeon like this be so coherent. Usually, it is snarls and a few threats until they hit the upper C-ranks.” She seemed to be talking to herself.

<I am right here. Thank you for the compliment, but get to the point please.>

Minya took a deep breath. “I need to give you a bit of background information. I’ve been a dungeon-diver for decades. A few years back, I got impatient. I wanted to break into the A-ranks and didn’t want to do it the right way. The slow way. I found a dungeon that had four types of Essence in it, an elemental dungeon. That is, it had earth, air, fire, and water in near-equal amounts.” She paused, tearing up a bit.

“I… I forced open two more affinity channels. I had always had strong affinities with air and fire, but I figured that if I could just double the amount of Essence I drew in, I could reach the A-ranks in half the time. Mere days after I had opened the channels, someone killed the dungeon. I could hear the screams in my mind as its Core shattered, and its thought patterns dissipated into its influence. A huge amount of corruption was released somehow. My raw meridians were forced open wider than I had wanted, allowing so much corruption into me that I would never have a chance to reach the next step in the B-ranks, let alone the A-rankings.”

“Not only that, but the land is still poisoned and unlivable.” She refocused on me. “That is where you come in! Ever since then, I can hear the voices in the dungeons. Others have called me insane, and I was starting to think they were right. You, though,” she cackled, “you respond! You talk to me!”

<So you want me to… what now?> I cautiously asked.

“I want you to tell people that you are alive!” She cried out, “I want them to know that I was right all along!”

<So… you don’t want me to fix you?>

“You can’t fix me,” she growled. “Someone already tried that. When I got free, the largest chunk of them that was ever seen again was a molar I somehow missed. Sure, I lost my place in the Guild, but they deserved it.”

“Celestial crap! She’s bonkers!” Dani mouthed at me while Minya was distracted.

<And they tried to fix you… how? Humans can’t seem to work directly with corruption.> Uh-oh. My curiosity was piqued.

“Pff. And you can? Get real.” She snorted, to my great offense. “They decided that what I needed was to swallow a Core and that they would just take it out after it had absorbed the taint.”

<It seems that you do have a Core in you,> I noted, keeping the conversation going as I eased my influence into her brain.

She chuckled darkly. “I assume you have seen the process then? Where a person swallows a Core and then pukes it up a bit later? Sound accurate? Well, when a person does not take the Core willingly, there are… side effects. Like the Core sticking to them and draining them slowly. It is a bad way to die, Dungeon.”

<The name is Cal,> I offered amiably, determined not to be caught working inside her organs during the conversation.

She nodded. “Well, Cal, the Core in me absorbs all the corruption all right. Also, any Essence that I try to cultivate. I’ve had to carve Runes to block the flow of Essence just to keep the Core from exploding and turning my abdomen into ground meat when it finally becomes too full.” She lifted her shirt, exposing Runes carved directly into her skin that glowed with a malevolent light.

I memorized the pattern. I would experiment with it later. Heh. Thank you, Minya. <They seem a bit… shall we say, flawed?>

She agreed angrily, “Skin heals over time. The Rune is breaking up and will soon allow Essence into the Core. Then I will die. I want to prove my sanity before then. Also,” a bit of Essence arched from the Rune, shocking her with a tiny bolt of lightning, “it hurts like a mother.”

<So that is all? You want your sanity proven and not to be fixed?> I clarified.

She folded her hands and tried not to be angry. “I would love to be fixed, but it isn’t possible.”

<Yes, it is.>

“Stop messing with my head!” she shrieked. “Just because I am desperate doesn’t make me an idiot!”

<Well, what do you have to lose? Make a deal with me. What do I get for fixing you?> I remained calm, carefully attempting to hide my greed and excitement.

She looked at Dani. “Is he… serious? Also, is Cal a he?”

Dani smirked. “He is serious, and since he has no reproductive organs, he does not actually have a sex. I say ‘he’ because he has a masculine voice, and I think he was male before he got in that Core.”

“Huh. I… I might live?”

<Depends on what you think your life is worth.> I was trying to rush her so I’d get a better deal.

“What do you want? I’m very wealthy. I could…” she started.

<No, I already have a guy for that. How about this? I want an agent. Someone who follows my orders and willingly gives me knowledge.> I watched for her reaction, ready now to open veins in her brain if she refused.

“You want me to… tell you about groups of adventurers?” she asked with an odd inflection.

<Not necessarily, but a warning about people that are after Dungeon Cores would be nice.>

She chuckled wetly; it seemed she was crying.

<I’ve found that memory stones are very useful to me. I want those.>

“How many?” She sniffled.

<What do you mean?>

“You want them a specific one? A set of Dwarven mathematics?”

<No, I want all of them. I want to know everything that anyone knows,> I replied dreamily. <The sum total of all knowledge.>

She looked crestfallen. “I’m not… that rich.”

<You will be.> I chuckled, mentally rubbing my hands in greed. I had her, I just knew it. <Anything you need in order to get them, I will provide. Money? Done. Empty stones? I’ve got hundreds. You will also be well-paid for your services. I’ll make you fantastically rich if you want it.>

“I just want to live,” she softly muttered.

<Then that is even easier for me! Shall we get started?> I had already picked out the spot to start working. <Do we have a deal?>

She took a deep breath, eyes dilating a bit. “Yes.”

<Let’s get started!> I inflamed a tiny portion of her brain matter, and Minya slumped unconscious as I nudged a vein in her head softly.

Dani looked at me reproachfully. “Really?”

<Why do you think I wasn’t worried about her threats? Dani, a human agent in the human world will be a huge benefit! Dale could have been the guy, but noooo. He had to be all whiny about how he got to survive. Ungrateful, I tell you.> I was looking at the interior of Minya’s body at this point. <Woof. Lots of damage. I suppose if she hasn’t been able to cultivate for a few years, her body must have been running off whatever she had stored. Look at this spot near her Center. I wonder if this is what happens when Mana doesn’t have a layer of Essence as a buffer?>

“Oh, right. She was in the B-rankings. Yikes, I can’t believe how much internal damage she has! How is she alive right now?” Dani seemed suddenly impressed by this person’s tenacity.

<Force of will?> I created a molecule-thin barrier of Essence in her flesh, separating a few inches of tissue and spinal cord from her body. The Beast Core was too tightly bound to these areas to just take it out directly. I pulled out and tossed away the chunk of meat. At this point, I was holding her body together directly with Essence, replicating veins with hollow barriers. After I absorbed that chunk of tissue, I was able to perfectly reproduce it in place without the Core and hooks of Essence. I reattached nerves and blood vessels, regrew bone and muscle, and made sure it was all working together correctly.

I wondered why it was so easy to do. Mana users were exceedingly tough. I realized as I was working that without Mana being able to flow through her, the bonds had weakened. If she were unable to cultivate long enough, her body would have literally fallen apart chunk by chunk.

<All set. Now she will be able to cultivate again!> I looked at her ragged body. She deserved a bonus for being so willing to work for me. <Maybe a few more alterations?> I went through her body, fixing imperfections and damage like I would my tunnels. I smoothed her skin and replaced the areas that had Runes carved into them. Certainly not just to harvest more Runes—it was to help her! I, uh… promise!

I repaired the external signs of wear next, the lines of stress and pain, making her hair shiny and lustrous instead of lank and unwashed. I even trimmed her nails to a reasonable length. Her clothes were—well, needing to be burned doesn’t quite cover it. Instead of trying to wash her or something of the like, I simply absorbed any foreign substance, then grew a new set of clothing on her.

Dani was fascinated by the process and offered a few other minor details that I wouldn’t have ever thought about, like opening capillaries a tiny bit wider in her lips so they would be a brighter red or adjusting her eyebrow hair to be very thick, but only in a certain area. For some reason, she also had me remove the hair follicles anywhere that wasn’t on her head. Dani had strange concepts of what ‘fixing’ meant.

It was now time to wake Minya up; hopefully, she wouldn’t mind the changes. After all the fixes, there was nothing keeping her from getting up on her own, but it seemed that she was at the point of physical exhaustion. No wonder she had seemed insane. Even if she only needed a tiny bit of sleep, she still needed it. I washed her brain free of the buildup of toxins that lack of sleep allows to accumulate, and she opened her eyes.

She started moving slowly, obviously waiting for the pain that had been a constant presence in her life for years. I knew this because I had had to work on her frazzled nerves.

When she sat up and looked at herself in confusion, she had to ask, “How long was I out? I feel like I’ve slept for weeks. I feel… amazing.”

“About thirty minutes,” Dani informed her primly. “I hope you don’t ever forget your part of the bargain. Cal really went out of his way to fix you. He could have created a dozen Boss Mobs with all the Essence he used on you.”

Minya smoothly rose to her feet and began walking around. Her movements before had been jerky and rushed, like a person overdosing on stamina potions. She did a few flips and danced around, getting a feel for her body at the same time as showing her excitement. She whirled around and looked at where I was.

“I am yours forever, Cal. Anything you need, anything in my power to do, I will. Your whim is my order!”

A line of her aura suddenly raced to me and connected to my Core, then dispersed into the dungeon at large. Also known as my aura.

<Celestial crap, what was that?>

“That was an oath. At the B-ranks, when Mana is a part of our body, our word becomes our law. Words have real power, and a spoken oath is binding.” Minya smiled, much more appealing now that I regrew a few teeth and straightened the rest. “I am yours unless you release me from my oath.”

“Back off, hussy,” Dani muttered very softly.

<Dani, the Elves are coming back. Go invisible.>

Dani vanished from sight with my warning, just before the Elves walked in.

“Who are you? Where is Minya?” the female Elf sharply demanded, drawing steel.

The male scoffed. “Who cares? The bitch knocked me out!”

“What did you just call me?” Minya turned toward them menacingly. They gasped as they saw the changes in her. Her voice sounded a bit strange to them, having been healed as well, but they recognized her quickly enough.

“Minya?” the female murmured in wonderment.

“Mmhmm.” Minya allowed a smile to slowly spread on her face. “I’m going to sit and cultivate while you do your thing.”

“You’re going to what?” the male sputtered. “You’re committing suicide?!”

“Oh be quiet,” Minya muttered and moved to sit down.

<Minya?>

“Hmm?”

<Move over about a foot, there is a small hole there. Do you have a cup or empty vial? If so dip it in and collect the fluid,> I directed my new servant.

She dipped in a vial that she had hastily poured out, a potent stamina potion of some kind that decreased the feeling of tiredness. She dipped the vial into the hole and retrieved a shining fluid—condensed Essence.

<Do you think you can safely drink that? It is absolutely pure. You don’t need to refine it, just add it to your Center,> I inquired of her.

She murmured softly, so the Elves wouldn’t hear what she said, “Yes. I have the patterns in place for Essence up to the B-ranks. I am just depleted. This will help me get back on track, thank you.”

I closed the hole as she put the vial to her flushed lips and drank. Her aura began to glow as her Center drank in the pure Essence. She didn’t even show signs of discomfort—only relief—as her meridians began moving a torrent of energy versus the trickle it had been.

“Can I have more?” she asked a bit plaintively.

I tried to respond, but her aura had thickened and condensed, apparently blocking my words. She seemed to understand the problem after a few minutes of failed communication and subtly rearranged her aura so that the tendril of her aura that formed her oath to me had a clear path to her brain. Odd.

<Can you hear me now?> I prodded her again, earning a disgusted sound from Dani at the repeated question.

“Yes!” Minya cried in rapture, making the Elves whirl around, looking startled.

Dani chuckled. “That sounded overly sexual.” Minya blushed and kept her face resolutely turned away from the Elves’ view.

<Right, so. That amount of Essence takes quite a while to accumulate. I cannot just give it away constantly. Sorry,> I told her pseudo-sadly. I wasn’t just hoarding it. Nope.

“No, I am sorry. You have done so much for me, and I keep asking for more.” She paused a moment. “Can I help you at all?”

<You had said something about fixing the Essence upstairs? Something about me being lazy?>

Minya blushed. “Yeah, sorry…”

<What did you mean? Is there a way to fix that easily?>

Every little bit helps after all, and I planned on keeping her—essentially forever—as a researcher.

“I’ve seen dungeons collect the corruption into minerals. I’ve never seen any of them work directly with corruption like you seem to be able to do, so it should be something easy for you. They put veins of minerals along the air vents, sometimes with Beast Cores at the end. The Core draws in corruption along the mineral, leaving purer Essence overall. I have never seen Essence as pure as it is here, though,” Minya thoroughly explained to me.

“What kind of minerals?” Dani inquired on my behalf. I had to be faster at asking questions apparently.

Minya thought a moment. “I’ve seen different things, but if I had to guess at the best mineral to use… every type of Essence seems to have a preference, so using topaz for celestial, emeralds for earth, ruby for fire…” She seemed hesitant to continue.

<Go on. What is the matter?>

“I am unsure of the next. I can only say what legend says, and I don’t want to give you bad information.” She grimaced and continued, “If legend holds true, opal is the only mineral that infernal really likes, but it travels through diamond fairly easily. Wind, for some reason, likes taaffeeite, and water is attracted to fluorite.”

Dani looked entirely confused, but I knew half of the patterns to make those. <Okay, what would you need in order to find me taaffeeite, opal, and emeralds? I think emeralds are going to be the first priority because of all the earth Essence I collect.>

Minya bit her lip. “How much do you need?”

<A tiny amount. A sliver, really. Just enough to analyze.> Her reaction confused me. <What is it?>

“Oh! Um. Opals are treated like a controlled substance since they are allegedly ‘known’ to help Necromancers. Even a small one is going to be really hard for me to acquire.” She looked around like I was about to start beating her.

<No real rush, infernal Essence isn’t particularly abundant in here. Now I know why so many weapons and armor have gems stuck in them at least.>

I started growing veins of crystal and gems throughout the dungeon. It would take a few days, but if she was right, this could make me even more appealing to adventurers. <I think it is time for you to get going, the Elves are looking at ya funny.>

She glanced around, stood up, and bowed obsequiously at the Silverwood tree. Ha. That would throw off the Elves.

They walked to the stairwell, and before they left, she looked back and whispered, “Thank you.”

<Don’t mention it! Ever.>

Dale

“What now?” Dale sighed at the courier that ran up to him.

With a grin, the young man handed him a sheaf of papers. “Approvals that need your signature. New businesses and housing developments that need your signature, and yes, these are from the city planner.”

Dale’s eyes flicked around as he scanned the document. It wasn’t a magical contract… but just like any legal document, it could still ruin his life for a long time if he signed it without knowing what it said. His Elven political tutor liked to slip in documents to test him. Sure enough, here was one saying he would wash dishes for a week in the Guild mess hall. He shuddered.

He signed what he needed to and threw the rest into the fire. The courier ran off with the documents and a shiny new silver coin as an unfamiliar couple of people walked up to him. They had on a lot of armor. How did they wear all of that? They were at least a foot shorter than Dale, and… oh. They must be Dwarves.

This was confirmed when the one on the left took off his helmet and squinted at Dale. “You Dale?”

“…Yes?” Dale answered cautiously, examining their auras.

“Are you sure? You don’t sound sure.”

Dale grinned. “I just don’t know you is all. I’m Dale.”

“Good! I’m Beor Moonshadow, this is my brother, Brick “Stonewall” Moonshadow. I have a proposition for you,” Beor announced abruptly.

“Do tell.” Dale grinned wider; he liked this brusque fellow.

“Walls!” Brick bellowed. Dale and Beor looked at his unsmiling face.

“Yes, thank you for your contribution.” Beor chuckled as his brother’s face flushed. “Well Dale, it seems you own this area. It is poorly defended, and you don’t exactly look like you are swimming in gold.” Beor looked meaningfully at Dale’s work clothes, torn and worn from daily bunny hunting. “I have a full contingent of Dwarves ready to step in and start building, and you seem to be without defensive walls around your… city?”

Dale nodded. “It’ll get there.”

“Right, well. You’ll never see better stonework than Dwarven make, and as we have Mages along, it will be a fairly fast process. Whaddaya say, chief?”

Dale pondered for a moment. Walls certainly were going to be essential, and with winter fast approaching, they would help to cut down the wind a lot. “And in return for your expert services?”

“Flattery! I like it!” Beor chuckled. “We have a few requests, but nothing that will cost you more than a lease for a bit of land. We want to build a place to live, essentially a barracks.” Brick made a noise. “And Brick here wants to build an orphanage. We’ll even fix and maintain the walls for you. What the abyss–”

A Dark Elf had just stepped out of nowhere and muttered to Dale that he was needed near the dungeon. Dale nodded his assent and turned back to the pale Dwarves. “I think that sounds reasonable. If I may ask, why do you need a new place to live?”

“Well.” Beor coughed; he was as pale as the Elf that had just vanished. “For one thing, it is obvious that you’ll give anyone a chance.” He looked meaningfully at the space the Dark Elf had recently occupied. “Next, we left our ancestral home after the King tried to have us killed off. Put us in a fight against overwhelming odds against an Orc horde.”

“You are welcome here as long as you follow the law. Talk to my city planner about the details for the wall and your area.” Dale patted the Dwarf on his arm. He still looked a bit sad. “I’m sorry. Anyone who would do that does not deserve your loyalty.”

Brick snorted as they walked toward the building Dale directed them to. “Yeah, Dad’s an asshat.”

Dale started, looking back in shock. Great… more exiled Nobles.

Chapter Seventeen

Dale hurried toward the dungeon and soon discovered the reason for the summons. There was an Elf blocking adventurers from entering, and the noise from the crowd of backlogged parties was inhibiting Dale from hearing why she was there. As he got closer and heard what she was saying, he sighed and almost left. Someone else could deal with the crazies for a while.

“No! I will not let you continue to murder helpless bunnies! They have done nothing to you, and their ruthless slaughter has gone on long enough!” the lovely Elven maid was shrieking at the grizzled man telling her to move.

“Get out of the way!” the man roared, attempting to shove her to the side.

She flipped him on to his back, promptly breaking his arm and two of his fingers.

“No! I am against violence, and all you want to do is get money. You will all promise to stop this madness, or I’ll kill you all! I promise on my good name, Leporiday Lagomorpha!”

“Oh for…” Dale walked over to her. “Go away. This is a dungeon. Everything in there wants to kill us, and this is a livelihood. For a lot of people.”

“They don’t want to hurt anyone! I’ll prove it!” She shoved Dale away, then ran into the dungeon, vanishing from sight.

The crowd went silent, shocked at her outburst. A few moments later, concerned people started talking about following the obviously unhinged Elf, but it wasn’t long until everyone present could hear the drawn-out-then-suddenly-cut-off screams.

“What the hell is going on today?” Dale muttered as people looked around uncomfortably. “Has everyone lost their minds?”

He turned toward a tap on his arm, and seeing who was doing the tapping, simultaneously lost his breath and blushed.

Looking at him was a stunning beauty. She was smiling at him, wearing a set of clothes that could have been painted on.

“Are you Dale?”

Dale felt a bit crestfallen. “Oh gods, not another one.”

“Excuse me?”

“Sorry, it has been an odd day.” Dale rubbed his head violently for a moment and took a deep breath. Plastering on his most political smile, he said, “What can I do for you, ma’am?”

“Well,” she looked him over, “I was hoping to talk to you about a mutual friend.”

“Oh?” Dale tried to think of who she could be talking about. “Who would that be?”

“Come to my wagon in a few hours. We have plenty to discuss.” She turned and started away, moving in a joyful way that—to the experienced—told a story about freedom from pain.

Dale saw it as flirting.

“Where can I find you?” Dale called after her retreating form.

“Just ask around for Minya. You’ll find me.” She tossed him a look and a wink over her shoulder.

Dale watched her go for a few seconds. “Damn. Now we have prostitutes here... at least Hans will be pleased. Is this something that will have to go in the charter?”

“Dale!”

“What now?” Dale growled as he turned to face a slightly deflated-looking shopkeeper.

“Oh. Um. I can come back later? Your Grace.” Tyler started to hurry away from the irritable Duke.

“Don’t go!” Dale grabbed his friend. “Sorry, Tyler, it has just been a long, strange day. What is going on?”

Tyler lit up when Dale started walking with him. “Well, rumors of royalty coming to live here for the foreseeable future is attracting people in droves! Business is booming!” Tyler cheered, covertly rubbing his hands together at the thought of new customers.

“Hmm. I’d better get with someone and discuss laws about moving. If the new people coming don’t have skills and a way to provide for themselves, we are going to have a serious problem with crime soon,” Dale muttered to himself.

“Say again?”

“Nothing, go on.”

“Well,” Tyler showed a toothy smile to his landlord, “I hear you have been looking for a dimensional bag? Just so happens I got in a new shipment this morning!”

Dale chuckled. He should have known Tyler was here on business. “I really do need at least one. How much are you charging?”

“For my savior and landlord?” Tyler pretended to think a moment. “A mere thirty gold.”

Dale stopped and stared. “Good lord, man. How much would it be if you didn’t like me?”

“Hmm. A platinum at least.”

Dale choked a bit at the amount.

“Of course, if you were just a normal customer, I’d charge you about eighty-five gold.” Tyler grinned at the look Dale gave him.

“You knew what I meant.” Dale huffed, crossing his arms.

Tyler nodded sagely. “Yes, but you need to learn to be specific, my friend. Especially if your goal is to progress in cultivation. A misspoken promise or threat can kill you at that point. And do not worry, no charge for this information.”

Dale squinted at Tyler. “Now you are just playing with me. Okay, what is the lowest quality bag you have? The cost I mean. Lowest cost bag,” he amended quickly.

“You are learning! If slowly. That will cost you twenty-eight gold.” He held up a hand. “That is the lowest I can go, even for you. I am taking a loss on it at the price I have quoted you.”

Dale grumbled but agreed to the price. A short trip to the temple’s bank later, he was the owner of a new, shoddy dimensional bag. He told Tyler he would return later for a better quality one and walked to the dungeon’s entrance.

“Cal? Dungeon?” Dale called mentally.

I responded instantly, <Oh, hello, Dale. Anything interesting happen recently?>

“No.” Dale sounded suspicious. “Should something have happened?”

<Don’t worry your pretty little head over it. Oh, wait. Yes, you should have met someone that would freak you out a lot. Looks like it is my turn to ask a question!>

“Right. Well. Here is the bag you wanted.” Dale tossed it into an empty part of the room, hiding his actions by pretending to urinate against the wall. “I had forgotten about your question game.”

<I didn’t. Also, thanks, I look forward to seeing what you bring me next!>

Dale grunted and turned away.

“Dale!” The heavily armored Half-Dwarf walked up to Dale, grinning happily. “I had hoped to run into you soon. Maybe when you had cleaner hands, but now will do!”

“Hello, Evan!” Dale also seemed rather happy to see his friend. “How are things? I heard you found a deposit of aluminum?”

“Yeah, I did!” Evan’s chest was puffed up proudly. “Though by this point, I am almost certain it has been converted to Mithril. Those Dwarves paid through the nose to get it.” He laughed at a memory.

Dale was a bit nonplussed. “You sold it? I had thought you would hold on to it for a while, drive up the price. Also, for some reason, I would think you would give Dwarves a discount…?” He trailed off as Evan’s grin vanished.

“You know what I am, yes?” Evan spoke seriously, more so than Dale had heard since he tried to rescue him.

Dale winced. “A Half-Orc, Half-Dwarf, yes?”

“Yes,” Evan spoke slowly. “Do you know that it is not only Elves that hate mixing of the bloodlines? Do you know how one of my kind is made?”

“Well… I…” Dale hated conversations like this; he had no idea what to say.

“That is correct. Half-Orcs are almost exclusively products of, shall we call it, forced impregnation?” Evan shook his head and leaned back stretching a bit. “My case is a bit different, though. You see,” he laughed bitterly, “my father is a Dwarf. He and a war-band got drunk on stone-piss, and he took a bet saying he could bed any woman. They got to choose who he would try to get with. That bet was made right before they attacked a small Orc camp, and guess who his friends chose? My mother. So, I have no love for Dwarves.”

“That’s… I don’t…” Dale tried desperately.

Evan started laughing at Dale’s face. “Don’t worry too much, Dale. I had a good childhood. I just have a bit of a constant need to screw over any Dwarf around me. Orc women don’t have children any other way—they are a very warlike race. I grew up a bit shorter than the full-blooded Orcs around me, but I had Dwarven stamina mixed with Orcish strength. I could have ruled the clan, but I wanted other things out of life than a small war band and constant fights for territory. Which brings me to my reason for seeing you.”

“What can I do for you?” Dale asked with relief, happy the awkward conversation was over.

“I am in the mine easily twice as much as anyone else. They don’t realize it yet, but the deposits of gold and silver are becoming more and more rare, as are reward chests and gems.” Evan had lowered his voice quite a bit, looking around to make sure he wasn’t overheard. “I think… I think a change is coming again, maybe a new area for mining. If it is deeper in the dungeon, I am going to need an escort to get there. I want to ask your team before anyone else does. I do the work of a full team by myself, so escorting just me would be much less work. Likely, it would pay better too. Interested?”

Dale pondered for a moment. “We have been spending a lot less time in here than we should since we can move through the first two levels fairly easily. I will talk to my team. If we see anything below, we will let you know, but I can’t make any promises just yet. My vote is yes, if that helps.”

Evan nodded. “That’s all I can ask for right now.” He clapped Dale on the back. “I’ll look forward to seeing you soon.” He stepped up to an unmarked wall and started slamming it with his pickaxe, the Runes on it allowing him to be lost from sight after only half a minute or so.

Dale made his way back to Tyler, collecting a much better dimensional storage bag from him. Tyler had assured him that this bag also reduced the weight of whatever went into it and that he had never found an upper limit on the amount of storage space it had. Basically, if Dale could carry it—and fit whatever it was into the bag—he could just keep loading things into the storage area. If the Runes on the bag were bound to him, he could say a word to bring out the item he was after. Of course, a bag of this quality went for a premium amount. Dale had hit the end of his funds, but he had good credit with Tyler, who agreed to let him pay it off in weekly installments.

He left Tyler’s shop, excited about his new purchase, when he heard sobbing coming from a nearby tent. Remembering his last venture into the shop area alone, he very cautiously went to inspect the noise. He peeked around the corner, noticing a small group of people huddled near the source of the sobbing.

“They… they’re all… they’re gone!” She hiccupped, returning to sobbing immediately.

Dale moved in closer, recognizing the people as members of the Spotters, a group dedicated to the research and cataloging of all things mystical. “What’s happening?” Dale softly asked the closest man.

The man, interrupted from his mourning, turned toward Dale full of fury. Seeing who it was, he deflated, almost going limp. “Spotterton was destroyed.”

“I’m sorry, I’ve lived near here my whole life, where was this?” Dale pressed for a bit more information.

“Spotterton!” The man looked upset that Dale didn’t recognize the name. “The training town for all aspiring Spotters, located several hundred miles due south of here? The pride of the Phoenix kingdom?” The man searched Dale’s eyes, hoping for a spark of recognition. “It was destroyed, the people slaughtered in the streets and their homes like animals…and just left to rot.”

“It had to be necromancers!” the crying lady screamed. “Who else would hate us so much?”

The others seemed to agree, but Dale was only a bit confused. “Why would necromancers hate you?”

A dirty look was sent his way in an attempt to chase him off, but Dale didn’t budge. Ultimately, an owlish man deigned to offer an answer, “We—the Spotters’ Guild—have been the source of almost all the new Runes for the last two centuries. If it weren’t for us, this area would be crawling with the undead by now.”

“But,” this one word from Dale’s mouth caused many fists in the group to clench simultaneously, “if it were Necromancers… why would they leave the dead?”

Anger turned to pondering, pondering turned to concern, and concern to fear.

“But,” a small voice whispered, “who else would dare?”

“The only people who could tell for sure are you.” Dale looked around the despondent group, “You are Spotters! The only people qualified to determine if this was magical in nature are you. I am so, so sorry for your loss, but you cannot let this hold you back. Even now, time passes and details are fading. You want to find out who killed your people? Me too! I am certain the Kingdoms want to know as well, but who else would be able to tell them?”

Faces around the group hardened, tears dried up. Several people nodded, and they set off to make preparations. Dale hurried back to the temple, making for his room. The night had quite a chill to it now.

Cal

<This is so… confusing.> I had just finished eating the dimensional bag, and the pattern it offered was so complex that even my analytical mind was having trouble understanding the nuances of what was happening.

“Why is that?” Dani was taking the day off from training and had settled on to a pillar of stone I grew just for her. It had a pillow on it made from the pink fabric I had gotten for Dale’s discarded robe.

<The way this pattern moves together. It… imagine a person building a house. They know what they are doing, and they know how it should look when finished. Sadly, they only have a hammer and nails. With me so far?> I offhandedly tried to see if she was paying attention.

“Mmhm.” Dani seemed less than impressed with my visualization technique.

<Okay. Now, again, say that person only has a hammer and nails. Instead of a saw, they beat the wood until it is broken pretty close to the way they want it. Then they just pound nails into the wood until a ‘house’ shape is made, and finally, they slather Mana on it to hold it together. Yes, they did the job… technically. Is the house garbage? Yes. And so is this bag,> I grouched, already trying to fix the errors in the pattern.

“I guess you should be more specific with Dale next time.” Dani chuckled at my grumbling.

I paused. I hadn’t considered that. Dale, you sneaky jerk! He is the bad carpenter that did the minimum amount of work to fulfill the order.

<Drat.>

“Pretty much.” Dani laughed at my consternation.

<And the bag! The pattern is obviously enhanced with Mana to create the effect, but for the life of me, I cannot figure out why!> I was so angry that I dropped a two-hundred-pound rock on a Basher; it barely had time to squeak before being crushed. Sometimes you just had to kill something. Plus, the rush of Essence helped me calm down a bit.

Dani was now paying full attention. “Why do you say that?” She seemed to be holding back from saying something.

<It is like… how do I say this? I think I could replicate this without Mana. Entirely Essence based. The pattern has Mana encasing it though, and I am unsure if this is a safety feature or something else.> I was now focused on Dani. She was oddly quiet. <What?>

“Well,” she finally just spit out what she had been thinking, “it… there has been a theory for a long time that almost anything done with Mana could be done with Essence.”

<And it has… what? Never been tested?>

“It has but always unsuccessfully. People have worked together, tried to form things, spent decades doing research. The issue is basically that no one has fine control over all of the affinities, and even the people that are masters of one type have trouble meshing their Essence with others.” She considered her next words. “You, though… hear me out. The biggest reason for getting into the B-rankings is so that you can simulate the effects of all the affinities.”

<What does this mean, Dani?> I was getting excited about a new potential project. Dangerous times.

She took a deep breath. “I think that Mana users fill in the blanks of their creations with Mana because they cannot control all of the Essences. You can. I think that you may be the only being I have ever heard of that could do it. As a matter of fact, you have already come fairly close with the abilities your Assimilators are using. Those are certainly outliers in terms of your pure power at the C-rankings.”

<I could create things that currently only B-rankers are able to?> I felt a broad mental smile forming. <You are saying that this bag is only enhanced with Mana because the creator had to do it that way?>

“Yes.”

<Ohhhh, yes. Ready to do some experimenting?> I was already setting up the testing room.

“Never,” Dani whimpered, making me laugh.

The first step was to un-spaghetti the pattern. To clarify, there were loops and whorls in the pattern that had been erroneously placed. I assume they were included because the maker could not see the aura of inanimate objects. I wonder how people felt comfortable creating Runes? Did they just force the pattern on to an object and hope for the best? That must be a terrifying experience. I digress. So, I worked at untangling the pattern, properly refitting it to itself and adding connections in places that should help to increase the stability of the dimensional warping.

Yes, dimensional warping. Someone had to have done this for the first time in the past. I don’t know who they were, but they must have had a pair on them bigger than my dungeon to be messing around with forces like these. Make no mistake, this stuff is dangerous, and this bag, in particular, was a disaster waiting to happen. How dangerous? Ask what remains of my test bunnies. I didn’t use Bashers for this; they were too intelligent for me to feel comfortable using them like that anymore.

I kept thinking that I had the pattern correct, but a surge along an Essence stream would collapse the whole thing randomly, with rather… unrelated—I think that is a good word choice—unrelated effects. Like a patch of rock melting across the room or my rabbit transforming into a bird. That last one was really disturbing, all the extra mass peeled away in what had to be a painful way.

Dani asked why I insisted on having rabbits in the room while I worked, and after an arm appeared and pulled a rabbit in, I explained over the squelching noises drifting through the portal, <You see, I thought that pattern was correct. There was no indication that I had it wrong, and I would have started testing it. Something on the other side was waiting, something hungry. If the rabbit weren’t there, and I made a full-sized version to test, what do you think would have happened?> Dani shuddered as she remembered a similar experience.

“Fair enough, do all your testing on rabbits!” She shuddered again. “Maybe add a few more in there just for, ya know, peace of mind?”

The experimenting continued, but after two days, I decided that it needed to wait while I added on the new mining area. The current third floor had been slowly descending over the course of a few days and now was deep enough down that I could add in the new third floor.

I started with a simple layer of stone for the floor, compressing it to become exceedingly dense. I had become very proficient with the creation of cursed earth, and it was only the work of a few hours to add the needed Runes to the flooring. The walls of the labyrinth had taken weeks. I felt proud of myself. Next, I—what the heck is that? Something was scratching at me. That is, at my dungeon. Not in the normal areas—for mining and such—but on the underside near the river I used to power my steam traps. I focused my awareness on the itchy area and almost screamed a little as a pick suddenly burst through the stone where my attention was gathered.

<Dani, someone just broke into the dungeon. I have no idea how to handle this situation,> I informed my friend and advisor.

“Where? Wait, what? Why would someone do that?” Dani laughed, trying to hide her nerves. “That is the same as writing a suicide note, right?”

<I guess. But who would come up into the dungeon? They would have had to be even further down in the mountain than we are, and we are… > I ran a quick calculation. Forty feet from the surface to the entrance, sixty feet down to the first-floor Boss, a spiral stair down to the second floor was roughly thirty feet. I had made the next descent into ramps so ore could be carted upward easier, another thirty feet or so. Last, there was a long, slanted staircase to the new fourth floor, but a straight drop would mean we were… <Two hundred and ten feet below the surface.>

“How did they break in?” Dani demanded, calling a Wither Cat into the area so she could go hunting. “Also, where?”

<They smashed through the floor using a pickaxe design I don’t recognize. They came in through the wall near where the river exits the dungeon,> I directed her, proud of her quick reaction time and willingness to charge into battle.

“I’m on my way,” she told me grimly in the mind-speak way that she was only able to use when possessing a dungeon creature.

I refocused on the area where the pick had broken the stone. Why hadn’t I taken the time to reinforce the floor down here? I mean, I knew why. I didn’t think anything would be able to enter from below. The pick was still swinging, and another few were joining it. There were noises coming through as well, what could be conversation but in a language that I had never heard before.

Dani had arrived and was hiding out of sight in the pitch-black darkness. The hole was still growing and was about half the size of a grown human when the ringing noise stopped. A head poked through cautiously, and wide eyes adapted to the darkness looked around. They focused on Dani, who was crouched and ready to pounce. The creature spoke almost recognizable words at that point.

“Gdood Khitty. Nho fhood khhere.”

Dani growled a low, threatening tone that made the hair on the small creature stand on end as it slowly backed away, deeper into the hole.

<Dani? Do you recognize what that is?>

“I do.” She growled again as another head poked into the hole. The terrified face vanished quickly after that. “These are the reason the elder races are so against intermingling of the bloodlines. A cross between Gnomes, Orcs, Elves, and humans. The cross made a monster race that was enslaved by Orcs centuries ago. These are freaking Goblins.”

Dale

Dale was having a rough day. Several of his requested teachers had shown up at the same time last night, but they were demanding payment up front. Having spent all his coinage on his new dimensional bag, he had to inform them that they would need to wait to be paid. He was able to set them up for room and board but not much else. If Dale didn’t earn enough money to pay them—and soon—they were going to leave. He was going through his normal morning warm-ups when the beautiful woman he had met recently walked up to him.

“Are you ignoring me intentionally, or did you simply forget I existed?” Her first words chilled Dale more than the morning mountain air. “Please let me know so that I can decide how to respond appropriately.”

Dale settled his form into a different stretch. “Good morning. Minya, is it?”

She nodded, crossing her arms.

“I am exceedingly busy. Please don’t feel ignored. Every morning I start my day by preparing to enter the dungeon. I eat a small mountain of food, trying to regain my muscle mass. I had a small… sickness, let’s say.”

Dying counted as a sickness, right?

“That doesn’t change–” she furiously tried to cut him off.

“Hold on.” He tried to remain amiable. “Then I enter the dungeon in an attempt to get stronger as well as make enough money to replace the gear that was stolen from me when I was beaten, robbed, and left for dead in the dungeon. I also need money for my instructors.”

He changed position to stretch his back. “After the dungeon run—which takes usually two to three hours—I go train with my Essence instructor, trying to harness my affinities into a useful skillset. Now after that, I have lessons in administration, mathematics, politics, logic, debate, tactics, and a few other things I am sure I have forgotten. I’ll remember them in a nightmare, I’m sure.” He shifted into a sideways bend that Chandra had suggested. “Around ten in the evening, I finish those classes.”

Minya tried to speak again, but Dale cut her off.

“Then my new training begins! Hand-to-hand combat. My instructor for that seems to hate me; he straps weights to me and forces me to run and dodge things—that he throws at me—while he beats me with a staff.” Dale paused, looking dreamily into the distance. “Soon, I might actually get to throw a punch during training. At something other than a wooden post, that is. Well. That ends around three in the morning. I get three whole hours to sleep if I don’t want to bathe. Apparently, I only need two hours of sleep now, but a lazy morning sounds oh so nice.”

Minya waited to see if anything else was forthcoming. “Is that why you are wearing that odd assortment of mismatched leather armor?”

Dale blushed a bit at the mention of his ill-fitted armor. “My team decided that going into the dungeon without any protection whatsoever was tantamount to suicide. They all got me something different as a present. No, they did not go shopping together, but it is the thought that counts. Is this really what you wanted to talk about? I am leaving in a moment.”

Minya remembered that she was angry at being ignored. “I understand that you are busy, but we need to see each other. Why didn’t you come to my wagon?”

“I…” Dale blushed. “Listen, you are certainly beautiful, but I have no time for romance. Not even a ‘romantic evening’. Plus, I simply have no coin to spare right now.”

“Coin?” Minya was confused for a bare moment before her temper flared even higher. “You think I am a prostitute?”

Dale stepped away slowly. “I am guessing by your reaction that I am wrong…”

“Damn right you are!” Minya growled. “If you were anyone else I’d scalp you! No, Dale, I am here to talk to you about our friend, Cal.”

Dale stopped moving, going totally still. “Where did you hear that name?” he whispered, hand unconsciously clenching into a fist.

“Where do you think?” She broke into a smug grin. “Looks like you aren’t the only dungeon born around here anymore.”

“What did you just call me?” Dale had never heard the term, though it sounded like it would make an amazing title for a book.

“It means that you are beholden to a dungeon for your life. It either created you, gave you back your life when it was lost, accepted an oath from you, or your parents were created by the dungeon. You don’t even know what you are? You didn’t bother to ask?”

“It’s his turn,” Dale muttered. He was looking down, deep in thought.

“What?”

“Nothing. Look, what do you want?” Dale demanded, angry that this skimpily dressed person was shoving things in his face that he’d rather avoid.

“I want you to make the dungeon strong. I want you to live and keep this area safe for Cal and his Wisp,” Minya announced vehemently. “I want to advise you on the best course of action, should the need arise.” She smiled and reached out to him.

Dale waited for her to stop talking. “No.”

“No?! What do you mean no?” Her hand was frozen in the air.

“Exactly what it sounds like. I don’t trust your judgment. The dungeon does its best to kill all of us every day, and I don’t need another person whispering in my ear that is only working for their own agenda. You are always free to talk to me, everyone is, but I will not guarantee that I will listen to you. Actually, knowing that you are working for the dungeon intentionally means that I will likely ignore your advice, but you are free to give it. Good day.” Dale walked away, leaving a sputtering, furious Minya behind.

Dale walked toward the dungeon; his talk had put him behind, so he had to miss a hot breakfast and instead eat dried rations. He was munching on some hard bread when the rest of his team appeared.

“Morning all,” Dale muttered around a mouthful of crumbs.

“Good morning, Dale, we missed you at breakfast. Everything okay?” Adam was looking at Dale’s pale skin and sunken eyes.

“Just swell.” Dale swallowed the rest of his food. “You all ready? Anyone grab something from the job board?”

Rose spoke up, “I took a request for herbs and assorted plants from the garden room. It pays a few silver but is upgraded to gold if we can bring back an entire Glade Mob. Apparently, they are stuffed full of things that both the alchemist and apothecary want.”

“I’ve got one for healing potions,” Adam spoke up. “They are selling for a premium. Apparently, people are showing up all over the Kingdoms with mysterious wounds, and the healers can’t keep up with what is being demanded of them. The downside to this job is that if it turns out the potions are poisoned, they will only pay a few copper. The poison isn’t useful on weapons, apparently.”

Dale nodded happily; this was a good chance at some cash. “I have a request from Evan—that we look for a new area that may be appearing. Apparently, precious metals and minerals are becoming rarer. He thinks it is a sign that a new mining area will be appearing. If so, we may have steady work as escorts.”

The others seemed happy enough with this knowledge, so Dale sighed in relief. He really wanted to help out his friend.

“I’ve got one.” Hans chuckled. “Oh look! It is snowing!”

The others looked around; it was indeed snowing, a light dusting that Dale knew was deceptively pretty. They would soon be digging tunnels through the snow if they wanted to enter the dungeon.

“Back to the request, it seems that the new residents are having trouble adjusting to the climate here.” Hans chuckled again. He meant that the Nobles from warmer areas were nearly freezing to death. “There is a request for fur, specifically warm rabbit fur. Lots of it. Apparently, they want to not only clothe themselves, they want to carpet the floors, walls, and ceilings of their rooms. And they are going to pay pretty well for it.”

“I have not heard of this request,” Tom interjected indignantly. “I have been following the job boards carefully and have seen nothing of the sort. Where didst thou come by this information?”

“I hear things,” Hans replied nonchalantly. “Also, there is a big demand for cloaks made from a single pelt, so if we can kill Raile without damaging his fur, we can start making some serious money.”

“So, we know what our goal is today?” Dale looked around at the cheerful faces and felt his own spirit become a bit lighter.

“Money!” came the response.

“Then let’s go!”

Chapter Eighteen

<Goblins?> That’s new. I wonder what they want. <Back off a little, Dani. We can always slaughter them if they start making threatening moves.>

“Cal, they are Goblins. It doesn’t matter what they want. We can’t trust them.” Dani snarled at me mentally.

<I think you are taking on a bit of the Cat’s ferocity, Dani. Back away and let them in,> I ordered sternly. I almost never used a tone like that toward her, so the shock of it made her listen. She stepped away and sat down, still growling softly.

The Goblin standing nearest the entrance stepped cautiously into the room. His eyes kept flicking between the sitting Cat and the river next to him. Oh, right. Yeah, this was obviously a him. His clothing consisted of a few rags wrapped over his shoulders, a belt, and a wrap on his feet. It seemed his thirst overcame him because he squatted next to the river and took a deep drink. He shuddered in pleasure, then stood up with shining eyes and said something into the hole. More Goblins started filtering in, and all of them drank as soon as they could get close to the water without angering the massive Cat hovering nearby.

“Why are they acting like this?” Dani was no longer angry, just very puzzled. “They should be terrified of me or trying to fight me.”

<Maybe they are dehydrated?> I offered tenuously.

She snorted, causing one of the smaller Goblins to startle and trip, looking at her in terror.

“These are Goblins, Cal!” she informed me as if I hadn’t heard her the first time. “I think them being a bit thirsty is the least of our worries. Wait! They’re addicted! Cal, they are addicted to the Essence-infused water! We did it!”

Just then a wizened, old Goblin wearing furs of a higher quality waddled to the water. After drinking a hefty amount, he turned and looked at the Cat, grunting as his hands began to move. Soon he was dancing in place lightly, and I felt a buildup of Essence.

<Dani, look out. I think he is using an incantation!> I warned her.

She crouched and growled, but he didn’t stop. There was a discharge of Essence after a moment, but there was no visible effect.

I was about to ask Dani what had happened when the Goblin started speaking again. This time, something was different; I could clearly understand what he was trying to say.

“Great spirit of the Dungeon, hear me!” the dancing Goblin sang/chanted. “We have felt your call and have tasted the power you have given freely to those who wish it. The water of strength has made us powerful enough to revolt against our former masters. They who had become reliant on our compliance. We offer ourselves and our children to you. All we ask in return is enough power to defend ourselves from those who would again attempt to destroy us or force us into servitude again! If this is acceptable, we offer our oaths to you freely!” the Goblin sang in a guttural voice.

Now, this is not what he said but what he meant. He was simply not able to shape his mouth enough to say the words, making me wonder if other races saw them as unintelligent simply because they were hard to understand.

The words that actually left his mouth were closer to this, “Big angry Spirit! You water make us strong! We kill lazy humans, let guard down! You let us live here, make us strong, all our clan kill only for you! You no let people hurt us! Deals?”

Dani couldn’t hear the meaning—only the words—so she had no idea why I responded as I did.

<Many of you will die, day after day. I can make your clan large, strong, and numerous, but you will need to fight for survival almost every day. Do you still want to live here?> I questioned the Goblin Shaman. That is almost certainly what he had to be.

He seemed surprised to get a response, and a grin only a mother could love appeared on his face. “Abyss yes!”

“Did he just say ‘hell yeah’? What is going on? What does that even mean?” Dani growled.

<Getting some ready-made Mobs, hold on,> I told her. <Well. What is your name?>

He responded with a name that was far too long to say quickly, so my response was, <Bob it is then. That is your new name, may you wear it well. Bob, I accept your oath and will do my best to honor it. I will do what I can to make you all strong for as long as you honor your end of the bargain.>

Bob nodded and motioned the others forward. Apparently, only a dozen or so Goblins had survived the journey to get here—let alone the uprising—and they were quite ragged. One by one, they sank to a knee and gave the same oath, and I responded in kind. Every one of them seemed surprised to get a response, but after their oath was given, a line of their aura mingled with mine, giving me direct access to their minds.

<Well, Dani, I think we found our third-floor Mobs,> I chattered happily.

“Cal… They stink, they are messy, and… don’t you think they are a little too intelligent to be something you will willingly sacrifice?” Dani had flown back to me, and the Goblins were now setting up a small camp on the fourth floor while they waited for instructions.

<Nah, they made their choice in life. I won’t use them for Runic experiments, but I did say I would make them stronger. Their average Ranking is mid-F, so a little boosting is in order.> If I had hands, I would have been rubbing them together in anticipation.

“…I never thought I would feel bad for Goblins,” Dani muttered quietly.

I almost didn’t hear her, but I still chose to ignore her barbed comment. I began working on the third floor. Now that I had an idea of what would be living there, I could add features and details instead of leaving the area as an empty room.

To begin, I grew a series of columns in the area, not all the way to the ceiling but about eight feet tall. I widened these until they were about four feet around and made what looked like worked stone grow between them. This gave an interior area of roughly four thousand square feet, which should be plenty of space for a dozen Goblins. The worked walls extended out from the dungeon wall, forming half of a hexagon. The walls of the dungeon behind the fortifications would have a higher quality of minerals in them waiting for miners.

I repeated this pattern several times, creating walled areas along this dungeon floor. There was roughly a minute’s walk between each of them, allowing plenty of space for people to walk past and ignore the Mobs of this level. If they’d rather go straight for the Boss and ignore the mining operations, fine by me. I made a similar wall around the exit from this floor but far more elaborate and grand. This would be where the floor Boss lived, protecting the entrance to the next level.

It took several days to complete the basic layout, and I heard Dale try to question me a few times as well. I ignored him and only responded to Dani in grunts or short one to two word comments. I maintained the current stair system, bypassing this floor until I could make it a viable level. The final result looked like a spacious beehive from above, according to Dani. I turned my attention to where the Goblins were resting fitfully and studied what they were using for a sleeping system.

They were clustered together, several to a… let’s graciously call it a tent. That wouldn’t do at all for my dungeon; it did nothing to help them or intimidate adventurers. While I was studying them, I noticed what Dani had been talking about—they stunk. I was unsure if it was due to them not having access to bathing supplies or if it was personal preference, but that would not do. I resolved to wait until the shaman awoke to discuss how they wanted their homes to look. I needed to solve the stink.

Looking at one of the honeycomb fortifications above the river, I modified the layout a bit. I shrunk the walls, made stairs up them, and created terraces about two feet deep. These empty spaces I staggered, placing them a few feet lower than the one before it. I then worked to create a few Runes on the floor that would collect ambient heat and pour it into whatever medium I wished. Some warrior with more money than brains had fallen and dropped a flaming sword. A flaming sword. It was ridiculous! Holding a shining sword in front of his eyes—while in a dark dungeon—had destroyed his night vision. From there, he was easy pickings for my Bashers. I did appreciate the new Runes though.

To my point, I placed these Runes along the floor of the top level, activating them with just a touch of Essence. Then I diverted a bit of the river from its flow, allowing it to gently flow into the room. It hit the floor and turned to steam with a hiss. Alrighty then, a bit less Essence in the fire Rune… I adjusted the heat and soon had a massive, multi-tiered bath.

The water that entered at the top was the hottest and flowed down into the next level. There it cooled a bit and eventually overflowed to the next level and so on. At the very bottom, it drained, returning to the river. I planted soapleaf bushes on the dividers. I was glad I finally had a use for these; even the greediest adventurers usually left them alone in the garden room.

What else, what else… food? Most likely, but what do Goblins eat? I looked back at their supplies and tried to find food, but I couldn’t find anything that resembled edibles…Uh-oh.

<Dani, what have they been eating?> I was worried that I already knew the answer.

Dani scoffed at me. “Oh, now you are paying attention to me? I don’t know, I’ve just been making sure they don’t sneak in here and kill us.”

<So they haven’t been able to eat rabbits or anything?> My stressed tone alerted Dani that something was wrong.

“No, I haven’t seen them eat… anything. Oh.” Dani made the same realization that I had.

I woke up the shaman with a nudge to his mind. <Where are your food supplies?>

I didn’t bother to let him talk; he simply connected with me through our bond and thought his answer at me.

“Great Spirit, we have continued our multi-week fast. We attempted to gather food, but your guardian made it clear that we were being tested on our resolve. We have eaten nothing since entering your depths and only what we could scrounge in the weeks prior.” He seemed proud of this instead of horrified as I was.

<I… see. Good work so far, your endurance is astounding. Allow me to reward you for your efforts. What do you eat?>

“Anything we are allowed to,” Shaman Bob informed me seriously, reminding me that their entire race was enslaved.

<Right. What do you like to eat? Meats, vegetables, is there anything dangerous for you to eat?>             

“We prefer meat when we can get it, cooked, unlike what others think of us. We eat vegetables, though not many if we can avoid it. The Orc blood in us does not do well with green foods. While they reduce our hunger, our body does not process it, and there is no gain on our part unless we are in dire need of pooping.”

<…Very informative, thanks. Listen, wake up your people and leave everything behind. I will direct you to your new home.>

A look equal parts glee and worry crossed his features as he moved to do my bidding. In a short time, the others were gathered and began walking, following a line of glow potion. They walked until they found the entrance I had made just for them and ascended into their new lair.

They looked around the dim room, which, to their large eyes, was as bright as daylight to humans. I had temporarily raised a small dais—a table—and covered it in steaming meats. Since I could make whole rabbits, I could make just portions of them as well. There was far more meat on the table than they could eat, though they certainly tried. Their mouths had mostly sharp teeth and no molars. The shape of them was wrong, a bit too wide for their heads, so they regularly spilled and dropped food while chewing.

This is a race hated and enslaved by almost all the others in the world, mainly because they are considered unintelligent and ill-mannered. I saw a race that tried to survive, even against all the odds stacked against them. When they had finished eating, most of them began to doze off, bellies full for the first time in—apparently—weeks. While I wanted them to sleep, I had something else to do first. Bob began prodding them, getting them moving to the area I had designated as the bath.

They grumpily climbed the stairs, but upon seeing the gargantuan area designed as a bathhouse, they all had the same reaction. They would pause, stare, look around for someone planning to beat them for disturbing the beautiful scene, then finally strip and charge into the water with a ‘whoop’. I guess everyone likes hot baths. The soapleaf bushes were soon tested, as the Goblins scrubbed themselves thoroughly. I absorbed all of the ragged furs and makeshift weapons. It was even more low-quality than I had first assumed!

I had placed robes in piles nearby for when they all eventually left the bath—the last one an hour after entering. They dressed, feeling very comfortable for what may have been the first time in their lives. I wanted to make armor and weapons for them, but they needed to recover and become strong first. Anything I gave them now would be useless in a week since they were currently skeletally thin.

<Bob, I’ve been giving some thought on how to proceed,> I told him, waking him from a light doze.

He shook himself and sat in a meditative pose. “Yes, Great Spirit, what are your wishes?”

<First off, call me Cal. That is my name,> I demanded; this “Great Spirit” business was getting tedious.

“Yes… Cal,” he murmured reverently.

<What do you know of memory stones?>

He had no idea what they were, so I talked with Dani and came up with a plan. We would attempt to store the entirety of the Goblins’ memories in a memory stone before working on altering their bodies. When asked for someone to test the idea on, Bob cheerfully offered a Goblin to me that the others barely tolerated. Apparently, he was somewhat lazy and complained too often.

The Goblin in question was napping and had to be kicked several times by Bob before he could be considered awake enough to consent to the idea. I think that Bob was… less than truthful about some aspects of the upcoming process, but oh well. I had formed a memory stone that was roughly the same size as the one that had once contained the cultivation technique I stole from Dale. That one had stored roughly ten years’ worth of deep thoughts and concepts, so I figured that it would be ideal for the less complex ideas and tedium that made up this Goblin’s life.

I was a bit nervous; this was the first potentially working artifact that I had made which was originally made with Mana. If it worked as I hoped it would, it would be the proof of concept that I needed for other—stronger—workings. The lazy Goblin picked it up and made as to eat it; luckily, Bob slapped it out of his hand and yelled at him. Really, this stone was as big as his fist. I had no idea how he thought he could swallow it. He raised it to his head and held it there, face screwed up in concentration.

He didn’t need to concentrate on anything in particular, but I think it made him feel better. The stone was designed to draw in memories, and this one was only set to stop drawing after it had everything that was coherent. No baby memories, but plenty of them from child to adult to now. I really expected the stone to leave him as a brain-dead lump of flesh, but the Goblin was only a bit dazed when it was finished. He handed the stone to Bob and wandered away to resume his nap.

<It worked, Dani!> I exulted in this small victory. This stone swirling with silvery light meant that I could reproduce Mana forged items without having Mana myself. I had examined the Goblin while the process was running, learning his aura and pattern. I began to remake the body when I had a thought and stopped. A ball of meat and blood plopped to the ground with a wet smack.

“Gross.” Dani looked at the half-formed mass of tissue. “I am happy for you.”

<Yeah, sorry about that. I figured that I should try and make improvements while I can. I’m not going to do that in here, though; that may freak them out a bit. To the experimentation room!>

My focus was instantly there, while Dani had to zip along the tunnels to join in the process. I always offered to share my thoughts, but she felt that seeing it for herself was important, like my thoughts were biased or something.

I was examining the pattern and making small noises of disgust as I did so. Dani grunted and told me, “Oh, just tell me what the problem is already!”

I ‘waved’ her down, <It’s like this is the pattern from a brand-new dungeon just learning how to make things. If Goblins have a natural lifespan of thirty years I will be surprised.>

A quick conversation with the wizened old Goblin—Bob—convinced me I was correct. He was twenty-eight human years old. <It is all wrong! I can fix this bit here by reducing bone thickness a bit; that will allow them to open and close their jaws without issue. I’ll increase bone density here in the spine, that had a similar structure to what I would assume an Elf would have, and their feet are too narrow for their weight because of it. I bet they trip for just… just… no reason whatsoever!>

I continued further, decreasing thickness and length of the tongue a bit, increasing or decreasing bone density, and making the nerves and blood vessels intertwine and flow in a more natural fashion. I have no idea how these creatures managed to survive at all, let alone become a large race. Their entire lifecycle seemed designed around breeding and fighting, both of which they did inefficiently. Sure, they may have had lots of children, but from the looks of it, they only did the deed as a biological impetus. It was something that had to be done. They didn’t even particularly enjoy it!

After all the reworking of the pattern, I began producing the Dungeon Goblin as an actual creature. The body formed easier than the original would have, the kinks and inefficient meridians replaced or smoothed. Essence would flow through his body at least as easily as it did through humans’ bodies. The mindless Mob in front of me sat down, drooling a bit. Well then. I almost called Bob before remembering that I wanted to boost them, not just fix the wreck of their bodies.

How to begin, though? Goblins had as much affinity for Essence as the other intelligent races, but what would be the right one for… right, they should have an open affinity channel. I checked his open meridians and found that he had the makings of a powerful warrior. His body had open channels for earth and fire Essence, whereas those were blocked in the original. If I infused his body with Earth corruption subtly, his overall density and defense would be naturally higher. Thick skin and whatnot. I also allowed a bit more fire into his blood, which should allow for a short temper and plenty of battle rage. I only added a little; these guys would be armed, armored, and intelligent. They didn’t need the same influx of corruption to make them into viable fighters as my Bashers did.

I put a simple set of clothes on him and directed Bob to the room with the memory stone. He came willingly but stopped in the entryway as he looked at the being in front of him with shock. “What is that?” he whispered. Well, what he meant to whisper anyway.

<That, good ol’ Bob, is what Goblins should have been. A powerful, strong, intelligent, decent looking mix of the races. This is the opposite of what your bodies currently are. Right now, they are a mix of the races that has all the weaknesses of each and none of the strengths. This… this is the mix of races with all of the strengths and the weaknesses tossed away.> I was—I hoped understandably—proud of the result. <I’m not trying to be insensitive, but as you are now… you are pretty useless. Weak. Unbalanced. Essence inefficient. I’ve tried to fix that.>

Bob looked understandably disturbed and intrigued.

<The last step, Bob, is to place the stone against his head and give him memories. Otherwise, he is less than an hour old in an adult body.>

Bob nodded and stepped forward, transferring the stored memories into the new body. The eyes focused, the muscles twitched, and after a few moments, my new Dungeon Goblin looked at Bob and asked a question. He stopped mid-sentence, opening and closing his jaw a few times. His eyes opened wide, and he stood up, nearly falling over due to the new body’s balance being different. It took a few minutes of practice, but he was soon running around, jumping and speaking almost non-stop. Gone was the previous slurring and hissing, and he strode around with proud, confident steps.

He now stood half again as tall as Bob, who was admittedly a shorter specimen. At five feet tall, my new warrior Mob would easily be the tallest of the new Dungeon Goblin race. They made their way to the remaining Goblins, who reacted in a much different manner than Bob had. The females looked at the Goblin warrior with heat in their eyes, while the males looked at him with something akin to hero worship. He walked over to his progenitor, examining him from the outside. He didn’t have nice things to say. Ah well, when you are suddenly far stronger, taller, more powerful, and have a greater capacity for intelligence than you used to, you may look back on your old self as a pathetic version. A bit harsh though.

I asked the others to undergo the same process, and soon, they were lined up so I could perfectly memorize their individual patterns. I made a memory stone for each of them and got to work. This time, the creation went faster as I had a template to work from. There were deviations to consider—such as gender—but overall, the bodies ended up fairly similar to each other. Then it was Bob’s turn. The differences in his pattern were obvious as soon as I began examining him deeply. His cranium had more room in it, allowing his brain to develop more fully than the others had to this point. The new Goblins would be his current intellectual equivalent eventually, but he would have a head start in nearly every aspect but muscle density. I could fix that.

I increased his body mass, making him significantly larger and tougher than the others. He had a powerful connection to his wind affinity, and his new form also opened the way for an infernal affinity that would be nearly as strong.

What would that combination create? I was looking forward to finding out as he developed it! Bob walked up to his new form, pressing his memory stone against the newly formed flesh. The stone dulled for a moment, but just like the others, it retained a copy of the memories. I had them place the stones into a specially designed chest, which I then sank into the ground. I would keep it safe, just in case they all died simultaneously.

This was just the beginning for the group. Each of the half-hexagon areas would be a home for a copy of the group, as I planned to recreate the group multiple times. It may be strange for them to see copies of themselves running around, but that was just too dang bad. I waited until this group had full control of their muscles before opening the floor, letting them get used to their new and improved bodies for a few days. Then I had them restore their memories in a new stone. By pulling memories from that set of stones, I filled the new floor of the dungeon with a dozen groups of a dozen, one hundred forty-four new Goblins, to be precise.

There were still the originals, but I decided to keep them out of combat if possible, so I didn’t count them toward the dungeon Mob total for the floor. I would let them live out their lives in as much peace and luxury as possible and add those memories to the stones so that I was never asked for vacation time.

Next up, I wanted a Boss for this floor, but none of them had the necessary build or willpower to be a strong Boss.

I turned to ask Dani her opinion when it struck me. Dani. She had been getting more vicious and bloodthirsty through her training with the Mobs in here. Why not see if she could pilot a meat puppet that had no will of its own?

<Hey, Dani?>

Dani looked at me with a critical eye. “Hmm. You only use that tone when you are about to do something I don’t like… What is it this time?”

I ‘grinned’. <Actually, I think you will like this. How would you like to be the third-floor Boss?>

“It sounds… interesting? Explain?”

I told her my plan, and she agreed on the condition that she got to help me design its body, weapons, and armor. Of course, I agreed. Why not? We started on the project, working out the kinks and having minor arguments. I wanted an agile fighter that could weave around attacks and counter easily, whereas she was adamant that that type of Boss already existed with Snowball on the third floor.

She wanted a huge, musclebound, heavily armored, female Goblin that used enchanted weapons. I argued for cursed items because the adventurers would be warier of using them if they took them from her. She agreed, albeit reluctantly. She seemed to think that the item would trap her in the body or attempt to draw her into the weapon. I assured her that at the first sign of trouble, I would turn the item to goop.

The new Boss was placed in the final half-hex—as I was now calling the Goblin encampments—on a throne. It was mindless, so it just sat there unmoving until Dani flew in and took control.

“Oh. Wow, this is so much easier than sharing a body!” Dani spoke with the Boss’s mouth, the first time that she had not communicated with me mind-to-mind while inhabiting a Mob. She tested that functionality, and we found that we could still speak that way, which would make fighting easier. “Hmm. I want minions.”

I snorted a quick chuckle. <Are you serious?>

“Yup.”

<Wasn’t the whole point of this floor to be easier than floor number four?> I carefully asked. She had an odd glint to her that spoke of a bit too much excitement.

“Well, then make the fourth floor harder!” she demanded with a laugh. “You did design it as the third floor after all.”

Thinking about the situation carefully, I decided that she was correct. <Alright, I’ll give you whatever you want, but I’m opening the third-floor tomorrow morning.>

“Perfect.” Dani put me straight to work.

Dale

“You’re looking good, Dale.” Hans was looking at his friend and team leader with a critical eye. “I know you haven’t been getting enough sleep, and you’ve been training like you think assassins are after you. What’s different?”

Dale shrugged at him with a grin. “Hey. It isn’t paranoia if they are actually out to get you. Nah, I guess the voices in my head just haven’t been bothering me this week.”

Hans laughed, and they walked toward the training ground. They were out today to see if Dale had learned anything from the Dark Elves since Hans was not just going to accept Dale’s word on it.

They got to the arena and did a few warm-ups, stretching and preparing themselves in the pre-dawn light.

“I hear there is a lady after you these days,” Hans coyly said. “You sly dog!”

“Ugh, I have no wish to see her again. She seems to deify the dungeon and has been making all sorts of wild claims.” Dale shook his head and faced Hans. “You ready?”

Hans pondered a moment. “I don’t think you should dismiss her so easily. She is known as the foremost expert of dungeon lore in the known world. Not only that, but she went for years without an influx of Essence. She has had to develop techniques and ways to be ultra-efficient with her Essence and Mana use. I bet she could teach you a thing or two.” He ruined the seriousness of his words by waggling his eyebrows at the last words.

“You know that I thought she was a prostitute?” Dale asked his lecherous buddy.

Hans shrugged. “Happens to the best of us. Sometimes they seem far too amazing to be real, so you make a false assumption. At least you didn’t tell her that you… you did, didn’t you?” Dale nodded. Hans started laughing. “You had better go fix that relationship before she murders you.”

“I’m not going to–” Dale leaned to the side, missing Hans’s punch only by a scant inch. “Apparently, we’re fighting now.”

Hans didn’t answer with more than a grin. He began attacking faster, slowly ramping up the difficulty until Dale actually broke out into a sweat. Dale tried to find an opening to attack, but Hans moved with a precision and economy of movement that left no noticeable opportunities. Soon, Dale was dodging with less and less space between his body and Hans’s fists. Finally, it was all he could do not to cry out with pain as Hans pounded him into the dirt with well-placed blows.

“You are certainly learning, and frankly, you are doing well.” Hans nodded and offered his hand to Dale. “You just need another decade of fighting experience or so. Also,” he had pulled Dale halfway up, and now, Hans let him fall to the ground with an oomph, “you are too trusting. We are fighting, remember?”

“Rude.” Dale rocked his body until he had enough momentum to stand. He was trying to learn a faster movement to regain his feet since his Dark Elf trainer beat him mercilessly with a stout staff whenever he was on the ground. “You about ready to head to the dungeon? Laying on the snow really isn’t my favorite way to start the day. I could really go for some movement to warm me up.”

Winter had arrived, at least the leading edge. A thin layer of snow was all that covered the ground, though not from lack of snowing. No, the wind had simply risen to new strength, blasting the snow off the mountain unless something blocked it. Less people were living here now, more and more were paying the fee to use the portal and live somewhere less intolerant of life. People said they hated it, it felt haunted, or it was the worst climate in the world. For Dale, it just felt like home.

“I’m ready, but do you think everyone will be there?” Hans gave Dale a significant look. “I’m not going to force her out into the cold again. That’s your problem now, oh great team leader.”

Rose had been rather resistant to venturing out into the cold air. To be fair, they had to be careful about how many layers they wore.

There was a person that had been too bundled up in loose robes and layers, to the point that the wind had caught on him like a sail and blown him off the mountain. They still hadn’t found his body. Now, people were trying to see how few clothes they could wear and how tightly fit they could be before they started to succumb to the cold. Businessmen no longer hawked their wares, if you needed something, you came to them through their triple-layered tents.

“Hans, you’re the one that is trying to win her over. If you can’t deal with her at her coldest, you shouldn’t get her at her–”

They came upon their meeting point just then, and the other members had obviously been there a few minutes.

“Oh, thank goodness, let’s go!” A shivering Rose ran off toward the dungeon entrance.

Adam was shivering so hard in his robes that he couldn’t speak, while Tom wore his sparse armor and looked completely normal. His nipples were unpleasantly puckered though, and Hans pretended he had to dodge them like a knife whenever Tom turned.

Tom grinned at Dale. “I see that you would do well in the Wolf Kingdom! This is a nice, warm day back home.”

Dale replied in kind, “It’s about time the temperature gets back to normal! I’ve been melting for months! Look at me, the heat reduced me to skin and bones! With this temperature, I’m finally able to start getting some muscle back!” The others, not invited to the bragging, groaned good-naturedly. The two laughing men had been having the same conversation every time they met up since the first snowfall.

“Hans,” Rose was squinting at Tom against the wind, “can you teach me a good assassination technique?”

Tom had a small look of panic on his face. “Let us not be hasty! We will soon warm ourselves in the fiery blood of our foes!”

Adam ground out through his chattering teeth, “Maybe you stop bathing in blood and just take a normal bath?”

Winter had started to impact the hygiene of most people that stayed here full-time.

They got to the entrance of the dungeon and stepped inside, happy to be out of the worst of the wind.

Dale looked around. “Any new jobs?”

Hans grunted. “Eh. More requests for fur. No real surprise there.

The others sighed. While fur was moderately lucrative, it was smelly, messy, tedious work. It slowed them down to skin each animal they felled and so had taken to tossing the entire animal into their dimensional bags. This had the distinct disadvantage of weighing them down more but added a small benefit of being able to export meat easily. Basher was now considered a delicacy in the kingdoms as it retained quite a bit of Essence in the meat. If you had the correct meridian open, eating Basher meat allowed you to almost passively gain Essence. It was a great training aid.

“Anyone else? Please?” Dale had just a touch of desperation in his voice.

Adam spoke up, “Healing potions and herbs are on the rise again. There have been more attacks recently. From what I hear, entire villages in the south are vanishing overnight, while the same is happening in the north, just with the bodies being left where they fall.”

Dale nodded; the gossip had been growing as more Nobles began appearing, coming to live semi-permanently. No longer was it just the second or third son of a branch family; now, firstborn and mainline Nobles had been arriving. Mountaindale—as his rapidly growing town had been laughingly dubbed—was the only place that was out of the way and remote while still being a viable training ground.

“So, let’s start. I’ll take point position. I want Tom on my left, Rose on my right. Adam, you are right behind me. Hans, take rear-guard, watch our backs.

They proceeded into the dungeon, doing their best to silently kill as many Bashers as they could. Recently, if they had been able to sneak up on them, they didn’t swarm. People were taking that to mean they were getting stealthier, but Dale had a different idea. He was still hearing mutterings and words from Cal that meant nothing to him, like ‘ossification’.

Dale knew that the dungeon was just distracted, and he assumed that without the dungeon guiding them, the Bashers were just less likely to attack people. He was fine with this; hopefully, it meant that he would have a more normal experience while fighting. They snuck up on a group of Bashers and began beating them quickly. Dale had found that grabbing one with his off hand and hitting it with his cursed battle gauntlet would almost always kill it.

He also didn’t hurt himself when he did this, as apparently the Essence released into the gauntlet would just flow back into his Center if he struck his arm or hand. Luckily for him, since he had found this out by accidentally scratching himself in a sensitive area when he had been startled by a sneak attack from a Basher. The activated knuckles had left a scrape where he had moved his hand too quickly, but the blood hadn’t been blasted away from that point.

“What the–” Hans had turned a corner and was shaking his head, half in disgust and half in laughter. “Someone has a sick sense of humor.”

They took a look; there appeared to be a High-Elf made of stone on a marble altar surrounded by statues of bunnies playing in flowers.

Dale choked on a laugh. “Wow, I mean, yeah she was insane, but it is still sad that she just let herself die for no reason.”

Hans glared at Dale. “If I die in here, and you find a statue of me, you’d better smash that shit. Especially if it is surrounded by bunnies and flowers.”

“I’d rather take it to the capital and have it immortalized in their history museum.” Dale started walking deeper into the dungeon as Hans let out a squawk of rage.

Rose looked back at the statue as they passed it. “I wonder who would do something like that?”

“Pay attention, Rose. There is a roving squad ahead,” Dale quietly admonished her. Roving squads were groups of regular or advanced Bashers that didn’t stay in a certain territory. They weren’t usually too dangerous, but they sometimes came up behind groups as they were focused on killing a group ahead of them. Dale jumped forward, backhanding a Basher as it squeaked the alert.

Its head was almost torn off from the combination of the blow and pressurized blood at the impact point. Tom stepped forward, landing a blow with a small hammer. Hans had been training him and decided that the Essence he cultivated in a day didn’t justify the use of his powerful warhammer. Since it took Essence constantly when in use, Tom had no argument to defend himself. Now that he was using a square ingot of iron on a stick, calling it a ‘hammer’ was really a bit misleading.

Tom was much slower with these ingot hammers, but they helped to train his muscles and aim. So what if he grunted every time he swung? They finished off the near helpless—at this to this group—Bashers and were putting the bodies in their bags when they heard a roar from ahead. Tom shook his head and limbered up his arms.

“It appears someone has spawned a Glade in the garden room. Shall we assist them?” A scream filtered down the tunnel to them.

“Let’s hurry. It sounds like they aren’t doing well.” Dale started moving faster, rushing toward the sounds of scuffles ahead.

They burst into the garden room to see an armored man standing protectively over another man who was cowering on the floor. The group rushed in toward the Glade, and Dale started beating the overgrown mushroom in an almost rhythmic pattern.

Since they had found that this type of enemy took little direct damage from non-sharpened weapons, Dale was not hitting it squarely but rather near the edges so he could tear off chunks of the Mob. An arrow from Rose punched all the way through the Mob as it turned on them, leaving a rapidly closing hole in its wake. Hans began lopping off pieces of the monster, and soon, it was too damaged to remain upright. It collapsed to the ground, dead, and Dale turned toward the two people that they had rescued.

“Just two of you? Can either of you even fight? I’ve made sure that everyone that enters here knows the dangers of the known levels. Why the abyss would you be here?!” Dale roared at the two-person group.

Chapter Nineteen

The armored figure raised his visor, revealing Evan. “Well, you know me, Dale. I see a person in trouble or someone doing something incredibly stupid,” here he glared at the man he was protecting, “and I just need to try to save their dumb ass.”

“Oh, hey, Evan. Good to see you. Wait, we heard a woman scream. Did you see what happened to her?” Dale was trying to look through the thick growth in the room.

Evan snorted, trying to cover a laugh. “Yup, that’s him.” He jerked a finger at the man who was now standing up.

“I am not a woman. Of course, I have read the warnings, but I expected them to be greatly exaggerated. The price of parts from Glade has doubled in the past few weeks!” The fussy man was worriedly looking at a new hole in his pants.

“Ah! You are the alchemist!” Adam remarked in an accusatory tone. Adam was the one who normally brought herbs and other items to the alchemist and apothecary. “Why in the world would you come down here?”

The alchemist took up a self-righteous pose. “Well, if you thought people were swindling you with product, wouldn’t you want to see the production yourself?!”

Evan made a sound deep in his throat. “I walked in to see him kicking plants and throwing rocks at trees. He musta been at it awhile, cause it wasn’t very effective.” His comment made the fussy man blush.

“I take it you are satisfied?” Dale dryly drawled. “Or would you like to wake up another flesh-eating monster?”

“Well. I suppose I’ll have to be satisfied, won’t I?” The man turned and walked out of the room, somehow making even that motion into a study of pompousness.

“Ugh,” Hans grunted. “Adam, how do you deal with that man? His face is just so punchable!”

Adam shrugged. “He gives us a lot of money.”

Hans thought silently for a moment. “That would do it.” He turned to Evan. “Now, as for you, do you need an escort out or something?”

Evan shuffled his feet. “I was actually hoping to follow you this morning. I don’t know if Dale mentioned my offer..?”

Dale nodded at him. “I did, but we haven’t seen anything different below. Why do you think there would be changes that you need to be present for?”

“Well, it’s more like this… are any of you miners?” Head shakes were all around. “So you don’t know what to look for. Here’s the deal—last night I hit a critical point. The ore and material on this floor are not rare enough—or high enough quality—for me to be able to make my payment on time unless I work at least twenty hours a day. I have a hunch that I’ll find what I need deeper inside. Also, I like sleep.”

There was a brief conversation, but most of the team was fine with him coming along if he accepted that the risks were on his shoulders. Plus, Evan certainly had a likeable quality about him that resonated well with the group. He was a no-nonsense, hardworking, driven individual. Before continuing, they debated fighting the remaining Glade Mobs, but everyone was more interested in continuing downward and cultivating than wasting time on the upper levels. They skirted the majority of the Garden room, and after a few minutes of walking, they made it to the tunnel connecting to the next room.

So far, they were making good time, having only been in the dungeon for about fifteen minutes and already making it through the second room. They wandered through the tunnel, laughing at Evan as he cussed at traps that startled him, such as a rock fall. To be fair, he had more reason to fear collapsing tunnels than they did.

They started competing with each other to show off their knowledge of the dungeon, though Rose won when she leaned on to Evan… then reached out and punched the wall. A section crumbled away, revealing a shiny, gold-plated chest. Evan’s eyes boggled at the small shower of coins they pulled out of the chest and thanked them when they loaded him up on healing potions.

Hans laughed, making Evan give him a questioning look. Hans ruined the mood a bit by informing him that the reason the healing potions to him… was that he was the most likely to get torn up and be in need of healing. After that point, they stopped showing off and returned to their usual formation with Evan standing near Adam. Now they were grim and serious again, which only served to make the Half-Dwarf more cautious.

Stepping into the third room was a new experience for Evan, the furthest he had ever traveled in. He looked around at the high ceiling, doing his best to see in the gloom and darkness. Without Essence enhanced vision, he would normally not be able to see at all, but his Dwarven ancestry allowed him limited vision. He yelped when the first attack came. There was a sudden rustling of armor and scratches of metal on leather as weapons were drawn and swung. High-pitched squeals came from dying Bashers, and a flash of hellfire blazed along a horn before the monster was slain.

“What the abyss is happening?!” Evan was crouched, pick held horizontally in front of him as he looked around wildly at the flashes of light, groans of pain, and shrieks of dying Mobs.

“Just,” Rose fired off an arrow with a thwap, “another day in paradise.”

The fighting quickly died off, and Evan was assaulted by the odor of animals being skinned. He had to fight not to vomit as the darkness and smells threatened to overwhelm his overwrought senses.

“You’re all insane…” he muttered, making the others laugh. This didn’t help with his assessment of their mental soundness.

A few minutes passed as they dressed the carcasses, storing them in their bags.

A glimmer in the distance caught Evan’s eye. “What’s over there?”

Adam glanced in the indicated direction. “Hey, good eye! Guys, there is a glowing chest over there!”

“Score.” Hans started moving in that direction before Dale called him back.

Dale was looking at the chest, and something didn’t feel right. It took him a moment to realize what the issue was. “Where are the Mobs? There’s nothing guarding it.”

This caught the group’s collective attention and prompted Hans to move closer to inspect the chest. He stopped a few feet away,

“Trapped! I’m not really sure what this will do, so back up a bit!” He pulled out a heavy knife, throwing it at what he assumed was the activation for the trap. He flipped backward just as the knife impacted, and a blast of superheated vapor blasted from well-hidden holes in a ring around the chest. Anyone nearby would have been boiled in their armor like a lobster if they had been caught in the spray.

“That’s a new one!” Hans chuckled, stepping forward to inspect the chest again. As he was setting his foot down, a spike shot upward, intent on skewering him. The spike shattered as it came into contact with his boot, and Hans chuckled. “Double trapped. This place is getting dangerous!”

Evan was a bit perplexed. “I’m glad you aren’t hurt, but I am wondering… how did you do that?”

“Inscribed boot. I calculated how much force was coming up at me and passed Essence into the boot to enhance my downward force by that exact amount. The stone shattered, and luckily, my boot did not,” Hans commented offhandedly as he threw open the chest. “Weapons!”

The others let out a soft cheer. They didn’t want to be too loud. Sound attracted attention.

“Looks like… oh yes. I think we have a set of demon busters here!”

The cheer got a bit louder, and Adam danced a bit.

“Demon busters?” Evan quietly wondered, feeling like he was missing eighty percent of the conversation.

Tom replied this time, “Tis what we have dubbed weapons that are specifically designed to destroy demons. The church pays very well for them, as the Inscriptions are very detailed and finicky. For a reproduction of this weapon style, near a year of work would be required. We also will need to assume that these weapons are single use, as they are intended to be stabbed into their target who will forthwith be returned to the abyss. A lot of work for this artifact, therefore a lot of money for us.”

“Let’s say three thousand, divided by the five of us… six hundred gold each?” Hans was calling out calculations.

“The six of us, Hans. We had already passed that point, only Evan noticing it brought us back to claim it,” Dale admonished his friend.

“Nooo, come on! I have a Mage to pay off!” Hans whined.

Dale gave him a look. “And how many weapons are there?”

“…Three,” Hans muttered sullenly.

Dale did a bit of math in his head. “Let’s round that up to ten thousand gold. That means fifteen percent goes to the city, so we are at eighty-five hundred. Then a flat twenty-five percent to the Guild… so down another twelve hundred seventy-five. That leaves us seven thousand two hundred and twenty-five gold if we play our cards right. Divided by the six of us, twelve platinum, four gold, sixteen silver, and six copper. If we haggle it correctly, of course. And adjusting for the current rumors, we could boost the price a solid amount.”

The others stared at him in shock. “What?”

Rose answered his question, “When did you start doing mathematics in your head like that? That was really impressive.”

“Oh.” Dale looked a bit embarrassed. “You all know that I am working to be a good little city Lord. I have been spending most of my money on memory stones that contain different concepts. I recently purchased the Dwarven mathematical system, and I guess it is kind of… I don’t know, I just need to do math when it comes up like this.”

“What’s the cubed root of three hundred times thirty-two squared?” Hans looked at Dale excitedly.

“I… I’m not a jester, Hans. I don’t perform tricks!”

This made the others laugh, while Hans muttered, “I’m never gonna figure that out.”

Rose looked at Dale with a half-smile on her face. “I had wondered why you insisted on coming in here unarmored. You are welcome for the greaves, by the way. You’re broke, aren’t you?”

“Oh yes.”

“Well, so are all of us! Just for different reasons. Don’t feel bad. Back to work?” Rose prodded them.

They moved to the final room on this floor, killing off the Boss Squad and moving to the second floor.

Cal

“Dale’s group is coming through the second floor right now. They’re bringing along a miner,” Dani informed me cheerfully.

<Now that is some good timing. We just finished up down there, and I want to get back to the other project I’ve been working on.> I heard Dale sigh as I started talking. <Yes, I still exist, Dale. Don’t be rude.>

“Want me to let you know when they’re getting near the third floor?” Dani offered. I gladly accepted. I really wanted to figure out the gate issue.

I returned my attention to the problem that the dimensional bag was becoming. I was using the principles it had allowed me to understand in an attempt to make portals that lead to each floor. I felt that the system I had in place to contain the energies and direct them should be working. Maybe there was simply an ephemeral quality to Mana that I simply couldn’t replicate with Essence? Gah, no! I couldn’t think like that! If I could just figure out why punching into a pocket dimension like this was making it so hard for me to… wait a second.

That explains my issue! I was trying to extrapolate the same pattern for an extradimensional bag and use it to allow intradimensional travel! I wasn’t trying to break out of this dimension; I needed to connect two points so I could allow things to move between those points in the same dimension! I wrapped my mind around this concept and formulated a plan.

If I understood the issue correctly, what I needed to do was to set up a gate that matched another perfectly. Then I could connect those two by setting up a resonance pattern and forcing the Essence at the two termini to move at the same time with the same criteria. Essentially, I was planning on inscribing the air by moving Essence in a continuous cycle. Then something entering through one gate would find themselves exiting the other!

I had just started getting excited and was about to begin working on a model when I was interrupted by my lovely Wisp. “Cal, they’re fighting Raile right… they beat Raile.”

<Have they seen it yet?> I shook myself a bit, concentrating on breaking physics tended to leave me a bit dizzy. I wasn’t sure how other people did it, but if my concept worked, it would be a bit paradoxical. It would be a gate that contained the other gate, which contained itself. The set of all sets that contains itself. It exists, I just needed to prove it!

“They haven’t. I think it is only a matter of time now. They are looking at the chest. The miner is looking and scratching at the walls… and Dale is doing his customary double check of the Silverwood tree. Wave at Dale!” Dani laughed as Dale’s face peeked into view high above.

Dale put on a strange expression, so I focused on his side of the conversation.

“I think there is another floor again.” Dale saying this brought many more faces into view through my sunroof.

“Looks like! You think this floor will be as insanely difficult as that little maze?” Hans chipperly input.

<Little maze?> I snorted. <It’s called a labyrinth, helloooo.>

“What is this made of?” Evan was trying unsuccessfully to scratch at the material they were looking through. “It’s tough!” He looked at it closely, the natural light spilling in from above allowing him to look at it without impediment. “It seems like a pane of nearly perfectly clear emerald, but it’s huge! I’ve never seen anything resist my pick either.”

“It is likely a derivative of cursed earth. I’m betting that it is emerald but with a large amount of earth corruption in it,” Rose postulated, gaining the attention of those around her.

“Why would it matter if it were emerald or not?” Dale asked her.

They dissolved into a discussion about mineral affinity as they made their way cautiously down the stairs.

<Here we go…> I was watching their faces as they stepped on to the third floor. Their shock was gratifyingly evident.

Dale

“Fortifications?!” Hans thundered. “What the crap kind of Mob hides behind fortifications?!”

Adam spoke up, concern in his voice, “Smart ones?”

His statement made everyone go quiet for a moment. “Shit.”

“What do we do? Go up and knock? Hop over the walls? They aren’t that high.” Evan grumped a bit, pickaxe itching to be swinging.

“We do knock, but not with our hands. Nah, we use the door-knocker. Tom, pull out your hammer, you’re up!” Hans directed with a sly grin. He glanced at Evan. “You’re gonna like this part.”

Tom placed his ingot hammers into his bag and pulled out his oversized warhammer. “I’ve missed you,” he whispered to it, caressing it lightly.

He walked directly up to the large door, swinging his hammer with a roar. He had only ever used the full force of his weapon on a stationary object once before, and a member of his old team had died because of it. The weapon impacted the doors with the force of a localized earthquake, blasting the doors to splinters. Those shards flew into the Goblin warriors huddled behind the fortification, killing several of them instantly. The remaining warriors roared and charged from their breached fort, swinging deadly weapons with great speed and accuracy.

Dale’s team joined the fight! Dale ran at an exceptionally large specimen that was wielding a warhammer and releasing saliva with every roar. Dodging its initial assault, Dale stepped forward, swinging a one-two punch. The first swing hurt Dale far more than the Mob, but the second blow shattered his victim’s collarbone and interrupted the flow of blood traveling through its arteries for a moment. This caused the creature to collapse for an instant, almost unconscious. Dale pressed his attack, his next punch cracking the skull and scrambling brain tissue.

Dale let himself be too focused on inspecting his prone challenger, and an arrow sliced into his thigh. He dropped to a knee with a yell, hand clapping to the wound to try and slow the blood flow. Rose counter-sniped the archer, pinning it to a wall across the compound. Adam tripped a Mob that was running at Rose with his staff, then used the sharpened end to stab it through the heart.

Hans was playing with his foes; three of them were trying to land a blow while he moved scant inches at a time, learning their attack patterns. He decided that he had a good handle on how they moved and attacked, so he drew his own weapon and killed the three with a quick spin and a rapid stabbing. Taking a moment to survey the battle, he turned just in time to soak his front in a wave of blood and gore.

“Oh, come on! This is exactly why I didn’t want you to be using that oversized killing machine in here!” Hans bellowed at Tom.

Tom looked at the clean-freak with an excited grin. “I had been under the impression that you wanted me not to use this for fear of draining my Essence. Now I understand why you were so adamant!”

“Did we get them all?” Dale ground out; trying to focus on his team was difficult when a foreign body was embedded in his flesh.

“We did. Hold on, Dale.” Adam dropped into a crouched position next to his team leader, working feelers of Essence into the inflamed flesh around the arrow. When he had closed off the nerve endings, he carefully pulled the arrow. As he suspected, it had a barbed head. He started digging with a small dagger, increasing the flow of blood from the wound. “Drink a potion, Dale. I can’t heal you at the same time as performing surgery.”

“Evan, you mind?”

Evan stepped forward, uncorking a bottle and pressing it to Dale’s lips. Dale gulped it down as Adam moved away, the pain suddenly returning as the Essence stopped flowing. Dale shot a bit of the potion out of his nose as he choked.

“What a nice place to sit and cultivate for, say, ten minutes?” Dale laughed a bit desperately.

The others chuckled, sitting down. Hans decided he would rather look around the area and began exploring the perimeter, taking Evan with him. Tom finished collecting the armor and weapons used by the Mobs and sat down to cultivate as well.

“What are these things?” Dale sniffed with disgust as the last of the bodies began turning to ooze.

“They look a little like Goblins, but they are so much bigger and well-balanced. If all Goblins looked like this, they would likely be accepted as a sentient race instead of a monster race,” Rose told him with hope blooming in her words. She had a soft spot for creatures with multiple races in their heritage.

“Then what do regular Goblins look like?”

Hans came back just then. “Goblins look, sound, and smell like sickly children who drank too much and can’t control their bowels. They are generally hated by all of the races and used as a warning against mixing the bloodlines.”

“Oh, so that is why people act so poorly towards half-breeds? That’s too bad.” Dale didn’t catch the look Rose sent his way. She couldn’t tell if he was being serious or an asshole. “They can’t choose their parents, after all.”

“Pretty much.” Hans nodded. “By the way, Evan found a likely spot for mining, so… mission accomplished?”

They could all hear Evan’s pick swinging now as well as his cheerful chanting. A low layer of dust started rolling toward them after a few minutes, but it usually vanished before it got too close. There were benefits to mining in the dungeon.

“We simply sit and cultivate? No fighting, no real guarding?” Tom looked around at the nodding faces. “I… hmm. I will try not to be bored.” He focused on the pattern he had been building in his Center and continued to cultivate.

They sat that way, working hard to build their internal Essences when a Dungeon Goblin poked its head in through the wreckage of the gate.

“It appears they are re-spawning.”

There was another small battle; this time, the defenses worked in Dale’s group’s favor, as the attacking archer could not find a way to target them. The Goblins had to enter only a few at a time and were cut down quickly. Soon, the group was back to cultivating, doing their best to ignore the sounds of rock shattering behind them.

Hans spoke up, “It appears to be about a thirty-minute time frame for the Goblins to return. I don’t know why it takes longer down here—maybe they are harder to create?”

They fought another two groups before Evan came back, smiling broadly and coated in debris. “I think I’m gonna like this floor a lot.” He was dragging a pack full of raw metal chunks, so bulky that he could hardly move.

“Eh. Maybe we can put that in our sacks for you?” Adam offered, looking at the hoard of metal. “I don’t know how you’re going to get that up the stairs otherwise.”

After some good-natured arguing, Evan accepted the offer, and they split up the miner’s goods. They attacked another fortification to see if it followed the same layout and ended up having a much harder time of it. These Goblins were prepared for the group and didn’t bunch together behind the gate. When Tom smashed it open, they poured through the wreckage at him, ensuring he was hard-pressed for several moments until his team came to the rescue. There were additional archers who took up position on the walls, firing down at the group.

Dale had a hard time fighting while dodging arrows, but Hans weaved in and out of attacks as though he were out for a casual stroll. Rose focused on killing the ranged snipers, while Adam kept an eye out for anyone getting injured or enemies getting too close. Evan watched the team working together to take down the enemy, their bickering and friendly jibes put away for less dangerous times. He was impressed, and when the last Goblin fell, he applauded them before running off to check for metals in the wall.

The team sat down to relax, breathing deeply and preparing their bodies for an influx of Essence. They were just at the twenty-five-minute mark when Tom suddenly looked up, gasped in pain and began sweating black filth. His eyes dripped tears of blood and blackness, and his breathing became ragged.

Dale leaped to his feet. “What’s happening? Is it poison?!”

Tom couldn’t answer, but Hans gripped Dale and pulled him back. “He’s breaking into the D-ranks. This is going to be difficult. We can’t expect him to be able to move himself. All of his mind is turned inward. Someone grab him and put him in a defensible location. What shit timing! Move!”

Dale figured that the others had been covered in filth from him before, and it was time to return the favor. He gripped Tom under the arms and dragged him toward the one-man mining operation. He had to adjust his grip several times; the black goop was slippery. There was a light trail of the substance leading to Tom when he was settled against the wall in a seated position.

“They’re coming!” Hans shouted to the team. At the previous location, when the Goblins had tried to take back their fort, they came stealthily. Or tried to at least. Here, they were sprinting down the path, howling at the top of their lungs. “What? What is different?!”

Dale had a sneaking suspicion that there was a reason that this small Goblin horde was intent on their position. “Cal, you are a cheating asshole!”

Cal

<Hey, it wasn’t me that made your teammate decide that an unmapped floor was the best place to go unconscious. How long does that last, by the way?> I chuckled at him.

“Screw you!”

<Ha! Yes! Thanks for not answering on my turn. Now I can throw harder Mobs at you! Such an easy question too!>

Dale was fuming as I opened the doors I had been hiding Mobs behind, and the now-imposing form of the Goblin Shaman stepped in to join the fight. He was mostly hidden behind the advancing warriors, but he started dancing and chanting almost instantly. I had found out that there was a good reason for the dancing, at least outside the dungeon. The movement pushed the shaman from areas of low concentrations of Essence to areas of slightly higher concentrations.

The dancing had a similar effect to what I did, which was to collect the unrefined Essence in an area and use that for incantations instead of personal Essence. I didn’t know why humans, Elves, and the like didn’t use this form of incantation. Either they didn’t know about it, or they thought it was primitive. Either way, I was just glad they limited themselves.

The dancing and chanting grew in franticness, culminating in a wave of combined air and infernal Essence. A dark form congregated in front of him, then drifted toward the battle. Hans saw it first.

“Wraith!” he shouted in a light panic. “Enchanted or Inscribed weapons only! Adam, a celestial barrier on me, now!”

Adam began weaving his staff in front of himself, chanting a bit.

Huh, maybe they do use a similar technique… I looked at the Essence around him, but all of the Essence powering this working was coming from Adam. It seemed like a waste to me to just ignore all that loose Essence around yourself! Adam finished just as the wraith joined the battle. A glowing barrier sprang up around Hans, wrapping him in light. The wraith moved at the speed of darkness now that he was in attacking range. Insubstantial claws pinged off of the light, and Hans started retaliating just as fast.

Hans’s daggers were slicing tiny slits into the fabric of darkness the wraith was made of, and blood-like blackness was dripping to the floor. Each time the claws of the wraith touched the light, a mind-bending amalgamation of celestial and infernal colors was released. The colors drew the eye to them, and the mind of the beholder turned toward insanity. This was the light of chaos.

Oddly—at least to the team of adventurers—the Goblins ran as the wraith died. A few stragglers were cut down, but the general consensus was that they didn’t do too badly. The humans and half-human sank to the floor to recover. They were filthy, covered in blood and gore. They tried to figure out why the Goblins had run but decided that it was because the wraith died. They waited another thirty minutes, getting tense as they expected another attack. After an hour, they were getting concerned that something was different.

“Go tell Evan to stop attacking the wall. I’m done for today. That wraith took most of my willpower to defeat,” Hans directed Adam.

“What would have happened if it had been free to attack you?” Dale wondered softly, not sure he wanted an answer.

Hans rolled his arms, stretching a bit as he stood. “They drain you with each attack. They latch on to your Center and pull. They suck in Essence to continue to exist. Even if they die, if they have landed a blow, there is now a hole in your Center that leaks Essence. All of their victims die, and usually fairly quickly. Luckily, Adam is a cleric that is a cut above the rest.”

Adam came back at a run. “Tom’s gone.”

Heh. About time they noticed.

Chapter Twenty

Dale’s group scrambled to get into formation and follow the trail of the long-retreated Goblins. They had Evan filling Tom’s position temporarily, mainly because he was well-armored. Quickly moving through the room, they were easily able to follow the trail of sludge that dripped from Tom. They came upon the large fortified area that was home to the floor Boss and stopped a good distance away.

The walls had patrolling Goblins armed with powerful-looking bows. The doors were wood banded with iron, a far cry from the simple wooden structure the others had at their entrances.

Evan grunted, “Now what?”

Dale shook his head. “I don’t know. We need to get in there. We need to help–” Hans covered Dale’s mouth; he had been getting a bit loud at the end.

“What we need,” he stared into Dale’s eyes, “is to not panic. If he is dead, charging inside in an act of vengeance isn’t worth getting ourselves killed. If he is alive, we need to make sure he stays that way, and that means a plan.”

“First off, how to get in. Now, we could try and scale the walls, being as sneaky as possible. If we can get in there without anyone noticing us, we might be able to…” Hans stopped talking as Dale was shaking his head.

“It won’t work. I’m sorry to say but they already know we are here.” At Dale’s words, the Goblins on the wall stiffened, then gave up the pretense of watchful ignorance, focusing on their location.

“Well piss. Anyone else have a plan?” Hans griped.

Rose thought for a moment. “Why not do what we’ve been doing?”

Hans sighed. “In case you haven’t noticed, we are currently missing our giant, ginger door-knocker.”

“Forget the door.” Rose grinned for the first time since discovering Tom was gone. “Let’s go through the wall.” She hitched her thumb at Evan.

Cal

Dang, these guys are good! I couldn’t blow my cover of neutrality by telling the Goblins what the adventurers were up to, so I was relying on their training and willingness to die repeatedly. That would surely be enough to stop a few D-ranked and a C-ranked… I sighed. My Goblins were going to die.

I glared as the adventurers put their plan in motion. Rose fired an arrow, killing one of the archers on the wall. This drove the other archers into cover, and they began firing wildly at the location the arrow had come from. So much for training and willingness to die. While they were hidden from view, the humans basically waltzed up to the wall and began marking out their plans for a new door. Every time a Goblin tried to get a look, an arrow either impacted them or sailed by their oversized noses. When Evan reared back for a swing, there were three dead Goblins already!

The pickaxe came crashing against the thin wall, blasting open a Dwarf-sized hole. The Goblins started toward the breach in the wall but were driven back as a hail of arrows and throwing knives came through. Evan took the opportunity to smash another section, creating a large hole and actually collapsing the entire section of wall, killing a few Goblins as they either fell into Hans’s blades or as stones rained down. Evan took some damage from the falling rock, but his stout frame and heavy armor made the pain laughable. At least he would need to work some dents out. Nothing like creating a minor inconvenience for someone! Take that! …Yeah!

Hans and Dale rushed into the compound like avenging angels, throwing themselves recklessly at the defenders. Dale had a new fighting style that was upsetting for me to watch. He dodged but so poorly that I was sure he was about to have his blood splatter on the floor. Instead, he clunkily avoided attacks and threw punches that were poorly placed. His blows would have been entirely ineffective if he didn’t have his Inscribed battle gauntlet on. This allowed him to turn weak punches to non-lethal areas into deadly attacks.

Hans was a different story entirely. He was fighting with a rage and speed I had never seen him use before. Actually, he was screaming as he repeatedly stabbed a Goblin.

“Where is he?” StabStabStab. “Where is my student?” StabStabStab. Hans was furious, and when he attacked, his knife entered and exited a body three times so fast that it looked like just a single blow. It appeared that he was no longer holding back, no longer trying to teach the others anything. He never stopped marching toward the center of the fortification, though he was moving at a measured pace instead of sprinting.

An arrow flew at him, but he caught it and whipped it back, treating it like a throwing knife. It hit the bow of the Goblin who had fired it, shattering it and ricocheting into the Mob’s neck.

Did he do that intentionally or was it luck? …Either way, no more arrows at Hans. Mental note there. A warhammer-wielding warrior ran at him, and Hans shot forward and delivered a kick to it. The kick chunked the poor Goblin.

Let me explain, the kick was from his Inscribed boot and blasted the surprised Goblin into three separate chunks of flesh.

<I don’t think we’re gonna win this one,> I mentioned to Dani. She had a different opinion.

“Since he is going all out, way above the level of the Mobs, can I too?” She was hovering near the floor Boss.

<Oh… you want to use that? Go for it, but I’ll warn Dale. It’s only fair. He’ll whine otherwise.>

Dale complained about my statement but was listening intently as he continued to fight. <Dale? Since your teammate is going all out, I’m adjusting the floor Boss accordingly. For future reference, if a huge party of people comes in, or a few overpowered people, I’m going to do my best to kill them. That means lots more Mobs or something like… this.>

Dani had full control of the Boss now and was standing up. At seven feet tall, this Goblin Amazon was at least three times as strong as the other Goblins and would usually carry a warhammer in each hand while wearing standard armor. Right now, we were moving quickly to get ready for a too-strong opponent. I activated a Rune on the throne that the Goblin normally sat on, and her armor crumbled away. A quite expensive way to undress. A stone slid aside, and a large chest shot up from the opening. She opened the chest and pulled on the body-hugging chainmail inside.

A double set of battle gauntlets finished her preparations. These were a bit different than the ones Dale wore, as these had large blades that reached to the massive Goblin’s elbows and extended past her hands. Hans walked into her area right as she finished equipping her weapon, and a throwing dagger punched through her armor and into the muscle on the right side of her abdomen.

Dani roared in pain and turned to face the enraged Hans. She hissed at him in true Mob style, “Die worm!” With that, she activated the Inscriptions on her weapons and armor. The shiny but easy to damage armor—made of pure aluminum—had a column of Essence move through it. It glowed bright silver for a moment before darkening slightly to a silvery-purple. Her weapons did the same, but the right hand darkened further as infernal Essence raced along it. The left-handed blades sprouted fire-Essence-fueled-flames along their edges, and she charged.

Hans had a moment of surprise that almost cost him his life. He threw another dagger at such high speeds that it vibrated the air in its passing. This hit the armor above Dani’s knee and bounced off without a scratch. She kicked her leg forward, adding a bit of a spin as she struck him in the face. His surprise kept him from dodging fully, but his attempt allowed him to keep the bones in his skull from fracturing as he sailed across the room.

Hans had barely regained his footing when Dani was over him, stabbing downward with her flame-coated weapon. Hans weaved away, but the intensity of the flame scorched his skin, causing blisters to form on his neck. He crouched and then pushed upward, lifting Dani off the ground and tossing her to the side with an ease that his size made questionable. While she scrambled to her feet, he attacked with his blades.

StabStabStab.

ClinkClinkClink.

His attacks did scratch her armor but failed to penetrate. She swung at him with her infernal blades, but he crossed his daggers in an ‘X’ and caught her blow with ease. He pushed, throwing her arm upward. Hans reared back and kicked her in the chest with his powerful boot, sending her into the wall. It shattered on impact, and she lay there stunned for a moment as Hans raced over.

“Too strong of armor, huh? Fine!” He stabbed his dagger down into her eye, and she spasmed.

He stood straight, then reached down and retrieved his blade. The fight was over…

<Nope. Made those modular this time.> As he pulled out his dagger, the eye came with it, trailing a severed bundle of nerves.

“Look out, Hans!” Dale screamed, saving his friend’s life as a wave of heat blistered Hans’s back. He had barely escaped by rolling away.

Hans came to his feet several feet away, ready to block, but Dani had crossed her blades and was several paces away. He started toward her when the Essence around her weapons surged. Hans was very skilled; he kicked off the ground and went straight up, driving his daggers into the ceiling and holding on as a wave of life-ending cold rolled in a path away from Dani. She needed a moment to collect herself—that attack took a lot of channeled Essence—a moment Hans didn’t allow. He threw a dagger at the crossed blades, and this time, they were so cold that the impact shattered them.

Now, these blades had Essence moving through them, and as they broke, they momentarily created Runes that shouldn’t have existed. Uncontrolled Essence rushed into them, creating a tiny gravity well that crushed the Goblin Amazon into a small orb. It only lasted a moment, but the ground in all directions had shattered, and the high-density ball of matter crashed to the ground and embedded itself there. I took the opportunity to begin absorbing it—just so the group didn’t get a ball of condensed Mithril.

<Dani? Are you okay?> I hadn’t seen what happened to her, but I wasn’t too worried. She was essentially Essence, and a small thing like gravity shouldn’t be harmful.

“I’m fine!” She was returning to my room. “That was so much fun! I have so much training to do, gah! I can’t believe he won! I had him so far out-armored!”

I was exceedingly relieved, and I had a new Rune to research.

I looked back at the battle, well, at this point it was over, so former battle. Hans was stalking around looking for Tom, but Adam found him first.

“Get over here! It’s bad!” Adam began shouting.

They rushed over to find Tom trussed to a pole over a vat, where the black sludge was still dripping off of him. The vat was collecting the anthracite liquid into a jug, and there were little pieces of material stuck in him that ensured the sludge would continue to come out of him as his Essence tried to purge foreign objects from his body.

“Oh… god.” Rose looked sick. “His arm…”

His arm—or more accurately stump—was poorly tied off, blood draining from what remained. The Goblins had been trying to tear his warhammer away from him, but even with his attention inward, his body had refused to release it. After struggling with the unresisting form, they scratched their heads, shrugged, and used their rusty knives to chop Tom’s arm off just below the shoulder. It was not a clean cut, and they had needed to saw for several minutes, but Tom was finally warhammer-less.

Adam was working on the bleeding stump. “I… I can’t get the wound closed! He is losing too much blood. If I don’t work to replace that, he will die either way!”

Hans grimaced. “I really hope you can’t feel this.” A layer of fire appeared around his hand, and he gripped the open wound. The smell of charring flesh filled the air, and Dale had to struggle not to gag.

Evan’s stomach rumbled as the aroma reached him. He looked around sheepishly as the others glanced his way. “Right, yeah, well. I have Orc blood in me. It’s not like I’m gonna go take a bite of him. Sheesh, bring me in front of the Protectorate.”

“Is he stabilizing?” Hans’s words were sharp, directed at Adam.

“Yes, though that is going to be an ugly scar,” Adam muttered. He paused and looked around. “On the other hand, he is completely fine.”

Rose fixed him with a look. “You are making a pun? Now? Really?”

“Right. Go find the treasure. Take anything not nailed down. Anything that we can sell.” Hans had several odd looks sent his way. “What? Regrowing an arm is stupid expensive—it takes months to get the hand bones correct. He is going to need a lot of money as a down payment. We can do it though. He will be fine, I promise.” Hans patted Tom on his unmoving back. “Welcome to the in-debt group. You’re late to the party!”

With Hans’s words, the group relaxed greatly. Adam released a weak chuckle. “Going to the University in the capital would cost more than an arm if I remember correctly.”

“No joke! Higher education?” Rose responded, finally allowing herself to see the humor in the situation.

“They take an arm and a leg.”

The group started to laugh while Evan looked on in horror.

“You people are pretty… dark.” He wasn’t making eye contact with anyone and was fidgeting with his pickaxe.

Dale responded since that comment had killed the moment. “He’s gonna get his arm back, and he survived. That is the best outcome we could have ever hoped for, far better than we had hoped. We are just trying to mask our pain, Evan. Please don’t think we are uncaring.”

“Ah, I see. Gallows humor.” Evan grinned. “Well, if you need quick money, take that jug. Breakthrough oil from a fire cultivator is explosively flammable and goes for a good price since it is so rare. That should help pay for the work he needs done, at least a bit. Bring it to the alchemist we rescued, and I bet you’ll get an even higher price than normal.”

“Good call!”

They began searching for a treasure chest, and sure enough, they found it in a slightly hidden alcove. The glow potion on it had them all excited, and for a moment after opening it, they were disappointed at the contents. Sure there was a handful of gold coins and a couple small, silvery ingots. But… potions in a chest of this rarity? They felt cheated until Evan took a look and nearly shat himself.

“That’s not silver, you brain-damaged, monster-loving bunny punchers! That’s aluminum!”

Evan was almost drooling as he saw the processed ingots. Then a sick look crossed his face. “For the love of god, don’t sell that here or tell anyone where you got it! This floor will be overrun by Dwarves! They’ll look for ingots like that one by smashing rocks with their pickaxe-density erections if they get wind of the dungeon releasing processed aluminum!”

Rose shuddered. “…Thanks for that visual.”

“It was pretty vivid, wasn’t it?” Hans laughed, picking Tom up and draping him around his neck like a scarf. “Let’s get going—the sooner Tom gets to a safe location to heal, the better.”

Just before they made it out, I whispered in Dale’s ear, <Torture wasn’t my intention. I told them to just kill him, but they wanted that oily stuff. I hope this doesn’t ruin our fun.>

Dale

Dale’s mind buzzed. That was what the dungeon was worried about? That Tom surviving was a reason to dislike the dungeon more than he already did? He shook his head. What an alien mind. He looked at his friend, not unconscious, but not aware of what was happening to him. Tom was pale from blood loss, but luckily, the healing center was right at the top of the stairs.

They stepped into the open and handed Tom over reluctantly. Adam went with him, but the rest were ordered away as the healers got to work. The group trudged through the mounting snow, hurrying toward the river.

There had been an unexpected benefit of the Dwarves setting up shop in town.

While the Dwarves had received space for the walls, a barracks, and an orphanage for free, they had purchased the rights to an area along the river. Now, normally, Dale refused any offers to purchase land next to the river, as it would be too easy for a business to cut off access to the only water source in the area. But the Dwarves… they set up a bathhouse! It was expensive to use but certainly worth it to stay clean. At least to Dale’s group. Hygiene was becoming an issue, and Dale was thinking about providing funds from the city to buy the bathhouse and make it a public service.

They soaked in their respective areas, enjoying the feeling of warmth after the bitter cold. Their armor and clothes were being cleaned at the same time, for an additional fee, of course.

They were just finishing, pulling on their clothes when a courier ran up to them.

“Lord Dale?” the young man said questioningly.

Hans jumped in, “Careful there, youngster. Technically, you need to address him by his highest rank. In this case, it would be “Your Grace” as Dale is a Duke. He doesn’t care, but other Nobles tend to be a bit jumpy about that sort of thing.”

Dale glared at his friend. Conversely, the courier was nodding seriously.

“I’ll spread the word. I’ll ask the Messengers’ Guild to give us some training in court etiquette. At least that explains what happened to poor Geoff.” He looked at Dale. “Your Grace, I was asked to inform you that your friend is stable and still undergoing the breakthrough process. He will be there from three days to a week, depending on his willpower.”

Dale nodded and flipped him a coin. The courier bowed slightly and started to leave, then saw that the coin was gold. His eyes widened, and he looked back, but Dale nodded and made a ‘shush’ motion, finger on lips. He got a deep bow in return before the man returned to work.

“You are going to spoil them.” Hans poked his friend in the side.

Dale allowed a conniving look to cross his face. “Who will they go to first with important news—the generous and noble Dale or the spoiled Lord who makes unknowable things happen to their friend Geoff?”

Hans approvingly laughed. “You are getting good at this politics thing. What do you want to do for the next few days? Find a replacement teammate or take a vacation?”

“How about we sell the ingots and find a flesh Mage to fix Tom? Oh, and tell Father Richard about those weapons. How much is it going to cost to fix up Tom, if you can estimate for me?”

“They always charge half up front, so somewhere between ten to fifteen platinum.” Hans was fixated on the smell of roasted meat coming from the Pleasure House.

“What? A thousand to fifteen hundred gold is half of what they’ll charge?” Dale was aghast.

Hans had an odd look on his face. “Dale, we made more than triple that on this single dungeon run. Before taxes of course. Stop thinking about money as a long-term… thing. You are going to be around long enough that you will eventually amass a huge amount of money.”

“See, you say that,” Dale rounded on his friend, “but aren’t you in your sixties and in debt to a flesh Mage?”

“As soon as we sell off the stuff from this run, I won’t be. Even after paying for Tom’s arm,” Hans countered easily. “To change the subject, what was the deal with that Boss? That thing nearly killed me.”

“Hrumph.” Dale thought about how to answer without giving away too much information. “I think it was a reaction to you going all out like that. Did you see how it tossed away its old armor and weapons as you went all furious and stabby?”

“A dungeon that scales its difficulty to the people fighting? Doubtful.” Hans had a faraway look.

“I wouldn’t go that far. For instance, we stay out of floor four because we’d die very painfully, but that was certainly a reaction to you,” Dale promised. He glanced over his shoulder after hearing a noise, spotting Minya storming toward them. “Incoming.”

“Why are you ignoring me, Dale?” Minya growled as she stomped toward them.

“Because I think that your ideas are insane?” Dale answered frankly.

Minya stopped, throwing up her arms. “Wow.”

“Yeah, that was harsh, Dale,” Hans admonished him. He turned toward Minya. “Hello, my name is Hans. Before you ask, yes, I am single.”

“Not interested. Dale, you know as well as I do that this dungeon is different; it needs special care, or things are going to go very bad, very fast. You need to put me on the council,” Minya demanded, daring him to argue.

Dale took the dare.

“It isn’t going to happen. Also, if you don’t stop asking people to let themselves be sacrificed to the dungeon, I’m going to bring you up on charges for attempted murder.” Dale caught the flicker of shock on her face. “Yeah, I heard about that and the cult you’re starting. If I hear about you starting trouble, I will either banish you or put you in jail. You could be the first person to make it to a cell that wasn’t drunk!”

The others usually just died.

“You’re making a mistake, Dale,” Minya promised darkly. “It isn’t me you are going to have to worry about. I won’t do anything that could get me kicked out. You don’t want to talk? Fine, but when this city starts burning, come to me. I’ll happily save you all, no matter how crazy you think I am.” She stormed off, the snow melting out of her way.

“What a woman,” Hans and another voice breathed at the same time. Hans looked over at the other speaker, glaring. “Who are you?”

Dale looked over to see a ruggedly handsome man dressed in completely unsuitable, bright colored, fluttering clothes.

“My name, good sir, is Brakker.” He swept his feathered hat off, bowing deeply. He righted himself, pulling the hat back on as a stiff breeze blew snow over the exposed area. “Good god, you are all insane living here.”

“How can we be of service?” Dale asked to be polite, continuing his trek toward lunch.

“Since you ask…”

Dale groaned at these words from Brakker. “I am a humble Bard, seeking my fortune in these frozen wastes. More pressingly, I am looking for a place to survive the winter. I am told you two may hold some sway over the proprietor of this fine dining establishment?”

“Just… sure. Come on, we’ll introduce you to Madam Chandra.”

Dale was soon rid of the man, but as they started lunch, musical notes began floating into the room.

“More weirdos.”

“Nah, Bards are cool,” Hans told him around a full mouth. “Give it a month, and he’ll be the most popular man in the city. Good job getting him on your good side. I’d advise you to keep him there. Unless you want unflattering songs about you to be drifting around.”

Rose perked up; she had joined them recently. “Right, don’t you have some songs out there?”

“No,” Hans asserted firmly. “We’re going to the capital for a few days, wanna join us?”

“Sure. Looking for a buyer?”

“Mmhm.”

They left for the portal, planning on being back in three days, the earliest that Tom might wake up.

Chapter Twenty-one

<I think it is ready.> I was looking at the dual gates in my test room. They were as similar as I could make them, actually grown as a single unit and then separated into two distinct items. There were esoteric Inscriptions spanning the entirety of the archways, mirrored perfectly from one to the other. Along these inscriptions were embedded Cores for storing Essence, behind which were hidden Runes for Essence gathering.

“Well don’t keep me waiting! Do it!” Dani was watching raptly, ready to either cheer our success… or run like a maniac upon failure.

I activated the Runes at the base of each arch, allowing them to start accumulating Essence. Now it was a waiting game. I had designed these arches to power up slowly, filling the cores with a minimum amount of Essence before allowing the next Rune in the series to activate. This way, I could monitor the progress and halt it if there were an error in the Runescript. Also, it would allow the two arches to activate simultaneously, which I felt was important.

“Is it going?” Dani impatiently flew in a circle.

<Yes, but it’ll take a while to gather Essence.> I paused a moment. <Didn’t we talk about this earlier?>

“You mumbled a few things under your breath when I asked you questions about it. Does that count?” she replied on just this side of civility.

I felt a bit sheepish. <I get a bit… focused.>

“A bit? Okay, and a two-mile-wide meteor tends to kill off a ‘bit’ of life upon impact,” she teased me.

<Right, wait, so a meteor is a chunk of stone or metal that drops out of the sky really fast, correct?>

“Just let me make fun of you without having to explain myself!”

<Ugh, fine. Don’t satisfy my curiosity. Well, I’ve been pumping extra Essence into the room there, so it is being collected much faster than it normally would. If you want to watch, it is about to activate,> I informed my grouchy best friend.

She looked over at the arch as the final Rune activated, entranced by the interplay of Essence as it weaved together from the center of each Rune, traveling into the exact midpoint of the air in the archways. I should note, there were Cores on the frame that were specifically designed to absorb all of the corruption from the Essence as it was gathered. That meant that the Essence reaching outward now was as pure as I could possibly make it, so it looked like slow-moving lightning. It connected, branched, wove and unwove itself through all the other strands of Essence until an effect began to make itself noticeable.

A hole began forming, quickly and silently expanding. I was watching how Essence around the arches was reacting, preparing to stop the process if there was an adverse reaction. The portal was now open and looked like a flat soap-bubble. From one side I was able to look through the portal and see out the other, while from the back, there was only a slow-moving swirl of colors. The colors confused me until I realized that it was only the interplay of purified Essence with the loose Essence in the room. It didn’t seem to be affecting the stability of the portal, so I saw no reason to try messing with it.

“It’s beautiful, Cal. You create the coolest things. It is so quiet too! The one outside always hums and sounds vaguely threatening.” Dani was debating on getting close or not. “Is it safe?”

<Let’s find out.>

I created a rabbit in the room and directed it to walk through the light.

Splatter.

<...No.>

“What just happened?” Dani demanded, dodging falling chunks of rabbit meat.

<I’m hoping that the issue is that it entered from the rear of the arch. Let’s try making it go through the front,> I muttered as I was creating another test bunny.

“You are a cruel being.”

<Nah.>

The bunny hopped to the front of the arch, squirming a bit to avoid puddles of blood. It really didn’t want to go into the light. I gave it a little mental push. It stepped in, vanishing a bit at a time, reappearing behind itself through the other arch. Success!!

“You actually did it!” Dani whooped!

<Yes! This is so—wait a second. What do you mean, ‘actually’?>

“Is it still stable?” she skillfully avoided the question.

<Hmm. Yes, but it is sucking up Essence at a prodigious rate. I need to find a way to remedy that, or it won’t be a useful portal. Also, I want to replace the stairwells with these wherever possible. Then people can teleport around the dungeon, and there is a small chance of them failing to use this correctly and exploding!> I liked portals!

“Always thinking ahead.” Dani morphed into an eye and rolled herself. “How about this? Can you make portal ‘keys’? As in, when they make it to a portal, they have to have a specific item in order to get to the next floor?”

<I could do that.> I paused. <Actually…>

“Yes?”

<I could take that a step further. What do you think the odds are of a group like Dale’s dying on the first floor?> I rhetorically asked her.

“Pretty low? Unless they come in bound and gagged?” Dani remembered a situation Dale had been in recently.

<Right, so why make them go through that early area? If they can make it to a level once, it is pretty likely they can do it again. How about I make an attuned key that allows them to return to whatever level they like? That way there would be a better chance of them going to harder levels right away, which means a higher chance of them failing to survive?>

My argument made sense to Dani, so she agreed that I could do it. The hard part was going to be altering the structure of the portal so that it remained inactive and charging while accepting incoming key requests via proximity. I explained this to Dani, much to her disgust.

“Just make things happen and let me explain it away as ‘magic’, would you?” She was unbelievably uninterested in the technical details.

I made the adjustments, creating a single, long archway which I split into twenty arches. I wanted two arches per level—at the start and after the Boss. I kept a few as spares, in case of future expansion. I added all the Inscriptions and Cores to the arches and let them sit for a few hours to accumulate all of the Essence needed.

The keys were an interesting artifact. I decided to create them as a short, modular chain. At the end of the chain was a chunk of gemstone with a tiny Core buried in the center. When a gemstone was collected from a Boss in the dungeon, it could be added to the chain. This would grant access to that level directly when the correct gem was touched as the holder walked through the portal. To that end, I altered the first floor a little bit. It had a clear quartz ‘window’ in it that allowed viewing into the second floor Boss Room and was directly below the Inscribed celestial quartz. I replaced the clear quartz with a clear pane of fluorite and began filling it with water corruption after adding a few Runes.

Now, I wanted to make sure my previous efforts weren’t wasted, so I made a clear keygem that would exit at the top of the stairwell and into the church area above. The first floor would be accessed via a topaz keygem—from inside the dungeon of course—the second floor via a gem of fluorite, the third floor with an emerald, and the fourth floor with a ruby. I made sure that the viewing panes reflected these changes, though it meant removing large sheets of minerals. I wanted to have my own stylistic theme, and no one could tell me ‘no’! Okay, Dani could… but if she didn’t know about it, she couldn’t stop me.

Returning to the explanation of my portal setup, I only allowed incoming portals to connect to the start of each level; I wouldn’t want someone taking a Boss by surprise. I thought about making the chain as a bound item but decided against it. After all, if someone too weak stole it and entered the dungeon, they would be almost assured to die. A too-strong person wouldn’t be bothered by the first levels at all, so it felt like a logical wash to me. The next step was testing. I spaced the arches out and brought a Goblin in to test them for me. I’d have used rabbits, but they lack opposable thumbs.

I wondered if I could fix that...? No, no, focus!

I was glad that I had spaced them out; most of them worked just fine, but two had a slight variation in the Runescript. One of them exploded, and I lost a Goblin. I cleaned up the room before bringing in a new one. When I found the next failure, I wasn’t even aware of it for a moment because the Goblin simply never reappeared in the second portal. I waited, but it seemed that this arch had sent the Goblin… elsewhere. I didn’t know where, and I decided not to try and find out. I let that one stay on after deactivating the Essence accumulators, and it eventually was just pretty stone again. I reabsorbed it, then began moving the arches throughout the dungeon.

I was sure that they would be a conversation starter in the morning.

Dale

“Thank you for coming on such short notice, sir,” Dale respectfully said to the flesh Mage entering the bitter cold of Mountaindale. They had just stepped through the portal and were hurrying toward the church.

The flesh Mage nodded, a regal motion that caused a flutter of jealousy to race through Dale. The man had obviously worked on his own body and used himself as an advertisement. He was the most symmetrical person Dale had ever seen. He was almost disturbingly handsome, with chiseled muscles and a powerful frame. His voice was deep and mellow; Dale had no doubt that this was the most charismatic man that he had ever talked to. It was actually intimidating on a deep level.

“Thank you for your advance payment. I hope that you understand my reluctance to come here, and I thank you for allowing me to bring along a guard,” the Mage uttered in a honeyed tone.

“Why not?” Hans tried to say brightly. “It only costs us an extra gold per week.”

“Exactly.” the Mage agreed, not noticing the sarcasm. “I assure you, Your Grace, Nez is worth every copper.”

The black-haired, blue-eyed swordsman walking ahead of them didn’t bother to join the conversation. His gaze was flickering between the people walking around.

He vanished suddenly, only a zap and flash of light allowing the group to follow his progress after a moment. He was next to a tent, sword against the throat of a Dark Elf. He uttered his first words since they had met him.

“Assassins. Instructions?”

“Hold!” Dale cried out before the Mage could speak. “The Dark Elves are here by my request and are acting as the policing force for this city. Hurting him would be a very bad idea.”

Ru’Nez the Blade nodded, stepping away from the Elf and sheathing his sword. “My apologies. Normally, beings that are stereotypically assassins are something that a host would mention to others… before bringing them into his territory.”

The Elf looked at the swordsman and nodded, vanishing from sight again.

Dale winced at the intended rebuke. “Sorry about that.”

The Mage waved a hand to show that there was no harm done. “He is just proving his worth again. He does that. Where is the patient?”

“Ah. This way.” They moved into the chapel, finding Tom propped up in a ring of intense fire.

The Mage looked at him critically. “He is currently undergoing breakthrough? I’m not going to work in that fire. We’ll have to wait until he is aware. I do charge by the day…”

Dale agreed with the flesh sculptor, as it was hard to argue. They found an empty room for the Mage, and Dale decided to leave him there and walk around to see the improvements in the area. He was almost to the exit when two people carrying a litter with a bleeding man ran in. Dale almost ignored this but realized that injuries from the dungeon usually resulted in people coming up the stairs, directly into the church. He followed them, waiting for their explanation.

“Sir, we found him like this out on t’mountain.” The speaker was a local, someone who had lived on the mountain their whole life. He took off his hat and was holding it in his hands—fidgeting—while he talked to Dale. “He tol’ us that his horse ‘ad died, and he were from some village down south.” He paused, chewing on a fingernail. “They’s been attacked, some kinda human-lookin’ monsters. ‘Parently, them same monsters been follerin’ the river, killin’ everone that’s in they’s way.” A small coughing fit. “He’s been trying to warn people, but he’s been barely ahead of ‘em this whole time. I think he lost ‘em at the bottom o’ t’mountain, where the river waterfalls down.”

The other local simply nodded along, saying ‘yup’ every once in a while. Dale thanked them, told them to go get some food on his credit, and went off to gather the council. It took nearly an hour for the members to gather. Apparently, they took less notice of messengers coming to talk to them than they did Dale.

Go figure.

Dale wasted no time. As soon as they were gathered, he launched into an explanation of the situation. Unfortunately, they treated the problem with much less care than Dale desired.

“Dale,” Amber countered soothingly, “you can’t fly into a panic every time some random peasant thinks there are monsters after them. There are monsters all over the place in this world.” She chuckled at the look Dale gave her. “What? If there weren’t, don’t you think the Bashers would have garnered more attention? Mutated, horned rabbits that attack people?”

“We don’t know if this is real, and it is a second-hand account as it is. We need to wait until we have more information,” Frank condescendingly stated. “Let’s send out some trackers on horses. It’ll be a few days before we know anything for certain.”

They left, leaving Dale with a growing pit in his stomach. They were correct, but people living in the Phantom Mountains weren’t prone to flights of fancy. He heard Madam Chandra talking about an unrelated topic as they walked away, proving that they were treating this far too lightly.

Chandra was discussing with Frank, “But if I buy enough of them, I can change the name to the Chantom Mountains!”

“People would always spell or pronounce them wrong! They’d write it with an ‘S’ as the Shantom…” Frank’s voice faded into the distance.

Dale decided to go check on the fortifications. He walked to the quartz-flecked new walls, feeling relief as he got closer and they blocked the wind. The walls were not a ring around the city but simply walls that blocked the paths needed for travel. The Dwarves were relying quite a bit on the natural fortification of sheer cliff face to block unwanted travelers. A section of stone was rising slowly from the ground, doubling in height by the time he arrived.

“Hail the walls!” Dale shouted, feeling better after the exercise he had gotten from his short jog to the wall.

“Hello there!” Beor shouted back, pausing from overseeing the work. “What brings you all the way out here? There aren’t any new ways into the dungeon since that first one.”

“What? What?”

“Don’t worry about it, we sealed it up.”

“…Right. Well, we got a report about a gathering of monsters at the base of the mountain, and I just wanted to see how the walls were coming.” Dale tried to ignore the previous comments.

“Monsters, eh?” He pulled on his beard. “This beauty’ll stop just about anything, and we’re working in Runes so that it’ll ignore other earth Mages. We should have this last section done this evening if we hurry a bit. Now, we won’t be staying here, so you need to post guards or things’ll just swarm over it.”

Dale tried to think about who would be willing to watch the walls. “Crap, there is no one.”

“Eh?”

“Nothing, I just need to find a way to hire on guards…” Dale thanked the Dwarf and hurried back to the main areas.

He found the city administrator after asking directions a few times and worked out a plan of action with the harried man. They would have guards by tomorrow, but they would mainly be lookouts, not fighters that could actually defend the wall. That would take much longer to accomplish, but Dale was still relieved that they would at least have advanced warning if something were coming. He was walking back to the chapel when Adam came running out.

“There you are! Hurry, he’s waking up!”

Adam turned back and ran, Dale hurrying behind him. They walked into the stiflingly hot room just as Tom gave a great shudder and took a deep breath. He opened his eyes, and a smile crossed his face. The smile turned to a frown and then a yell of pain and rage.

“Ye gods! I knew that breakthrough was painful, but this just seems excessive!” He groaned, trying to rub at his arm. He paused, a look of horror crossing his face. “My arm?” Tom roared. “What foul deeds have been done to me in my absence? Was I neutered as well?”

Rose had a startled look on her face. “We… didn’t check?”

“I’m not being literal! Get thyself away from my smallclothes, you!” Tom barked at a cleric that was reaching a bit too low.

“Tom!” Dale exclaimed loudly, demanding attention. “This happened in the dungeon! The Goblins ambushed us and took you, cutting off your arm as they tried to get your warhammer.”

Tom calmed down as Dale talked, a reaction to having to listen to orders on a daily basis. He looked down. “I cannot fight as I am. I am sitting, and my balance is off, nearly toppling me. The joy I felt at achieving my breakthrough has fled, and all I feel is shame.”

“Oh relax, you tight-ass,” Hans joined the conversation in his usual fashion. “All this means is that we need to do some specialized training. At the end of it you are still going to get your arm back, so don’t start wallowing. Plus, you just extended your natural lifespan by a handful of decades, so even if you weren’t getting your arm back, giving up wouldn’t be an option.”

Tom’s face rose and fell and rose again, emotions playing across his features as Hans berated him into listening and thinking of the situation from a different standpoint. He stood and thanked Hans, moving to hug him.

“Back!” Hans dodged the clumsy attempt at an embrace. “I don’t do half-hugs, sorry.”

Tom looked stricken, then gave a wet chuckle. “You are such a terrible person.”

“I know, but it works for me.” Hans laughed and slapped Tom lightly on the face. “Let’s go meet the Mage who is going to be giving you a new arm.”

Chapter Twenty-two

“Well, it is pretty. Sell it as a bauble?”

If I had hands, I would slap these stupid adventurers. They only saw the profit and never the usefulness or true beauty in an object.

The person asking the question scratched himself and sniffed his fingers, making Dani cringe.

“I mean, a jewel on a chain? It’s not even a bracelet? Is it supposed to be earrings of some kind?”

“Nah. There’s only one. Earrings come in pairs.”

Did I need to make something blaze with Essence in order for people to treat it as anything other than a shiny stone? I released a frustrated noise; no one had used the portal system yet. A bunch of people had found the stones, and a few people had even found down to the third floor’s keys! I noticed that someone was now wearing a bunch of them as a necklace. I had made them modular so you could connect them together, but I still had to sigh when I saw the topaz, fluorite, emerald pattern repeated over and over as simple jewelry.

The archways on the floors had been noticed, but after an initial assessment, they had been ignored. After it was found that the Cores couldn’t be pried off, the arches were largely forgotten. It was days before Dale’s group came back, and I was surprised at how much I had missed a semi-intelligent group of people being here regularly. They were talking about something, but I was looking at Tom. He had an odd chunk of armor on, and it took me a moment to realize that someone had strapped a buckler on to him where his arm had been. I snorted with laughter at the odd sight and listened to what they were saying.

“New jobs, anyone?” Dale was all business today.

“Yup, someone felt that Glitterflit pelt and decided that they must have an entire wardrobe of them. It is a huge offer of money. Apparently, they were told how difficult it is to get that type,” Rose informed the group.

Hans shrugged. “I don’t know. I kinda have a soft spot for those little guys.”

“The Spotters are asking for an entire Goblin. They want to determine the differences between them and their non-dungeon counterpart,” Adam announced. “Double pay if it is alive.”

“Too much effort for a live one. We’ll see how it goes otherwise.”

“Evan wants us to escort him down to the third floor again.”

Dale paused. “That triples how long we stay in here; does anyone have plans after?” A few shrugs were his answer. “Guard duty is a go then, make sure he visited either the alchemist or apothecary. If we learned anything last time, it is to not let him come down here without a night vision potion.”

Tom made a noise and raised the shield a bit. “I think you and I learned different things during our last dungeon run.”

This got a few laughs from the group.

“Right, well, here comes Evan. Now, everyone ready to go?”

After checking their supplies, the group of six walked deeper into the dungeon.

<It’s been a few days, Dale. How’re things?> I nonchalantly asked the team leader.

Dale’s movements gave nothing away. His eyes stayed focused and roving, looking for danger. “It is my turn to ask questions, and I am going to save it forever so that you can’t screw me over again.”

Hans suddenly laughed. “Look! Tom, you’re in the statues!” I had replaced the statue of the crazy Elf and bunnies with one of dozens of small Goblin arms holding up a single, larger arm.

“That is not funny. Who takes the time to make these odd statues?” Tom grumbled, looking a bit sick as he wriggled his stump.

Their questions ended as combat began. They fought through the first floor with ease, finding six sets of the topaz keygems in the Boss Room’s chest. Dale looked at the gem intently, muttering, “What the heck is this?”

<You know, I’m glad you asked, Dale.>

“Son of a shit.”

Hans glanced at Dale. “You okay there?” Dale just nodded.

<That is what I call a ‘keygem’. I created a stable portal system between the floors. You just walk up to the archway, touch the keygem, and the portal will activate for whoever has a keygem. If someone without a keygem walks into the portal, nothing happens… but I can’t guarantee that it won’t open as someone else walks in, which could be messy.> I paused to let him imagine things. <Messy, like they are suddenly very ‘pieceful’. Piece of him over here, piece of him over there.>

“You know what, Cal? I’m not even mad. That is actually really useful information,” Dale thought at me, laughing as I squirmed. I preferred making him needlessly mad. He walked over to the archway, and it suddenly blazed with light. He looked through it and saw the startled faces of a few miners glancing his way. Dale waved and stepped back, explaining to his team what the item was.

Hans was nearly dancing. “The Portal Guild is going to be having kittens over this! They’ve had a monopoly on human portal travel for a century! Listen to how quiet this portal is too! And so stable!”

I felt like blushing from all the praise.

“The Runes on here, they look like they shouldn’t work together at all—like they should just blow up and kill us all—but it is actually working! Miracle?”

<He’d better go back to the compliments; that sounds dangerously close to an insult…>

Dale

The group pressed on, eventually returning to the third floor. They each had two gems on their chains, signifying that they were able to move directly to the second floor. Now they were discussing their options. Should they press on to the Boss directly and get the floor keygem, or should they mine for a while first? They decided that the best option for them at this time was to attack, getting the third-floor keygem.

They followed the curving room, bypassing the honeycomb-like fortifications and the glaring archers therein, dodging arrows when they got a bit too close. The grand door of the Boss’s area loomed in the distance. It was illuminated by the light pouring down through the huge pane of emerald set in the ceiling, creating a sinister environment. Adam shivered as he looked upon the gate, and the others clearly had mixed feelings. Tom glared at the area; he only knew what had happened from stories, but this was where he had lost his arm.

“You’re sure that the reason the Goblin Boss was so powerful was that I was going all out?” Hans glanced at Dale, waiting for confirmation.

“Ninety-five percent,” Dale responded agreeably.

“Does that mean ‘yes’?” Hans raised his eyebrow.

Dale had forgotten that Dwarven mathematics was not common knowledge. “Err. Yeah, it means I am almost positive.”

Tom nodded gravely. “It is good to be a positive person.” The group went silent, Tom staring ahead and rubbing his chin. “How do we get in?”

Rose shrugged. “Go through the wall again?”

“No, we may not always have Evan with us. We should practice other tactics.” Dale looked for structural weaknesses or obvious flaws.

Unsurprisingly, it was Hans, the ex-assassin, who came up with the plan.

“If we were to go to that portion of the wall where it connects near the natural curve of the cave, we could press our back to the cave and ‘walk’ up the wall,” Hans announced thoughtfully.

“How would that even work?” Adam’s eyes were filled with disbelief.

Hans walked over to the wall, casually dodging an arrow that sailed his way. Rose sniped the attacking Goblin while Hans demonstrated the technique.

“Put your back like this… and push with your legs.” He started walking up the wall horizontally, much to the amazement of the others.

Adam watched, trying to memorize the movements. “I would never have dreamed that this was possible.”

“Neither do most guards. Or the Nobles they are supposed to be guarding,” Hans mentioned, halfway up the wall. He dropped back down to the ground, landing softly.

“I am certain that is harder than you made it look,” Tom commented.

Evan nodded along with the statement.

“You want to try something difficult? Do this.” Hans jumped from a standstill, pushing off the wall, then the cave, over and over until he was standing on the wall. “It’s only about eight feet tall, so I guess it isn’t too hard.”

“You are ridiculous.” Rose chuckled, reaching into her bag. “I thought ahead! I bought this rope and grapple yesterday.”

Hans made a face at her. “Boo! Cheater!”

“Doing something in an intelligent manner is not ‘cheating’,” Rose blandly replied to Hans, swinging the rope and connecting it on the first throw.

Again, the wall was only eight feet tall; it wasn’t too hard to launch it up to the top. They climbed the wall one at a time. Rose remained on the lookout for more archers and so went last.

Standing on top of the wall looking down, they could see the Goblins moving into defensive formations. The Goblin Boss… Queen? Amazon? Amazon. Was standing up and lifting twin warhammers to taunt the group in.

“Let’s stay up here.” Evan chuckled nervously.

Dale paused from his downward descent. “You know, why not? It’s not like we need to have a knock-down, life-or-death battle every time, right? Rose, can you turn them into pincushions? Hans, what’s the range for your throwing daggers?”

The whole group was a tiny bit thrown off, but Dale made perfect sense. Rose shrugged and started sniping the Goblins who were yelling obscenities and scrambling to avoid arrows. A knife thunked into the Goblin Boss’s neck, severing the arteries. She roared, stumbling around for a minute before slumping to the ground. The group descended, killing the Goblins that had managed to survive the brief scuffle.

“This just seems… wrong somehow,” Tom rumbled as he rammed a Goblin with his shield, finishing it with a hammer blow from his ingot hammer.

Dale patted him on the back. “I think that we have gotten so used to constantly fighting that we forgot our main goals. We are here to cultivate and gain money or items. We aren’t actually here to fight, that is just usually, you know, how it goes.”

They looked around for items, scavenging the weapons that hadn’t vanished before they got to them. They found the treasure chest under a partially collapsed section of wall, pulling out coins, a few Inscribed items, and a keygem each for the floor.

“Looks like we got what we came for. Ready to test the portal system?” Dale looked around with a goofy grin.

“Are we sure we won’t just explode when we go in it?” Adam questioned, making the grin drop from Dale’s face.

“No… “

Evan stood forward. “I’ll test it. You’d be coming here for my benefit anyway, else you’d just fight floor-by-floor as usual.”

Before anyone could nay-say him, he stepped forward holding the topaz keygem. He entered the portal and exited on to the first floor, much to Dale’s relief and a series of miners’ amazement. The entire group tumbled through the portal, blinking owlishly in the sudden bright light.

“I’m gonna send a runner to explain this to the Guild, then we go back in?” Dale looked around to several nods of acknowledgment.

Rose coughed. “I’m going to run to the latrine…”

This spurred a whole host of other minor things they wanted to do before delving back in, so it took about half an hour before they all reconvened.

“You know,” Dale thought aloud, stepping through the portal, “this isn’t making me sick. Going through the big portal outside always makes me nauseous.”

“Could be any number of reasons.” Hans leaned against the wall. “A difference of perspective moving through, like going from facing south to east suddenly. Could be a fluctuation in gravity, going from a low to high-pressure zone. Or it could simply be that the portals aren’t all that great out there. They found a design that worked and never tried to improve on it, maybe.”

They moved into a honeycomb fort and killed the guards, ending the fight with only minimal injuries. Feeling quite pleased with themselves, they settled down and ate a picnic lunch that Adam pulled out of his bag while Evan began mining. They cultivated for hours, staying in the dungeon far longer than they normally did. A few groups had found them, to their great surprise. They would run in yelling war cries, only to be stopped by a lazy wave and a ‘hey there’ from Hans.

They finally left, exiting the portal at the entrance to the floor, not bothering with the Boss a second time. They were cheerfully selling their wares and ore to Tyler when a courier ran into the tent at breakneck speed.

“Mr. Tyler, the council… um. Your Grace, we have been looking for you as well.” Dale nodded, motioning for the lad to continue. “The council is having an emergency meeting. They need you both as soon as possible.”

“The church?” Dale asked, moving to the door.

A head shake. “The Guild tent, sir.”

“Let’s go, everyone. I’m sure you’ll want to hear about whatever this is, and I hate re-telling stories.” Dale motioned them all to follow; they took off at a jog.

Entering the Guild tent, they could hear concerned muttering coming from the war room. Dale threw open the flap, marching inside.

“What’s happening?” He looked around, noting an absence. “Has Father Richard been informed of this meeting?”

Frank responded grimly, “He is the reason for the meeting. His quick reactions saved us, but he may well pay with his life.”

“…Explain.”

“There was a person brought in, the one who collapsed. He had been injured by whatever was coming this way. That man… he had some kind of disease. Soon after treatment, he collapsed into a death-like state. Growths appeared on his body, and then... he woke up. He went mad, attacking anyone nearby. It was horrible.”

“A disease? That’s what we are here for?” Amber interrupted, scoffing. “At the earliest stages of the B-ranks, we are immune to disease.”

“Not. This. One,” Frank ground out. “Listen, when that man woke up, he was not right in the mind. He flew into a mad rage, attacking anyone who came near. He used any weapon he could get his hands on but was not shy about using tooth and nail. Father Richard captured him, obviously suffering no physical injury. This did not go… well.” Frank swallowed, voice hoarse. “When he no longer had a chance to escape, he… the sick man… he ruptured his Center.”

“Oh god.” Chandra’s hands went to her throat.

“Father Richard placed the building under Celestial quarantine instantly. You see, he survived the after-effect, but the man seemed to release some kind of dust or possibly seeds of some kind. They settled on every surface, and many of the people still trapped in there are showing symptoms that the man came in with.”

“Could it be necromancers?” Brianna interjected. “Who has the means to do this?”

“Wait, please back up. What do you mean that a man ruptured his Center?” Dale commanded the group’s attention.

“It is a forbidden suicide attack. That is, it is forbidden to teach, but obviously, it is hard to punish those who use it.” Hans growled grimly, the council showing surprise at his knowledge of secret lore.

“The person using it shatters their Chi spiral, and all the Essence contained in their body leaves in a single instant. It is an attack powered not only by the refined Essence but also by any corruption they have in them. Fire cultivator? Crack the Center, and you have a fireball powerful enough to melt Mithril. If a Mage were to use the technique, it would have an effect similar to a volcano erupting.”

“Correct,” Frank agreed, continuing his assessment. “We do not think this is related to the rumors of necromancers. The Spotters have their own theories.”

A squirrely man stood up. “Thank you for the introduction. Father Richard brought an infected person close to his barrier so we could do our job. The growths forming on this man have been seen before, but at that time, they were a mere curiosity. We saw no reason for it to remain here, as the person the growths were found on was dead when she was brought to us. We… we sent the corpse via portal to… to Spotterton,” he finished brokenly, stifling a sob.

He took a moment to regain his composure. “The symptoms described are the same as what was reported, and the growths are becoming more prominent and recognizable. There is no mistake. They are a variant of the mushrooms from the dungeon. Specifically, the Glade monster.

“No,” Dale whispered in horror.

The Spotter nodded grimly. “It is the only explanation. We have been hearing reports of entire towns being killed off. Anyone dead was left where they landed, rotting away. We now think that anyone who survived was infected and joined the horde. It’s madness. The victims are not rational—all they want to do is either kill or infect others.”

“That can’t be all! They have to have some goal, some destination!” Amber smacked her palm on the table, cracking it down the center.

The Spotter hesitated. “They have been following the river. The river exits from here, and lower down the mountain, it connects to another river that—we think—is coming out of the dungeon. It could be that they are attempting to re-enter the dungeon.”

“Could we just… let them?” Brianna silenced the room with her question.

Tyler spoke up for one of the first times ever at a council meeting. “I don’t think that would be wise. We’d need to let them into the town—the dungeon is almost at the center. If there were anyone around, I’m sure they would be attacked. Are we sure that is what they are after? If not, this place becomes inhabited by contagious creatures. If re-entering is their goal, what happens when the dungeon begins to create a copy of these things? I’ve heard stories of the Distortion Cat that broke in. Yes, it was defeated, but within days, there were Cat variant Mobs in the dungeon.”

“Good god,” Frank whispered. “I hadn’t thought of that.”

“It’s already from the dungeon, isn’t it?” Brianna scoffed. “It knows how to make the disease!”

The Spotter gave a half-hearted nod. “Yes, but… this version is mature, fully developed. It would—potentially—be a disaster if the dungeon began to replicate this.”

“What do we do?” Tyler broke the silence that followed the Spotter’s words.

“There may not be a problem coming our way, so we need to send messages to the Kingdom and the nearest towns. If they do come for us… we need to eradicate them,” Dale grimly announced. “Close everything, all businesses and leisure activities. We need to gather everyone and make an announcement.”

An hour later, Dale walked to a platform with the other members of the council. There was an agitated, muttering crowd that grew slowly larger as people exited the dungeon or filed in from other activities. Dale walked to the hastily erected podium and began to speak.

“Hello, everyone.” As he spoke, the roughly three thousand people in the area quieted down to listen. There were only about seven hundred people who fought in the dungeon; the rest were traders, merchants, cooks, waiters, or any other number of support staff. “We have a serious problem.”

“You’re droppin’ the tax? About time!” someone called out, making a low rumble of laughter roll through the crowd.

“No.” Dale’s frank answer and serious tone stopped the chuckles. “It is possible that we are going to be coming under attack within a few days.” A rumble of a different sort sounded. “There are—what we are estimating to be—a few thousand infected people on their way here. Violent, vicious, extremely dangerous, and contagious people.”

“What do they have? Plague?”

Dale answered this question since it was heard over all the others. “They have a disease of a mystical nature. It originated here, from this dungeon.”

He paused, gathering air in his lungs to continue his proclamation.

“We are calling it ‘Dungeon Madness’ until a better term is found.”

“No!” Minya stepped forward, shaking her head. “Dungeon Madness is a different, much more dangerous problem. We don’t want to confuse people.”

“Whatever, Minya! We’ll call it ‘Mad Dungeon Disease’ then!” Dale decided to get this over with. “Currently, there is no known cure. Unfortunately… it seems to be effective against everyone, even Mages.”

This—more than anything else he had said—caused the icy touch of fear to affect the listeners. At the Mage rank, there was no more sickness, no more injuries from age or other human ailments.

“Then let’s get the abyss out of here!”

This comment was generally accepted to be a good idea.

Dale shouted over the noise, quieting them with his words, “I won’t stop you from leaving right now. I will say this, though. If you are here now, and you make your living fighting in the dungeon… if you leave us… if you leave the people who are going to be relying on you… I will not let you come back. You can make your living elsewhere. Someplace safer.”

A roar of outrage sounded from nearly every voice. It took several minutes before order was restored.

Dale continued, trying to explain himself, “If you are not a fighter, it is understandable that you leave and actually encouraged. Those of you who fight for a living, let me ask you this. Where will you go? This dungeon will make you rich and powerful if it is not converted into a disease spewing disaster center! If you are not willing to fight for others, fight for your own future! Fight for your greed, your self-serving desires!”

“What do we get out of it?”

Dale’s shoulders slumped. “A place to live, money, and power that is there for the taking? That isn’t enough?”

“No!”

“...What about half taxes for six months?”

There was a pause as people took in his words, and faces lit up. A few people nodded, some clapped.

Then a voice rang out!

“…Death to the infected!” was the roar of bloodlust and greed following Dale’s offer.

“For Mountaindale!”

Chapter Twenty-three

The mostly-tented city was emptying out, hundreds of people leaving per hour. To their credit, most of the fighters remained, as did the Guild cook. The cook was having a grand ol’ time, his favorite phrase being, “I knew you’d all come crawling back! Them pansy waiters won’t stick around to feed ya, but ol’ cook-ie will always be there for you!”

“I can’t believe how empty it is out here,” Dale murmured, looking around the near-empty plain. Where tents had been, there was grass or dirt showing, but those spots on the landscape were slowly being filled in as the wind carried drifts of snow around.

“This is awesome! When people come back, I can actually force them to set up in some kind of order!” The city administrator was staying, much to Dale’s confusion.

“Well… I’m… happy for you?” Dale’s face gained a crooked smile.

The administrator nodded, walking away. “I’m happy for all of us! Gonna have a nice looking city this year!”

“What a strange man.” Adam was watching the administrator pull out a measuring rope and start outlining property boundaries.

“He gets the job done, and he loves his work.” Dale smiled. “Good enough for me.”

“The Dwarves have finished the wall, and unless I’m mistaken, that is the rider that was sent out to scout the other day.” Hans pointed at a man on a horse that was lathered up, nearly dead with exhaustion. “I’ll put fifty gold on him having bad news.”

“No deal.”

It was bad news. The horde had found the road up the mountain, having been stymied by their unsuccessful attempts at swimming up the waterfall. As soon as a few started going up the road, the rest had followed. They had been a bit off in their estimates as well. There were nearly ten thousand of the creatures that had once been human.

“How? How are there so many?” Dale demanded of the silent council.

Amber shook her head. “It shouldn’t have been possible. There are maybe a thousand people in a good-sized village. Unless there was a near one hundred percent conversion rate from the disease…”

“I know what happened.” Prince Henry walked into the room.

Everyone stood, murmuring, “Your Majesty.”

Henry waved for them to sit while he paced. “This year we were holding a census in the kingdom. To ensure accurate records, we had made it mandatory that each town hold a post-harvest festival and bring in anyone within fifty miles.” He stopped, looking close to tears. “That mass of infected represents nearly a sixth of our rural population.”

“Good god above.”

Cal

<Sure has been quiet the last few days. Even the miners are gone. Except Evan, of course. Do you think he ever sleeps?> I prodded Dani. I think I was driving her insane with my incessant talking, but I was so bored!

“He leaves for a few hours every day,” Dani said the next part under her breath, “I’m starting to think he has the right idea.”

<I’m not that bad. Maybe Minya will wanna chat.>

Dani bristled at my comment, though she didn’t vocalize anything. So far, Minya was the only person that had a keygem that granted access directly to the room with me and the Silverwood tree. Dani was upset that I was showing so much favoritism to her, but Minya was already proving that she was a good investment. She was well-informed, intelligent, discreet, and brought me presents all the time.

Though she was waiting on the first shipment of memory stones, she brought me interesting trinkets daily. She had also walked into the dungeon and started discussing topics with people. That was an interesting way to learn things. I had particularly enjoyed when she had started talking to a smith who was buying ore from a miner. I learned so much about desirable metal purities and alloy creations that day!

Just that single conversation would have been worth the risks of keeping my pet human. There was more; she had talked to a bowyer, carpenters, and other tradesmen. Each of these conversations helped me understand concepts that would have taken years of trial and error to figure out otherwise. Something as simple as using larger bricks at the base of a wall to help strengthen it changed the way I looked at things. I had thought that using the same size throughout was the best way, so I had simply made them huge. Silly me!

As though our discussion had summoned her, Minya walked into the dungeon and started talking to me, “Cal, there is a serious problem.”

<What is going on?>

“Did you release a parasitical virus into the wild?”

<What? Why would I? People dying outside of here doesn’t benefit me at all.>

“Okay. Thank goodness. I had to ask. Well, they think it is your fault. Apparently, there is a multi-thousand person horde of infected people coming this way. When they die, they release spores like a mushroom would,” Minya informed me with a hint of relief overshadowed with fear.

<...Uh.>

“Hmm?”

I mentally winced. <That actually may sound a bit… familiar?>

Minya paused, thinking through her verbal options. “Did you do it on purpose?”

<No, it was a side effect of creating a new Mob. The result was uncontrollable for me; it made the victim insane. I removed that in the next batch, but someone took her out of here. They wanted a reward for a new Mob, if that means anything to you,> I tried to explain myself.

She gained a considering look. “So it was the Spotters’ Guild’s fault. Thank you, Cal. If they get in here, would you make more of them?”

<No. Like I said, the result is uncontrollable, and they would kill me as well, given the chance.>

Minya nodded. “Then I’ll go see how we can turn this to your benefit.”

She stalked out of the dungeon with a look on her face that reminded me she was very dangerous. I wouldn’t want to face her when she was this determined. I hoped she was going to go yell at Dale.

I turned to my Goblins, as they had been having some mental issues themselves. Each day, any survivors would add their memories to the memory stones that I had provided. This meant that they would lose, at worst, only a day of memory if they died. I had also made them into what I called Delta memory stones, as it would only take what was different from previous memories, not make a full copy. The problem was surprisingly not with the Goblins who died frequently; it was with the ones who lived every day.

They all made copies of their memory to the stones, but the survivors did it much more frequently. There were only twelve total stones. I had made them share in the hopes that the accumulated experiences would make them smarter and more dangerous. This worked… to a point. Then there was the worst-case scenario. The first Goblin to show problems was the massive Goblin that carried around a warhammer. His mind had snapped, and he reverted to a bestial mentality. He didn’t attack the other Goblins unless they got in his way but was absolutely mad for combat. He would fly into a rage at the first hint of a fight, ignoring all attempts at defense as he threw himself at his opponent.

I had allowed that memory stone to continue and simply called them ‘Goblin Berserkers’ now, but the new Goblin Warriors I reverted to the old, original memories. He had to relearn a lot, but it was a good lesson for me. I made a memory stone for each encampment and would let them diverge as individuals from this point forward. No need to make sentient beings slip slowly into insanity.

The shaman had had a lot of fun with the Delta stones, having a dozen of himself trying new ways of doing things, then using the accumulated knowledge to push himself in new directions. Every two days gave him nearly a month of research, so he was progressing quickly. As a seeker of knowledge, he was the only one disappointed when I took away the Delta stones, so I gave them back to him in secret when other Goblins weren’t around.

Since the dungeon was approaching empty, I started experimenting with Essences. The combinations were so interesting, and I had barely scratched the surface of their potential. Slight variations in the corruption levels produced astoundingly different results. For instance, earth and water in equal amounts made ‘mud’ Essence. A bit more earth than water made ‘plant’ Essence, while a large amount more water Essence made ‘blood’ Essence. There were combinations that I was sure did something, but they didn’t affect the things I could test them on, so it was hard to tell what kind of affinity they were.

What really interested me were the opposing affinities. Let’s just discuss the equal amount of each. Earth and wind; water and fire. These, at first glance, seemed to simply cancel each other out or make something seemingly useless. Fire and water made steam, right? Wrong! Fire and water intermixed naturally also needed a third component, air! That made steam. When combined without air, it made an interesting fluid that super-compressed itself! This ‘superfluid’ when released or exposed to air would violently explode, decompressing itself straight to a gaseous form! Useful? Not a clue, outside of traps.

Earth and wind made freaking lightning when combined! I had really thought that would be an effect in the purview of fire, but I was pleased to be proven wrong. Chaos, the intermixing of celestial and infernal, had mind-altering properties that made it very difficult for me to work with, as I was a thought construct. I would suddenly start, having a feeling of a breakthrough, only to realize that I couldn’t remember what I had been doing. It was incredibly frustrating.

“Hey, um Cal?” Dani was speaking in a horrified voice.

<Hmm? What is it? You okay?>

“Have… have you looked at the Mobs on the fourth floor recently?” Dani seemed to be going somewhere with this. I focused but sensed no life, well, beyond a few insects that had made their way in. Useless bugs, couldn’t even evolve to a useful configuration.

<Where are they?> I couldn’t find any of the Mobs!

“They’re all dead, Cal. Look for bodies.”

This time I changed what I was looking for, finding corpses littered around the floor.

<What? What happened? Who did this?> A horrible suspicion came over me. <Did I do that?>

“What? No, how would you forget killing five dozen Cats and double that in Bashers? Are you okay…?” Dani now had a really nervous look. She tried to shake it off. “No, Cal, we are pretty far underground. You and I don’t notice—as we don’t have lungs—but the air quality is so bad down here that it became polluted and poisonous. It happened quietly; everything just sort of laid down and died over about an hour.”

I inspected the air, and sure enough, it was bad. There was an overwhelming amount of earth Essence and little air Essence at all, except around the Silverwood tree. I thought about how to fix this; should I open vents to the outside? That would take a while, but it was doable…

“So, if you could go ahead and grow some plants down here, that should take care of it,” Dani interrupted my thoughts.

<Wait, that’s it? No air ducts?>

“Yup. Plants will release breathable air, and at the rate you can grow them, the air should be breathable in an hour or so. No air ducts needed,” Dani promised me while looking wistfully at Snowball. I started absorbing him so she would be able to move on a little faster.

<Sorry, Dani. I know it seems like I understand everything that is going on, but really, I am still learning all the time. Air quality was something that I had never considered and just goes to show how much I still need to learn. I do try to minimize my mistakes…> I trailed off sadly, feeling like a bad dungeon.

Dani tried to shake me out of my melancholy, “Hey! Listen!”

<Huh?> For some reason, the way she said those words made me slightly upset. I tried to move past it.

“Mistakes happen, big guy. You are fixing it now, right? Then let’s move on. What were you working on?”

Her sweet voice eased my tension, and I gratefully described my experiments with Essence. She listened raptly and offered some suggestions for my playtime. Um. Practicing.

“By the way,” Dani mentioned as a thought crossed her mind, “has Minya brought all of the gemstones that you asked for?”

<She is having trouble finding infernal-grade opal. I have the rest, and if you follow the pathways, you’ll find veins of them through the entire place. Matter of fact,> I was fully distracted at this point; nice work Dani, <I have them all connected to two distinct points if applicable. For instance, I have topaz connecting to the pane of celestial quartz as well as an oversized Core designed for corruption storage. To deal with infernal Essence, I have diamond mixed in for transportation, but I’ll replace it as soon as I can.>

“Has that helped with your corruption cleaning efforts?” Dani was flying along, visually inspecting the plants now growing on this floor.

<I think so. Interesting tidbit, you know the Essence accumulation Rune I’ve been using?>

“Yeah?”

<Well, powering it with taint makes it draw in corruption! So what I’ve done is placed that Rune on the corruption-connected Cores, and it pulls corruption along the lines of gemstone, just like a human running Essence through meridians!>

I really enjoyed watching the process. It was fun to watch loose Essence stick to the wall before floating free, corruption removed. There was constant cycling and pretty coloration if you could see it.

“Wow! When did you make that? Why didn’t you tell me? I hadn’t noticed!” Dani went from elated to curious to slightly angry in the span of a single breath.

<Well, you took a nap yesterday, then I was done and started testing Essence…>

Dani made a small noise. “You actually forgot that you had made corruption collection devices?”

I gave her a mental shrug. <Memory is an imperfect storage device.>

“Ugh.” Dani sounded disgusted. “Minya just had to talk to that mind-cleric here.”

<I like learning,> I started as someone stumbled into the dungeon, bleeding heavily. I looked at the time; it was getting near midnight.

<That’s odd. Normally, people leave here bleeding…>

“Something is happening out there, I’m gonna take a look,” Dani informed me, flying out her specially-designed escape tunnel just as the ground began shaking.

Dale

“Dale. They’re coming.” Frank jogged up to the serious, young city Lord at a normal human speed.

Dale looked at the Guild leader in shock. “What?! They’re way ahead of schedule! They shouldn’t be here for another day at the earliest!”

“This part is non-human,” Frank frankly revealed. “The infection is far worse than we assumed; it affects more than just humans—it also takes animals and magical Beasts. They’re far faster than their two-legged counterparts, and we need to be ready to defend right now.”

The alarm was sounded, just a guy with an Essence-enhanced voice. They had had to improvise, as no-one had expected an attack this early. Fighters began running the distance to the walls, and there was no formation or discipline to be seen amongst the cultivators—at first. As they moved, they slowly began to separate from a mob of people into small groups of five.

The wall was easily large enough to hold the entire defending population with just enough room that the line wasn’t too thin in any spot. Melee fighters had a slightly disgruntled look, while archers and other various ranged attackers were flushed, excited to show off their ability.

A sound reached the ears of the defenders, a low rumble of feet pounding the ground, hooves clopping intermittently against stone. Above all, a wailing, anguished noise tickled their eardrums, creating a feeling of primal dread in more than one person.

The first of the things came into view, and what may have once been a regal or handsome animal now appeared as a fungus encrusted, diseased horror. It bleated. Had it been some type of goat?!

The eagerness and bloodlust were starting to fade as more and more infected specimens appeared. Herds of various cattle, forest creatures, packs of wolves… The disease had taken everything in its path. Towering, lumbering forms appeared, some massive type of Beast that was totally unrecognizable under the parasite.

The horde was moving quickly but without appearing to be violent. They were totally silent apart from the wailing and crying sounds they emitted. That was… until the first arrow thunked into the lead animal. Then the creatures stopped, actually going quiet before screaming, bleating, whinnying, or roaring with rage and charging the wall.

Arrows began to fall like rain, slicing through unprotected flesh. Dozens of the creatures died, then hundreds as the slaughter continued. Still, they came onward, throwing themselves at the wall, their blood painting it red, their cries shaking the very foundation. For now, the towering defense held. The stone crafting abilities of Dwarves were more than ready for this test.

A blast of fire from a defender charred a swath of beings below but prompted Frank to shout, “Hold your Essence! This is only the advance group, bare animals with a sprinkling of weak Beasts! Wait for the dangerous opponents!”

This had a sobering effect. People had been getting a bit exuberant, seeing the enemies fall so easily. The slaughter continued for hours, with the once-animals unable to overcome this barrier in their path. A few hours after dark, the creatures below started having a different shape to them, and the howls became disturbingly human.

Brianna, standing with her half-dozen Dark Elves, peered into the gloom below. “Those were definitely people recently.”

The human monsters were slightly more intelligent than their bestial counterparts, using tools, weapons, and armor. They climbed the huge mound of bodies in their way, reaching the wall and starting to climb. A flicker of fire was seen before Frank shouted ‘hold!’ again. These humans were struggling up to the wall, slow and easily slain.

Amber pointed. “Frank, Mages approaching!”

A trail of light followed the form of a man sprinting at superhuman speeds. He blasted through the infected in his path; their flesh gave way, their bodies pulverized from the impact. Then a wave of gore shot in every direction as the glowing infected man sprinted directly into the piled dead in front of the wall. The effect would be best described as if a large rock were tossed into a shallow pool of water. He made it to the wall and impacted the shuddering blockade, beginning to pound away at it with sledgehammer-like blows. Chips flew at every strike, his punches enhanced with an earth-type Mana.

“Kill that bastard!” Beor the Dwarf was screaming. “He’s breaking Cliff!”

Dale glanced at the furious Dwarf. “You named the wall? You named it ‘Cliff’? Won’t that be confusing with all these cliffs around?”

“No! We didn’t want the wall to feel out of place, so we’re letting it think that it is a natural rock formation!”

“What are you…? I don’t…” Dale paused, Dwarven logic didn’t matter right now. Only one thing did. “Kill that bastard!”

Arrows and rocks fell on the man who was pounding on the wall, but though his clothes were destroyed, he took no damage.

“Damn Mages and their near-physical invulnerability,” Hans grumbled. Amber stepped forward, opening her mouth and releasing an eye-drawing stream of multi-hued light. It seemed to flow into the infected man, and he dropped, blood pouring from his ruined ears. “What did you do to him?”

Amber shook her head, “I spoke to his brain and convinced it that it was dead. His physical state soon followed his mental one.”

Dale shuddered, trying not to be disturbed. Mana was terrifying. He looked into the darkness, seeing lights begin to sprout amongst the people affected by this madness of the dungeon. “More Mages!”

“That Mana signature! That’s–” The Spotter who was speaking gasped. “Those are three of the Mages from Spotterton!” He finished his statement as shimmering colors flew from the Mages, impacting the wall. The strike knocked dozens of people off their feet, and some fell off the wall entirely. Those who fell on the defended side of the wall were injured, but those who fell toward the infected were torn apart amidst howls of fury. Chunks of stone fell from the shaking wall, killing a few Beasts at the base, but the wall held firm.

Midnight was swiftly approaching when lesser cultivators appeared, those in the C-ranks and below. They moved faster than their counterparts and were able to begin scaling the wall using personal Essences. There were easily a thousand C-ranked or below Cultivators at the base of the wall, interspersed with a few Mages. They were scaling the wall like spiders when Frank suddenly took action.

He moved to the edge of the wall, Mana gathering around him like a thundercloud, dense and heavy. Dale had seen this before and tried to intercept him.

“No, Frank! Remember what happened with Father Richard!”

Frank either didn’t hear him or didn’t care. His Mana poured out of him, shaking the air with its power. “STOP!” he roared into the night.

Dale spun around, now facing toward the city center and his team. He reached deep inside himself and held a pattern with his mind. Forcing his Essence into the pattern, it burst past his aura, successfully activating for the first time. He took a step forward, moving with a speed he had never managed before as the earth itself tossed him away. He threw his arms out, catching his team in a half-collision, half bear-hug before jumping into the empty air behind the wall. They were moving at such high speeds that even with the added mass and air resistance, they were a dozen feet past the edge. Then what Dale had feared… occurred.

The rolling Mana from Frank washed over the horde, but the ones on or near the wall were the most affected. Their movements slowed, finally coming to a total stop as all of the kinetic energy was stripped from them. For a moment, they struggled. Then realizing they could not move or escape, the most affected group shattered their Centers.

The wall was blasted to rubble from the pressure wave as a thousand lower ranked and three Mage-ranked Centers shattered simultaneously. The wall bearing the brunt of the outpouring of energy was the only thing that saved Dale’s group, though the blast pushed them further away from their looming landing point. The group was now thirty feet away and falling quickly.

They were pelted with searing hot chunks of stone and thrown further from their impact site when a secondary explosion happened, by happenstance changing their landing point to a thick snowdrift. Dale stood as quickly as he could, turning to look at the shimmering air behind them. The massive quantity of raw power was having a horrible effect on the environment, and clouds were already gathering and turning sickly colors from corrupted Essence lying thick upon the world.

Bodies and body parts were raining down around the group. Some were moaning, and some sprang to their feet immediately. Dale looked at the survivors closely. It seemed that all of the Mages had survived, but beyond his group, there were no other people below the C-ranks among the survivors from the wall. That meant, at a minimum, there were already five-hundred and fifty casualties. Not all of the C-ranked people had survived, so the death toll was actually higher than Dale could estimate. From one. Simple. Mistake.

“Dale.” Brianna limped toward him. “We need cover. My people are going to go and protect the Silverwood tree. Your defenses are gone, and your hopes of keeping the remaining things out of the dungeon are crushed. I advise you to seek shelter within the dungeon, but it is your choice. Good luck.” The Dark Elves gathered together, moving toward the entrance at a limping run.

Dale looked over at the wall of deadly Essence and Mana. The ground was poisoned; the air was blazing with fire and poisonous gasses. He could hear the horde weeping on the other side, only held back by the deadly barrier. He tried to focus his addled mind, looking around. Minya appeared in front of him and grabbed his chin, forcing him to look at her.

“Gather any survivors. We need to get to the third floor in the dungeon! It is the only defensible location remaining.”

Chapter Twenty-four

<Now there are a lot of bleeding people entering. What’s going on?> I muttered in consternation.

“Cal-Cal-Cal!” Dani shot down her personal tunnel. “Shut this behind me, now!” I filled the wall with stone behind her, all the way to the top.

Suddenly, I was fighting to keep the stone solid as it cracked and shattered along the weakened path.

<What is happening out there?!>

“Something horrible. There is an army of infected, and somehow, millions of them just exploded! They died and released all of their Essence and corruption in a single burst!” Dani was sobbing, terrified at her close brush with death.

<Dani, it is okay! Don’t be sad! I’m not even sure I could have absorbed all of that at once.> She looked up at me, confused. <I mean, I would have given it my best shot, and I know it was a huge waste for millions of people all to die out there, but there is only so much I can do.>

She let out a weak chuckle. “Oh, Cal. Not everything is about you! Also, you should know by now that I exaggerate.”

<Hmm?> I was casually inspecting at all the people pouring in but did a double take when I realized that a group of Elves had just entered the third floor via portal and were sprinting toward the Boss Room. I roused the Goblins, but the Elves simply avoided them and ran down the exit. Strange behavior. That was fine, the Cats hadn’t had anything to do in days… oh feces. The Cats were all dead. I struggled to get some Mobs going on the floor, but the air quality was still so poor that they fell unconscious as soon as they came into being. <We have incoming, Dani. A group of Elves, headed straight for us.>

“No, I’m pretty sure those are the ones that have an unhealthy obsession with the Silverwood tree. I’ll bet that they are coming to stand guard around us. Let them in!” Dani demanded, following this statement by flying out to meet them, something she had never done before.

<Dani! What are you doing?!> I bellowed as she zipped along the tunnels.

“Excuse me, Elves?” Dani moved to the side as a knife flashed through where she had been. “Well, that’s rude.”

“Hold!” Brianna directed, stopping the next attack. She looked at Dani, eyes wider than usual. “Are you a… Dungeon Wisp? You are supposed to be just a legend.” Her voice was almost accusatory.

Dani laughed, the sound like tiny bells mixed with deadly threats. “I’m real enough to be here, aren’t I? Why are you racing in?”

“The Silverwood tree…” Brianna shook herself. “We need to protect the tree.”

Dani started drifting away. “Works for me, but you don’t want to go that way. Traps.”

<Dani!> I whined at her. She ignored me.

“I’ll help you. If this horde wipes out the rest of you, there won’t be anyone to lure in anymore. My own strength will wane. I’ll make you a deal.” Dani stopped, hovering near a trap. “I can stop the Mobs from attacking the adventurers, and I will even help them.”

She paused, staring at them. “There is a catch. You will all need to swear an oath to me that you won’t reveal any secrets you learn while you are here, at least those that pertain to the dungeon. Personal achievements, brag about whatever you want. You are also in damaged armor, and a few of you have broken weapons. I can replace those for now, but a part of your oath will be returning them to me before you leave here.”

Brianna didn’t answer right away. When she did, it was considering. “I want something else as well. The Silverwood tree is doing very well here, and I want to know what the difference is between your attempt and our attempts to grow one. Also, I want direct access to the tree via a portal if it is within your power. Do so, and I will swear not to take advantage of your trust, as will my people. We will follow the spirit of your words, not just the letter.”

“Cal?” Dani spoke into the air.

<What, you can tell whoever you want about us, but I get yelled at for letting two humans into the loop?> I griped as I stared at the tasty, tasty Elves.

“Cal…”

<Fine, whatever, I’ll make it happen.>

“Good.” Dani paused. “Plus, think of all the people who are going to be dying in here even with your help and all the infected on their way that you get to eat!” She always knew how to make me see the silver lining in a situation.

Dani turned her attention back to the Elves. “I agree to these terms. If you will swear the oath, I swear I will uphold my portion of the deal.”

Brianna and the others swore the oath, binding themselves to their word of their own free will. Dani nodded, telling them to place all of their armor and weapons on the ground. They stepped away and watched nervously as the scrap was absorbed. Dani started moving again, and they turned a corner to come face-to-stinger with two Assimilators, who were crackling with unreleased lightning. The Elves tried to scream, but before they could utter a sound, I allowed the Essence stored in the Assimilators to fade away.

“What was that, Cal?” Dani angrily berated me.

<Insurance. If they attacked you or didn’t swear the oath, I would have killed them if at all possible.>

“While we walk, and since we will never be able to tell anyone else, could you satisfy my curiosity?” Brianna prodded as they got over their shock. Not literal shock, I didn’t use lightning on them. The mental kind of shock. Anyway.

“I suppose… you can certainly ask?”

Brianna launched into full question mode, asking about the dungeon, the tree, and Dani. Dani answered as well as she could, and I filled in any gaps in her knowledge. Possibly the most horrified look I had ever seen on an Elf came when Dani explained that I was alive and intelligent. Well, wait. That isn’t accurate. The most horrified look was when that one crazy Elf let herself be killed by my Bashers. Heh.

“All this time, even the most knowledgeable of us thought that the dungeons of the world were simply places where Essence would accumulate intensely, and this was what spawned the monsters that inhabited them.” Brianna shook her head sadly. “People have always had wild theories… I guess not as wild as I had originally thought. Dungeon Wisps were supposed to be the guiding factor according to legends.”

<Where does she think the loot comes from? It just grows on saplings?> I paused, struck by the thought. <Dani, I just had an idea… vines that grow arrows on them instead of thorns!>

“Not now, Cal. There are things to do right now. I can’t let you go all introspective.”

They made it to the center of the floor, bypassing a snoring Snowball. They walked up to the tree, gasping in shock at the items waiting for them. There was a full set of Mithril armor waiting for each of them, fully Inscribed. To ensure that they would be able to fight as well as possible, the Inscriptions were powered by fully-charged Cores. Reverently, the Elves put on the armor. There were no gaps in this protective gear after it was equipped; even their faces were covered by a fine mesh of woven Mithril!

“This, on top of our bodies’ normal durability… we should be unstoppable.” One of the Elves seemed about to break into song.

Dani spoke up, souring his mood a bit, “Don’t get too attached. The gear comes back to us when this is all over.”

<Dani, have them take their weapons. I think they are going to need them sooner than we had hoped.>

There was a scratching coming from the mouth of the tunnel the Goblins had created. I had covered it with stone but had not gotten the chance to reinforce it yet. In a few moments, the scratching turned into pounding, and cracks formed on the wall.

Dale

Hans stepped through the portal, the last of the wounded with him. “Dale, we have good timing. The barrier is failing, and a Mana storm is coming. A snowflake the size of the King’s palace just drifted past. It caught on the Pleasure House and cut it in half.” Hans shuddered. “At least it was drifting and not plummeting. I can’t imagine how much that weighed.”

“I’m assuming a Mana storm creates odd weather phenomenon?” Dale helped his teammate carry the wounded man into an empty fortification.

Hans agreed with a few reservations. “More than that, it creates… things. All of that Mana could just go up and up, then suddenly turn into a new moon! Who knows what could happen? Even if we survive the night, we may not survive the weather.”

“Is this why shattering your Center is so illegal?” Dale wondered, hoping a solution could be found.

“Pretty much.”

<Dale, you need to get ready. The first of the infected have begun coming into the dungeon. They are on the first and fourth floor, so look out for infected coming up the stairs as well. I’m going to be allowing the Mobs to fight at full strength, so avoid them and don’t attack them. There is a new kind, a berserker, who attacks any threat,> I told him, lifting out Dani’s Mithril armor.

She took over the Goblin Boss, getting ready to hold the stairs.

“The fourth…? How?” Dale demanded impatiently as he helped the wounded into a fort.

<What? You think I just created the concept for Goblins? Use your head! They tunneled in.> I was taking out my nervousness on him, but it couldn’t be helped. <Seriously, this guy fights magical things all the time! You’d think he could assess a situation,> I muttered.

“I heard that. Who has ever heard of Goblins tunneling?”

<Don’t care.>

Dale growled, then started giving orders. They were far too close to the fourth-floor exit. He finished explaining to one group, then moved to the next half-hex fort. He yelled for them to open the gate, but they just glared at him and told him to leave. It took Dale a moment to realize why he recognized the people on the wall. He snapped his fingers. “You are the Nobles that came a while back! Why are you still here?”

“Oh, I don’t know.” One of them spat at him. “Maybe because someone basically called everyone cowards and told them if they left they couldn’t come back? The same person who killed hundreds of cultivators with that order? Sound familiar?”

Dale’s gut twisted. He had been thinking along those same lines, but hearing someone else say it was much worse. He took a deep breath, reminding himself of the phrase he had been raised on. “Death is everywhere in the Phantom Mountains. By being here, everyone accepted those risks. They could have left, but their greed held them here. I accept no blame for wanting to protect my home!”

“Shut up, you common-born filth! You’re just trying to get us all killed!”

Dale’s vision flashed red. “If I wanted to kill you, I could order you to leave my land right now!” he bellowed at the man on the wall, who paled at the revelation. “Now, follow my orders and those of the council, or I will make you leave! Failing to assist in the defense of the dungeon kills us all, and doing it knowingly is punishable by death. Starting now!”

There was a pause as the people behind the wall went silent. Dale wasn’t having it. “Move your blue-blooded asses!” There wasn’t exactly a scramble for the door, but a slow shuffle of people made their way toward the midpoint of the floor. Dale had to take several deep breaths to calm himself. The Prince and Princess had been called back to their Kingdoms after the Nobles had been settled and the infection announced, and Dale missed them. He hadn’t had to bother with the stubborn branch family members a single time after punishing the unruly Barons and sending them away. Their respective monarchs had kept their promise, forcing the Nobles to stay in line and under control.

Dale waited a minute after the last people had left. Just long enough to see a contingent of exceedingly well armed and armored Goblins walk into the fort. “Good,” he thought. The rear would be defended. “Cal, we need a bit more protection. Eight-foot walls aren’t going to keep the infected out.”

<I’m having my own problems, Dale. What do you want?> Contrary to my words, I was really enjoying how the infected didn’t bother to dodge Raile’s attacks. I had made five versions of him, and they were really fun to watch as they squashed bodies as a team.

“I need these walls to connect to the ceiling. Can you make it happen?” Dale begged the Essence-hungry dungeon, using his mind to speak so he could avoid odd glances from the stragglers.

<You know, Dale, sometimes you need to solve your own problems… but in this case, I may have something prepared. There was a fifteen person group that came through here once—you may have heard of them—and I made corrections to my defenses in case a large force attacked again.> I paused my speech, releasing a small block of stone above each hex fort that allowed granite fortress enhancements to slowly drop. When they were all the way down, there would only be small gaps for arrows and other projectiles to move through. I sure hoped people were claustrophobic and panicked as they saw the walls closing in on them. Heh.

“Is the ceiling falling?” Dale muttered aloud while he looked at the roof with serious concern. Now that he was alone, he was much more talkative.

<If I were you, I’d get into a fort before those came all the way down. I’ve never tested them. They might block off the entrance.> Dale started scrambling to get to his chosen fort. <Good luck! Kill a lot of things for me!>

“Yeah, yeah, Minya told me that killing things is how you get stronger. Don’t remind me. I don’t like to help you,” Dale mentioned breezily, keeping his breathing even as he jogged.

<Don’t judge me like that. You do the same thing!> My words almost made Dale stumble.

“I do not!”

<You are personally responsible for the death of one thousand four hundred thirty-two and a half Bashers. Forty-eight Goblins. A few human criminals. Finally, one human that was going to cut you out of the profits when you found me,> I informed him primly.

“That’s diff…” Dale trailed off as he realized the extent of my memory.

<Go on. Keep telling yourself that I am the one of us that is evil and terrible. Everything I do, I do to survive and get stronger. People die here, but death is all around in the Phantom Mountains, isn’t it, Dale?> I taunted him, expecting him to wither. Instead, he smiled.

“Why, yes it is, Cal. I’m so glad you asked.” Dale laughed as he ran to safety.

<Oh, you brat!> I hated wasting my questions! Sneaky human!

Dale closed the door behind him, and soon, the walls met with the descending stone. A grinding noise was heard for a few moments as things settled, but all of the walls held. Just in time, too. Wailing and sobbing noises were echoing into the room as the infected stumbled down the stairs. Soon, the sound of battle joined the ruckus as Goblins in the forts were attacked. They showed their mettle, keeping the horde occupied for nearly a half hour as they fought to the death. Hundreds of lower-ranked infected cultivators died throwing themselves against the walls, but it was the Mages that ended their desperate defense.

The Mages blasted the walls into splinters with very little effort, and the Goblin defenders were soon overrun. Dani had done well holding the Boss area, but she wasn’t ready for Mages yet. She hurried back to me as the Amazon finally fell.

The infected used Essence and Mana liberally, sparing nothing in an attempt to kill as quickly as possible. The Goblins’ armor offered little protection against the globes of water that suddenly surrounded their heads, drowning them where they stood. Blasts of fire cooked them; gusts of wind tore them apart, blasting through gaps in armor. The snarls and screams of rage from the infected slowed, replaced by their sobs and wailing when they ran out of things to kill.

Dale looked around the packed little fort that his people were planning to defend, taking heart in the fact that there was no terror showing. Fear was present, but determination shone in people’s glinting eyes and their firm stances. They may die here, but they would die fighting! Dale nodded, pleased at what he saw. He gave one last command, as softly as possible, “Everyone… first off, good luck. Let’s try to stay as quiet as we can. It’s possible that they may ignore us if we don’t attract their attention.”

He got some nods in return, and all conversation ceased. The infected started filing past, a trickle at first. The trickle quickly turned into a flood. The infected in front of the group moved along toward a noisier fortress, the ones behind them following like sheep. More people looked to Dale, nodding and giving him a thumbs up. The Guild cook was among them, and he patted Dale on the back.

“THAT WAS A GOOD PLAN, M’BOY!”

The people in the fort looked at the smiling cook in horror, and the smile slowly slid from the cook’s face. “Dammit. I shoulda let that healer fix my ears.”

A shriek of rage pierced through the walls, impacting their ears as the nearest infected turned toward them in a rage. They almost seemed more furious than usual, as if they knew they had been tricked. The mushroom encrusted beings charged the fort, bent on the destruction of all things living.

Chapter Twenty-five

<These Dark Elves are seriously interesting to watch! They’ve been fighting non-stop for at least two hours, and I don’t think they’ve stopped moving and swinging their blades for a single second!> I cheered as one of the Elves landed a particularly tricky attack, removing an infected’s head followed by slicing another in half without slowing.

“Nice one, Jason!” Brianna called, laughing right along with me. Somehow, she was able to keep these random people’s names straight.

The labyrinth was stuffed full of infected beings. I had Bashers and Cats spawning constantly. Well, at least as fast as I could make them. The infected were expending Essence so frequently that I was easily able to continue production! As the fighting progressed, my Essence gain began to outpace my expenditure, filling me with joy… and Essence! I had Wither Cats hunting Mages because—while Mages were hard to damage—if a Wither Cat landed a successful attack, the Mage’s access to Mana and Essence was heavily restricted. A short while later, the Mage would collapse. They were alive but unable to access their Centers. This kept them from exploding while taking them out of the fight. Win-win!

“Are you making sure to get all the spores, Cal?” Dani nagged me a bit.

<Yes, yes. We’ve been over this. I’ve got it!> When the infected died, they tended to release a cloud of spores, and I was making sure that I absorbed them as fast as possible. It wouldn’t do to have my defenders join the attackers.

“You’ve got it today or sometime next week?”

<I’m a little busy here, Dani.>

“You’ll be busier if we lose an Elf!”

<Gah! Here, I’ll give them a reprieve!>

In two of the tunnels that connected to the Boss Room, I raised portal arches. They took a few minutes to become fully active, but there was so much loose Essence in the air that they soon began to shimmer and hum softly. Fully active at a speed I had not been able to achieve before, the deadly traps were ready!

The infected could still see through the boiling air and so had no idea that they were running into the backside of an active portal. In another tunnel, I placed a row of Assimilators along the ceiling and had them fire shards of stone and blasts of fire as continuously as possible. The hanging Assimilators went to work immediately, killing several infected that made their way into the tunnel.

The unending stream of infected began pouring into the shimmering space of the open portals, their deaths silent but for the spray of meat slapping against the nearest surfaces. The group as a whole moved faster into their impending death while the ones at the front struggled, trying to avoid the deadly light. Sadly for them, the infected in the rear were pushing the mass of bodies forward, noticing that there was room to move again.

<Fifty dead in two seconds! They’re still coming, too!> I crowed. The Essence in their Centers was mingling with my own, bringing me ever closer to my next ranking. Hundreds of deaths were slapping against my senses every minute, and I grew more powerful by the moment.

“Are you doing okay, Cal?” Dani flew around me, staring at me as if she could tell with her vision if I were starting to go insane from the influx of power.

<I am doing amazingly,> I reassured her with a wide mental grin. Which, now that I think about it, may not have confirmed my sanity in her mind.

“I’m worried.”

<What? Why?>

Dani paused, looking at the enormous death toll in the dungeon. “I think it is only a matter of time before a Mage dies in here. I have no idea what might happen in that case… will you move directly into the Mage rank? Will you only get their Essence? Will you die from the sudden gain? What if…”

<I have a plan, Dani.>

This seemed to throw her off. “You do? What?”

<I’m going to put the Mana into a bag and save it for later!> I told her cheerfully, and I suspected she began to question my sanity again. <Seriously! I made a dimensional bag, a ‘pocket space’ that is totally empty. There is nothing in it except for an exit, but that is a one-way door. I can make it two-way, letting it flow back to me, but I won’t until I am ready!>

“And you are… sure it will work?” Dani asked in a skeptical tone.

I turned a bit red. <Well, it should work in theory. The transfer of energy, as long as I am not trying to make it stop existing, should allow for an unoccupied space to contain said energy. It will not dissipate nor will it move into an alternative form as it has nothing that can act upon it.>

“It’s a what?” Dani spun in place, trying to understand what I was saying.

<Don’t worry too much. It is a theory I heard about the Elven conservation of energy. The idea let me build the portals much more efficiently than I had thought I would be able to. Basically, in that space there is nothing, and so the energy—in this case Mana—will remain there, unchanging, until acted upon by an outside force—which can only be me, since I’ll bind it to myself.> I tried to tell her a bit more, but she cut me off and went to kill something. <What? What did I say?>

Snowball started moving in different attack patterns as Dani took over his movements. Dani went for weak points like throats and joints, whereas Snowball usually just mauled whoever got near him. It seemed she was not going to answer my question. Ah well.

I gauged the amount of Essence I was accumulating. So far, the majority of dying creatures were in the D-ranks. They did not give me much Essence overall, but a constant drop in a bucket will still fill it up eventually! I began devoting more attention to refining what Essence I was gaining. My cultivation pattern allowed me to passively and efficiently remove the corruption I was accumulating, but directly and actively removing it was even faster. I was moving through the C-ranks quickly, as I had already reached C-rank four!

A fort was breached on my third floor, and soon, the death toll began increasing yet again. Most of the attackers were too weak to do much damage, but their huge numbers allowed C-ranked and even B-ranked infected to attack without warning. When the first C-ranked defender died, it felt like a lightning bolt had struck me! Essence shot into my Core, swiftly swirling into the hole in my aura. My mind’s construct of a galaxy of cultivation lit up with points of brilliant Essence appearing in the void!

The fighting above raged on while my Elven guards mercilessly slaughtered the few infected that made it into my room. The fighters on the third floor were holding up well, protected as they were by the forts. I was feeling very good about their chances of survival until a massive blast of Mana slammed into the mountaintop above my dungeon. It was strange, and I soon understood the issue; it was undirected Mana! When the Mages above had detonated their Centers, the freed Mana began reacting according to its nature. All Mana was accumulated by forcing Essence into a concept, a law of the world. The Mana above was attempting to re-shape the world in its image, causing catastrophic damage.

One of the types of Mana must have been a gravity derivative because everything above was being sucked into a gravity well and slammed against the ground with the force of a falling star. What was currently impacting the mountain and reducing it to rubble? Birds. Flying overhead, their mass in the gravity well was enough to dig ten-foot holes into the rock. The real issue arrived when a quagmire of Mana was sucked in, impacting the Celestial quartz and shattering the rock holding it in place with a huge outburst of power.

The quartz that had been directly Inscribed by the Runescript was nearly unaffected—Runes were quite durable when made properly—but the small portion of the quartz reinforced with celestial Essence that did break sent a shockwave of concentrated power outward, killing any infected within a dozen feet. The huge plate of minerals smashed forty feet to the dungeon floor, breaking off the activation sequence of the Inscription. The remaining Runes were intact but now useless because the bridge to their power was removed. That was the good news. The bad news was that there was now an opening the infected could pour into, increasing how many could enter the dungeon at a time.

<Well, Dale, it’s been a pleasure, but I don’t think you are gonna make it,> I cheerily thought my good-byes at the fragile human.

Dale

“You are way too happy about that,” Dale muttered, getting an odd look from the people around him, who were all exceedingly somber.

“How are you so clean?” Hans glared jealously at his friend. “My clothes have poop on them, Dale. Poop. You don’t even have blood on you!”

Dale laughed at his overly cleanly friend and demonstrated. He threw a punch into an infected person who got too close, blasting its face into meaty chunks. A bit of gore got on to him, but waving his battle gauntlet near it sent it zipping away to land on someone else. “Fluid repulsion Rune.” Dale chuckled smugly at the angry look sent his way by the other—now slightly filthier—defenders. “Seriously, though, I have a feeling that things are about to get worse.”

Hans made a face. “What tipped you off? The ground shaking or the underground thunder?”

“Definitely the ground shaking.”

“Cheeky brat.” Hans ducked a wild swing from a weak once-human, retaliating with a blow that removed the creature’s head.

The number of attackers started to swell, increasing until they were literally crawling over each other in an attempt to fill the room with wriggling bodies. Dale was worried that they would be overrun—but soon had a bit more to be concerned about.

As the press of bodies became too intense, the weaker infected were pinned to the ground. After a few moments of being walked on, they gave up and shattered their Cores. Their suicidal assault blew holes in the attacking line. Chunks of stone began raining down as the walls and floor were damaged. Fire filled the air, and chaos reigned supreme!

“We need to make sure there aren’t too many of them on the walls at one time!” Rose screamed over the hubbub. “If they pack in, they’ll blow us all to the abyss!”

<There are Mages approaching your position. Best of luck!>

Dale was amazed at the amount of death that had followed the relatively weak cultivators shattering their Centers. In the confined space, the blasts had been far more effective at tearing apart bodies than anything he had been able to muster.

“Dale! Move!” Tom cried out, tackling Dale away from the wall as a form blasted a small section of it to bits.

Tom cried out in pain as his good arm was grabbed through the opening and he began to be drug out of the safe area.

“Tom!” Rose screamed, racing forward. The defenders moved together and began a painful tug-of-war using Tom’s body as the rope. Tom screamed as the defenders won with a roar and a jerk, pulling off the arm of the creature that had been gripping him.

“Anyone need a hand?” Tom panted, then chuckled. “I… ha-ha… I got a spare arm now!”

There were chuckles all around as people went back to defending. Someone called out, “I wouldn’t use that one; you have no idea where it might have been!”

“Looks like we don’t need to give you a hand.”

“Seems you have a good handle on things!”

“Yikes, this fight is getting out of hand!”

Rose shuddered. “You all need to stop.” Her statement was met with laughs. The laughing turned into loud cheering as Tom used the scavenged arm to beat a creature to death while the Dwarves worked to fix the wall and reinforce it.

“There we go! I am at thirty-eight!” Tom called out with a grin on his face. “I’m doing better than all of you with one hand tied behind my… oh, right.” He grinned as people laughed, wiggling his stump.

Dale was struck by inspiration. “A platinum bonus to whoever gets the most kills! And after this, drinks are on me for a week!” A roar of approval met his words, and the flagging spirits of the fighters were rejuvenated. Arrows, blades, darts from blowguns, and all sorts of artillery flew into the crowd, killing the bestial ex-sentients at a distance.

As the things closed in on the fort, the defenders activated dozens of different techniques. Blood rose from the ground and formed whirling blades that tore chunks of meat from anything they touched. Shards of stone zipped into the melee. Apparitions appeared and flew into the ranks, killing without leaving a mark. One Mage released some kind of gas that only moved among the enemy ranks, not doing anything until he snapped his fingers. Then the whole group it had engulfed seemed to turn to dust and scattered on the floor. A bleeding Frank whispered stop repeatedly, targeting individual combatants. They would slow, then stop, finally detonating and taking out groups around themselves.

“I’m counting all of those as mine,” Frank stated calmly as some people jeered.

“Of course you are, Franky.” Hans patted him on the back, leaving a bloody handprint. “We all know you need the money, right?” Frank glared at him and shrugged.

Even with the wholesale slaughter happening on the killing ground, the infected were still coming, even more dangerous now that the weakest of them were dying off.

“Oh, abyss no,” Dale heard a soft voice say near him. He turned to see the swordsman Nez looking into the crowd. Nez pulled in a gasp of air. “Don’t worry, I’ve got this one.” He moved as close as he could to the wall, taking a defensive stance and breathing deeply. Just as he sharply inhaled, a thunderous boom began shaking the walls.

Dale had to blink rapidly to clear his vision, blinded by a massive, writhing column of lightning that had formed a continuous stream from an infected Mage. The path of it was still burning in the air as the Mage attempted to channel it into the defenders. At the halfway point, the path acquired a sharp turn, pulsating toward Nez. There was a beautiful Runescript in the air in front of him, spinning in place as the lightning accumulated on it like flies on feces. Nez was beginning to pant as sweat poured off of him. The wall—inches from his face—was glowing and melting from the plasma burning through it. Any infected that ran through the light had whatever bit of them that touched it lopped off and the wound cauterized even while the flowing electricity killed them.

Nez roared in triumph as the lightning stopped, then slammed his foot down and released the energy back into the crowd. The lightning shattered into individual bolts, arcing to and fro in the seething crowd. The chained lightning expended all of its fury upon the unsuspecting diseased people, killing hundreds in seconds as their hearts stopped. The wall of bodies was motionless for a long minute as Nez sank to the floor.

“Celestial…” Adam whispered. “How did you catch that?”

Nez wheezed in reply, “Lightning… cultivator.” He took a sip of offered water. “You try cultivating in a thunderstorm without having a way to hold the lightning in place!”

A light seemed to dawn on the faces of the Mages around the small area. Dale felt uncomfortable as they exchanged glances. “What?”

“That Mage should have easily been able to return the favor, catching the lightning and returning it…” Chandra spoke up, trailing off. “They have no defenses in place! Defending against elemental attacks takes focus and… they don’t have any! We have been using more powerful abilities than we needed to, thinking that they would have defenses in place that we would need to break through. With this knowledge, though… we can be far more effective.”

Rose spoke over the resulting noise, “That didn’t kill the Mages! They are getting to their feet out there!” She pointed at bodies that were being tossed to the side as the most powerful infected returned to their feet.

“A little thing like their heart stopping wouldn’t stop a Mage!” The portal Mage Justin scoffed, bringing the group’s attention to him. “Haven’t you ever heard the description of a Mage’s body? ‘Near physical invulnerability’ is not just a saying we use to scare off assassination attempts! Watch and learn.” He raised his hands, and after a few seconds of intense concentration, the lightning Mage who had just seemed to come back from the dead dropped dead. Again.

“What did you just do?” Dale whispered in horror as blood leaked from the dead Mage’s eyes.

<Oh abyss yes!> The next words from me were drowned out by the hubbub of noise that followed.

Justin, not catching the interplay, smugly announced, “I made a small portal in his head and transported his brain a few feet away.” He got a few cheers and pats on the back as Dale waited for something horrible to happen.

Chapter Twenty-six

<Oh abyss yes! Here it comes, Dani! Lightning based Mana, coming towards my Core! Rerouting, opening the holding container now… It’s working! Dani. We’re set here!> I grunted in pain as a huge mass of Essence from the man slammed into me. Luckily, my chi spiral was up to the task of holding all of it. My chi threads were currently bloated with power; the Essence of over a thousand people was trying to force its way into my Core simultaneously.

<Whew! Wasn’t expecting that. I thought Mages only had Mana in them?> I queried Dani, disturbed by this development.

“They do, right until they die. Then a small portion of their Mana is reduced to Essence as their soul separates from their body,” Dani explained to me, much to my relief.

<Thank you, my fantastical floating friend!>

She gave me a look. “That is far too long for a nickname, and I think you are trying too hard.”

<I’ll eventually find something you like,> I mumbled petulantly.

“Why not just call me by my name?!” Dani sounded a tad exasperated. “Whatever! Did all of the Mana get into that extradimensional space like you had planned? No leakage?”

<I am pretty sure it did.>

“Pretty sure?”

<Yeah, and I’m not exploding, so I think I am okay. I can’t double check to see if the storage went as planned… if I reopen the space, at least some Mana will come out… but all of these deaths are driving me closer and closer toward the B-rankings! I think we need to come up with a plan of action for making sure that happens smoothly.> My change of topic caught her off guard. She turned, considering what I had just said.

“Do you mean finding a concept to meditate on? Something compatible with your Essence type? That will be difficult. You have pure Essence, and I am not certain what kind of Mana you will be able to bind with…” Dani trailed off, both of us deep in thought.

<Hey, Dani?>

“Yeah, Cal?”

<After this little war, how about we take a vacation? Ignore the adventurers unless they get really close and just spend some quality time together?> She started turning pink as I spoke. <Realistically, most of what we have been doing has been fighting or learning. I’ve been learning concepts; you’ve been training to fight as every creature in here. I’d like to learn more about your past. Where you came from and so forth.> I almost felt embarrassed, but we were going to be together a long, long time.

Dani sounded a bit shy. “That sounds like a plan, Cal. The last few months have been rather stressful, huh?”

<They have. I know that I am usually focused on the things going on, but I know that I need to work on helping you as well. Maybe we can find a way for you to travel for a while?>

“I would like that! Not too long, of course!” Dani paused mid-chuckle. “Cal! I just realized! The concept you could bind your Essence to, the concept to bring you into the B-ranks!”

<What? What?!>

“Oh, this is just perfect.” Dani started to vibrate, she was laughing so hard. “Cal, what is the difference between your Essence and everyone else’s?”

<Um. It is really pure?>

“Right!” she shouted, startling a nearby Elf. “And as we know, as Essence becomes purer, it gets closer to its true state…” She trailed off leadingly.

<Are you saying that I should be a Quintessence Mage?> I paused, realizing the joke. <So I will transform my Essence into the… concept of Essence?>

“Right?” Dani could barely contain her glee. “Right? It would be totally unique! There has never been a Quintessence Mage before! Well, that I know of anyway!”

<Awesome! Dani, that is hilarious and brilliant!>

“Here is how to begin. Focus on the concept, in this case, Essence. Feel the Essence, meditate really hard on what Essence actually is. As you approach the B-ranks, if your affinity for Quintessence is high enough, you will begin to understand it in ways that are unexplainable to anyone else. In your mind, during your breakthrough, you will form a bond to Quintessence and learn its true potential.”

<Do you think I have a high enough affinity?> I hesitantly questioned.

“I hope so. You are the only being that I can think of that could do it.” Dani coughed. “Except Dale, at this point, I suppose.”

<Would that be an issue?>

“Well, not really. It is just that… the more Mages of a certain type there are, the more likely that there will be someone to counter whatever you throw at them. Two Mages that follow the same cultivation path are basically at a stalemate against each other.”

<Well, he is a long way away from the Mage ranks. I’m getting closer by the second!> I announced proudly. I would be the first Quintessence Mage. Dale might never find out that this was an option, so I may stay the only one.

“Well, hopefully everything is as it should be. The Mage trials are difficult, and if you aren’t suited to the Mana type, it could break your mind…”

<…> I sighed, a completely unnecessary noise, as I didn’t breathe. <You know, you could have just kept that tidbit to yourself.>

A scream reverberated down the tunnel, returning my attention to the battles raging. I frowned in concern as I realized that a few defenders had been affected by spores while my attention was elsewhere. They didn’t know it yet, but if something weren’t done soon, they would sink into madness.

<Dale.> I waited for a response.

“A bit busy here,” came the reply. “You promised not to distract me in battle, remember?”

<This is important. I need to talk to your alchemist about a cure or at least an antidote for the spores. I can provide materials and anything else he needs, but a few of the defenders have been infected,> I told him earnestly.

Dale imperceptibly paused in his fighting. “Why are you offering to help?”

<If you all die, I am doubtful that other people will feel secure coming here. Total self-interest here.> I blatantly ignored the fact that I was also in danger from these things.

“Can’t you bother Minya with this?” Dale’s thoughts were filled with frustration.

<I would, but she is killing things a lot more efficiently than you. Taking her from the front lines would leave a big hole in the defenses. Taking you… well, let’s just say you won’t be missed too much.> I looked at the people around him. <Except as a laundry service, perhaps.>

“You are such an ass.”

Dale told the people around him that he was moving back. Just as I predicted, there was almost no change in the quantity of dying infected. He moved to the rear where healers, the apothecary, and the alchemist were doing their best to get people patched up.

“I need to talk to you!” Dale called to the alchemist. The man in question glared and told Dale off for interrupting him. He stopped grumbling at Dale’s next words. “I may have a way to formulate an antidote.”

“Fine. You have five minutes to explain how you, an untrained, know-nothing, non-alchemist can help me find a cure for this before we all die. Also, without a lab or any kind of equipment.” The man glared at Dale, seemingly ready to jump down his throat at the first mistake.

<Tell him we have all the equipment he needs if he can describe it accurately enough. Say you can also get him any material he needs if I know how to make it. I also have a deep understanding of the disease itself, as well as how it interacts with humans and animals at this point,> I instructed Dale.

He repeated verbatim what I said, and the alchemist—though skeptical—nodded and followed Dale to the back wall of the fort.

They pushed against the wall where I told them, opening the Goblin respawn room. The alchemist looked around in confusion.

“Why haven’t we been using this room for the wounded? It is far more defensible!”

“I just found it,” Dale told him honestly. He pointed at the jumble of alchemy equipment that I had whipped up. “What else do you need?”

The alchemist looked at the equipment. “First, I need to make sure that you can get me what you promised. Let’s start with rare material. I need two strong-type Beast Cores, a pound of powdered aluminum, and an alembic.”

<Have him describe the alembic and its function,> I told Dale. He did, and I was able to create what I hope would be close to what the man was talking about. I had Dale open the top of an oversized chest in the corner of the room. To get around the concentration of auras in the area, I had a chute attached to the back of the chest that I could drop things into. This setup also had given me a good idea for a new trap!

“Here you go!” Dale cheerfully told the incredulous alchemist, handing over the requested items.

The man looked at the gear in wonder. “We may actually have a chance to…” He rushed to start setting up his lab, calling out for various things. I have no idea why he wanted some of the things, but I was watching raptly. There was one point where he asked for Elves ear but had a disgusted look on his face as Dale handed over the dripping flesh.

“What?” Dale was taken aback at the look on the craftsman’s face.

“Riiiiight…” He sighed. “I’ll be more specific. Elves ear is an herb, not a literal ear. I’ve seen it upstairs. You may also call it ‘mountain lavender’?”

<Oh, that’s easier.> I dropped a bag of the herb down.

Next, there was an intense interview, where Dale was asked exceedingly detailed questions about the fungus. Dale had a delightfully confused look on his face as I answered through him. The poor lad really had no idea what he was saying, just repeating as best as he could.

“...and I soiled myself,” Dale repeated, before turning red at the realization of what he had uttered.

“Oh. Um.” The alchemist took a step back. “Well… battle isn’t for everyone…”

“What the shit, Cal,” Dale muttered, choosing poor phrasing in my opinion.

<Just trying to lighten the mood.> I chuckled at his embarrassment

“I need crushed topaz, but if you want to go clean yourself first…”

“I’m fine!” Dale snapped, grabbing a bag of topaz and nearly throwing it at the man. The alchemist looked at Dale, nodded, and began calling out ingredients whilst continuing his questioning.

Dani kept me up to date on the goings-on of the fight. After a small reminder from her, I returned to using a portion of my willpower focusing on collecting and eradicating any spores that the infected released. The battle was not going well for the defenders at this point. Though they were killing hundreds every few minutes, there were thousands more making their way down the tunnels.

An exhausting hour passed, the alchemist squeezing information out of me that I had no idea was relevant. Dale was hoarse from the constant stream of speaking and looked like he would rather be fighting mindless humans.

“Now we wait for the distillation to complete.” The alchemist sat down with a heavy sigh. “I don’t know how much this will make, but it is a start. We need someone to test it on as well.”

“How sure are you about this?” Dale asked the first question in an hour that wasn’t from me.

A slow shake of the head. “This will end up being one of two things. I am sure it will have an effect on those poor souls, but in what way? If it works as intended, it will be an antidote for the fungus, killing it without harming the host… I suppose it may simply be an effective way to kill them quickly.” I perked up at hearing this. “Otherwise… it will end up being a reagent.”

“A reagent? What do you mean by that?” Dale looked at the fluid flowing slowly through glass pipes.

“When an Inscription is powered, certain things in the pattern can allow the Rune to have additional or more powerful effects. A reagent is added for a single-use ‘effect’, whereas a catalyst is used to reduce the Mana or Essence needed to power the Inscription.” The alchemist took a deep, shuddering breath. “If this turns out to be a reagent, we will need a huge amount of celestial Essence—or a moderate amount of Mana—along with a compatible Rune for it to have any effect at all. The process will most likely kill anything with the aural signature of the disease.”

“Let’s hope it’s an antidote which will simply be a cure then.” Dale patted the man on the shoulder.

Another head shake. “Has our luck ever been that good?”

Dale

Dale left the alchemist to his fussing over heat levels, preferring to be in the thick of battle. He surveyed the dungeon, and it appeared that the only forts remaining were the one housing the Nobles and this one. He had to stop himself from sinking into depression at the thought that everyone had stayed on his command. He shuddered for a moment and inhaled sharply. The knowledge that your mistakes led to the death of others was the price of command, and he would do his duty by joining his vassals in combat. Falling apart would help no one except the dungeon.

Dale moved forward, replacing a much-relieved, exhausted man on the wall. His fighting style was simplistic with these beasts, draw back a fist, straight punch. Draw back a fist, punch. Pull, punch. The infected didn’t bother to defend; they were one hundred percent attack. Dale chuckled at the thought that his combat instructor would actually approve; he had made Dale punch like this into a wooden post five hundred times to end every session. Constantly drilling the simplest moves was the best way to improve the foundation of your art, at least according to the crotchety old Moon Elf.

As he was putting down another rabid humanoid, Dale realized that he was seeing a dark haze of Essence in the air. It reacted to his cultivation, so he attempted to draw it in. For the first time in his life, he unwittingly cultivated infernal Essence. He stopped fighting in shock as the Essence did everything it could to be absorbed by him. When he started drawing it in, the dark power poured into his Center, attempting to overwhelm whatever else was there. Only the fact that the taint was drawn into a small Core to the side of his Center saved him from being overwhelmed by the tendril of corruption.

“Dale?” Hans was standing next to him. “Are you okay? It looks like there is infernal Essence being drawn into you. Did an affinity channel get forced open or something?”

Dale hesitated to respond, then realized that if he couldn’t trust his teammate with his secrets, he shouldn’t trust him with his life on a daily basis. “I actually think I have… all of them open?” he stated weakly.

Hans looked deeper into Dale, then gasped and took a step back in shock. “You’re a Beast?”

“What? No!” Dale reached out to reassure his friend, patting him on the arm. “I do somehow have a Core embedded around my Center, though. I think it has something to do with the Beast we fought a while back. After that, all my affinity channels were open.”

Hans inspected Dale’s pure Essence. “How have you not been overwhelmed by corruption? If they are all open, you should be absolutely sick.”

“Watch.” Dale opened himself up to the infernal Essence in the room, and Hans watched as it sank into him and vanished.

“Wow! Some kind of… where did it go?” Hans was poking Dale in the chest, as though that would help explain the situation.

Dale smacked away the offending finger. “Stop that. It goes into a small Beast Core to the side of my Center.”

“How have you been cultivating?” Hans waved away the answer. “Right, pure Essence in here. On the next rest rotation, I want you to open all of your affinity channels and suck in everything. Essence and corruption. We need to find your limits so that we can set up a training plan when this is all over.”

Smiling at his friend, Dale nodded. “I’m loving the optimism.”

“Better than planning to die!” Hans reached out and stabbed an infected man that was getting too close, punching his dagger through the man’s forehead as easily as pushing a knife though unenchanted parchment. He chuckled. “I’m going to enjoy you having to purchase enough alcohol to make a Mage drunk.”

Dale felt a shiver of apprehension at these words. How much booze would it take to make that happen? He looked up as he heard a now-familiar explosion; somewhere in the dungeon, an infected had ruptured its Center.

“Shards! Hit the floor!” a voice rang out, followed by shrapnel from damaged rock pinging off the defenses hard enough to gouge chunks of rock. The unlucky few who didn’t respond fast enough fell screaming as holes were torn in their bodies. The Mages hit released a short grumble as their clothes were torn a bit more.

Dale waved at the man that had called out the warning. “A fifty silver bonus to you, sir! Teamwork is the only way we are getting out of here. Nice work!” His praise made the man swell with pride, and soon, warnings were ringing out across the fortification.

“The line is getting thin on the left wall! Get some archers up there!”

“Big-ass infected charging! Mage! Mage!” Boom! “Thank you, Mage!”

“We need some relief in the center! They haven’t had a break in hours!”

“Who needs a break? We’ve got this!” A roar of agreement rose from the center of the line.

Hans threw an arm around Dale’s neck. “Look at that. You’re inspiring! Who would have guessed?”

“Rude,” Dale responded, pushing Hans away and punching an infected that was scaling the wall.

“Oh, gods!” a man suddenly screamed. “I can feel it! I’m infected!”

Hans looked askance at Dale. “Erm. Want me to go check on that?”

“No, I’ll do it. We needed a test subject for… a… thing.” Dale looked at his nonplussed friend. “I’ll go now, how about?”

“Sure?” Hans tried to suppress a grin. “Just so you know, people don’t really like their liege-lord experimenting on them…”

“It’s for a cure, I’m not exper… dang it, Hans,” Dale sputtered as Hans started laughing at him. Dale hurried over after confirming that his team was holding up well. He walked up to the small group looking at the man who was slowly sprouting mushrooms. “Come with me, the alchemist has been working on a potential antidote.”

The man looked up, fury beginning to build in his eyes. “You! I’m the leader of The Collective, and you ordered us around like animals! If I turn, I’m coming for you first!”

Dale was shocked by the anger directed at him but didn’t let it show. “Nick, correct? If the cure works, then everything will be fine. Don’t worry, if you turn too quickly, we’ll put you down before you become a threat.”

Nick’s face drained of color as he realized he was being threatened. He was used to people of lower cultivation rankings cowering before him, and the look of total unconcern on Dale’s face made him quail inside.

They moved over to where the alchemist was putting the finishing touches on his concoction. He looked up as they entered the room. “Ah! Do we have a volunteer?”

Dale hesitated a moment. “He was kinda volun-told.”

“A death for research is better than a death by devolving into a ravenous creature. Hopefully, you will even survive!” The alchemist didn’t seem to notice nor would he have cared about Nick’s unhappy face.

A thick sludge streamed into a vial, and when it was full, the alchemist began to put it into a thin blade, similar to the style of injecting daggers that Hans used.

<Dale, get some of that before he uses it all! I can make a whole lot more than he can in a limited time frame!> Dale ducked as my words entered his mind; the others looked at him in startlement‎.

“Sorry, stress,” Dale hurried to explain.

The alchemist leaned closer to Nick, whispering, “He made a mess earlier…”

“Stop that!” Dale commanded, face flushing. “I need a drop of that liquid. In the chest here, please.”

“I can’t just waste this potion!” came the indignant reply. “Who knows if we have enough time to make more?!”

“Sir,” Dale interrupted the tirade. “Please don’t fight this. I promise it is for a good reason. Have I let you down yet?” A grumble came, and a tiny droplet of the concentrated solution was dropped into the chest.

“Happy now?”

<Yes.>

“Yes, that should do it,” Dale affirmed on my behalf.

The alchemist turned and jabbed the short dagger into the muscle tissue of Nick’s thigh. Nick yelped and started to take a swing at the man but stopped himself as the potion hit his system. Nick went pale and dropped to the floor convulsing.

“Blast and damnation!” The alchemist stomped on the ground. “Hold his head, or he will damage himself!” No one made a move to touch the infected man writhing on the ground. “Oh, right, the disease. He should be fine, then.”

“What went wrong?” Dale asked as the alchemist began mumbling about the quantity of potion remaining.

The man slumped and sighed. “This turned out to be a reagent. We will need to fill the lines of a Rune with this, then channel celestial Essence or Mana into it.”

“We can do that!” Dale determinately turned, preparing to call the clerics and celestial Mages.

“No point.” The alchemist shook his head. “We would need a massive Rune, an Inscribed Rune, and we just don’t have that kind of time. An enchantment won’t work. The reagent would be used up as it was applied instead of in a quick, evenly activated sequence.”

<Can we use a smaller one?>

“Why couldn’t we use a smaller one?” Dale questioned the reasoning presented to him.

“The area it affects would be too small to be of any real use. A few would be stopped, but an arrow or three can do that.” The alchemist scoffed.

Silence reigned in the room, at least as much silence as could be garnered while the world seemed to be ending.

<Fine, I have had enough! Time to fix things. Again. Ugh.>

Chapter Twenty-seven

<Dale, ask him what kind of Rune it has to be,> I directed. Dale relayed my words, which had the alchemist rubbing his patchy beard.

“Well… I suppose really any Rune that is specifically anti-infernal. This fungicide should do the rest.” He waved the small remaining amount of potion around.

Dale chimed in, “How much of that will we actually need in order to activate a Rune large enough to be effective?”

“Enough for at least an even coat,” came the calculated reply.

Easy enough. I had been working on examining the pattern of the potion that had been put in the chest. At this point, I had almost… done! I fully understood the potion and how to make it. My method of creation was far less time intensive, and a thud announced the arrival of an oak cask in the treasure chest of the room.

“What was that?”

They lifted the lid and opened the cask, revealing a large jar of the precious fluid.

The alchemist looked around with bright eyes. “I never want to leave this room again,” he muttered under his breath.

<That could be arranged,> I muttered in a completely non-threatening way. Dale still glared around the room.

“Could we test the potion with this?” Dale reached into his tattered, bloodstained shirt and withdrew an amulet. This amulet had the first Rune that I had ever learned, a celestial-attuned Inscription that would weaken the bonds of infernal influence when powered by Essence.

“I see no reason why not.” They moved over to the weakly thrashing leader of The Collective and waited as the alchemist carefully poured an even coat of fluid along the lines. He started to lean down but, with a frown, looked around. “I don’t suppose any of you are celestial cultivators?”

Head shakes all around.

“I’ll go get someone.” Dale took off at a run, grabbing Adam and sprinting back with a breathless explanation. Adam gingerly took the amulet from the alchemist and, with a quick prayer, thrust it against the spasming man’s chest. Activating the Inscription with a burst of Essence, Adam was knocked back as a ripple of celestial Essence interacted with the reagent and expanded in a sphere from the Rune.

Nick screamed as the light flowed over him, and the visible mushrooms withered and died. They tore themselves out of their host, leaving gaping holes as the semi-intelligent parasite tried to save itself. The light seemed to hunt down every last bit, spearing even the smallest speck and converting it to ash.

Adam applied his Essence in a different way, working to heal Nick before he bled out on the floor. He looked around as he spoke, “That took a lot more Essence to activate than it ever has before. Did you say that you were planning to make a larger version?”

“Yes, the hope there was that we would be able to stop the infection by creating a cure, killing only the mushrooms.” Dale glanced at the pool of blood around Nick. “It appears that this process will be a bit more… fatal than we had originally hoped.”

Adam looked surprised. “You thought this could fix them without killing them?”

“I had hoped,” Dale stated glumly. “That hope is gone now, though. Nick here was barely infected, and the cure nearly finished him off.”

The alchemist chimed in. “This Rune was pretty much our only hope. The area it affects is too small to be of any use in combat, though. We will just have to do our best to survive.”

<Did you not hear the determination in my voice, Dale? I think I have a solution for you.> I was getting a bit cross about them making decisions based on incomplete data.

“Do tell,” Dale thought at me sarcastically.

<We have a few options. The first is that you clear a large area of anything not sworn to me, and I build a Rune on it. This includes people and the infected. Then your celestial Essence users would sacrifice their entire cultivation for the Runic activation,> I began, only to be cut off.

“I don’t see that happening. Most of them would seriously rather die than give up decades worth of Essence,” Dale rebutted in frustration.

<Fine. Then you could have everyone here swear a binding oath to me, so I could ignore their auras and build the Rune here,> I offered hopefully. I could use some new material-gatherers.

“I would rather die than give you that kind of access to people,” Dale returned unhelpfully.

I snorted. <Well, that is just mean. Fine! The last option is to go collect the celestial quartz that was knocked into the Boss Room of the first floor. That is stuffed full of Essence and even has the appropriate Rune!>

Dale sighed in frustration. People were dying!

“I don’t know if you were listening, but the reagent has to go on an inactive Rune.”

<Yes, exactly my point. There is a Mana storm raging outside, something hit the quartz hard enough to knock it loose from its stone setting, and it fell into the dungeon. The activation portion of the Rune broke off from the strike, so the Rune is sitting inert,> I spoke to him a tad condescendingly. He really needed to listen to me more.

Dale perked up, a bit shocked at the information I was freely giving him. He relayed my story to the others, and the alchemist agreed that it was their best shot. The man also danced a bit when we told him it was an option. They quickly gathered the leaders in the area, asking for help in gathering a group to get to the powerful Runescripted quartz.

Frank was not at all interested. “Why would we do that? We’re holding the area, and they can’t last forever! We have a defensible area, supplies, and enough people to survive the horde!”

Dale was taken aback at the Guild Leader’s vehemence. The other Mages of the group agreed with Frank’s words.

Adam boldly joined the conversation, doing his best not to stammer in the face of these powerful people, “That is inaccurate. While we are holding out for the time being, almost a quarter of our people have received serious injuries. We have been able to patch up most of them, but we are running out of potions and Essence to make this happen. The people injured are weakened, and they will be exhausted for at least a few days. That increases their chances of being re-injured significantly.”

Frank waved his hand. “We can make it just fine. We’ve killed thousands. The end is in sight!”

“How many Mages were in Spotterton?” Dale had a flash of insight.

Amber glanced at him. “Dozens. Maybe as many as fifty?”

“And how many have we seen in this fight? Just the known ones from Spotterton?” Dale questioned leadingly.

Sometimes it was better to let powerful people think that they were the ones making the important decisions.

“Oh, abyss,” Chandra cursed. “We’ve seen a bare handful.”

Frank powered on, “Maybe they all were the ones to rupture their Centers up above!”

Dale sighed. “Frank, you are making good points, but we can’t rely on ‘I hope so’ right now. We have a proven method of defeating this enemy, and I feel that we need to take this chance.”

“Frank. You… you have something on your arm,” Amber announced in a tremulous voice, pointing at his left arm.

“What are you...?” Frank swatted at his arm, wincing when he hit a small mushroom. “Oh no.”

“You have seemed a bit more… aggressive.” Chandra took a step away from him.

Frank looked at Dale, eyes wild. “You said something about a proven cure?”

“Better, I’ve tested it. The cure takes a large amount of celestial Essence, though. We can’t continuously use the process on individual people,” Adam spoke again.

Frank looked at his arm, deeply troubled.

“I’ll go.” Frank’s voice cracked as another mushroom began to sprout from his elbow. “I can’t order other people to go, though. It would not be right, and we still need defenders.”

“I’ll go as well,” Dale stated, hushing the people that started to object. “I have access to information that you just… don’t. I really cannot explain.” His words had all of the Mages in the room look at him. Several did a double take, and a few gasped.

“You… you Beast! What did you do with Dale?” Chandra’s hands and eyes lit up with Mana.

“I’m still me.” Dale tried to remain calm, eyeing the deadly glow. “Also, if I understand my situation correctly, I am immune to the disease.”

More gasping and a few suspicious looks were his reward for honesty.

<Well… not technically, but for all real purposes, I guess that works. If you don’t mind me chopping bits off of you,> I slowly agreed.

“I mind. But as long as you only do it to infected bits and you grow them back, I think it’ll be fine,” Dale agreed to my statement and also found the loophole I was trying to use.

<Darn, I was hoping you would agree to let me eat you when this was over.> I laughed as his face twisted.

“Immune… and there is a Core in your system. How did we not see this?” Frank muttered, still mistrustful of this new situation.

“I really can’t say,” Dale apologetically muttered.

“There is going to be some long talks when this is all over, Dale,” Chandra threatened. “You’d better get your story straight by then.”

“I’ll see what we can do,” Dale promised, then quickly tried to recant his slip of the tongue. “What I can do.”

“Fine. You still need more people. You need to make it up the stairs, through the horde, and apply the reagent. That isn’t a two-person job.” Amber’s voice was harsh and filled with frustration.

“I’ll only take volunteers,” Dale agreed with Frank on that particular subject. They went out and asked for people to brave the conditions, but the area stayed near-silent. Dale’s group all stepped forward bravely, but no other Mages or regular cultivators offered their services. They had already agreed that the rest of the council would stay as a last line of defense.

<Wow. What brave people you have in your little city,> I told Dale sarcastically. <I’ll bolster your ranks then. Clear your pet alchemist out of that room, and please don’t kill your helpers.>

I set to work creating a full contingent of Goblins, not giving them Mithril but still filling their weapons and armor with powerful enchantments. That way, if they were killed when they stepped out, a human wouldn’t make off with a nearly indestructible material.

Dani interrupted my concentration, “I’m going too, Cal. I don’t trust these people to get the job done without some serious Goblin power.”

<Dani, no…> She was already following her secret tunnels to the next floor. I sighed; I try so hard to keep her safe, and she just throws herself back into the fight. Oh well. <If you feel you must go, I am going to be setting your armor and weapons to the maximum.>

“Neat.” she chimed, circling the spawn room as I formed the Goblin Amazon. I didn’t bother to set her armor to the side; I formed a seamless set of aluminum around her towering form. Dani entered the huge Mob and took a deep breath as I flooded the aluminum armor with Essence, pleased as it darkened to a silvery-purple. Mithril. She prepared her weapons and nodded as I swung the door open.

There were a few shouts as a dozen Goblins and one Goblin Amazon entered the area, but they stayed right next to the door and didn’t make any hostile moves, so the humans calmed down fairly quickly.

<Dale, I have a matching battle gauntlet for you. Actually, I am equipping your whole group. We are going through the tunnels to a different fort that didn’t have the defenses lowered, so hurry up.> I was looking for the best place to move the group to, and I found one closer to the entrance of this floor that wasn’t entirely flooded with infected. Just mostly flooded.

The group started moving hesitantly past the steel-clad Goblins and very cautiously past Dani’s over-armored form.

“Wait!” a voice called. “I’m coming with you.”

Dale and I looked at the speaker, watching as Nick strolled up to the group. Dale was quite a bit happier about the help than I was. “Alright, Nick! Thank you, any help is greatly appreciated! You’ll be well rewarded for your services.”

“Yes. I will be,” Nick stated flatly.

Hans clapped him on the arm. “Ah, yes. Nothing like being a jackass to make people want to shower you in silver. Well, molten silver. How do you feel about being a statue?”

“Look, I am here to make that cure happen and get the hell out of this deathtrap,” Nick growled. “I’m the leader of The Collective! All I was supposed to be doing was making money here, not playing nursemaid to a bunch of incompetents.”

“I am coming as well.”

“Me too!”

Dale looked back to see both Minya and Nez trying to stare the other down. “Yes, and abyss no. Nez, you’re with Adam. Minya, go play with the infected.”

“When are you going to let go of your anger toward the dungeon, Dale?” Minya asked scathingly. “The dungeon is just following its nature.”

<I usually go by ‘he’ or Cal,> I stated blandly. <You know what? I suppose you’re just trying to protect my identity. Carry on.>

“Minya, if I’m not here, you are the only one that can,” he leaned in close and whispered, “talk to the dungeon and get a backup plan. You need to stay.”

She scrutinized his face. “Is that really the reason you don’t want me along?” She crossed her arms.

“No, but it works really well as a reason to make you stay,” Dale answered, eliciting a squawk of rage from the Mage. She turned and stormed off, fuming.

“That was harsh, Dale.” Rose shook her head at Dale’s treatment of the lady. “We could have used her help.”

“Trust me, we don’t want it,” Dale firmly stated. “Let’s go.”

They walked into the room and found a few presents.

I had made a matching battle gauntlet for Dale with a slight variation. Instead of a fluid repulsion Rune on it, I had placed an Essence gathering Rune combined with the draining portion of the demon summoning Rune I had, um, ‘acquired’ a while back. I was unsure if it would work as intended, but I had run Essence through a different version a while back, and it didn’t explode. It was supposed to rip the Essence out of whatever Dale hit and store it in the Core hidden in the folds of fabric. It would drain infernal, water, and earth corruption from Dale to power itself, but that shouldn’t be an issue with the taint gathering Cores around his Center.

For Tom, I had made a large chunk of armor. It was basically a greatshield that strapped on to his body. A person with two arms couldn’t have worn it at all, so it was perfect for the one-armed barbarian. With this on, he could act as a mobile battering ram! I also made it enchanted so that he wouldn’t need to use his personal reserves to use it correctly. I chuckled in merriment when his eyes lit up; he had gotten his warhammer back as well.

He roared in approval. “Today is a glorious day for battle! Perhaps I can fall in combat and join the ranks of the fallen warriors on the fields of heavenly war!”

“Or maybe you could try really hard to survive and keep us alive too?” Nick scathingly snarled. Dale started to have second thoughts about this man being on the team.

Rose acquired a bow with a force enhancement enchantment as well as reinforced arrows that wouldn’t shatter when the bow fired them. A few arrows were tipped with small jars of explosive fluids, and there was a small collection that had sharpening enchantments for piercing armor.

Adam got a white robe with a fine mesh of Mithril throughout it, well hidden by the cloth. This would stop almost any stabbing weapons but didn’t offer too much protection against direct force or blunt weapons. Dale explained to him in a whisper how amazing the robe was, keeping it a secret from the greedy leader of The Collective.

Hans got nothing.

“This is total… why doesn’t your mysterious benefactor like me?” Hans whined as he simultaneously twirled four knives across his fingers.

“Shall we?” Dale looked around the nervous faces, ignoring Hans.

They set out, walking along the tunnel to the next fort, nervously listening to the sounds of fighting, wailing, and scraping through the thin stone walls. Periodic explosions transformed the wailing into snarls and screams of pain or fury, but the weeping would soon return to being a constant background noise.

“This is horrifying,” Rose whispered, her eyes round with fright.

Dale made a motion at her as the ambient noise lessened a bit on the other side of the wall and querying sounds could be heard. Holding a finger to his lips, Dale pantomimed Rose closing her mouth. The noise picked up on the other side, and the group breathed a collective, silent sigh of relief. Treading carefully, they soon found themselves in a room identical to the one they had begun their journey in.

“It should be safe to quietly talk if you really need to.” Dale looked around. No takers.

<Ahhh!> I screamed in his mind. Dale jumped, nearly falling and bashing into the wall next to him. Luckily, a huge hand caught and steadied him.

“Cal? Must you be so… ‘funny’?” Dani thought at me in consternation as she patted Dale on the head.

<I just think Dale is being too serious about this. I believe in you, Dale!> I cheered him on in a falsetto.

“I hate this place,” Dale muttered softly.

“It grows on you.” Dani patted him on the head again and ruffled his hair. Her voice made the others all stare at her.

Hans asked the question they were all thinking, “You are an intelligent being? I thought you Mobs were mostly animals…”

“I’m smarter than you are, Hans.” Dani walked forward to the exit.

Hans gave a panicked look to Dale. “It knows my name,” he whispered harshly.

Dani threw open the door and charged into battle amidst howls of outrage from the infected. I watched as she plowed into them, a whirling cyclone of blades.

<I’m gonna lock the door behind you so the fort isn’t overrun.>

She didn’t answer, too caught up in the slaughter.

The remaining people charged into battle, doing their best to clear a route without stopping to try and set up a defensible area. They were surrounded, and their best chance was to charge the stairs. With the loss of only four Goblins, they reached the bottom of the upward spiral. A huge mass of bodies greeted them; this was the choke point of the entering abominations.

“How the abyss are we supposed to get through that?” Adam muttered anxiously.

“I’ll take care of it,” Dani informed them with a growl. “Cover me.”

<Dani, I’ve been using the vents in this area to filter out nitrogen and other gasses from the homogeneous mixture of breathable content–>

“Cal, all you told me was to start a really hot fire. Is that still the plan?” Dani rumbled ominously, cutting me off quite rudely.

<Well, yes, I just wanted to let you know why this–>

Dani grunted and held forward her weapons. Crossing them, she released a gout of fire through a thin film of celestial Essence. Holy fire raged outward, reducing all in its reach to cinders. The fire suddenly roared higher as it reached my prepared area, and a concussive blast resounded, throwing Dani back like a ragdoll. Hans was suddenly in front of her, casually holding out one hand. In front of him was a wall of fire which curled back and away. The fire was only racing up the stairs. The high oxygen content in the area allowed the blaze to burn exponentially hotter than it ever could have under normal circumstances.

The celestial tinged fire moved quickly but consumed all the available air in the tunnel, burning out too quickly to superheat the stone stairs or wall. Dani bellowed, “Go! Go! Go!”

Fresh air was beginning to be pulled up the stair shaft, and they ran forward, propelled by an updraft.

The sentients raced up the stairs, slipping over meaty chunks of semi-seared flesh. I did my best to absorb all of the bodies before they got to them, trying to ease their passage. Scores of low-cultivation infected had died, but a few lived through the initial blast. Most of those were writhing on the floor, burned, blinded, and dying, but a few were standing up, trying to breathe the de-oxygenated air. Those few took swipes at the running group but were killed in passing, much to my delight.

I looked at where they were running and swore vigorously. <Dani, unfortunately, that blast cleared the way for a few Mages to wander to the Boss Room. Do you want me to open a Basher warren and hide you while they pass?>

Dani paused, causing those behind her to bounce off of her armored form with a curse. Her guttural voice uttered, “How many?”

<A good handful. They seem more confused than the low-level infected. They didn’t sprint down the stairs right away or seem to focus on an area to target. I’m betting that if they noticed you, they would be much more active…>

“Open a passage, Cal,” Dale chimed in, speaking aloud for his party’s benefit. “We don’t have the strength to fight a large group of Mages.”

I gave a tiny mental nod, and the stairs in front of them slid open, revealing a few startled Impalers and a Glitterflit. Dani pushed past them and sat in the small room. The others joined her, though Tom began having trouble breathing when the walls closed around them.

“I do not like this at all,” Tom whispered, earning a glare from the people hushing him.

<The Mages are beginning to descend. Oh crap, who pushed the Impaler out into the–>

A blast of Mana shook the stairway, vaporizing the Impaler and putting cracks in the stonework in all directions. The attacking Mage screamed, then began glowing and charged down the stairs. I thought that this was finally the end of the line for Dale’s group, but the Mage ran right past them, never turning around.

<Huh. I guess he thinks there is more prey down there.> There was, so it was a fair assumption. The other Mages saw the first run off and chased him at high speed, eager to participate in some good ol’ fashioned killin’. They raced down the stairs, pounding their feet in a deadly staccato. All of them passed the hiding place of the group except the last, whose feet burst through the stairs and tripped him. He bounced headfirst off the floor.

The Mage stood up slowly, growling… and continued down the stairs with a howl.

<The room is filling up again! Also, easily a dozen Mages just entered the dungeon. You are only going to have a short while until they reach the Boss Room. Move! Go now!> I barked instructions at Dale and Dani.

They nodded and started moving. Tom let out a sigh of relief as they left the enclosed area and rushed upwards.

<In case you wanted to know, the Mages that passed you have reached the floor and are starting to attack the fort. I need to concentrate down there for a bit. Good luck!>

“We need to hurry!” Dale told the others as they reached the top of the stairs. He ran into Dani’s still form. “That isn’t good,” a nearly inaudible whimper left his lips.

Chapter Twenty-eight

The room, utterly filled with infected, went quiet for a moment, the collective sobbing of the crowd postponed before howls of rage filled the air. Reacting to the sound of prey being found, dozens of infected dropped through the opening in the ceiling. The weakest of them hit the ground and splattered gore across the room, dying upon impact. The remaining ones ran, limped, or crawled at their new targets.

“Screw this.” Rose raised her bow and fired a jar of explosive oil into the crowd. It blasted a hole in the wall of infected, and the battle began.

Tom—laughing—charged into the infected, acting as a battering ram. He used his shield as a mobile wall, and Nick scoffed at what he thought was a suicidal charge. When a large group had gathered to attack him, Tom took a sharp step back and swung his warhammer with a mighty grunt. A wave of death followed the swing. The beings hit directly had large swaths of their bodies blasted into vapor, their bones flying from their still-twitching corpses to act as projectiles.

“I! Have! Missed this!” Tom roared, swinging his hammer ever faster.

Nick’s eyes were bulging from their sockets.

“He’s insane,” Nick whispered.

The leader of The Collective looked to the side to see Dale pounding on infected with his—apparently—only cloth covered hands, leaving behind craters in the flesh. An arrow from Rose ripped through everything from her to the wall in a straight line, tearing through bodies and armor like paper. Hans was jauntily strolling along, poking enemies with casual grace and disregard for his own safety.

“They’re all insane!” affirmed Adam.

Nick looked his way to see him ignoring several infected that appeared to be stabbing him with daggers. “If you don’t mind, could you start clearing the area?” Nick shook himself, then threw his power hesitantly into the fight. Nez walked up to Adam and killed the infected near him with efficient strokes from his longsword.

Nez looked over Adam, noting his Mithril-lined robe and nodding. “Good, that’ll make it a lot easier to protect you.” He settled in, killing any infected that tried to close with Adam.

The Goblins got into a tight group and made their way to the center of the fallen quartz plate. They pushed the infected back, slowly clearing the savages away from the Rune. As soon as I had enough room to work, I began dissolving the bodies and any fluids left behind, leaving a sparklingly clear space for them to apply an even coat of the reagent. I would have done it myself, but the constant attacks from the infected kept throwing aural interference in the area, and I would hate to have to put down a half-formed version of the needed fluid.

Dani left the quartz and began walking toward the tunnel that connected to the room. Taking a deep breath, she forced Essence along her weapons. They began to glow slowly as she built up the Essence to levels that became visible to the naked eye. Her breathing increased in speed, and she laboriously held her form, forcing the Essence to the utmost compression.

With a tortured scream, she released a torrent of holy fire, and it surged down the tunnel. Released from their mortal coil, the infected in the tunnel simply died. They exploded into ash as the heat reached into the multiple thousands of degrees.

“Now, Cal! Drop the security door!” Dani wheezed as she collapsed.

I dropped the five-ton chunk of cursed-earth granite, cutting off the only tunnel into the Boss Room. Thank goodness! I had been unable to release the panic doors, cut off by the auras in the area. Infected still jumped down from above, but now there was only one direction for the enemy to appear. For now, at least. In the tunnel, infected were shattering their Centers as they raced into the molten tunnel and had their limbs melt off. Explosion after explosion rocked the corridor, and the rock began to crack.

Adam stepped on to the quartz plate and pulled the huge jar of reagent from his storage bag. With steady hands, he used the built-in nozzle to begin pouring the viscous fluid along the lines of the Inscription. He went at a measured pace, not only because he didn’t want to make a mistake but also due to the fact that the fluid left the container oh so very slowly. He bent down to fill a deep portion of the Rune, and Dale used him as a springboard to punch a sprinting infected in the face.

“Done!” Adam shouted, several minutes later.

A ragged cheer reached his ears while he noticed that the Rune wasn’t doing anything. “The activation sequence! Where is it?!”

A moment of frantic searching turned up the missing chunk of quartz, and Adam began filling its lines with the remaining fluid. They were moving toward the Rune to place the piece… when a familiar body landed next to the Rune, falling from above. Dozens more fell to the ground from on high.

The area seemed to go still, just for a moment. Dale saw the face contorted by rage and shuddered. The words that left his lips caused the fight to return to its previous intensity.

“Father Richard… no…”

Cal

I was looking in on my other pet, er, minion, uhh… Minya. She seemed to be doing well.

“Fear death not!” she intoned above the raging battle. “Our work empowers our dungeon, and with each death, we will increase our reward in the afterlife!” This was met with sideways glances and muttering,

“With each enemy slain, we increase our rewards in this life!”

That was the way to get the people motivated, it seemed. A constant flow of valuables. Well, if that was the case…

When a group of infected was cleared enough for me to create things, I rained down an explosion of shining gold coins. The defenders were quiet for a moment, and then all abyss broke out. They redoubled their efforts, and with every explosion of the elements, I followed it with a hail of coin. Chandra whooped at the suddenly vigorous group and spread her hands out over the crowd of flailing attackers.

“Hold on to something!” she screamed in delight.

Thousands of seeds left her outstretched palms, seemingly appearing from nowhere. Thick foliage and intertwined vines grew in front of their fort and the defenses holding the group of Nobles. I was disappointed at first, as she had been preparing to attack for almost half an hour! The infected were trying to attack the barrier but were having little effect on the dense vegetation. Then the attack portion of her incantation went off! Thousands of thorny vines sprouted from the seeds in the air, wrapping around anything moving. The infected in the area were suddenly all pinned to something. The floor, each other, themselves. They struggled to escape for a moment, then collectively relaxed, shattering their Centers.

The room shuddered, and the explosion was so loud that any non-Mage was instantly deafened. Chandra laughed as the elemental storm broke against her barrier of flora, then sat down to enjoy the fireworks. I worked overtime to collect all of the Essence that was suddenly in the air and within my grasp. The corruption gathering gemstones threaded throughout my body began sucking at the air, desperately trying to bring the dungeon system back to homeostasis.

The corruption gathered into a thick sludge that, surprisingly, started moving. A slime Mob? No. Nope, I want no part in that. Not again. Again? What? I shuddered at the memory of a night a while back, forgotten for some reason. I would think about that later. If I remembered. Um. Remembered what? Huh. That was strange…

A Rune that I had never noticed before shimmered into view and… whatever was on the floor vanished with a plop and bubble as it jiggled and wiggled. Bizarre.

Oh! Right! A huge amount of creatures had just died! I looked at the fort where all the defenders were waiting with bated breath and staring at the now open space. I made a small mental shrug, then created a sheet of gold coins across the entire room! The people cheered with happiness and greed as the coins rattled and clinked. The hailstorm of ringing metal almost drowned them out.

Then I noticed that there was a new group entering the room. Even before the cheering died down, one of the infected Mages raised a hand and squeezed. The stone wall the defenders were attacking from shattered, spilling people into the open area. On the plus side, they had access to a sea of shimmering gold. Conversely… well, there was nothing between them and the Mages.

The Mages started forward, moving at high speeds. One allowed himself to fall flat, an inch of space between him and the ground. A gust of wind propelled him forward, and a ringing boom trailed his passage, echoing tremendously in the dungeon.

<Interesting! It is possible to move fast enough that you temporarily shatter the air around you?> I was taking meticulous mental notes as the Mages moved since all of them were activating some kind of ability. The humans were not having as fun of a time with this since they were dying. That tended to ruin the mood.

I spoke at Dale and Dani, <In case you wanted to know, the Mages that passed you have reached the third floor and are starting to attack the fort. I need to concentrate down there for a moment.>

Two of the Mages were tearing open small holes in reality, and birdlike creatures—possibly giant, wasp-like creatures, depending on if birds can have stingers—were pouring out of the rippling portals. I was very excited by this until one of them was killed and turned out to be merely a Mana construct. No new Mobs for me… I still examined the tears hanging in the air. They had similar qualities to my dimensional bag. These required a bit of Mana constantly, unlike a magical item. Good to know it was possible to create temporary effects without needing an item! I memorized the pattern and watched the fight.

A wave of light passed from one of the infected, the particles amalgamating into a spear of luminous metal. A holy weapon Mage? The spear flew forward, then shattered into thousands of miniature fléchettes, shredding screaming people as they were continuously fired into the fortified area. As the shards of spear struck, they shattered further, and those shards hung in the air, daring anyone to breathe them in. Anyone breathing in the dust-like metal clutched their neck, gasping as blood poured out of their orifices.

The Mage zipping around low to the ground had invisible blades made of air surrounding him. He didn’t bother to move his arms or give any signs of attack, simply ramming through bodies. Literally through them. About a foot from where his body touched them, the people would just be violently blended by whirling air. When his flying form impacted the newly-ground corpses, they splattered apart, chunks of bodies falling to the ground.

In the first few seconds, at least forty people died. Then my pet Mages retaliated! Chandra stepped forward, face twisted in a rictus of pure, pissed-off fury. She began chanting, firing thorns that intercepted the fléchettes with ease. Her focus shifted as she devoted a minimal amount of attention to keeping the attack going. Chandra was a terrifyingly powerful Mage, the only currently known A-rank nine cultivator in the Phoenix Kingdom. Splitting her focus was never an issue; Chandra was a master multitasker!

While her specialty was plants, she had powerful earth and water magic to augment her abilities. She popped open a water skin and drew out all of the moisture, compressing the water and infusing it with Mana. With a poke of her finger, the water moved in a thin stream at unimaginable speeds.

The rock wall behind the Mage split in a perfectly straight line. The Mage himself stumbled, then fell into two halves with a grotesque, slapping splurt as his entrails slipped out of him. I was watching with fascination. Water could cut through not only a body but stone? I’m sure that the infusion of Mana helped, but was that something water could do naturally at high compression? This had already been a banner day for information, and the fight was just starting! I remembered at the last second to redirect the Mana into my dimensional storage space. I shuddered; that had been too close!

Amber was speaking in a conversational tone, her words subtly making the air thrum. One of the Mages that was summoning wasp-constructs slumped, and his creatures turned on him. They tore him apart a small chunk at a time, his naturally durable body resisting their efforts. Someone glanced at her, and she shrugged, “I convinced his mind that he was his own worst enemy. He was already programmed to attack his enemies, so…”

Minya was going toe-to-toe with the wind-powered Mage, and she was losing pretty badly. She specialized in elemental magic, and blasts of fire, stone, and water rained down upon the infected Mage. His whirling wind—infused with unhealthy amounts of Mana—redirected even her most well-timed attacks. Minya was working to counteract the wind with her own ability, but the highly specialized wind Mage was able to ignore the majority of her blows as he counterattacked.

Minya’s skin began to tear as she was assaulted by atmospheric-speed winds. She tried to leap away, but the wind caught and blasted her into the stone, imprinting her into the solid granite. She began to scream, but even that was torn away as the air rushed into her.

Dale

“Father Richard…” Dale whispered as he slowly raised his fists.

The priest turned bloodshot eyes on the young man. “…Dale. Runnn,” he moaned, tears forming as a sob ripped out of him. Surprise showed in his eyes as his body moved without his consent, a glowing fist soaring at Dale.

Dale yelped and ducked, pushing up instinctively with his hands. He caught Father Richard’s arm at the elbow, surprising himself. Trying to stay ahead of a devastating blow, he gripped the unyielding muscle and twisted. To Dale’s surprise, the priest went flying, landing heavily several feet away. The man got back to his feet, totally unaffected.

Father Richard stumbled toward Dale, uncoordinated as he tried to fight the invasive parasite controlling his actions. He threw another wild punch, which Dale dodged again, following up with a one-two combo before putting some distance between them.

“Are you in there, old man?” Dale called at the slightly glowing priest.

The only response was a stumbling charge. Father Richard suddenly stopped, shuddered, and looked at Dale with clouded eyes. His steps now were smoother, and his speed increased dramatically. “Oh, shi–”

Tangg-g-g! Father Richard was now flying backward and impacted the wall hard enough that he stopped moving for a moment as dust rose in a cloud away from the stone. Dale looked in wonder at Tom who had landed a full-power blow on the priest as he was running.

Tom was hopping up and down, shaking his hand. “Ow! Ow!”

“Thanks for the rescue, Tom!” Dale called. He hurried to find a better defended position before Father Richard started moving again.

“Sonder,” was all Dale heard before flying into Tom.

“What?!” Dale yelled at Tom to let him go, but no matter how much they tried, they were stuck together.

“I’ll distract him!” Hans shouted as they were futilely struggling. He was going full out, a glowing line of plasmatic fire highlighting the edge of his weapons. Every movement was smooth, although it seemed that the wind was favoring him by enhancing his movements to triple their normal speed. Hans reached Father Richard, and his body became a blur.

StabStabStabStabStabStabStabStab.

The priest howled with vexation as his clothes ignited. He took a few swings at Hans, which were easily avoided. Hans kept moving, poking his blade at every weak point possible. During Richard’s howl, a blade poked the back of his esophagus, his gums, and the uvula twice. There was no effect. Richard’s body was too empowered by the Mana flowing through him.

Richard locked red-stained eyes on Hans and whispered a word that could only be understood as, “Sonder.” Hans started to be pulled away, so he landed a double kick to Richard’s groin. Again, no effect.

“Really?” Hans yelped as he was also stuck to Dale. “I’ve always wanted to know if Mana took care of that issue, but this isn’t how I wanted to find out.”

Tom looked at the two men he was stuck to. “I am uncertain how his magic works. Is there a weakness?”

Hans sighed as he gained his footing, lifting the other two as easily as a backpack. “He has a weird Mana base. Celestial and infernal users often find odd concepts to bind to.” He shook his head, rattling Tom a bit. “His magic is based on the bonds between people and how they all interact.” He jumped, avoiding a hurled stone slab. “I had no idea he could use it to physically bond people together.”

“Whatever you say, Hans!” Dale was trying not to get sick as his perspective changed and death missed him by inches. “Just keep going!”

“Sonder!”

Hans slammed to the ground, bound by an irresistible force.

“Apparently,” Hans wheezed, “he can bind us to more than… just… each other!” He vomited as the pressure affected his inner ear, splattering bile across the two bound to him.

“This is a terrible way to go.” Dale snarled, shifting his position as much as he could. He was trying ridiculously hard to keep his face out of the growing puddle of partially digested food as Father Richard stalked toward them.

Whap! An oversized arrow hit Richard, knocking him back a foot. Another hit his face, exploding into flames that blocked the priest’s view for a moment. Arrow after arrow impacted, but none had any more effect than simply yelling at him would have. He raised his hand, and Rose flew to him, her forehead binding with his palm. She smacked into it with enough force to cause her a moment of blackout.

Rose came around just as Father Richard raised his hand to strike her. His glowing hand began to descend as Hans screamed.

The priest paused, and Rose went limp. Between them was a glowing ball of Essence. Neither of them could look away, and both were locked in position as the ball of glowing light began to dissipate.

“Chaos Essence!” Hans whooped as he felt a rush of pride for her. Then he only felt terror as Richard began to shake off the effects. Just as the powerful Mage began moving again…

“Done!” Adam screamed, giving the activation Rune a final twist.

Chapter Twenty-nine

The world seemed to end in a wave of light as a thunderclap of celestial Essence imbued with a special-purpose reagent tore through reality. The light formed a perfect sphere, ignoring any physical material that got in its way. At ground zero, Dale’s group was blasted to the wall, damaged and healed almost simultaneously. They remained pressed against the wall as the pressure of flowing Essence stripped away layers of skin. They may have screamed, but there was no sound.

There was no time.

The cure was worse than the disease for the infected, tearing large chunks out of them as the parasite tried to abandon them and flee. Again, there was no time. Thousands of bodies caught in the wave of power simply died, and only a fraction of them was within the dungeon’s sphere of influence.

The Mages fighting on the third floor were slammed to the ground, and the deeply ingrained infection nearly tore their bodies to bits. Some of the defenders cried out as unknown sores and spores were eradicated from their system.

As the bodies were forced on to the ground, the light vanished as if it were simply a figment of the imagination. People looked around, their adrenalin pumping as they searched for the next enemy to fight. Almost a full minute passed in silence before a ragged cheer was struck up and joined by nearly all the survivors! Then there was a general scrabbling and rioting as I made another wave of gold wash over the dungeon floor.

I reward those that serve me, even if they do so inadvertently.

My mind turned upon the first floor, watching as Dale and the others, including the remaining Goblins, eased themselves off the ground and stood on shaking legs. They looked around at the destruction that was already beginning to fix itself in amazement. They had survived!

Adam was unconscious. Rose was checking on him as Hans rolled over Father Richard, searching for signs of life.

“He’s breathing!”

Dale ran over, seeing the huge tracts of flesh that were torn out of the Mage’s body. The wounds seemed to be sealing themselves, and Father Richard glowed with internal celestial light. “Will he make it?!”

Hans shrugged. “Anything that doesn’t outright kill a Mage… well, probably won’t. He should have a good chance of coming back from this. It may take a while, but he should be okay.”

Dale whooped, shouting and pumping his fist in the air. Hans smiled at his exuberance. They made Father Richard as comfortable as possible and went to check on Adam.

There was a grim outlook for their friend, though it seemed that Adam was waking up. His eyes fluttered open, and they recoiled when they saw his eyes. What had been the whites were now a shining, corrupted celestial gold. “Huh...? Whazzat?” Adam muttered painfully, tongue swollen in his mouth.

“His affinity channel for celestial Essence…” Hans whispered in awe. “It’s beyond open. He has a higher than one hundred percent affinity for it… His infernal affinity channel was ripped out! Replaced!” Hans looked sick. “I… I don’t know what this means for you, Adam. I do know that you are corrupted beyond anyone I have ever seen with celestial Essence.”

Nez extracted himself from a crater in the floor. It closed behind him as I noticed the unsightly blemish in my pretty granite. “Ugh…” he moaned as he stretched his back and cracked his neck.

“What? What happened to you?” Hans looked at the man judgmentally.

“He pulled me back down to earth,” Adam breathed heavily. “The blast started directly under me. I went through the hole and was continuing up at a speed I didn’t know was possible. He appeared and wrapped me in static, which drew me back down safely while he took my momentum. He set about saving me at the cost of doubling the force of his own impact.”

“You were conscious for that?” Nez coughed out some rock dust. “It didn’t look like you were.”

Adam looked at him, puzzled. “I was just repeating you. No one was listening to what you were saying for some reason...?” He looked around, trailing off as the others looked at him oddly.

“You read a piece of his recent history off of his aura.” Hans was looking at Adam’s eyes with great interest now. “This could be a very useful ability…”

“You could see the truth in a situation!” Rose babbled, patting Adam on the back and helping him up. “You could save hundreds of people who are wrongly convicted or…”

“How do you feel about card games?” Hans interrupted her by swinging an arm around Adam.

Rose glared at Hans. “He has a new ability that he gained by sacrificing his body and saving all of us, and you want to use said ability to cheat at card games?”

“No!” Hans indignantly took a step away. “I want him to cheat at card games for the both of us!”

Rose looked ready to explode, but Adam put a calming hand out to her. “This is how he tries to come down after a battle, joking in tough situations.” He took a shuddering breath. “I’m ruined for cultivation. There is no way I could rank higher than I am with this level of taint. He is trying to keep me calm.”

“Then again, this ability may be super annoying instead,” Hans grumped as he looked around. “Where’s the Nick guy?”

<Pff. He ran back to the Basher warren and never left after he saw you all start to fight Father Richard,> I told Dale, whose face darkened.

Nick came out of the stairway just then, grinning broadly and cheering. “You are all amazing!”

“Go downstairs and tell the defenders that it is over,” Dale got out through grinding teeth. “You can at least be useful as a messenger.”

Nick’s face turned red and furious. With shaking hands, he turned around and marched downward.

“Wow, Dale. Where did that come from? That was harsh and uncalled for.” Rose crossed her arms and glared at Dale. The others didn’t try to defend him either. “What if he had just been blasted into the tunnel? I saw him fighting at the start…”

“No.” Dale shook his head. “When he saw Father Richard show up, he slipped away and hid in the Basher warren. He left us to die. I feel no pity for him, and I refuse to rescind my words or apologize.”

The others were awkwardly silent as Dale busied himself by picking up Father Richard. They started their trek down to the third floor with the few remaining Goblins trailing along.

Cal

<Oh, come on, Dani! I need you down here to translate for these Elves! They won’t leave me alone and keep caressing the Silverwood tree in a creepy, sexual way.> I shuddered as Jason tickled Brianna with a leaf. <So odd.>

“Cal, you want me to just drop out of the Amazon and leave this huge amount of Mithril laying around?” Dani retorted tiredly.

<Well. No, but…>

“I’ll get down to the spawn room and come straight to you,” Dani assured me. “I’m sure the Elves will leave soon if no enemies show up.”

<Fine, but if they try to take the armor…>

“Their Mana will force them to leave it there before they leave the dungeon.”

<Well… I just miss you. Hurry down!> I finally admitted to her.

A smile tinged her tired voice. “I’ll be there soon,” she said aloud.

The group limped into the third floor to see scores of people crawling around on all fours. “What the…?”

“The floor is gold, Dale!” Hans shrieked like a teen girl and dove at the floor.

<Well, there are coins all over it.> I was starting to feel embarrassed by that and was making the coins that hadn’t been collected vanish slowly.

The group collected coins for half an hour while Dani waited patiently to be let into the fort. <Hey. I’m really close to reaching the B-rankings, and I just had a bit of inspiration! I’m gonna be thinking about foundational effects of primordial energy and how matter and energy are actually the same thing and…>

“Go ahead!” Dani sounded a bit panicked for some reason. “I’ll be right down. Then I’m sleeping for a week.”

The fort gate opened, and Dale’s group—now in more dignified positions—entered. The gold had been cleaned up so I sank into my contemplations, waiting for everyone to leave so that I could repair all the damage.

Dale

Entering the fort, Dale’s group was met by cheering, hugs, and sobbing. Rose was intently inspected by Chandra before giving her the okay to go anywhere again. Hans and Dale left Father Richard with the healers and joined the gathering. There was to be a small meeting of the council, but all they decided was that they needed to take a few days to recuperate.

Dale looked over to see the Goblins entering the small spawn room and decided to go and thank them before they became enemies again. He walked over, spotting the Amazon removing her helmet. He opened his mouth to offer his gratitude when a spray of blood splashed wetly across his face.

Confused, Dale looked down. He wasn’t injured...? He looked up to see the Amazon Goblin slumping as her head rolled away.

“What the abyss are you doing?!”

Nick glanced at Dale and scoffed. “What, you expect me to believe that I’m going to have a warm reception here? With you in charge?” He ducked down and collected the Mithril helmet. “Do you have any idea what this is worth? I won’t need to bother coming back.”

Dale was furious that Nick had killed a Goblin instrumental in their survival. “How are you planning to leave? Did you forget that the portal is closed? You going to walk?”

“No need for that.” Nick turned with a sickly grin. He held up a small, enchanted vial. “Emergency portal access. Lets me get where I need to go, as long as I can make it to the portal arch.” His eyes flickered past Dale, and an awestruck look crossed his face. He shot forward, and Dale yelled, ducking into a defensive position.

Looking at where the man was currently standing, Dale gasped to see a shining, pink orb trapped in bands of Mana.

“What are you doing?” he repeated the words again in the span of a few seconds.

“It’s a real Dungeon Wisp!” Nick whispered. “I thought I had imagined it, looking down into the Boss Room weeks ago.”

“A Dungeon Wisp?” Dale looked at the orb of swirling light. “Wait. Minya told me that dungeons go insane if they lose their Wisp! You can’t take that!”

Nick looked at Dale, sneering mightily. “Like. I. Care.” His eyes shone with greed. “The bounty for a Dungeon Wisp… I’ll never need to–”

“Get off my–” Dale bellowed, all he could get out before a fist impacted his throat.

“Can’t be having that now, can we?” Nick tsked at him. “Who knows, I may need to come back some day.”

“I’m Dani!” a tiny, chiming voice sounded. “Tell Cal that I will find a way back! I prom–”

A heavy fist impacted Dale’s face, and the world went dark.

Chapter Thirty

Dale woke up with a start. Someone was waving a vile-smelling vial under his olfactory organ. “Gah! No! Never that!”

“Dale,” Chandra’s calm voice reached him through his sputtering, “what happened?”

“What?” Dale looked around; they were in what remained of the church. A bitterly cold wind was blowing in through the holes in the walls and roof.

Amber stepped forward, eyes flashing. “Do you know who the abyss used a highly illegal portal jump? People are dead from this, and trust in the Portal Guild has plummeted!”

Realization was slowly dawning in Dale’s mind, and he threw off his blanket, trying to run out of the room. He was stopped by Frank, who was just entering the room.

“Wow, where is the fire, young man?” Frank queried him, holding him with his unbandaged arm. “Shouldn’t you be in bed? You had a nasty head wound.”

Dale stopped, knowing that they needed explanations. “The person who used the portal was Nick, leader of The Collective.” He started to sink into despair as it dawned on him that he was too late. “Where did he go?” he asked weakly, already sinking into depression.

“We don’t know,” Amber stated grimly. “That is one of the reasons they are so illegal. That and also if someone is using the portal and it is intercepted, they get cut in half.”

“That is horrible, but–” Dale was interrupted.

“Damn, right it is!” Amber was about to go on a full tirade when Dale held up a hand.

“I’m sorry, but I have more bad news.” He took a breath. “The dungeon’s Wisp was taken.”

The group looked at him, nonplussed. Chandra broke the silence, “So a collector took a Mob? That isn’t uncommon, Dale.”

Minya strode into the room, eyes fixed on Dale. “Are you sure?”

Dale nodded. “I was there. That’s why he attacked me.”

“What is the big deal?” Frank’s voice had high notes of nervousness creeping in.

Minya sighed. “This is why my lore is so important, but no one bothers to read it… Frank, when a dungeon loses its bonded Wisp—its Dungeon Wisp—it goes insane. Its influence spreads wildly, and corruption becomes rampant. That is usually when a crusade is called to kill a dungeon.”

“The… like the Kantor incident?” Frank shook, gripping the wall for balance. “Is that what caused the disaster?”

Minya nodded grimly. Chandra leaned her head against the wall. “This is bad. Should we take preemptive action and kill the dungeon now?”

“We have time, and that needs to be a last resort,” Minya hurriedly stated. “If the dungeon dies… so does Dale and so do I.”

Amber looked at Dale. “I think it is time we all had that chat we’ve been looking forward to.”

“I think so.” Dale nodded and began his story.

Cal

<I think I’ve got it, Dani! I know exactly what I need to do to enter the Mage rankings!> I smiled brilliantly, looking around for my partner. She always had the best reactions to good news!

<Dani?> I cast my mind about, but she wasn’t in here. She must be out flying around...? Something felt different. I ached. How strange…? I examined myself and found the issue. There was a rip in my aura! I tried to fix it, but it resisted my tampering. I looked closer. It wasn’t so much a tear as a horrendous stretch, extending so far away from me that Essence was leaving but was unable to cycle back to me.

If I remembered correctly, that was the part of my aura bound to… to Dani? <Dani!> I shouted frantically. Maybe she just couldn’t hear me? <Dani!> I shouted. No response. I flooded my aura with an amount of Essence that I would normally be horrified about wasting.

<DANI! DANI!!> I screamed from the bottom of my soul, Essence flooding the world around me.

Weaker beings went through a short period of rapid growth as the massive surge of power flooded their affinity channels, forcing natural evolutions upon their bodies. Those that survived would have interesting changes that even just yesterday I would have loved to study. Today, I was a broken soul.

<Dani! Dani…> I broke off, sobbing. <…Dani…>

“Cal,” a pained voice broke through my weeping.

<Dale! Dale, Dani is missing! You need to help me!> I latched on to his voice like a lifeline. Dale had legs! He could go find her! <She must have flown too far away and gotten trapped. She’s likely weak from loss of Essence, you have to–>

“Cal,” Dale called firmly, cutting off my babbling. “I’m so sorry. I’m going to do everything that I possibly can to get her back for you.”

My dread shifted into suspicion. <Dale. What do you know?>

“Cal, we are–”

<What do you know?!> I screamed at him, and the room jumped ten degrees as fire Essence flooded the room.

He paused, stunned by my anger directly assaulting his brain. “Cal… Dani was taken. By Nick, the leader of The Collective. He ran and teleported away before we could stop him. She talked to me. She said she would find a way back to you, no matter what.”

I stared at him, and even though I didn’t have actual eyes, I could project a mental image of myself into his mind. <She was taken? You didn’t stop him?>

“Cal, I tried, he…” Dale petered off as the air began to fill with corruption. The light shifted from a soft blue to an undulating, patterned red.

My voice was the barest of whispers as I turned to my work, <I. Am going. To kill. You. All.> I had so much to do. There was no time.

No time like the present.

I shifted my attention away just as someone else entered the dungeon.

“How did it go?”

Dale let out a heavy sigh and a few tears. He gulped, trying to clear his voice. “You were right, Minya. He… he’s already drifting into Dungeon Madness.”

Epilogue

Nick swallowed dryly as he was led into the musty castle. He would have been feeling far more confident if his escort hadn’t been an infernal-Essence-radiating demon. Nick yelped as the creature spoke, its terror-inducing voice echoing. “The Master approaches. I would offer you a seat, but I would highly recommend kneeling.”

Nick had to resist scoffing at the demon. He turned as it spoke, realizing it was gone. “Kneeling? Pah.” He shivered as an aura of dread washed over him, far greater than the feeling had been from the demon. He turned and had to resist a scream as he saw a person standing near a wall. There were no doors nearby, so Nick had no idea where he had come from.

“Is a little respect too much to ask for?” a melodious yet rasping voice buzzed in his ear. Nick swatted at his head; the sensation was maddening.

“N-not at all, m-my Lord.” Nick genuflected a bit late but deeply. “Demons… have a reputation for misleading information.”

“Hmm.” The dark figure strode forward, and Nick’s skin began to itch horribly. “I am told you are here to claim the bounty that I was offering. Is this so? If so, you will certainly get what is coming to you.”

Nick reached into his bag, pulling out a glowing ball of Essence wrapped in bands of undulating power. His cocky attitude began to return to him as he realized he had something the ‘Master’ wanted. “Right here. It’s all yours… if you have the funds, of course.”

A burning stare made his attitude wither again. The Master made a motion, and they were surrounded by a sphere of smothering darkness. Somehow, Nick could still see perfectly without any natural light.

“Release the creature. If it is what you promised, you will get your reward.”

Nick wanted to refuse, but he got a little too close to the wall of darkness and had bits of his skin flake off. “If it gets away, I’m still claiming my…” He found himself unable to finish his sentence and so instead broke the bands of power, allowing the ball of light to shoot away at high speeds. Nick gave a hoarse cry, but the ball of light impacted the darkness and fell, catching itself just before reaching the floor.

“Ow! Let me go, you assholes!” Dani screamed at the pair. “You have no idea what is going to happen if you don’t!”

Nick’s face twisted into a snarl, but the Master smiled. The smile was a terrifying expression that seemed to have no place on his face. “Ahhh, finally! Hello, little Wisp.”

“Let me go!”

The Master gave a slow shake of the head. “I am truly sorry, little one, but I have need of your services. Also, you are mistaken. I know exactly what is about to happen.”

Dani vanished in a burst of shadows.

“Satisfied?” Nick had his arms crossed and a grin on his face. “Now, about that bounty? I’d like to go retire.”

“You certainly deserve your reward.” The Master turned away. “Enjoy your retirement.” He turned around and threw something at Nick, impacting him in the chest.

Nick’s hands flew up, grabbing at the object. He gasped, looking down as he sank to his knees. “I… this…” He made a throaty noise.

Nick looked up at the Master for the last time. “This is even more than was promised! Thank you!” He turned and scurried away, clutching the dimensional bag stuffed with gold, platinum, and silver. “I’m buying an island!”

The Master nodded as the man left. “Those who serve shall be duly rewarded.”

DUNGEON CALAMITY

Book Three of THE DIVINE DUNGEON Series

Written by Dakota Krout

Table of Contents

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-one

Chapter Twenty-two

Chapter Twenty-three

Chapter Twenty-four

Chapter Twenty-five

Chapter Twenty-six

Chapter Twenty-seven

Chapter Twenty-eight

Chapter Twenty-nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-one

Chapter Thirty-two

Chapter Thirty-three

Chapter Thirty-four

Chapter Thirty-five

Chapter Thirty-six

Chapter Thirty-seven

Chapter Thirty-eight

Chapter Thirty-nine

Chapter Forty

Chapter Forty-one

Chapter Forty-two

Chapter Forty-three

Epilogue

Prologue

“Just ignore it, Rob. Of course you feel like you are being watched. Yer in a dungeon!” the tiny human tried unsuccessfully to comfort his student. He groaned and tossed his hands into the air. “There are monsters going crazy in here, and the place is changing constantly. We just need to go through one more room, and even with my seventy percent fee, your tuition will be paid for life! We’re already on the fourth floor, might as well finish the labyrinth, right?”

“I don’t like it.” The uncomfortable man shuddered as he felt the alien mind appraising him again. “You know I can tell when I’m being watched, and whatever this is, it is watching. It wants us dead!”

His teacher sighed. “We just went over this. This is a dungeon. Of course, everything here wants us dead, but for the money–”

The teacher’s words were cut off as the floor beneath them shifted subtly. A feeling similar to a seesaw dropping made them stumble, and their pulses began to race! The floor dropped only another few inches when a click behind them made them whirl around. They were too late to retreat now, thanks to the rising stone that blocked off the five-man group’s path of retreat. All light had fled, leaving them in utter darkness and growing despair. Only sharp orders from the leader allowed them to think clearly again.

Regaining their composure after a moment of panic, the men tightened their formation. Their eyes had begun to adjust incrementally when a glimmer of light washed over them, nearly blinding them after their immersion in darkness. Still wary, they edged toward the light. Eyes twinkling with mixed interest and caution, they walked toward the only landmark now visible. Before them lay a tablet of stone on a small, intricately carved pillar. The light fell from above and illuminated words carved deeply into the rock.

“What does it say?”

“Confound it! I can’t read. Rob, get over here!”

Rob stepped forward, glancing around as the presence stared at him again. His hackles rose, and he tried to gulp air into his heaving, dehydrated lungs. He stared at the words, easily reading them but failing to understand their meaning.

“Well?” Rob got slapped on his rear, causing goose bumps to spread over his skinny arms. “What does it say, boy?”

“It says, ‘You have entered the trials. Trial one: Carry your weight, and the rewards shall be great. Else, one for all.’ The punctuation is all funny-like. Whaddya suppose that means?” Rob rubbed his butt; that slap had been way too hard.

“Huh. No idea. What do you think that means?” The teacher was trying to act wise, returning the question to his students, but the words came out flat.

"I hate poems. They always mean dangerous things are about to happen. A woman getting them from a nervous love interest, bards making terrible songs, and now traps…"

“Is the light in here getting brighter?”

“The ceiling! Look at the ceiling!” They looked up to see the ceiling—now visible and covered in jagged metal spikes—descending slowly toward them. Rob looked around for an opening, a way out of the trap, anything! As the ceiling fell, a small section of stone lifted. The opening behind it was only spacious enough for one person to crawl through.

“There are spots on the roof that don't have spikes! Five spots, five of us! We need to hold the ceiling up!” the teacher called loudly and calmly. The group rushed to find a spot that they could fit into; the roof was curved specifically to match the average height of adventurers. They raised their hands, and the stone came to rest in each of their palms at the same time. Grunts were elicited from the struggling men as the heavy trap continued to press down until it rested upon their shoulders. Pushing and straining, they heaved and called out encouragement to each other as the minutes passed and their knees began to wobble.

Rob started to panic as he felt a sense of satisfaction from the probing presence. “We’re going to die! It’s going to kill us no matter what we do!” The feeling of satisfaction wavered as Rob looked at the opening. It wasn’t so far away, was it? He could make it in the few seconds it would take the ceiling to fall. His fear-addled mind raced as he thought of the test. One for all, one for all… so everyone would die, or one person could survive? Rob’s eyes narrowed. He wasn’t dying for these people. He barely knew them! He wouldn’t die here, not like this!

“Rob! No! What are you doing?!” Rob heard as he dove under the spikes and crawled as fast as he could for the hole in the wall. The ceiling lowered by a few deadly inches.

“I’m surviving!” Rob dragged himself the last little way into the hole and looked around. There! There was a Rune on the floor! He placed his hand on the activation pattern and flooded it with Essence. The cries of his old team were cut off as the wall behind Rob closed off, leaving him in the small space. He waited for an exit to appear. And waited. Rob didn’t even realize when he slipped into sleep, the oxygen content too minimal to allow his panicked mind to remain awake.

Outside the tiny room, a joyous scene was playing out.

“It’s going up!”

“Rob did it! He must have deactivated the trap!”

“He did nothing but try to save himself! That must have backfired on him.” Their leader growled at the jubilant faces. “Think about it. One for all or ‘carry your weight’. Rob thought that meant he could trade our lives to save his sorry skin, but it really meant he would die to save us,” he scoffed disparagingly. “While it is sad for him, I hope you all learned something today. This was the worst kind of self-sacrifice. Let’s get the abyss out of here.”

“Look! A chest!”

“Look at all those tokens! They were right about the fourth floor!”

Chapter One

<What’s going on?> I was woozy. My mind felt cluttered and ‘off’ in an indefinable way. I looked around my dungeon, noting the man dancing near my Core. He was wiggling in an exceedingly creepy way, making awkward noises that would have made a human blush.

“It’s mine! You. Wiggle. Can’t. Wiggle, wiggle. Have it! Awkward hip thrusting.

<Oh. My. I don’t know what ‘it’ is, but please, take ‘it’ and go away. You are the most disturbing thing I have ever had the misfortune of seeing,> I stammered, knowing that he couldn’t possibly hear me. Still, my frazzled nerves weren’t because of his social oddity, they were due to his ranking. His presence released a pressure that affected me all the way to my soul. There was no doubt in my mind that this man was in at least the Spiritual ranks.

Somehow, it seemed he had heard me.

“Damn straight I’ll take it! It’s mine! It’s all mine!” The man stopped moving around. “Glad you agreed so early. Mine. I was gonna kill you soon otherwise, and I don’t wanna do that! Ha ha! You are a strange, interesting aberration! Also, you make me chuckle.”

<I am happier than you could possibly know to hear that.> My voice was trembling. What is going on? When did this filthy, overpowered man show up?

“Now you are boring again. Oh well. Don’t worry, strange little dungeon. I’ll come back when you start doing interesting things again!” The man turned and ran at the wall. Not the door. The wall. He didn’t slow down, and as he hit the stone, it shattered from the massive pressure he was exuding. He ran in a straight line, destroying my cursed earth as he went. “Stealing my whispers! Dumbass dungeon!”

I watched him run, creating a tunnel as he went. He eventually broke out of my labyrinth, reaching unaltered stone. He ran through this even faster, eventually popping out of the side of the mountain and entering free-fall with an echoing shout of “Wheeeeeee!”

<What. Just. Happened?> I was shaking in reaction, and I looked around myself to see what had changed. What had I been doing? I had some vague recollections of creating new traps and Mobs, collecting materials from Dale and Minya, and researching ways to find Dani… Did that creepy, filthy man just mess with my memories somehow? I haven’t been this confused since I became a dungeon Core so very long ago. Just like now, my memories of that time were confusing and fragmented. I remembered a flash of a necromancer’s laugh as I was killed, and then remembering how beautiful a day it was… I shook off the confusion and focused myself. What the…? What was wrong with my floor? I had been vandalized!

I looked around and set to fixing the place up. Had that man done all of this? There was a lot of damage in the dungeon—walls in rubble, the place littered with filth and remains, Mobs oddly mutated and damaged. Far too many Mobs, for that matter. Traps not reset? What was going on? I cleaned the place up and quickly set some short-term goals for myself. Clean the place thoroughly, fix everything that was broken, then I needed trackers—things that could live without me and still find Dani. I needed to push myself into the B-ranks. I needed to find a way to communicate outside of myself.

Finally and possibly most importantly, I needed to create powerful weapons that might be able to damage the inconceivably powerful people that might attack me in the future. That twisted old man had scared me badly. I focused inward and began devoting Essence to the tasks at hand. They may seem impossible right now, but each of them needed to be done. I smiled dangerously. My mind was clear, and my will was strong for the first time I could remember. It was time to join—or terrify—the powers in this world.

Dale

The snow crunched under his feet with each step he took, the sub-zero temperatures making the frozen crystals brittle. Dale bowed his head against the wind as it twisted around him, seemingly angry that it had been disturbed from its original flow. With each crunch, he was that much closer to his destination. He looked through frost-laden eyelashes at the changes that had been wrought in the last month. Snorting, he shook his head. Snow that had collected on him blew away as he examined the roads and stone buildings. He reflected on the usefulness of magic. This place had turned from a ragged collection of tents into something approximating a booming village. Soon, they would need to expand to keep up with the influx of people trying to strike it rich.

A light distorted by the achromatic precipitation appeared ahead of him. Dale readjusted his fur-lined cloak and moved slightly faster, looking forward to the warmth of the tavern he was approaching. A bit of melted slush dripped down his neck, and he shivered and frowned; Dale was not looking forward to the impending conversation. He had been avoiding it for too long, though. He sighed. It was now or never. The light became stronger and soon illuminated a beautifully carved, extra thick oak door.

Dale reached forward with snow-laden gloves and found the handle, twisting it and opening the door. His actions allowed a blast of icy wind into the tavern ahead of him. Shouting reached his ears nigh-instantly as people demanded he shut the only barrier between them and the bitter winter wind. The newly appointed Baron stepped in, pulling the door closed behind him. Ice crackled on his fur-lined boots, and enough snow fell off of him to make a decently sized snowball. Dale stepped closer to the roaring bonfire in the center of the room, pulling off his cloak and gently shaking it out. A few people grumbled at him as they were hit by particles of water, but only one voice spoke up.

“About time you showed up, you snail-slow, sandbagging bastard! I thought I was going to have to drink all this ale all by my lonesome… again! Dale looked around and caught sight of his best friend, Hans, cheerfully waving at him from a bench next to the fire.

“Evening, Hans. Or, I guess, good morning?” It was three in the morning, and while most people would be abed, people in the C-ranks—or those with all their meridians open—only needed a few hours, at most, to have a full night's sleep. “What did you want? I want to get some sleep before you exploit me for personal gain in the dungeon. If I try to stay awake for too long—happening too often as of late—I’ll probably fall apart.”

Dale had been undergoing a rigorous training regimen designed by himself and a few experts to maximize his survivability as well as shape him into the best possible leader for the small community that had sprung up around the dungeon. He had just been released by his hand-to-hand combat instructor, a Moon Elf assassin who seemed to hold a grudge against all of humanity. This day's lesson was supposed to be about Dale shaping his Essence into usable formations while under attack and emotionally flustered. In reality, the training had consisted of Dale standing on a wriggly log and focusing on his Chi formations… while snowballs laced with stones had been thrown at him by exceedingly strong and accurate women. While he was naked. Dale was not in the most positive of moods right now.

“Well, Dale, it has been a month since the swarm of infected, and you have not taken any time off from training, sending out messengers, studying math,” Hans shuddered at that last one, “and I think it is time you explained what is going on.” Having spoken, the door opened again, and the rest of Dale’s team walked in.

Rose—a Half Elf archer—was followed by Adam—the party’s cleric—and Tom the barbarian. Adam was leaning on his staff and was mostly covered by a floor-length, gleaming white robe. Tom naturally drew the eye of the patrons as he entered. He was wearing very little in terms of practical winter gear, mainly just what could be called either a short, fur kilt or a long loincloth. He was trying out a few pieces of armor, so the patchwork set had chunks of plate mail and laminar armor intermixed. The red-haired barbarian wore no helmet but oddly had a massive shield awkwardly strapped to his left side. Where his hand should have been was a grip that tied his shield to his body, but it was obviously uncomfortable. This was most likely due to the fact that his arm, which he had lost in the dungeon, was nearly fully regrown.

The odd collection of people nodded to Dale as they sat. Adam stared at his team leader with glowing yellow eyes, disconcerting not only because of the color but because he seemed to need to blink only a quarter as often as a normal human.

“I don’t think that’s going to happen.” Dale stood, preparing to go to bed.

“Dale,” Adam softly voiced, “you need to tell us. Things will go… poorly if you refuse at this point. Strange things are happening. The dungeon is changing, as are you, and we need to have trust between us. Refusing now will lead to strife amongst us.”

Dale hesitated. Adam had gained the odd ability to see and understand situations at a strange level after being exposed to an inconceivably concentrated influx of celestial Essence. This, more than anything, made him sit back down and reluctantly begin telling them what had happened. Hans stopped him when Dale started to talk about things they didn’t know. A strange wind began circling them, cutting off sound from the area around them.

“Burning-wind wall,” Hans muttered a quick explanation. “Heats the air to create a distortion that just kinda… stops sound. Feel free to explain now. No one is listening except us.”

Dale nodded his thanks and continued his tale. His friends gasped at all the right places, shaking their heads at revealed wonders. The dungeon was alive and intelligent. It relied on a Wisp—a creature of legend—to function properly and remain mentally balanced. The Wisp had been taken, and people were getting worried. Most importantly, their team leader had a Beast Core in him that connected him to all of this insanity and potentially called his judgment into question. Dale stopped talking and looked around at the incredulous faces.

“That is really good to know, but what about you, Dale?” Rose took it upon herself to ask the unfortunate questions no one else wanted to. “Are you compromised? Are you a Beast now? Will you go crazy if the dungeon does? We all know it is getting worse.”

“You sound just like Madame Chandra.” Dale chuckled softly. “I can totally see the relation.” Rose huffed at him and arched a brow. “I’m… okay. Having something to do helps me to not worry, which is why I’ve been pushing myself so hard. I’m not compromised, and my mental defenses have allowed me to ignore the dungeon in the past.”

“That is why you were so twitchy? There was a thing whispering in your mind?” Tom interrupted in relief. “Oh good! I had been concerned that you were simply not up to the task of being a battle leader. It is a trait that not many have, after all. I am quite pleased to know that you are mentally sound.”

“…Thanks? Twitchy?” Dale replied half questioningly with a confused look around at the nodding heads. “Also, I am not a Beast. I do have a Core in me, but no one has been able to tell me what that means. By rights, I should be dead from Essence loss many times over.”

“Death arrives for everyone eventually, Dale.” Tom gripped Dale’s wrist. “No need to invite it.”

Dale continued his story, “At this point, I’ve been doing everything I can to prepare. I want to go after the Wisp, Dani, but I’ve been infernally busy with rebuilding, repopulating the area, and my own training. Not to mention our dungeon excursions.”

“You’ve been doing well, Dale,” Adam said as he looked around the room with his faintly glowing eyes. “About half of the surviving fighters didn’t come back after receiving their reward. Their choice is no great loss to us, though. With the dungeon giving out such high amounts of resources on a successful run, dozens more are showing up than those that are leaving. Daily.”

“It was also a great idea to build a big tavern right away!” Hans grinned as he took a gulp of his ale. “Plus, since you technically own it, I am loving the discount.”

“I’m seeing fewer familiar faces, and morale seems to be getting higher as the survivors’ stories are drowned out in the sea of bodies,” Dale put forward his thoughts, agreeing with Adam’s assessment. “As for the higher rewards, the risks have really gone up as well. I’d be surprised if the Guild doesn’t try to rank it as a C-ranked area soon. At least that.”

Before, there had been clear-cut areas for each type of monster in the dungeon. The big Cats stayed on the fourth floor, there was a clear progression of difficulty, and the rewards had been calculated based on how well a group did overall. Now, the Cats showed up wherever they wanted. If they weren’t so lazy, they would have overrun the dungeon by now. Typically, a Cat would now only attack if you invaded ‘its’ territory. Unfortunately, that territory shifted by the hour. The Goblins stayed on their floor but did nothing to slow the Mobs running rampant in the dungeon.

If the adventurers took a day off for some reason, the dungeon would double its population. It didn’t matter if the whole place was full to bursting, more Mobs would spawn. Dale had had to offer extra incentives for groups that went in first in the morning to trim down the overwhelming numbers, just to ensure that they went through level-by-level instead of hopping to their floor of choice. Of course, his team was now the first in every day so they could be one of those that claimed the treasure that piled up overnight. The loot would increase at a constant rate as well, and a chest untouched for a full day might contain anything—from nothing to a child-sized pile of gold coins or an obscenely dangerous trap. The traps had been getting more numerous of late. Still, the danger and hardship, coupled with having all of his affinity channels open, had done wonders for Dale. He had flown through the rankings, reaching D-rank four in just a month.

“Look. I know you mean well, and I know it’s been a rough few months, but right now, I need to sleep. We will talk later today after finishing our run through the dungeon, okay? I’ll make sure to clear my schedule, and we will just chat. Deal?” Dale looked around. The others seemed to agree and responded as such.

“Deal.”

Chapter Two

Cleaning up the dungeon had only taken a few hours. The walls were quickly repaired, and Mobs not in pristine condition were culled and replaced. Traps were reset, and rewards were returned to regular yet profitable levels. Looking at my interior like this led me deeper inside myself as well. I looked at the aura representation of my mind and soul, noting that they seemed patched up and tattered. I tried to smooth them further, sinking into my Chi spiral. Introspection is a beautiful event. Staring deeply into myself, I admired the galaxies of interconnected Essence pulsing and shining. This was my mental space, a pocket dimension only accessible via following my Chi spiral to a tiny hole in my soul. It was peaceful. It was healthy and whole. It was beautiful. I began to drift off. All I wanted was to stay here forev–

“Cal? Are you listening?” Minya called into an empty room again, the third time this morning. Her voice grated on my nerves as it shattered my tenuous illusion of peace.

My annoyance began to build as my attention slipped from my projects and self-serving repairs. Does Minya not understand how our bond works? It was early enough in the day that there was no one else around, so of course I’m listening! I really have no choice but to listen at this point. Stupid bond. Why are sentient beings so annoying?

“Cal, slipping into madness won’t help you to…” She took a deep breath, seemingly near tears. “I know that it is getting harder for you to understand me, and your bestial instincts are taking over. I just hope that speaking to you will help bring you back…”

Enough was enough! <Minya. Just because I am busy and ignoring you all does not make me insane. Stop calling me crazy. I’m not crazy! I’m not.>

“Cal! You’re here!” she called happily. “I’m so glad you are speaking rationally again. I have so much to discuss with you! Also, I think you are in denial. There are serious issues in the dungeon! Just look at the–”

<Have you found Dani?>

“…No, but we have some leads now… someone bought an island recently. We think it was–” She lost my interest as soon as she admitted her failure.

<I’m really busy right now, Minya. What do you need?> I disinterestedly asked her as I began focusing on my current reconfigurations. How had I taken so much damage without noticing?

“I want to–”

<No! What do you need? Do you have items or knowledge for me? Have you found an opal? Do you need trade goods or money to acquire these things?> Why didn’t she understand that I had things to do?

“I need to talk to you, Cal!” she roared, catching me entirely off guard. I was so startled that my focus slipped, and a small group of Bashers got a wash of Essence, bumping them up a few rankings. Muscular forms lengthened and tapered a bit, and now, they looked similar to long-eared dogs. Maybe that would…? What was I doing?

I sighed at her when I realized she wasn’t going to go away. <About what, Minya? You have my attention. Go ahead. Speak. Enlighten me.>

“No need to be a jerk, you overpowered rock.” She took a breath to calm herself a bit, but I could see that her hands were still shaking. “The council has been debating coming in here to kill you. You’ve been showing signs of severely dangerous behaviors, and every dungeon before you that lost their Wisp has gone insane and caused a continent-scale disaster. Now that they know you are aware of any actions they may take, they need assurances that you won’t start releasing diseases or something like that.”

<Why would I release a disease, Minya?>

“Because you are angry?”

<Minya…> I sighed gently, giving her my full attention again. The entire weight of my mind dropped on to her, and she began to sweat. <I’m not angry.>

“You aren’t? What abo–”

<I’m furious!> I shrieked far too shrilly, causing my tunnels to rumble a bit. The once blue light that had permeated my dungeon had long since turned into a shifting violet, a patterned red-blue that varied based on my moods. <I did what I could to save you all! Now I can’t even rely on your people not to attack me? Because I’m pissed that one of you literally stole a part of my soul?> If I had lungs they would have been heaving; my eyes would have been bulging from their sockets.

Minya stayed quiet for a moment as my rage abated. “I know. I’m sorry. What can we do, Cal? How can I help you? I am here for you. You know that!”

I paused, thinking. I needed plenty. <What can you do? I need knowledge. I need people out there looking for Dani so I can get her back. I need revenge!> The tunnels quaked ominously at my words. If anyone had been near to my Core at that point, they would have felt a small flicker of the madness that had unknowingly dominated me in recent times.

“What can I, personally, do for you?” Minya questioned me in a conciliating tone. Calm words on her end drew me back to the issue at hand, and I shook off my near-overwhelming fury. I needed to be practical.

I thought about what I had been working on. Just before I told her everything, I mentally shook my head. She didn’t need to know about these projects just yet. My words came out calmly, <Answer a few questions for me?>

“Anything.”

<How did that Nick guy—The Collective’s leader—use Mana to capture Dani? Dale told me that bastard had bands of Mana holding her in place. I know for a fact that he wasn’t a Mage, so things aren’t adding up.>

“It is a common magical trap. People who collect rare creatures or easily damaged items can purchase magical containment devices. It is highly likely that he had a net-like version,” Minya responded instantly. “What else?”

<And I assume anyone can use them?> She nodded quietly, letting me speak. I was grateful. <I need one. There are multiple variations? One of each type then. Here, use these.> I created a small pile of gold bars at her feet. They clinked and thudded heavily to the ground.

<If you need more than this, tell me. I can always kill off a few adventurers and make more.> I coughed a little, not a physical response but a social conversation tactic. <Being thrifty won’t hurt, of course. That pile represents three dead F-ranked men.>

“Thank you. I’ll work on finding things that you will find useful. Also, to your earlier question, I do have an opal for you.” Minya opened her bag, pulling out a shimmering stone that scattered light like oil, allowing colors to play across its surface. “It is the highest grade stone I could get my hands on. You would have had it days ago if you would have talked to me.” She couldn’t help but throw in an admonition.

<Yeah, yeah, sorry.> I absorbed the stone, examining it and ‘tasting’ its flavor. It was… spicy. Odd. I created a small replica and fed infernal Essence through it. The lights within brightened considerably, and the Essence flowed into it at an exponentially higher rate than it did even with diamond. <Huh. It does work well for infernal. Good job.>

“So infernal Essence really does move through opal better? That wasn’t just a myth? For some reason, I assumed that kingdoms made that story up to catch naive necromancers! This is really something that will help you to become stronger?” Minya’s eyes lit up as she realized how helpful she had just been to me. Now I felt bad for yelling at her.

<Apparently, it was not a myth. Where did you get this, by the way? I thought opal was highly guarded? Kind of treated like a controlled substance or dangerous potion?> I was warming up to the conversation. As much as I hated to admit it, I hadn’t realized how depressing a month with no social interaction had been. Maybe I should start talking to Bob? My Goblin must be getting bored by now. We could visit each other.

Minya’s face flushed. “Erm. Well, after the infection went through the Lion Kingdom…”

<Oh no.> Another thing that was my fault with no real benefit. Did I accidentally topple a kingdom?

“Yeah… the entire country is drawing outcasts and is totally lawless. Huge tracts of land have no guards nor anyone to enforce the law.” Her voice became softer, and she trailed off, “On the plus side, the booming black market has all sorts of ‘forbidden’ things. I can find traps, enchantments, and war Runes that are much more deadly than is typically allowed to the population.”

<Good. Do it.> The pile of gold at her feet grew too more than triple its previous size. <Try to find things that are strange or seem to have no practical use, as well. I’d be particularly appreciative of Runes designed for direct attacks, and… you know what? I’ll make you a list.>

Minya was soon outfitted with money and trade goods such as gems. Armed with a list of goods I was interested in, she prepared to leave the dungeon and start her black market shopping spree. At the last moment, she hesitated, seeming to argue with herself for a moment before finally putting voice to her thoughts.

“Cal, do you remember much of the last month?” Minya guardedly questioned me.

I thought. <Hmm. Yeah, but I was so dang busy. It is all kinda… fuzzy.>

“I don’t want to upset you Cal, but… you were seriously acting insane,” Minya started to talk.

<Ugh, not this again. Minya, I’m not–> I rebuked her. At least, I tried to.

“Can you access memories from Cores like this?” Minya held up an empty memory gem.

<Uh. If you smash it in my influence, I get the memories. But… why?> I cautiously replied. I’m not ashamed to admit I was afraid to hear the answer.

“Good enough. Wait a moment.” She held the gem to her head and concentrated. After a few seconds, the gem began to glow brightly with swirling light. “Cal, I’m… sorry about this,” she preemptively apologized as she smashed the gem.

My thoughts were filled with horror as I watched what she had seen in my dungeon for the last few weeks. Rooms were heavily scarred, statues and walls half-formed and grotesque. Mobs damaged and malformed, out of their minds with pain. Swarms of creatures disproportionate to party size and ranking wiping out dozens of adventurers. Worst of all… unfair traps. Traps and dangerous things that there was no chance of defeating. Walls that closed and filled the enclosed space with poisons or acids. The only saving grace of these traps was that no one survived to tell about it, or my reputation would have been destroyed. I likely would have been as well.

<Wait. If no one survived, how did you know about it?> I latched on to the hope that she was somehow lying to me. Unfortunately, that was impossible with memory stones.

“You told me, Cal. You laughed and raved at their stupidity. You… forced me to watch as you killed them. Somehow, something brought you back from the edge. I don’t know what changed today, but for the first time in weeks, you suddenly started talking to me normally,” Minya told me sadly. “I bet you don’t even remember the majority of our conversations. Truthfully, if I weren’t bound to you, and I knew this… I would have killed you myself.”

<I would have let you. I don’t remember any of this…> I softly exhaled.

“Which is why I am telling you now. We need to hurry along with our plans. We need Dani back to even you out.” She waited a moment for me to reflect on my actions. “Are you sure you will be okay?”

<I’m sad, Minya. I’m hurting, and I’m going to do what I can to absorb absolutely everything. But… I do have my own rules that I play by. If people can prove themselves, if they can find the way out, I won’t go too far out of my way to hunt them down,> I graciously allowed, <unless they are part of ‘The Collective’. I promise you right now, I’m not going crazy. I also give you permission to kill me if I ever get like that again.>

“Not going crazy right now, at least. I suppose that is all I can ask for. Take care, Cal. I’ll be back soon.” She paused, turning to look around. “One last thing, Cal. Would your Wisp have wanted you to be so angry all the time?” She stepped into the portal after releasing these cutting words and was gone.

<Hey, that was rude and out of nowhere! You… gone? Finally.> Trying not to be hurt by her words, I turned my mind back to the series of impossible tasks I had given myself, trying to ignore how hard her words had struck me. I would make sure to follow through on my plans, I would find a way—and to the abyss with the consequences.

I had not been idle this month, I knew that much. Through my, uhm… indiscretions? I had somehow remained focused on the goals I had set for myself. I had been exceedingly busy. Now that my mind seemed to be clear, I could finish my tasks much quicker; I could find Dani, I knew I could. Unfortunately, undeniably, infuriatingly, I couldn’t do it alone. Yet. My plans for the future were slowly coming to fruition, but I had no idea how long Dani could last without me. To further my goals, I had been digging… no, that isn’t the right word. I had been boring my influence downward. A huge amount of Essence had been devoted to the project. It was only a thin tendril of influence, not even a half inch in diameter, but it was growing deeper by the moment.

<Bob, we have had a bit of a development,> I began talking to my current favorite sentient Mob. Bob was a Goblin Shaman with infernal and wind affinities.

Bob looked up as soon as he heard my voice, then slid to his knees in supplication, almost like prayer. “Great One, we live to serve! What can we do to further your goals? I cannot express my thanks that you have begun speaking to me in intelligible words again!”

I ignored the subtle reminder that I hadn’t been myself recently. Looking him over, I was still impressed by how the changes I had wrought in the Goblins had altered their bodies so much. For instance, now there was hardly a hint of the speech impediment that had plagued their race for so long. <Research, Bob. For you, always research. The digging is approaching the depth needed. I just wanted to ensure that everyone is ready for any accidental… explosions.>

“As always, we live to die for you.” Bob nodded heartily, his happy tone contrasting to the dark words.

<Right, well, I have a new staff for you, if you want it. The staff is the same wood you are using now, aspen? I never actually got a reason for that, by the way.> My curiosity derailed my gift-giving by a bit.

“Ah, yes! Aspen is believed to enhance our abilities to communicate with the spiritual world. It offers greater protection and control over the spirits I must face if I want to direct them,” Bob explained instantly. At the start of our relationship, he had been a bit more hesitant to give up the secrets of his race. That had quickly changed. I suppose that seeing a being unendingly resurrect fallen members of your tribe would be a good incentive to open up a little.

<Oh. Alrighty then. This staff looks almost the same as the one you are using, but it has a rod of opal through the center, connecting to a small orb of opal at the very top.> I stopped talking as the staff appeared in front of him. He was nearly dancing with glee as he reverently picked up the staff and channeled a bit of infernal Essence into it. A bolt of purest darkness shot from the orb, impacting a passing Goblin and making it scream and collapse.

Bob looked at the Goblin in shock. “Oops. So… it launches arrows of Essence.”

<Yeah, unfocused infernal Essence in this will fire off a bolt of… that.> I looked at the weakly convulsing Goblin on the floor. <Let me fix him really quick…>

I took a moment and restored the Goblin, who scampered off with a sharp look at the sheepish Shaman. <Right, so, I want you to do research with that staff. It should focus your abilities and allow you to complete your Incantations and summoning with much less Essence and far greater control.>

“I… we will put it to good use, Great Spirit.> Bob was one of the few Goblins that could work with the alternate versions of himself without getting weirded out. It was always amusing to watch twelve versions of Bob arguing.

<Good luck, Bob. I need to get back to digging.> I focused more Essence into the tendril of influence I was extending downward.

“Wait!” Bob cried out loudly, even for him. What? Bob had never stopped me from moving on to other things before.

<Yes, Bob?>

He took a deep breath. “Great one, we are forever in your debt, and we could never hope to repay the lavish gifts you have given us…”

<Go on, Bob, I won’t be angry.> I waited for his request to leave. It made sense; they had been fixed, and who wouldn’t want to explore the world? I had likely scared them off with my bout of insanity.

“There are a few of us who miss certain aspects of our life outside, and while we are happy to eat the food you provide, we hoped that,” here it comes, more people leaving me, “you would be willing to allow other things to live and grow in here.”

<What? You just want more things?> My voice may have come out a bit strongly, as he cowered a bit. Can’t he recognize excitement?

Bob fell to his knees again. “I am so sorry to have bothered you with such a request! I am ashamed and–”

<No, no. What can I do for you, Bob?> I consoled him cheerfully. <You serve me well. I am happy to help make you happier.>

He glanced up hopefully. “Ah… we had hoped to make this place more like the outdoors. Plants, flowers, small animals such as birds… maybe some things we can hunt without being hunted in return.”

<And? That is completely doable. It might even benefit me somehow. Though, I am sensing a bit more, perhaps? What is it?> I cajoled him. Hearing that you weren’t going to be alone forever can really put you into a good mood.

“Well, the thing most missed… and you can say no, really, I don’t know the scope of your abilities, and–” Bob babbled away, wringing his hands.

<Spit it out, Bob. I do have things to do.>

“Yes! Sorry! The thing most missed is the feeling of wind. It can get a bit… stuffy down here,” Bob finally finished. “The animals are mainly for background noise; we have had a few days where my people can’t seem to take the silence. They tend to tear their ears open when it lasts too long.”

<You… want insects and rodents? I didn’t bother because I never saw a use for them. Sure. I’ll make bugs and various non-threatening creatures on every floor and instruct the Mobs not to eat them. The breeze might take a while, but I know I can do it. Maybe an updraft generated by heat from my digging…> My mind wandered away as I was considering how to make a breeze, so I didn’t hear his thanks. I redoubled my digging efforts and poured more earthen Essence into my deepening depression. To clarify, not the mental state. I mean depression as a ‘hole’. Tunnel. No, wait. If it is vertical, it is a shaft. I pumped Essence in an attempt to enlarge my shaft. Um… that still sounds wrong for some reason.

There was a good reason for my apparent waste of Essence. No, not waste—use. Brilliant use of Essence. Not a waste. I should kill something to clear my mind. To my point, a copy of a Dwarven memory stone I had ‘acquired’ from Dale recently had come with some very interesting information. The Dwarves had allowed some of their theories to be available to the outside world, thinking that the knowledge could never benefit a race outside of their own.

You see, Dwarves were the only known race that had dug through the earth so deeply that they had found a point where rock ceased to be solid, where the heat and pressure of the world above liquefied everything below. They had never found a way to go beyond this point but noted that this was certainly how volcanoes gained their deadly payload. To me—beyond the obvious benefit of turning my mountain into an active volcano—the fact of the matter was that the Dwarves used the heat and molten metals they found to create wondrous weaponry and formulate deadly traps. I would find a way to do the same.

It was possible that the Dwarves also ignored a huge benefit in the form of cultivation. Maybe they didn’t understand the various benefits, but most likely they did and simply chose not to share with others. Magma was a massive source of various combinations of earth and fire Essence. At least those types, maybe more. They could make a fortune guiding people to the unceasing Essence generation of the deeps. Then again, lava cultivators tended to congregate around active volcanoes, which was very dangerous for obvious reasons. I’m sure this led to an unstable group of people, thrill-seekers, warriors, and such. Maybe the Dwarves just didn’t want guests that could turn on them? I could understand that.

I collected my thoughts and focused on the outcome I wanted. If I could tunnel to the depth where the world turned liquid, I need never fear my tunnels being sealed off for I could use the loose Essence of the earth to generate enough power to surpass what slowly drifted into here. I also had a river that flowed through my levels. If I could find a way to generate wind, I would have everything I needed to be a self-sufficient elemental dungeon. Bob, with his request for fresh air, may have actually helped me more than he knew. Celestial and infernal Essence were still an issue, but I could work on that. Later. After I finished my current project.

Chapter Three

Looking at my dungeon, I took a deep ‘breath’ and got back to work. To help keep my mind focused, I had created a plethora of totally sane schemes! I had my Mobs warring every day—not only against adventurers but against each other. The creatures that fought and survived had their memories stored in Delta memory stones and were becoming more confident and powerful by the day. To clarify, not all of them were strong enough to have their own Core yet, but I was able to imbue their memories into them, similar to the Goblins below.

Allowing them to retain their memories and be granted a healthy body upon death pushed my Mobs to remove their various inhibitions. This process quickly forced them to become more vicious and territorial, even when they had started as passive creatures. For example, now even the Bashers didn’t need my guidance to attack when people came too close! The territorial aspect was something that I had been forcing upon them by keeping creatures bunched together, only sending them after dungeoneers when they got within range. Now, I am happy to report the Mobs did that work themselves! Not needing to dictate every movement left me free to ignore them in favor of working on more important things.

While I was pleased by the progress of my life forms, as my mind returned to my project… I scowled. I hated being interrupted, especially when Minya interrupted with her inane attempts to force me into self-reflection! Bah. I refocused on my walls, little by little chipping away the heavy, dense granite and other various minerals and exchanging them for a new type of stone. I had found this material during my downward digging, nearly two miles straight down. It was porous and very light… pumice! That’s the word I was thinking of. Since I was absorbing more dense material, replacing it with pumice had the fringe benefit of giving me a net return of total Essence. That is, I was gaining Essence faster than I was using it while creating my walls.

I could shape the pores in the new stone walls, creating fractals of smaller and smaller Runes. Since it was still a strong-ish material—being rock—I could grow it in Runic formations easily, sacrificing the density of the old material without damaging the structural integrity of the walls. This stone could be integral to the next phase of my plans, but there was plenty to do before I even thought about achieving that lofty goal!

I paused my efforts, thinking back on my recent conversation with my favorite dungeon born. Though she had gone out of her way to bother me, Minya had provided me with a very important piece to my puzzle. Opal. Right now, I was collecting vast quantities of Essence as well as various flavors of corruption and storing it for later use. Whenever I got too bored with the tedium of replacing multiple tons of stone, I turned to a few of my side projects that allowed me to automate the process of Essence collection to a higher degree. Hopefully, this new gemstone would help since I was getting too large to micromanage everything that happened here.

The lining of various minerals through my walls did allow a constant flow of Essence and taint to drain into Beast Cores. This had the adventurer-beloved benefit of purifying the Essence in the dungeon without my direct influence. The downside was that the process was slow. Without taking a more active role in the interplay of energy, corruption had begun to build to noticeable levels.

I sighed as I thought about the potentially superb usefulness of this gift… I should really apologize to her. Minya had good timing, even if she had gone out of her way to annoy me at that moment. Infernal Essence had been accruing at a higher rate than I had bothered to keep up with. It moved even slower through the diamond channels in the walls than the other types of Essence did. Because of its low… viscosity, for lack of a better word, there was a dense miasma of the corruption in my tunnels. Already over a month had passed since the multiple hundreds of defenders and infected had died in here, and there was no noticeable progress in clearing the taint. Hopefully, supplementing the diamond filaments with an opal version would help me clear the corruption from the air.

I took a deep drink of my collected Essence and, refreshed, began working, threading the opal along every wall over the course of the next hour. A portion of the diamond wires melted back into my aura as I overlaid the original path with that of opal. I connected the shimmering gemstone to the murkily swirling Cores designed to draw in and store the infernal corruption and laughed gleefully. To my immense satisfaction, the effect was both drastic and immediate.

The infernal Essence seemed to shriek with demonic glee as it flowed into the opal, flashing into the Core faster than any of the other Essences bothered to move along their own varied filaments. This confirmed another of my theories… the gems I was using were not actually the best type of material for the various Essences! The humanoids above me had it wrong! While the gemstones I was using were good at collecting their associated corruption, there would certainly be a better option. I laughed at my good fortune, now all I needed to do was–

A meteorite slammed into the surface, jarring me from my cheerful examination. How long had I been focused on this? A day? The crater left from the impact extended into my influence, so I looked at the remnants of the meteor… a house? That's an odd celestial body… ah. A Mana storm must be forming above. Good, good. I was in a cheerful mood right then; things were going well. I could use some company. I can only talk to myself for so long before I start to go–. Stop that train of thought! Gotta think positive!

Dale

“Mana storm!” a screaming voice woke Dale from his uneasy slumber as an alarm began to howl. A rumble from an impact rocked the ground, making the awakening process much swifter. Dale started to sit up, but his instincts grabbed his attention, and his body shifted into a defensive stance. He blocked the jagged blade tearing through the air, easily returning a double jab. At this moment, Dale was happy that he was always armed, his cursed weapons refusing to vacate their prominent positions on his fists. His pugilistic maneuver paid off. His clenched hand smashing into the robed figure wielding the blade. Surprised when the form didn’t go flying through the side of his tent, Dale charged recklessly, doing everything he could think of to avoid the dancing blade.

The robed figure slashed at him, always just slightly faster than Dale could manage to perfectly block. Soon he had small, bleeding cuts crisscrossing his arms and chest. The robed figure took a step back at blinding speed, removing his hood.

Pointed ears, ebony skin, and a scowl were revealed. “Enough. Barely passable. Weeks of training and you still allow the blade to touch your flesh. Pathetic, even for a human. You should be ashamed of your weak dedication to the arts.”

Dale inclined his head in the smallest of bows, not trusting the other person not to attack. “Sorry, sir. I was a bit over-concerned that a Mana storm is settling in.”

Dale’s combat instructor smacked him across the face hard enough to make his nose bleed. “You think your enemies are going to care that you are worried about a little snow? You think an assassin is going to hold off so you can seek shelter? Grow up, child! I should have just ended your miserable existence when we met instead of agreeing to train you. You know what? You need to show greater progress, or it will reflect poorly on me. From now on, your instruction is not limited to two hours at night,” he spat viciously. “I will be training you constantly. You should be grateful that I am giving you advanced warning. Very grateful.”

Breathing heavily as he took in the significance of the Moon Elf’s words, Dale managed to grind out a few choice expletives before remembering to respond correctly, “T-thank you, sir. I am… overjoyed that you are planning on taking such an active role in my daily routine. Does this mean I should be expecting attacks in places like the dungeon? That I’ll see you in the latrine and bathhouse?”

The Dark Elf chuckled snidely as he slowly vanished from sight. “Foolish boy. You won’t see me.”

Dale switched his vision to an Essence enhanced version but didn’t detect so much as a ripple in the ambient energy of the world. “OhmygodIhatethis,” he mumble screamed under his breath. A second impact nearby made the ground shake, urging him to head for the dungeon entrance.

The dungeon was the only place nearby that provided enough shelter to weather the storm, and so it tended to become a bit crowded during these dangerous atmospheric events. Dale joined the gathering crowd, trying to wait patiently while the sky was filling with odd effects. Illusions of monsters in the air manifested and dissipated, small portals formed and vanished, sometimes leaving behind creatures or items. One portal stayed open for a few long seconds, blasting a torrent of water out at a forty-five-degree angle. Fish began falling from the stream of liquid.

“Are you bleeding? What? How?” Rose strode up next to Dale, looking at him then at the mesmerizing patterns in the sky. “It is almost beautiful. Not as bad as the last one at least.”

“Please stop tempting fate with your poor choices of words.” Hans slid up next to her, trying to put an arm around her shoulders.

A blade appeared at his throat, and Rose quirked an eyebrow at him as she played with the small dagger. “I’ll stop tempting fate when you do, Grandpa.”

Hans’ face flushed. “I am not that old!”

“An early excursion into the dungeon, my friends?” Tom strode up to the gathering, easily parting the crowd with the simple expedient of walking into people who didn’t move out of the way in time. The large man had Adam trailing behind him, casually using Tom like a battering ram. “I have a request for mineral samples from the walls of the fourth floor! We can make a pile of gold before breakfast!”

“Looks like we are going in whether we like it or not. Everyone feel up to officially starting the day early?” Dale looked around at his friends, doing his best to clean the drying blood off his face.

“For sure, but let’s pop down to the second floor to begin with. The first level is going to be packed. Bleh.” Hans shuddered at the thought of a constricting press of people. “Sweaty.”

They walked into the dungeon, using their keygems to activate the portal system. With a single step, they were on the second floor. Dale went first, ready for combat. His preparedness was directly beneficial to the group. A Smasher—a stone covered Basher—was jumping toward the open portal in an attempted ambush. Dale lightly dodged the assault, using his battle gauntlets to ‘soft block’. This meant that he didn’t directly block the entire attack, but instead angled himself and pushed so that the attack passed him while his actions deflected the soaring bunny into the wall. Trying to block a charge from these overgrown creatures had been the cause of many shattered shields over the last few months, and Dale didn’t care for yet another broken bone.

He swiftly moved after the downed Mob, crushing its skull with a heavy stomp. “What a nice way to wake up in the morning.” He stretched, chuckling as an Impaler appeared out of a hidden hole in the wall. The infernally-enhanced Basher had flesh-peeling flames covering its jutting horn, so Dale made sure to avoid the sharp bone as he counterattacked. His fist impacted the side of the altered rabbit, and he activated his gauntlet as the blow struck home.

Splat. The entrails and viscera of the animal were blasted out of its body as the fluid repulsion Rune on Dale’s knuckles activated. He picked up the corpse as the remainder of his team walked through the portal. “Basher jerky, anyone?” Dale offered the exsanguinated rabbit around with a smile.

Only Tom actually considered it. “Hmm. Perhaps after the fur has been removed…?”

“Don’t listen to him, Tom. He is just showing off,” Rose grumbled, pulling back the string of her force-enhanced bow. “Must be nice to have permanently activated magical weapons on you all the time. Isn’t that right, Dale?”

“Hey, now! Must be nice to use the bathroom without worrying that you are going to blast something back into you, isn’t that right, Rose?” Dale rebutted too loudly. He froze in place. “Not at all based off of actual life experiences, of course.” He grimaced sourly, realizing he had shared way too much.

“Sinking your ship to put out a fire! While I would love to hear the origin of this story,” Hans released an uncharacteristically high-pitched giggle, “it does appear that we are going to have to fight. Looks like we walked into a territory war.” He gestured ahead of them, where a Coiled Cat was springing back and forth among a group of Bashers that were larger than usual, even for advanced Bashers like the ones Dale had just defeated.

They watched for a moment as the infighting raged on. Rose was the first to notice the oddity. “Shouldn’t… shouldn’t this be over by now?”

“The Essence patterns in those Bashers are flowing in a different pattern than usual. More highly concentrated Essence is swirling around their skulls, so I would have to assume that they are more intelligent than usual,” Adam spoke in a melodious baritone. His body had been subtly undergoing changes since the battle of the infected, dubbed ‘The Wailing War’ due to the constant crying and howling of the afflicted. His voice was becoming smoother, and other small characteristics were becoming noticeable. His skin was perfectly clear, all signs of scarring vanished, and his hair was slowly turning a silvery-blond. With his pure white cloak and staff, he looked like a Bishop.

“More intelligent?” Hans pondered this revelation for a bare moment. “Gah! They must have started developing Beast Cores! Let’s go kill ‘em all and find those Cores!”

“Or we could just enjoy the show?” Rose quirked an eyebrow at Hans’ exuberance.

“No, cause if we win, we can claim this territory as ours!” Hans started moving toward the Mobs. Actually, if they had Cores now, they would all be considered Beasts. Weak Beasts, but Beasts nonetheless. Hans smiled, now seeing the creatures as walking gold coins.

“I do not think that Mobs would honor an agreement of that nature,” Tom responded with confusion evident in his voice.

“He’s trying to distract us so he can force us to start fighting,” Adam clarified for his large friend, readying his staff.

Hans charged into the fray, laughing as he dodged droplets of blood spraying from his instantly impaled target. The Bashers squeaked indignantly, and a few turned to charge him. The Coiled Cat took advantage of the distraction and pounced on to a Basher, crushing it under his weight. The Cat’s claws lashed out, tearing a chunk of flesh—and the Bashers horn—out of its skull. With a crunch the Cat bit into the horn, and a flash of Essence entered its body. It shuddered as the muscles along its back rippled with fresh power.

“Argh!” Hans shouted in horror, “He just ate a Core! He ate it! Dale! Tom! Get in here! It’s eating our profit!”

Dale complied, charging the Cat while it was distracted. He was able to land a solid blow, but the knuckles of his battle gauntlet glanced off of the metal-reinforced skull of the Beast. There was a bit of an effect from the liquid repulsion Rune, but Dale was used to being able to do serious damage with each attack and failed to use the provided opportunity to follow up with more punches. The Cat shook itself and sprang forward, ramming into Dale with its massive head. Luckily for Dale, there was little momentum to the blow as there were only a few inches between them. His luck was wearing out quickly though as the Cat opened his jaws to take a chunk out of the human it was standing over.

As the metallic jaws came down, teeth punching through Dale’s skin with barely any resistance, a golden, cube-shaped barrier appeared in the Cat's mouth. As the metal teeth tried to clamp down, the barrier forced the jaws apart. Adam shouted in a strained tone, “Hurry up, Dale! Do something! Dale!”

The Cat leaned back, disengaging and rearing to swing its paws at the man scrambling to stand up. An arrow punched into the meaty paw, slicing flesh but failing to penetrate the bone, though the force was enough that the Cat was twirled around one hundred eighty degrees. Tom swung his ingot hammer at the Cat and forced the vertebrae apart, severing the spinal cord as if its metal coating didn’t exist. The paralyzed Cat fell and hissed impotently at the group, scrabbling around with its legs dragging behind it, but it was quickly put out of its misery with an accurate arrow to the eye.

“A hand with these Bashers?” Hans called in an oddly desperate tone. Turning to look at him, the group watched incredulously as the Bashers performed complicated maneuvers to dodge the blades Hans was swinging.

“Are you being serious?” Dale stared at the former assassin. “Just kill it!”

“I don’t want to go all out against glorified food!” Hans huffed as a Basher casually hopped over a low swing.

Tom and Dale looked at each other, shrugged, and waded into the combat. Rose stood next to Adam, carefully aiming at the agile creatures. Tom frowned as his swinging ingot hammer consistently missed every target. “Hold thyself immobile so that I may bring about thine end!” the redhead roared at the whirling balls of fur.

“Tom!” Hans shouted at the lumbering barbarian.

The redhead jumped back, looking for the inclement danger that must be nearby. Seeing nothing, “What?”

“They aren’t listening to you.” Hans chuckled as he finally slashed one of the Bashers. In a falsetto, he mocked his student, “Hold still so I can kill you! Grahh! You. That’s you.”

“My voice does not even slightly resemble that,” Tom grumbled as he abandoned his hammer, opting instead to slap at the Bashers with his bare hand. He glared at the Bashers as they attempted counterattacks, dodging every swing he attempted. “Dale, you make striking these Beasts look so easy!”

“Helps to have both fists,” Dale muttered offhandedly, fully focused on using the nimble Bashers to train his pugilistic accuracy. He threw a few combination punches that stunned the Beast he was focused on, not bothering to use the Runes on his weapons to finish it off. Rose snorted loudly, attempting not to laugh at the unintentional insult. Tom’s arm was mostly regrown at this point, but he hadn’t had any work done yet to restore anything past his wrist.

Tom lifted his handless arm in what was a poor attempt at a rude gesture. Adam laughed. “You’ve been spending too much time around Hans, Tom. Why don’t you have your shield?”

“You say that like it is a bad thing!” Hans called in mock outrage. The others took a moment to see where his voice was coming from. He was hanging off the ceiling.

Catching a Basher by the scruff of its neck as it jumped at him, Tom sighed and smashed its head on to the floor, splattering blood across his shins. “With my arm mostly regrown, my shield does not fit anymore. Also, I cannot hold it normally since it was forged to be worn as a piece of armor, not be used as a held item. Even if it was, I have no hand in which to carry it.”

Dale finished off the last Basher attacking him. “Don’t worry about it too much. You should have full use of your hand by the end of the week. At least, that’s what the Mage told us.”

“Verily, I look forward to it.” Tom nodded gravely, swinging the limp Basher into a jumping Smasher, throwing the stone-clad attacker into the wall. He threw his improvised weapon, which released a piteous squeak, hurrying to follow the attack with his ingot hammer. With all his might behind the blow, cracking the heavy stone armor and finishing off the stunned Beast was child’s play.

Hans looked around at the carnage. “These all had to be Beasts, right? Even if they are low quality, there is a standing order for Cores! The lowest quality Core we can find will still sell for a solid gold, so let’s make sure we don’t leave any here!”

They got to the grisly task of cutting out the Cores, which were in the horns of the Bashers and seated between the three eyes of the Coiled Cat. The entirety of the Cat then was inserted into a bag since the Guild had found that the bones were interwoven with a type of high-grade steel. The Cat would be skinned, the usable meat removed, then the remainder boiled to leave behind only the gleaming bones. Those were given to the smelters, who reduced them to steel ingots. This was all part of a very efficient operation that used every part of the Beast.

Chapter Four

<So, Dale, how are things?> When my voice broke his attention, Dale nearly sliced his thumb open with the knife he was using to skin a Cat.

“It speaks!” Dale quipped dryly. “I am not worthy! So feel free to go away.”

<Of course I speak, and of course, you aren’t worthy. You’re lookin’ good. Healthy. Are you going somewhere? I see you have your suitcase packed. Oh, wait. Those are just the bags under your eyes! You look like rabbit scat.> I kept up a running commentary as he continued working on the carcass.

“What do you want, Cal? You’ve never bothered me unless you wanted something,” Dale mind-groaned in reply. I was instantly angry, a side effect of whatever had kept my thoughts fuzzy for the last month.

Dale shivered as he felt my mood fluctuating. <Dale. Oh, Dale. You know what I want. I want my Wisp back. I want DANI!> Dust rose into the air as the dungeon trembled a bit. I tried to calm down, and after a moment, the room returned to a more blue-ish hue as my mood stabilized.

“I don’t know where she is, Cal,” Dale hurried to think at me—the angry entity—while inspecting the integrity of the walls along with the others.

“That Mana storm must be getting nasty. Let’s get further down,” Rose muttered to the group, readying herself to continue into my depths.

I finally got control of myself. <I know, Dale. I know. Sorry. Listen, I’m going to find her, and I want to know that you will help me get her back when I do.>

“I’ll do what I can, Cal, but I am just a D-ranked cultivator. There really isn’t much I can do to help bring her back. Even my political power only extends to this mountain,” Dale tried to soothe my agitation.

<So do more!> I growled in a fury, wishing I could strangle him. <Work harder, cultivate more, throw parties, and make rich friends! Marry a princess! I don’t care! I don’t care if you think yourself pathetic, you need to be ready!>

“Dale, are you talking to the dungeon right now?” Adam looked at his leader with faintly glowing eyes.

“…Yeah.”

I glanced closer at Adam, and his head turned to look directly at me. My perspective. Whatever. <Ugh, that’s creepy.>

“He’s looking at me right now,” Adam calmly stated. Yup, freaky. Hang on though…

<Can I fix him?> I queried Dale, who seemed to be trying to hold back a laugh.

“What? No!” Dale loudly stated, making the others look at him.

“Does it want something?” Hans put a hand on Dale’s. “Can you see the dungeon right now, Dale? Is it in the room with us?”

Dale shook off the hand of his patronizing friend. “Knock it off. He isn’t an imaginary friend. He wants to ‘fix’ you, Adam, but I think that usually means he wants to eat you or try out ideas for corrupted growth on you.”

Adam stopped and looked downward, considering Dale’s words. <You do understand me! Also, see? He wants to be fixed! Now, if you just push him on to that spike over there…>

“Avoid that spike, Adam,” Dale stated instantly.

I grunted in dissatisfaction. <This is why no one likes you, Dale.>

Dale continued talking to the group, “Yes, the dungeon is talking again.”

“Speak out loud, would you?” Rose instructed him crossly.

“What? Why?” Dale was a bit caught off guard by this request. “You will only hear half of the conversation!”

“No, I agree.” Surprisingly, it was Hans who interjected. “At least then we will have some idea what is going through your mind.”

Dale reluctantly agreed, “Whatever you want, I guess. What is going on, Cal?”

<Well, tiny and tasty human, I have plans, you see.>

“Yes, very mysterious and vaguely threatening of you. I assumed as much. How do I fit into these scary plans?” Dale actually had a good question for once. Oh, wait! Questions!

I chuckled in a slightly sinister manner. <We haven’t played our little question game in a while. Do you want to start it up again?>

Dale slowly shook his head. “I’d really rather not. I’d rather be open and honest and have you do so in return.”

His words caught me off guard. <Whoa, Dale! What changed? You used to be so adamant against every little interaction! You sound so… mature now!>

The human paused, lips quirking as he tried to find a nice way to phrase his next words. “Cal… the difference is that you’re different now that I know you care. Maybe you don’t care about me, my team, or maybe even life in general, but you do care about something besides yourself. I now know you have feelings and that loss affects you. Talking to you now… it feels less like talking to a psychopathic individual and more like talking to… I don’t know, a living force of nature?”

<That’s a decent description of me. A psychopathic force of nature.> My mood soured again with the reminder that Dani had been taken from me. <Well, whatever works for you. Can I count on your help to get her back?>

“Of course, Cal. If there is something I can do, I will. As long as I don’t die first.” Dale chuckled half-heartedly, fishing for some words of affirmation.

<No promises on that front, but, really, good luck,> I returned bluntly.

Dale stopped laughing. “Right, you are still a dungeon.” He grunted uncomfortably. Hans raised an eyebrow at him in consternation. “How are you planning to find her?”

<I’m going to ‘bug’ people. Places, too. Maybe things as well, just for fun.>

Dale waited a moment. When no more information was forthcoming, he tried to force it a bit, “Care to elaborate?”

<Not particularly! You will find out soon enough anyway.> I had to hold back a laugh as his face turned red. Apparently, I was upsetting him. <Before I go and have fun setting traps in your way, I do have a potential fix for your low ranking. That is, if you are interested…?>

He wavered, deciding between anger and curiosity. He broke down after a moment of deliberation. “Alright, what is it?”

I grinned internally. I knew he couldn’t resist the swift way to the top. <Well, Dale, you have a Beast Core in you! I know that cultivating has been difficult for you recently, too many open affinity channels, yeah? Why not take the easy path? You can get stronger the same way Beasts can! Take the Essence right from their Cores.>

Chapter Five

Dale was unsure of how to respond to my new information. “So, what… eat the Core? Like that Cat just did?”

<Well. If you want? It’d be fun to see you break your teeth. I was more thinking that you would crush the Core in your hand. You know, the one with the Essence-absorption Rune?> I snickered a bit as the pieces started coming together in his mind.

“You planned this?” He looked incredulously at his armored hand.

<Of course I did! You are so unimaginative that if I didn’t make interesting things for you, you would just keep on doing the same boring things over and over,> I rebuked him whilst laughing. <Did you think that that Rune would only work if someone attacked you with Essence or something?>

Dale flushed and avoided answering. “Won’t crushing a Core make it explode?” He was overly paranoid, in my opinion.

Or he was just a realist. <Maybe? Explode is a strong term. Though maybe chewing it is a bad idea after all.>

He sighed and rubbed his forehead. “At least there is a flesh Mage here if something goes wrong,” he muttered darkly. Seriously, where was the trust?

Dale pulled a Core from a Basher out of his bag, holding it tenuously in his hand. His team was looking at him like he was a crazy person, so he quickly explained what he was about to do.

“Dale? Buddy? Maybe you don’t cause an explosion in an enclosed area? Do it outside if absolutely necessary?” Hans wheedled him. “Maybe you don’t want to throw away profit, either? You are basically planning to throw gold–”

“We’re right next to a portal.” Dale glared at the knife-twirling ex-assassin. “If something goes wrong, please feel free to get me healed. I’ll pay you back when I’m able to move.” With a deep breath, he forcefully activated the Rune on his battle gauntlet and squeezed.

Bamph! The Core shattered, sending out a halo of multi-colored light. Dale screamed as his pinky finger was torn off from the concussive force.

<Hey, it worked! You absorbed most of it!> I cheered for Dale as he howled and gripped his energy-amputated finger stub.

“You son of a– Oww!” Dale gripped his hand as Adam stepped forward and healed the energy burns and lacerations from exploding crystal.

“Well, the finger is gone, but the rest will heal up,” Adam pronounced after a few minutes of triage. The cleric wiped his sweating brow as he leaned back. “If we can find the finger, I may be able to reattach it. If it hasn’t already vanished.”

<Hmm. You should have probably let the material of the gauntlet wrap the Core in its entirety, then there wouldn’t have been any Essence loss,> I informed the bleeding human.

“Cal, what the shi–” Dale kept shouting stuff, but now his group was just sitting around being boring, so I had already moved on to other things. Now Dale would have to come up with his own ideas. If he could. Pff. Anyway. What was I doing? Oh, right!

My idea for searching for Dani was ready! That is probably why I was in such a good mood. I’m sure messing with Dale had something to do with my joyful outlook on life too, though. I had been searching for a way to send out creatures that would seek Dani, and an idea had come to me after watching an anthill for a few hours. Bugs! Why did bugs do what they did? Why did they look for certain things or follow the same paths over and over? They were looking for something. In the case of ants, it was a small chemical trail. Others were looking for food, some for mates. I had no idea what wasps were looking for; as far as I could tell, they were just assholes. I liked wasps.

After some, um, minor modification and a few days of altering what they quested after, I learned how to force them to track a specific Essence signature. Now, no matter where they started or how well I hid their target, the bugs always found what they were supposed to. There was another advantage to this method—who looks at bugs and gets worried? Even I couldn’t deal with all of the insects in my dungeon now that I had created them for Bob. Their population grew too fast, it would take way too long to micro-manage them, and they didn’t really have great combat potential. But! They could be seekers. I knew it was a long shot, but if I put enough bugs out there, they should eventually converge on a single location. Hopefully, Dani would be there. No… she will be there.

To that end, I had been growing all sorts of insects and modifying them with Essence. They were a bit larger than their natural counterparts, and their shape was a bit… off from what is found in nature. This was because I had been mixing and matching to make the most versatile creature that I could. All of them could fly, and I had grown them in a low-Essence environment so that they could survive outside of the dungeon. Their survivability was actually surprisingly high in all the climates I had tried out.

Now that I was thinking about it, I might as well let the first batch out. It was getting pretty crowded in the incubators, and it sounded like the Mana storm was abating. With fewer people playing defense above, I hoped that more bugs could slip away without accidentally being squished. After opening their pens, the swarm of thousands began buzzing into the dungeon, moving toward the exit. They were only trying to get out, but the adventurers seemed to think that they were a new type of threatening Mob.

“Oh, God! Flying spiders!”

“Look at the size of those claws! Run!”

“Ahhhh! They have stingers!”

Well. I may have made them a little too versatile…

“That one is the size of a dog! How is it able to fly?!”

“They aren’t attacking! Just get down, and they ignore you!” Finally, someone noticed!

Hmm. Was the size difference really that important? I thought that a larger version of something they saw all the time wouldn’t be too noticeable. Humans are so strange! They scream like children over a few bugs but go running at the Cat Boss—Snowball, a steam variant Beast—looking for a fight? Bizarre, I tell you.

The last of the swarm was flowing out of the dungeon entrance and was scattering into the air. Hopefully, I would be able to find where they converged in the future. Good luck, love-bugs! I gave them a tearful farewell; it was always difficult to see your creations go off into the world, or so I had heard.

An hour later, after the great excitement of the morning, I was starting to wish I could fall asleep. I was working on mind-numbing tasks. Create a bird. Do it again, slightly different. Again, slightly different. Make a bug. Grow a tree. Grass. I was starting to hate grass. Do you know how annoying it is to grow each individual blade of grass? They aren’t even actual blades, just blade shaped! Boo! I started getting antsy when I was planting raspberries and may have accidentally gone off on a tangent and made a new Mob. Making harmless things is just so… bleh!

Bob called my attention to a trap he had come up with. He made me promise not to look at it before it was sprung, but I didn’t need to wait long. Some bleary-eyed adventurers were happily approaching a treasure chest, and after thoroughly checking it for traps, they threw the lid open. Boisterously collecting the silver coins and assorted goods inside, they stood straight while chattering amongst themselves.

<I’m a bit underwhelmed.>

Bob rubbed his hands together. “Shh. Here it comes!”

With a scream, a dagger-wielding Goblin was thrown out of the chest; a spring-loaded trap door on the bottom had concealed his hiding place. He impacted the standing human, his weight bringing them both to the ground. The adventurer took a half dozen stabs to the abdomen before the others—who seemed to be in shock—tried to attack the Goblin. Not sticking around to die, the Goblin jumped back into the large chest and slammed the lid shut, slipping into the tunnel underneath and sliding away down an incline. Even if a human found the tunnel under a chest like this, they couldn’t follow.

<That… that was amazing!> I started laughing, and so did Bob. The gore covered Goblin entered the room Bob was in a minute later and was awarded a higher quality knife as a reward.

“Glad you liked it!” Bob chortled. “I’ve been trying to find a way around their trap detection, but any wires or pressure plates are always detected by professionals.”

I was smiling now. <Thanks, Bob! That really broke up the tedium!>

Chapter Six

I’m bored again. Digging is boring. That is, it is dull. Not to be confused with boring, the act of digging a hole. Which, I suppose, it also is. I was at a bit of an impasse right now, to be frank. Digging was time consuming, more so since I was starting from near the top of a mountain. It was harder to do the further I moved away from myself and thus slowed down progress and increased energy consumption. Luckily, it didn’t take much concentration, or I would have gone as crazy as the council on the surface seemed to think I was.

For the first time in a month, I had decided to take a hard look at what I was doing. Minya—abyss take her—had scored a point in our last conversation. Dani wouldn’t have wanted me to ignore my upkeep and get lazy; she has always been a proponent of hard work and judicious rewards. When I looked at a few treasure chests lying around on my second floor, I was shocked to find them stuffed with gold of all things!

I didn’t give out gold on the second level! What had I been thinking? …The short answer was I hadn’t been thinking. At least not clearly. High rewards on an entry floor made for fewer people continuing to the deeper floors! I deactivated the Runes I had been using to generate treasure in the chests throughout my body and felt a wave of nausea as I noticed how much Essence they had been sucking up. All they were doing was generating coins and bottling health potions. Unendingly. They had been ceaselessly producing gold for a month. I recouped some of my losses by reabsorbing the metal and tried to think of a way to fix this situation. I liked the treasure chests because they made for a convenient distraction. People could waste hours looking for the hidden boxes, and I didn’t have to worry about generating rewards for each individual Mob death.

I didn’t want to go back to trying to make rewards for each individual person. I had way too many things to get done. How could I solve this problem? Quickly getting frustrated that I had no one to talk to, I… wait. Bob! <Bob, do you have a moment?> I questioned quietly. He was setting up some kind of dark ritual, and I really didn’t want to interrupt him if it would affect what he was doing.

Bob slowed his writing and carefully finished pouring some blood into a long stripe. He stood and stretched before answering, “Sorry for the wait, but if I did this wrong, it would backfire quite terribly. For you, Great Spirit, I will always have—or make—time.”

I was touched, and it threw me off a bit. <Thank you, Bob. It has been… hard… for me recently.>

“Understandably so. What can I help with?” I explained my situation and how I was having trouble finding a solution. He scratched at his leathery hide, considering my words. “Well. Too many adventurers to give exact rewards for? That is a good problem to have, I think. Let me ask you this, how many groups have those bags that are larger on the inside?”

His return question caught me off guard. <Oh. I haven’t really counted, but it is fairly rare. Maybe one group in ten? Less now that there are fewer experienced groups.>

He nodded. “So then the groups without them can only carry what they can fit in the sacks they carry around or in their hands?”

<That… sounds right? What are you getting at, Bob?>

“I think you need to play on their greed a bit more.” He grinned wickedly, and since his mouth was twice as wide as a human’s and filled with jagged teeth, it was a truly frightening visage. “How about this?” Bob started talking, and I started getting… excited.

Dale

“Stupid dungeon. Stupid me for listening to it,” Dale muttered as Adam reattached his finger.

“At least you didn’t start with a Core from the Cat.” Adam patted his hand. “I’d say you got lucky.”

“Question!” Hans raised his arm into the air and waved it around.

Dale rolled his eyes. “Yes, Hans?”

“Did it work, at least?” He looked at Dale’s slightly off-color flesh. “The intent was to allow you to gain Essence from crushing the Core, correct?”

“Yes it was, and yes, it did work,” Dale grudgingly admitted. “There was a slight side effect of losing a chunk of my hand, though, if you didn’t notice.”

“I don’t think you realize the potential here, Dale.” Hans was being serious again, which was always a nerve-wracking experience. “Outside of your normal cultivation, you can gain Essence from Beasts. Beasts will always have large amounts of Essence in their Cores, and no one has found a way to directly extract and use it before, outside of using it in Rune scripting. I think you should try again, more carefully.”

Dale was stunned at the earnestness of his friend. “Is it really going to be as useful as all that?”

Hans shrugged. “It could be, but that depends on if you can make it work or not.”

Dale sighed and pulled out another small Core. “I really don’t want to do this.”

“Please try not to lose another finger,” Adam muttered as he looked at the recently reattached digit on Dale’s hand.

“I think it’s fair for me to say that I’m more nervous about losing appendages than you are,” Dale grumbled, pulling on the cloth of his cursed battle gauntlet. He wrapped the Core tightly and squeezed.

Bamph! The Core shattered with a muffled explosion, but the fragments were stopped by the tough cloth surrounding it. There was a bit of light, showing that there was still Essence escaping the cage of his fingers. However, the vast majority of Essence was sucked into the Runed gauntlet and soon flooded into Dale’s Chi spiral.

Dale opened his eyes, which glowed an electric blue as the Essence moved through his meridians. “Oh, yeah,” he breathed the words in a husky tone, “it actually worked!” The corruption was separated out, moving into various corruption Cores surrounding his Center.

“This seems like an expensive way to cultivate,” Rose mentioned carefully. “While I am glad that it is making you stronger, I hope you also know that every Core you use is going to have to be your share of the loot?”

Dale winced but nodded. “I understand. Luckily, we have a fairly large surplus of gold right now. A month of coin-stuffed chests has really helped with the bills.”

They had proceeded deeper into the dungeon only a short way when Adam pulled the group to a stop. “Wait, listen! Listen to all that noise!”

“Sounds like a normal forest.” Tom shrugged expansively. “What is the issue?”

Adam locked eyes with his hulking friend. “The issue is that we aren’t in a forest. We are in a dungeon.”

Hans peeked around the corner. “Uh-oh.”

Expecting the worst, the rest of the group tentatively looked inside as well. Still, they were stunned as they stared into the noisy and brightly lit room. It was lush, full of life. Normal, non-mutated flora and fauna abounded in the room, creating a cacophony of sound. Chirping, squeaking, and rustling in the long grass pervaded the entirety of the floor.

Birds flew from nests burrowed into the stone walls, insects moved between various plants, and water burbled down the walls in a small stream. Dale looked around and saw huge Cats rolling in patches of mint, crushing and chewing on it.

“What’s happening?” Adam asked, unable to see around his taller teammates. They shuffled a bit, and he looked at the room. Frowning, he questioned the others, “Did we step outside? Are we on the wrong floor? Also, why ‘uh-oh’, Hans?”

“It looks like the dungeon is building an actual ecosystem.” Hans sighed deeply. “This is ‘uh-oh’ for a few reasons. Firstly, it makes it harder to determine what is a threat to us. If all sorts of animals are moving around, we may get used to the motions and not see the ones that are actually dangerous.”

“This could be an issue,” Tom agreed stoically. “If our constant vigilance would allow us to be caught unawares, which it will not.”

Hans waved a hand at the redhead. “I’m not done! The biggest issue that I see right now is those birds. They are flying all over the place without any kind of pattern.”

“So?” Rose glanced at him askance. “Far as I can tell, they are just birds, right?”

“Yes, Mountain Chickadees, to be specific, but what do birds do when they fly over you?” Hans nodded grimly, reaching for throwing knives. “Use you for target practice.”

“…This is about bird poop?” Adam made a calculated guess.

“Yes. That type of bird has a nasty habit of staining clothes irreparably.”

Rose glared at Hans until he looked her way.

“What?” His eyes were clouded, without a hint of laughter.

“Are you sure you aren’t a child in an adult’s body? Go fight a Beast. Here, I’ll get you started.” Rose pulled out an arrow and sent it at the rolling Cats. A deep roar in return caused dust to fall on to them from the ceiling. It did also get the birds to hunker down in fright.

The group got ready for the attack as three Cats ran at them, one limping heavily. The limping Cat was a Flesh Cat; the other two were Coiled Cats.

True to their name, the Coiled Cats sprang a great distance, covering the ground in huge, leaping bounds. Tom roared at them in return and took a few steps forward, settling into a good position for hammer swings. Dale bounced on his toes a bit, dancing in place to warm up his legs and arms. Adam stood just off-center behind Tom, while Rose stood to the side firing arrows. Hans leaned on the wall.

“I don’t wanna fight,” he muttered petulantly. “I like Cats. You know all the different words that have ‘meow’ in them? Meow, meows, meowed, meowing, homeowner. I don’t want to kill Cats right meow.”

“You are a total child!” Rose growled as she released another arrow. The Flesh Cat fell, blood draining from its torn neck.

Tom swung his hammer in an arc, somehow missing the lunging Coiled Cat. It knocked him to the ground and tore a strip of flesh off of him with its razor-sharp claws. Dale was busily engaging the other Cat and didn’t notice his friend's predicament.

Adam stepped forward and attacked! His staff came down and… bopped the Cat on the head.

The Cat looked up at Adam and hissed.

Adam looked at the slowly growling Cat. “Tom… now would be a good time…”

Tom couldn’t move, pinned by the weight of the metal-laced Cat. The claws lashed out at Adam, striking him squarely on the arm and throwing him to the floor.

“Adam!” Rose shrieked, firing a fat-tipped arrow at the Cat. The projectile impacted its head, bouncing off and stunning the Beast momentarily. Tom used the opportunity to roll out from under the staggered Cat, bringing around his ingot hammer. With a muffled clang, the hammer struck the Cat hard enough to knock it unconscious. Rose quickly strode forward, drew an arrow, and pressed the tip against the closed eye, firing point blank. The Cat expired with only a slight spasm.

“Everything okay over there?” Dale had the hand with the Essence-absorption Rune pressed in the space between the eyes of his target Cat, swinging his other hand on to its skull whenever it stirred. The Cat was severely brain-damaged at this point, the blood in its brain being forced around mercilessly.

Rose rushed over to Adam, who was already staggering to his feet. Blood was dripping out of his sleeve. “Adam!”

He stepped back from her. “It is better and worse than you are thinking. The claws didn’t cut me; the robe wouldn’t let that happen,” it was lined with what was essentially Mithril chainmail, “but the hit broke my arm enough that there is a bone sticking through the skin. I can’t fix it alone; we will have to leave. Please check on Tom.”

She nodded seriously and then moved to Tom, who was holding his side. “How bad is it, Tom?”

He grinned at her as he sweated profusely. “I don’t care to look at it…”

Rose moved his hand to the side a bit and was able to see intestines through the gash. “I need a potion over here!”

Dale hurried over and fished a potion out of his pouch. He poured half of it directly into the wound, prompting a howl of pain from the barbarian. The other half was poured into Tom’s mouth. His bleeding stopped as a scab formed, and his intestines were pulled into place by writhing muscles. He needed to see a healer quickly, as this was considered a temporary fix at best, and Adam was otherwise occupied.

Hans had walked to the corpses during these ministrations and stuffed them in his bag. He got a dirty look from Rose as he sauntered over. “It isn’t my job to kill everything for you. Think of this as… a test. You didn’t do well.”

“Everyone is on the first floor by now, so the healers should have a station set up. Let’s go,” Dale ordered, standing near Adam in case he needed help. As they walked, Rose questioned what he had been doing with the Cat. “Oh, the punching? I was trying to drain its Core. That way, I would get the Essence, and we would still be able to sell a quality Core. Win-win. It worked pretty well after it passed out.”

“Smart!” Hans enthused. “That way you won’t shatter the Core by removing all of its Essence! As long as it is alive, it will pull Essence from its body to maintain the Core. And we can still sell it! You’ve been making good life decisions today!”

His exuberance only increased the glare he was receiving from Rose.

They stepped into the portal, returning to the first floor.

Chapter Seven

Having all of these people on my first floor was slightly aggravating. Especially since so many of them were sleeping, and I couldn’t get any Mobs in to give them a good ol’ coup de grâce. Prone target, unconscious… too bad. It was like waving gold coins at a tax collector. I felt like I was going to start drooling. So, like a fart in the breeze, I drifted over to someone else.

<Bob, I finished most of the changes you asked for but haven’t been able to fix the airflow yet,> I told my Goblin Shaman. He was scratching at his neck and seemed agitated.

“We thank you, we truly do, but, those trees…” Bob pointed at a new grove near his home half-hex. “Why are they screaming?”

<That’s an insect called a cicada. It lives on the tree; it is not the tree itself. Minya brought me some as a present from the dry lands to the east. I was told people found the sound soothing. Not so much for you?> I explained with a chuckle. Of all inanimate objects I’d found, so far I’d only heard rocks scream. Screaming trees. That’s a good one.

“The general consensus here is that they are rather terrifying.” He gave a weak smile. “Would you mind?” The cicadas stopped singing, to both of our surprise. “Thank you, that was fast.”

<That wasn’t me. If a predator is nearby, they stop making noise,> I explained as a few humans popped stealthily out of the tree line. <It would seem you have visitors.>

The Goblin paused momentarily, mind whirring. “I’ve decided we will live with the noisy bugs.” Bob nodded once. An arrow whizzed by his head. He dropped behind the wall and shouted, alerting the other Goblins. They hurriedly moved into a defensive position and started releasing projectiles at the group outside.

The tanking unit of the adventurers—a mountain of a man who only carried a spiked shield—charged the wooden gate with a deep bellow. Shield leading, he rammed the barrier, accompanied by a deep crunching of splintering wood. His shout turned into a laugh as he leaped forward again, easily breaking through the wooden egress.

Following the massive man, a few others braved the light rain of desperate yet poorly aimed arrows to charge the open gate. They piled into the open courtyard of the half-hex, setting up a defensive formation so the remainder of their team could easily join them. One of the men was a ranger of some sort and was paying better attention to his surroundings. His eyes lit up as he noticed Bob standing amidst the other Goblin defenders.

“The Wandering Boss is in here!” he shouted to the people behind him with a mixture of fear and excitement in his voice. “Hurry your butts up!”

Ah yes, that was a new thing. There was a Bob for each of the half-hex fortifications, but they all spent most of their time working for me, doing research in a hidden room. Whichever Bob hadn’t been out recently would go fight, but they had to go to their own home base so that a particular fortress wasn’t associated with him. Also, if he was killed, the freshly respawned Bob could decline to go out the remainder of the day. All of these restrictions added up to Bob being a once-daily unique Mob. As his capabilities for air and infernal incantations—and what he called ‘rituals’—made him much more potent than the average Goblin, he had been dubbed the “Wandering Boss” by adventurers.

“Ah, abyss take them! They saw me. Now I have to fight. I hate dying,” Bob muttered angrily as he started hopping from foot to foot, gathering ambient Essence for his impending fight.

<So don’t die.> I chuckled at his sour glare. <I know what you are thinking, ‘easy for you to say’, right? Well, I work to not die as well. Unlike you, there’s no coming back for me if I were to be destroyed.>

“Humph. Well, at least I can try out my new ritual.” Bob nodded at the large series of Runes covering a six-foot area in the courtyard. “It was done anyway, and I needed a sacrifice. Or two. Three?”

I looked at the Rune. It was drawn in blood and seemed very obviously placed to me. <You are sure someone will step into that? It looks dangerous. Faintly evil as well.>

“I don’t know for sure that they’ll fall for it, but since you always make me carry the nicest prizes, I feel confident that they will come for me,” Bob muttered the last bit under his breath as the adventurers piled into the area. “That is a lot of humans… How many people are attacking us?”

I did a quick count. <About fifteen. Three parties. Oh, right. I should have warned you, the whole dungeon is overrun with people right now. There is a Mana storm going on outside. Anyone not sleeping is diving in for early gold. Feel free to go all out on them, I feel like they’re cheating.>

“Oh! Really?” Bob perked up significantly at these words, then started gibbering in the Goblin language. Pauses in his speech were accompanied by sharp movements of his now-sinisterly-glowing staff.

“He’s starting to summon something! Hurry up, he’s distracted!” The humans gave a resounding war cry and charged.

They were met in the open by the most uncontrollable of the Goblins, the Goblin Berserkers. Each of these Goblins had had their mind damaged by repetitive respawning and strangely developed an unusable affinity for fire Essence. Their bloodlust was unmatched in the dungeon, and they threw their lives away for the chance to do any damage whatsoever to their opponents. Brutally attacked, the humans were forced to stop and defend. Most of the Berserkers used simple blunt weapons, such as maces or one-handed warhammers. The blows rained down on the humans, heavy weapons whipping through the air as if they were enchanted.

The Berserkers screamed in rage when their first attacks didn’t kill their targets, so they redoubled their efforts. They began to fall apart, tearing their bulging muscles with the force used and frothing at the mouth as their bodies unconsciously re-routed Essence to increase their strength. For every attack which damaged them—or an opponent—they seemed to get slightly faster and stronger. They also seemed more feral, less able to deal with changes on the field of battle.

A heavily dented shield blocked one last blow and shattered, opening a human up to a deadly attack. The shield-bearer fell backward, and the Goblin screeched in glee, dropping his weapon and tearing into the now-prone human with his claw-tipped fingers. Chunks of flesh were tossed to the side as the battle raged around them.

The humans seemed to get serious, their formations coming together while they began attacking in waves. They smoothly set their shields, pushing forward as a single unit with an air-shattering shout. My front line was staggered, and the humans followed up with efficient thrusts of their various stabbing weapons. A Berserker took a sword to the neck and fell just in time for a bolt of infernal Essence to smash the offending adventurer in the chest. The rapidly dying man fell to the ground, writhing in agony. His flesh seemed to melt away as a combination of deep rot, fluid, and pus drained on to the floor.

Bob looked at his staff in wonder. “What an excellent weapon! Thank you, Great Spirit!”

<…Might be too good. We’ll reevaluate later.> While muttering at Bob, I was looking at the actual effects that the bolt had had on the corpse. For every magical effect I had ever seen, there was a discernable reason for the following reaction. For instance, a sharpening Rune didn’t just ‘sharpen’ a blade. Instead, Essence flowed into the blade and increased the bonds along the edge of it. This had the effect of making the blade thinner and harder to chip, resulting in a ‘sharpened’ or ‘honed’ blade.

<So that is what infernal Essence does…> I had suspicions before, but this new data would certainly help my research. <No need to reevaluate, you can keep it. We need to know more. Use it as much as possible.>

It seemed that infernal Essence would enter the body and attach itself to impurities in the flesh. After latching on, it would force the Essence of the tissue to deteriorate quickly, generating more infernal Essence from the death of the cells around it. To the casual observer, it looked like the body rotted away at high speeds. Since it was targeting impurities, this also explained why infernal Essence had less of an effect on people of higher ranks; their bodies expunged impurities as they reached higher cultivation ranks! Therefore, they were less susceptible to the pure version of this energy.

I really needed to devote some time to the origin of both infernal and celestial Essence. If I could find their source, it would be a great step toward generating them myself. I assumed that death was the origin point of infernal, but I bet there was more to it. In the interim, it looked like Bob was going to die. Too bad!

The Berserkers had been slain, their brutality defeated by the simple expedient of a solid defensive formation. The archers had been counter-sniped by the dungeon-divers, and a group was converging on Bob. I was about to offer him my condolences when I noticed him grinning a disturbing smile. To be fair, with their sharp teeth and extra-wide mouths, most of their grins were a bit frightening.

Bob fired off a bolt of darkness every few seconds, but the shields seemed to block the Essence effectively. I didn’t see why he was happy about this until I saw that the pseudo-phalanx was almost to the center of his ritual formation. Their dedication to their shields didn’t allow them the option to look where they were walking!

Taking a step forward, Bob openly laughed as the humans warily halted. Poor life choices on their part. The Goblin set the end of his staff down on the stone floor with a resounding rap, and the dark glow of the infernal spread from the wood… into the blood underneath it. There was a disturbing organic sound and a small shriek of torturous pain. Each of the humans in the ritual area then slumped to the floor with a hollow clatter.

Hollow clatter…? <Bob, what did that do? And how?> I excitedly asked my minion. <Did you teleport them away?>

“Not done yet,” came the short reply. He was still channeling Essence into the ritual, and the glowing lines pulsed one last time and pushed a wispy darkness into the air, which vanished into the armor on the floor. As he finished his work, he collapsed to the floor, breathing and sweating profusely. I looked at his Center, reeling in shock from the huge amount of personal Essence he had used. My guess was that since he hadn't been able to move around, he was not able to use ambient Essence as he usually did.

The armor on the floor clattered and started to move. <Oh, they are still alive in there?> They hadn’t moved in a few moments, so I was… oh my. The armor stood up, but it was just the armor. There were no bodies inside! The surviving humans—mostly people waiting behind the others, such as archers and healers—cheered as their friends stood back up, calling out to them in relief.

The armor stopped moving, looking at Bob. Totally silent, they did not make a move until he pointed at the remaining adventurers. Then they moved, and they moved quickly. At a slightly greater than human walking pace, they marched toward their ex-comrades. Confusion was evident on their faces, which only increased to terror as the blades started to fall upon them. Soon, no humans were alive in the immediate area.

“It… pant… worked!” Bob was trying to stand, but even with the support of his staff, it was very difficult for him to do so. The refined Essence from the dead adventurers was making its way to me but was much less than I had been expecting.

<Would you mind telling me what that was? It seemed… taxing.> I hadn’t been this excited about anything in over a month!

“Yes, Great One. This was a ritual to create walking armor or ‘Phantom Armor’. It is the greatest, most dangerous ritual we have been able to recreate,” Bob began to explain to me.

<Ritual? You have mentioned that before, but I thought it was just the preparation of a Rune. No? It has to be more than that.> I fired questions faster than the humans had fired arrows, listening carefully to every bit of advice Bob had for me.

“Not quite. A ritual is a series of interlocking Runes that activate one after another in intervals, a set of sequential instructions. It is hard to do because, unlike a Runescript, the Runes do not all activate simultaneously at the end with an even distribution of Essence. These lines,” he pointed at the shadow of the lines that remained on the floor, “are called ‘symbolic links’ and allow you to send various amounts of Essence to each Rune. The trick to this is that all of them must be maintained for the entire ritual after activation. The Runes have their own effect, which changes the ‘meaning’ of the next activated Runes. Then their effect is spread over the entire ritual area. Just like normal Runescript though, the use of catalysts or reagents can aid in this greatly.”

<What did this do? In order. What reagents did you use for this?> As ever, I was hungry for knowledge.

“This, as I said, is the most demanding and dangerous ritual that we—the Bobs—know.” I chuckled at that. They referred to themselves collectively as ‘The Bobs’? Excellent. “To facilitate the effect, we drew the Runes in a tincture of Flesh Cat blood and crushed opal. The first Rune was the Rune to dissolve armor. By using the Flesh blood as a reagent, it dissolved bodily tissue instead!”

I was stunned by this revelation. I knew reagents could alter the effects of Runes, but I had no idea it could be this drastic! Changing the destruction of armor to the destruction of flesh? How did they come up with the idea?

Bob continued his lesson, not noticing my speechlessness, “The next Rune set hardened the armor, fixing imperfections and binding it together tightly. It also inserted tiny speckles of opal across the armor, allowing for easy influx of infernal Essence. The final Rune used the Essence from the body to create a lesser shade, a phantom. The phantom can’t hold its shape on its own, so it needs a vessel. The result? Phantom armor!” He proudly waved his hand in a grand gesture.

<Spectacular,> I whispered softly. <How do you control them? What kind of weaknesses do they have?>

Bob started speaking at once, as he had expected these questions. He held up an amulet hanging from his neck. “If this is destroyed, they are banished. They cannot touch it or attempt to take it. Therefore, whoever holds this controls them. They can be banished by simply smashing their armor and waiting, but after they are released, they are beyond furious. They know they only have a few seconds remaining, so they will vindictively attempt to kill anything near them by flooding them with infernal Essence.”

<But they move fairly slowly…> I added this comment questioningly.

“Yes, while in armor. Very quickly otherwise. Nearly the speed of darkness.” Bob grinned then ordered the armors to begin patrolling the floor. The eight creatures marched out and started wandering like normal adventurers. Anyone coming across them would be in for a deadly surprise.

Chapter Eight

“Try to take it easy for a few hours, will you?” The cleric patted Tom on the washboard abdomen she had just finished fully healing.

Tom nodded at her. “I will do my best, but if needs must, I shall always step into danger to protect my comrades.”

Her fingers slipped over his now-smooth skin. “So brave…” she whispered, looking up at him with wide eyes.

Ahem. Adam reminded her of his presence with a clearing of his throat. She flushed and turned away. Adam was the protégé of the most powerful cleric in the area, Father Richard. No one wanted to alienate him, and taking advantage of your patient was a sure way to earn the ire of clerics in general.

Tom looked at his friend with a tinge of anger in his gaze. “Maybe you should get that cough looked at, Adam?” the barbarian growled, making ‘shoo’ motions at him. “If it gets much worse, you could die.”

“We have work to do. Spread your wild oats on your own time.” Adam turned away, Tom following very reluctantly. They walked until they found Dale who was deep in conversation with a trader friend of his.

“I’m glad to hear that your business is going so well, Tyler!” Dale offered his waterskin to the merchant.

“Thank you! So very well, indeed. I was one of the first merchants to return, and I brought enough trade goods with to make a huge profit with the influx of new dungeon divers! I’ve bought into a few other companies in the area and even started an exotic weapons shop,” Tyler boasted happily, taking a long drink from the water skin.

“I am glad! My team is just returning though. I should be off. Good day to you!” Daly nodded and turned to rejoin his team when Tyler paused and caught his wrist.

“About that new store… I hear you are taking requests for materials from the dungeon?” Tyler stammered out, obviously reluctant to ask the question.

“Have a job for us, then?” Dale turned back with a grin, putting Tyler at ease.

“Of a sort,” Tyler agreed with the inferral. “The exotic weapon store I have is doing well, but I want to make truly exotic weapons. I’ve hired a smith, tailor, and alchemist to start putting together prototypes. They have various requests for materials that I can’t fulfill myself. Interested?”

“Always interested in money.” Dale grinned back at the slightly portly man while rubbing his fingers together in the universal language of ‘you get what you pay for’. “What are you after?”

“Oh dear, that is a loaded question.” Tyler dabbed at his forehead with a sodden handkerchief. “To start with, one of everything.”

“Right, well, that doesn’t really narrow it down for me, so…” Dale trailed off.

Tyler grimaced. “We don't know what will be useful yet. So we want one of each type of Mob in here with everything attached. If you find Runes used in traps or on weapons, we want that too. Each vegetable, animal, or mineral. As undamaged as possible.”

Dale looked at his group, who were as stunned as he was. “That’s… a tall order, Tyler. I hate to ask but… can you afford this?”

“Oh yes. As I said, business has been good,” Tyler looked him in the eye again, the light of greed playing in his pupils. “and when we are done cataloging what is useful to us, we will be able to narrow down future orders.”

They worked out a few details, such as the cost of each item, danger pay, and delivery fees. Both walked away smiling, thinking they had gotten the better side of the bargain.

“Well, team,” Dale clapped his hands in excitement, “it appears we have steady pay coming our way!”

Rose interrupted his jubilation, “I’m not sure why you bothered. There is no way he can pay us more than we can earn from just emptying the treasure chests on the way.”

Dale’s smile faded a bit. “I have a feeling that the ‘golden month’ is over. Remember, the dungeon talked today. We have already seen some changes, and we can’t just assume that it won’t notice how few people have been bothering to attack lower levels.”

Hans winced. “People aren’t going to be happy when they notice the decreased rewards.”

“Just play it off as the last month being a reward from the dungeon,” Adam interrupted the morose thoughts. “You know, as thanks for surviving the ‘Wailing War’. Now, people just need to be reminded that they need to work for their pay, not just go for a stroll and be entitled to buckets of gold. Prices have been skyrocketing in town; this will be good for the economy.”

“You don’t know people very well if you think they will be fine with that, Adam,” Hans uttered stiffly. “Who doesn’t want something for zero effort?” The group tried to think of a good answer for that but instead shrugged and moved to the tunnels. At least they had a paying job to work on. Dale waited until his team was focused on entering the dungeon, then slipped his hand into his pocket and squeezed. A bit of light shone through the fabric, and he shuddered a bit. Smiling, he picked up the pace.

The group started marching through the first floor, attempting to ignore the press of people. After they noticed a dozen people attacking a single Bane—the overgrown mushroom Mob—Hans gave a snort of disgust, and they turned around. They used the portal to jump directly to the second floor, deciding to go back and collect Mobs and items from the first floor when the area was less densely populated.

There were fewer people on the second floor but still enough to make Hans antsy. The rest of the group was fine with continuing and barely paused when collecting plants and Mobs. This high up, the monster population was fairly sparse. Although Cats had been in the area earlier, it seemed none had returned to reclaim the territory.

“The Cats we killed earlier were rolling around over there. Is there anything special about that plant?” Rose pointed at the slightly crushed plants.

Tom plucked the plant in passing and sniffed it. “It is just a mint plant.”

Hans grabbed a bit of it as well and inhaled deeply. “Well, yes, it is mint. Specifically, though, this type of mint is known as catnip. Put it in the bag!”

Thus the collection began and soon, not even the normal creatures in the area were able to escape the ruthless group.

“Will they even want a pigeon, though?” Rose was holding a weakly flapping bird in her hand, an arrow peeking through the blood-soaked plumage.

“He did say one of ‘everything’.” Dale shrugged, tossing a chunk of broken rock into the bag.

Hans looked affronted. “Dale! Are you just trying to increase the number of items we bring back so that he needs to pay us a higher fee?” Dale nodded with a wide grin, and Hans pretended to tear up. “I’m so proud.” Hans sniffled and wiped at his eyes, followed by grabbing a handful of dirt and stuffing it in the bag.

They continued down the tunnels, collecting everything that they could find. Leaves, flowers, bugs, saplings, Bashers, and Cats were unceremoniously dumped into the bag. Even with the bag’s ability to reduce the weight carried, it was starting to get heavy. Luckily, they each had their own dimensional bag at this point and were able to spread the weight amongst themselves.

“Everyone, wait a moment,” Rose called as they all approached the Boss Room.

“What is on your mind, beautiful?” Hans posed against the wall, attempting to look seductive.

“Eh.” Rose looked at him and shuddered. “The golden Bashers? Glitterflits? We need to drag this fight out to the point that they make an appearance. If we are trying to get one of everything, that also means the rare variants.”

Dale nodded. “Smart. Let’s go for the legs in that case. If we can lower Raile’s mobility, we should be able to do damage in small enough increments that the healing Bashers will have a chance to show up. Hans, you have the fastest reflexes—you are on capture duty.” Hans gave a mock salute, and they cautiously walked into the Boss room.

The battle was a farce. If they were fighting Raile one-on-one, maybe it would have been difficult. Their frequent excursions to the lowest depths had hardened them and honed their battle reflexes. Sadly, Raile was just an overgrown rabbit without real combat abilities. Without Dani to direct his movements in an unnatural manner, he relied upon jumping or running into his enemies, trusting that his great weight and armor would be enough to finish the job.

Dale took the lead as Raile charged into the room, armor bumping and scraping against the walls and floor. The Mob slowed as he saw them, and his eyes filled with hatred when they landed on Tom.

“You really shouldn’t have taunted Raile back then, Tom,” Adam informed his frowning friend. “He seems to be holding a grudge.”

Tom snorted. “I do not see how. The overgrown rabbit of that time was killed. This animal has always just had an unpleasant temperament.”

Taking a strong stance, Dale bent his knees and forced Essence along his earth affinity channels. To those who could see it, his Essence writhed into the ground and twisted into a knotted whip. He stomped his right foot firmly upon the ground, and the whip of accumulated power raced outward. The Essence followed the path of least resistance, flashing through the earth with a lightning-like pattern. “Huh!” He exhaled sharply as his hands shot forward and pulled, rerouting the Essence in the attack. When he did this, all his Essence in the ground—and even some energy in the stone the ability had passed through—was dragged back toward Dale with a powerful crack!

At the point where the Essence changed direction, a powerful shearing force was exerted. The granite making up Raile’s armor began shattering along his flank. At a smaller level, the technique acted on the stone armor at a direction perpendicular to the grain of the rock. This force caused stress fractures to appear in a localized area but did not actually do any damage. Contrary to expectation, pulling the stabilizing presence of Essence back to himself was what caused the stone in Raile’s armor to uncontrollably crumble. With a deep breath, the Essence remaining in the technique—albeit greatly reduced—finished returning to Dale’s body as the stone scattered along the floor.

“Nice work, Dale!” Hans chuckled enthusiastically, clapping his leader on the back. “Is that the mountain-destroying technique you got from the Elves?”

“Yeah.” Dale was breathing heavily; he clenched his fists to hide how much they were shaking. He shook his head to clear his thoughts, grimacing. “It failed. If I had used it correctly, all of his armor would have shattered, and he would have been seriously wounded from the impact.”

Raile took a step toward them and fell, his balance completely thrown off. It was a comical sight, but the screams of rage he was releasing sobered the team quickly. A normal rabbit screaming can be heard from five miles away, and this animal was a hundred times larger.

“Still!” Hans shouted right next to Dale’s ear, “a month ago, you couldn’t use it for crap! Is it the Moon Elf trainer who is helping so much? Are you still owed more techniques from the Elves?”

“Partly!” Dale yelled back, not catching the second question. He was barely able to hear his own words over the screaming rabbit. Dale watched as arrow after arrow flew from Rose into the hole in Raile’s side. “He has really been teaching me to focus and how to twist my Essence inside my body, but he is garbage at teaching me to use earth Essence. Luckily, Craig didn’t hold it against me that I didn’t train with him for so long. He’s been able to squeeze in extra training with me.”

Hans held up his hand. “Hold that thought.” He flashed away, returning with a squealing, golden Basher. He ended its cries with a swift twist of its head then put the corpse in the bag.

“Abyss, Hans!” Dale yelped at the brutal sight. “If you had caught it, why didn’t we return it alive?”

Raile’s screams of pain turned to fury, and he sloughed off his remaining armor as he activated his inborn ability known as ‘Avenger’. Hans tried to think up a proper response to Dale’s words as Tom began swinging his ingot hammer into Raile’s side, eliciting loud crunching sounds. Raile’s screams turned wetter before trailing off into silence. “I guess I didn’t want to go back just yet?”

Dale went silent. “That’s fair, I suppose,” he muttered softly. “Not like we are short of space in our bags.” He looked over to see Tom digging a Core out of Raile.

“We have a problem!” Rose called to the group. Since she was standing over the Boss Room treasure chest. Everyone gave her their full attention instantly.

“There’s no money?” Hans clutched at his chest and looked faint as she explained the issue. “I understand that ‘the month of gold’ is over, but… seriously?”

“Nothing but consumables,” Rose informed them, referring to items that could be eaten, applied, or swallowed. In this case, there were a few healing potions and a vial of potent poison. “Wait, there are also wood coins.” She held up a coin with an imprint of a sword on it as well as one that looked like a bar outlined in silver.

“Sadly, it is difficult to spend wooden coins,” Tom grumbled, shuffling his feet in agitation. He had been hoping to have a more exhilarating fight, and he was sweating in anticipation of battle. “Take them with us anyway.”

They stepped into the next room and yelped as sudden light burst into being. As they blinked spots from their eyes, they noticed an empty chest connected to the wall. Hanging over it were large globes containing light potion, which had been uncovered as they entered the room. Next to the chest was a pedestal with a slot in it and elegantly carved pictures above it.

They looked at this odd setup, trying to puzzle out the meaning. There was a person holding a tiny coin, followed by the same person putting said coin into a pedestal like the one standing before the group. The next picture showed the individual holding a sword above their head, which they had apparently gotten from the chest. As Dale’s group looked over all of the images, the person in the picture seemed to decline using the pedestal, deciding instead to go deeper into the dungeon. After finding another pedestal further down in the dungeon and attempting to use the coin, this time, the sword seemed to shine.

As the images progressed, there was a similar scene where the person in the depiction had arrived at the deepest level. The sword they drew from the chest this time seemed to sparkle and blaze with light. Rose pointed out a tiny picture beside each place a token was used; it was so small that it was nearly hidden by the mural. Adam was the first to discern the meaning behind the artistry, and his eyes widened comically as he found the deeper meaning.

“So many people are going to die soon,” Adam whispered into the confused silence.

Tom glanced at him. “What do you mean? Is this drawing a trap of some kind?” He took a step away and raised his hammer.

Shaking his head, Adam explained, “No, nothing like that. If I am reading this correctly, the wooden coins are tokens. We can hold on to them and place them in that slot and receive the reward shown on the coin.”

Hans gleefully reached into his bag and pulled out a wooden coin. This one had an image of a silver bar on it. He pushed it into the slot as Adam continued speaking.

“The rest of it seems to suggest that if we keep the tokens and go deeper, we can exchange the tokens for a higher reward. For instance, a sword token on the first level may give you a solid weapon, but the same token taken to the lowest floor seems to suggest an inscribed weapon will be given.”

“Wait,” Hans spoke suddenly as they heard a thunk from the previously empty chest. “You mean to tell me that the coin I just used could have been turned into gold or platinum if I had just taken it a few levels lower?!”

Tom opened the chest and pulled out a large ingot of silver. “Looks like it worked!” he exclaimed joyously. He looked closer at the chest, then told the group that there was an opening in the back of it that went up into the wall.

“Drat,” Hans groaned.

Rose slapped him lightly on the arm. “Just be glad it wasn’t an item token! Imagine getting a dagger here that is worth a few copper versus the same token giving you a dagger with a sharpening Inscription on it on the fourth floor! We would have lost hundreds of gold.” Hans looked relieved at her explanation, but he shivered at how close he had come to wasting a fortune. “Then there is the tiny picture. If we are understanding the meaning correctly, there is a small chance that each token will give out a ‘jackpot’ when used. I have no idea why the dungeon would offer more than we’ve earned though.”

“The issue I see here,” Adam spoke louder as conversations started, “is that greedy people will try to reach beyond their means in order to turn in the token at the deepest level they can reach. Not just that, but unscrupulous parties may wait in a room like this to catch weakened groups off guard. There is nothing on the token that says only the group that earned it has to be the one to cash it in,” he finished ominously.

The group went silent as they caught up with what he was saying.

“Yup. A lot of people are going to start dying in here soon.” Rose sighed discontentedly.

Chapter Nine

I was enjoying the Phantom Armor’s clanking. The metallic stomps created a pleasing counterpoint to the shrieks of surprise and pain coming from the group that had just been ambushed. The party of five had hailed someone they thought they recognized and were asking after his usual companions while expecting the worst. At least, what they had thought was the worst. Heh. While at first, they seemed a bit leery when the armored man didn’t respond, none of them had been prepared for the brutal assault. In opposition to the ponderous way the armor moved while walking, it was even more agile than the person who had previously inhabited the armor whilst in combat.

Clank. Clank. Clank. The hollow armored boots kicked up sparks as they marched away from the scene of a massacre. I began absorbing the remains, and within a minute, no signs of battle could be found. <Bob, would you look over the ritual again? I added a few more Runes,> I called out to my favorite overworked Shaman.

“My pleasure, Great Spirit.” Bob rubbed his tired eyes as he moved to comply with my request. He pulled a half-globe of glass from his pocket and placed it on my ritual diagram. The Runes and various symbolic links seemed to double in size and jump into focus within the glass, allowing him to see the intricate patterns and cuts I had made. He studied the work for another hour before sighing and nodding.

“As well as I can tell,” his exhausted voice rang out, “the ritual is correct. I would not let any living creature near it when you activate it, just in case it violently fails… but I don’t think it will.”

<Thanks, Bob,> I muttered hurriedly. <You might want to exit, then, if you don’t want to be around it.>

“I am happy to help, but I need to know…” Bob trailed off as he realized that he was questioning me. I had never punished him for doing so, but he had been a slave and old habits are hard to be rid of.

<Feel free to ask, Bob. I could certainly use the conversation. I’m still getting my bearings and trying to make up for lost time,> I prodded him impatiently. The faster he asked, the faster I could get back to activating the ritual.

“I need to know, why such a small ritual?” The words tumbled from his mouth faster than he possibly could have spoken as an unenhanced Goblin. “The power of a ritual is directly tied to the size of it! Also, it is so simple for a ritual. It only has a single function!” He seemed more flustered than the situation called for, in my opinion.

<That’s easy to explain!> The ritual diagram was only the size of his hand in diameter, so I suppose its usefulness could be questionable. <The size is linked to power, yes, but in more ways than one. This isn’t a simple Runescript where I can activate it and have a single use effect. A larger ritual will cost more Essence to maintain, and this will be active for the foreseeable future. A small version is all I need for now.>

“And the function?” Bob smirked, thinking I had forgotten. As if I forget things! Cough.

<I was getting to it!> I pouted at him, making him snort. <I have been digging for a week straight, and I am bored out of my gem! This ritual will dig in a straight line, no mental assistance needed from me. I just need to make sure it is getting enough Essence and make sure I stay out of the way.>

“Ah, so you will be linking it to a Core? I’ve been wondering how to do that.” Bob’s eyes gleamed. “I would love to watch this process. Are you using corruption? Why not simply pour acid in the hole and let it dig for you?”

<Ah, the acid. I tried something like that, but acid is still a fluid. It doesn’t dig straight down—it tries to fill whatever container it is in. While this makes a large hole, it won’t make a deep one, and frankly, I need a deep one. As to using corruption, I had planned on it!> I was overjoyed that he was so interested in my work. <That way the earth will accept moving easier. You could get a good look at how to do this in the future, as I will actually be linking two Cores to the ritual—one Essence and one corruption.>

He thought for a moment. “I have changed my mind. I would like to stay and observe this activation and linking process.”

I was a bit taken aback, though I had pushed him into it a little. <You recall that this has a chance to go poorly? By poorly, I mean go boom?>

Bob waved his hand in a dismissive gesture. “Eh, if I die, you’ll just bring me back anyway.”

I paused for the rest of the joke, but looking at his serious demeanor, I wasn’t finding one. <I think you are starting to take death a bit too nonchalantly,> I muttered, a bit upset with myself. Bob died repeatedly in my area after all. To fight my battles. I thought about it for a second, but eventually, I mentally shrugged. It was his decision to stay if he wanted to.

I tried to recall details of the portal system I had set up, which was the closest thing to ritual work that I had completed in the past. I was hoping that experience might give me some insight into this matter. As far as I could tell, the main difference between the portal and my boring ritual was how they were activated. The portals were charged. Then all of the Runes were simultaneously flooded with Essence. This allowed the Runescript to have a single, unified purpose. The ritual, on the other hand, allowed for a Rune to have its own effect, then be impacted by the activation of each Rune in sequence.

This boring—that is, digging—ritual had a few stages of Runic activation. The first determined the size of the affected area. The second set, the Essence type used, followed by a Rune that made this defined area spin. The next determined the speed of the spin, then added a direction, in this case straight down. The final Rune I added determined what to do with the displaced dirt.

<Ready, Bob?> I gleefully and rhetorically bellowed. <‘Cause here. We. Go!> I began pulling Essence through a Core I had filled for this purpose as well as earthen corruption through another. The energies intermingled and snapped together, returning to an unrefined state. I hadn’t actually expected that, and it nearly cost me my concentration. Only the stray thought that doing so would likely kill Bob kept me on task.

I drew the strand of Essence into the first Rune. It filled slowly but was then activated with a dull flash of escaping light. The area was defined! I focused, and the pathway between the Runes began to accept the still-flowing power. The second Rune flashed, and an emerald-brown disk of energy took shape just above the ground in the center of the ritual area. Power weaved into it, and the disk began to spin. This was so fun to watch!

As the next Rune activated, the spinning increased in speed to the point that a high-pitched whine began to resound in the area. Another flash and the convex disk began dropping, biting into the solid stone beneath. The noise was incredible, and strips of rock began flying around. At least until the final Rune activated. Then the shards of stone began smoothly stacking as a pile, which I quickly and easily absorbed.

I was watching the boring continue, which wasn’t boring in the slightest! <Oh, drat. I made the area too large. It doesn’t fit into the current hole.> I observed the digging ritual tear up the edges of the current hole, enlarging it a bit. <Still, it is descending faster than it would have otherwise…>

“At least it is taking care of itself now, right?” Bob looked down the hollow shaft, peering into the murky darkness below.

I was free of digging for the moment! <Right. On to more exciting things!>

Dani

“This place stinks,” Dani announced contemptuously to the dark-robed man controlling her. She was held with a tether of Mana, like a dog on a leash. “You stink too. Mainly as a person.”

A sonorous voice that could make the inanimate tremble with induced fear responded to her, “Little Wisp, you were so pretty when you were quiet—like the aurora borealis all bundled up just for me. Maybe we go back to that, hmm?”

“My name is Dani, you overpowered necrophiliac,” Dani scathingly spat at him.

“That’s a disgusting accusation. A slur against my people. Don’t repeat this mistake,” came the spine-shivering reply. “Besides, this place will not stink for too much longer. I do apologize for the smell, but I didn’t make it. That would be all the humans who have been dumping their filth into these tunnels for decades.”

“We are in a sewer?” Dani yelped in disgust. “What is wrong with you?”

“Now, now. Don’t judge me harshly. From what I hear, your precious dungeon was being used as a sewer as well.” A cold smile was on the man’s pale face as he threw her origins at her. “Also, if you address me again, do so properly. Can’t be having the troops hearing about your insolence. They may think that they can… participate.”

“Let me guess, that wouldn’t end well for them?” Dani’s voice dripped sarcasm.

The man’s glare made her shiver. “You will address me correctly. I am ‘The Master’, and you will address me as such. Either that or just ‘Master’. I have earned these titles, and I will–”

“So, ‘The Master’ or ‘Master’? Why not a shorter version? How about just ‘The’? That’s part of your name too, right? Or we could get on good terms, and you could go by ‘T.M.’,” Dani blatantly interrupted The Master again.

“I had hoped to put this off, but I suppose now is as good a time to learn as any. Lesson number one: disobedience is pain,” The Master calmly stated. A tiny flutter of air rippled between the two, and Dani began to scream.

Dale

“So, how long do you think it will be until these tokens become common knowledge?” Rose asked Dale as they made their way down the stairs to the third floor.

“Not long enough,” Dale voiced his thoughts with brutal honesty. “Though for the time being, I’m more concerned about how people will react to the much lower rewards. The gold is gone, powerful items are gone, and wooden tokens have replaced them. I’m betting people will be angry. Some people won’t believe that there will be any rewards whatsoever anymore. Will our population drop again? Is the economy going to fall apart? Will I be blamed for it?”

“Most likely. You are in charge, so you are to blame for any negatives in their lives. People stink. On that note…” Hans chuckled as he looked at the crestfallen lordling. “Are you still trying to buy the bathhouse?”

Dale’s face became tinted with a light shade of red. “I just really like not smelling people. If everyone had free access, I wouldn’t have to worry about someone brushing past me and staining my clothes with the accumulated grease of a work-week. Everything that isn’t super nice is already bloodstained from fighting in the dungeon. I thought you,” Dale thrust a finger at Hans, “of all people, would want this to happen.”

“I just don’t think it’ll work out like you think it will.” Hans scratched his butt and grinned knowingly. “People like him,” Hans jerked a finger at Tom, “think that a layer of dirt keeps you from becoming ill and makes you warmer.”

“Any insulation is insulation,” Tom agreed with a nod. “Why is dirt so different? Plus, the animal fat I spread on my skin keeps it warm, smooth, and un-chapped in the wind.”

“Maybe, but it rots if you don’t clean it off!” Hans and Tom devolved into a snarling conversation they had slogged through many times before.

Adam joined Dale’s conversation, “Some people will leave, but others will see opportunity. I would be very surprised if these tokens didn’t become uncommonly popular at shops in the future.”

“Why is that?” Dale would have latched on to any hope offered. Adam’s words made his heart pound with anticipation.

“Think about it.” Adam twisted his lips coyly. “The token is lightweight, gives you what is shown on it, and even has a number on it to represent the floor on which you earned it. While they don’t have any value by themselves, they are an easy way to trade or exchange goods. Like money, almost. They only have the value we assign them”

Dale pulled out a token and looked at it. He hadn’t noticed the number on it before now. What else was he missing when he glanced at things? How much more did other people see?

Hans looked at the token as well. “How do you know that number doesn’t mean you will get two of the thing?”

“Because you only got a single bar of silver,” Adam rejoined easily. “There is the third-floor entrance. Let us discuss this further when we have made it to the end?” The group agreed and fell silent, listening for any Mobs that might be creeping towards them.

This floor seemed to be the most affected by recent changes. The blue light that permeated the dungeon was brighter here, allowing for a greater range of vision. The Goblins they saw off in the distance seemed to be industriously moving about, and the drone of insects filled the fairly humid air. Adam flinched when a finch flew past him, barely an inch worth of space between him and its suddenly flapping wings.

The others chortled at Adam when he was alarmed but increased their vigilance accordingly. If that bird had been a hostile Mob, Adam could be dead right now. They walked across lush grass, a nice change from the hard stone floors. There seemed to be paths to follow, but only a moron would happily walk an unknown trail that seemed ‘safe’ in a dungeon. Being so wary was tiring, and the group was also getting hungry. Still moving cautiously, they stopped at a raspberry bush, and Hans checked the conglomerate fruit for poison.

“The fruit is fine,” Hans declared after a moment of inspection, “but the thorns have a nasty, subtle poison. It is a contact poison that seems to mimic a potent sleep potion. One touch and you will not be able to keep your eyes open. You don’t even need to get stabbed, just brushing past it will knock you out.”

“Can you safely cut off a sprig of it and put it in the bag?” Dale anxiously requested, staring at the juicy-looking raspberries. “I should have eaten more this morning.”

“I have a lifetime’s experience handling poisons. A little plant like this isn’t going to be enough to–” Hans yelped as the vines of the plant swung at him. He easily dodged the fibrous assault and glared at the offending, innocent-looking plant. Hans drew and threw a knife, easily cutting down the entire bush with a single attack. The sap that poured out was similar to blood in its consistency, making them question whether this was actually a plant, an animal, or a hybrid of some kind.

“Oh, take two of these things! We can turn this in as an uncategorized Mob to the Guild for a reward!” Rose brightly reminded them.

“Nice!”

Feeling a bit better about their assured payday, they formed into their usual formation and began cautiously picking their way through the area.

“We need to collect some Goblins as well,” Tom reminded them as they passed another half-hexagon fortification. He lifted his warhammer. “Anyone opposed to the… direct option?”

“We may as well call it the ‘Tom option’ at this point.” Rose grinned and limbered her bow.

“One moment,” Dale called as he pulled a Core out of his pocket. He wrapped it in the cursed cloth of his gauntlet and shattered it. Bamph! As Essence raged into him, he took a sharp breath through his nose and shuddered. Dale groaned as he shook the broken shards from his palm. “Oh-h-h, that feels amazing.” He opened his now-glowing eyes and grinned at the people staring at him.

Hans cleared his throat. “You know, I’ve met a lot of drug addicts…”

“You can’t get addicted to cultivating!” Dale exclaimed indignantly, looking around for support as the others pointedly looked away.

“I’m not so sure. Feels good, gives you a rush, costs a lot of money, and makes you want more?” Hans’ eyebrow bounced a few times. “Any of these sounding familiar?”

“Maybe I don’t do this so often. Fine,” Dale grumbled with a blush.

“What are you doing with all the stored corruption, anyway?” Rose prodded him, hoping for an answer to issues she was having.

Dale’s mouth opened and closed a few times as he tried to think of a good lie. The silence stretched long enough that he was forced to tell the truth. “It gets separated into… other Cores?” He grinned weakly, preparing himself for the ramifications of explaining his good fortune.

“…Cheater!” Hans choked on his own words. “You mean to tell me you don’t need to refine your Essence? You just gulp it down like a Dwarf at an open bar and go on your merry way?”

Dale looked at the incredulous, glaring faces around him. “Well, I mean… I still refine it! I still have to hold the cultivation pattern and…”

“Hey, dungeon! Can I get one of those?!” Hans started shouting at the ceiling. “Don’t ignore me, you giant hunk of rock! I’ll say nice things about you to other people!”

<Oh abyss yeah, he can!> I spoke into Dale’s mind. <All he needs to do is be ju-u-st about dead and start to dissolve his aura or swear a binding oath to me!>

Dale coughed. “Sorry, Hans, it isn’t possible. There were extenuating circumstances for me.”

<Oh, you rat bastard.>

“Ah, it was worth a shot.” Hans clutched at his chest in fake distress. “Well, let’s go take out our sorrows on those unsuspecting Goblins.”

Chapter Ten

“So what happens now, Great One?” Bob needled as he dropped a light-potion-covered stone into the deepening hole. It dropped for a long while, then was torn apart as it finally found the whirling disk that the ritual had created.

<That’s a good question, Bob.> I ‘inhaled’ deeply as I thought about how to answer. <I have a series of priorities that I feel are my best option for completing the long-term goals I’m after, but I am unsure which way I should tackle them.>

“Perhaps talking about it is the best way to decide?” Bob gently offered an ear.

I mentally nodded and verbally acquiesced, <You are probably right.> I gathered my thoughts and began speaking, <Well, rescuing Dani is, of course, my only real priority, but I feel there are other things that I need to do in order to make this happen. I need to find her. In just as difficult of a proposition, I then need to get to her or have someone else do so. I know she is still alive because I can feel a trickle of Essence flowing to her from my aura. I don’t know if it is reaching her or just draining into the world, and I can’t follow the trail of it because my aura is too diffuse outside of my dungeon.>

“That is what the… bugs… were for though, correct?” Bob chipped away at my mounting frustration with this comment.

I took a deep, calming, mental breath. <Yes, hopefully, the bugs can follow that trail to her. I heard a story about a fish that can follow a single drop of blood in miles of water; I hope I made my bugs to at least that equivalent.> I paused a moment, wistfully reminiscing about my Wisp.

<Hopefully, finding her is being taken care of as we speak. Next, getting to her or getting someone to her. I have plans for both of these possibilities. There are only two people I trust to get to her besides myself. Dale or Minya. Dale is too weak; he wouldn’t survive even a moment against truly powerful people, and they must be powerful, or Dani would have returned to me by now. I will send Minya as soon as I have a location, but I really don’t know what she is capable of.>

Bob had gotten quiet. “You do not trust anyone else? Perhaps… a Goblin you may know?”

<Don’t belittle yourself, Bob.> I snorted as I realized he was now thinking I didn’t trust him. <The changes I made to your bodies… they were more extreme than you seem to realize. You now need a fairly dense amount of Essence just to survive for any length of time, and I don’t know how we could make that happen for you. You can leave the dungeon, but you will need to make fairly frequent trips back here to live.>

“I see.” Bob dipped his head in thought. “Thank you for telling me.”

<I do trust you,> I assured him, just to be clear about it. He smiled faintly in reply, not saying anything aloud. <Bob, if they can’t get to Dani, or they dither and take too much time, I am going to go.>

Bob had a nonplussed look on his face. “But… if you leave, the dungeon will die. You will need to refill it with your influence again, and you will be much weakened!”

<That is why I plan to take the dungeon with me,> I settled the conversation grimly. His face was even more bewildered at this information. <Bob, what would you say if I told you that I am making all these changes to the dungeon in order to make myself lighter? What if I told you that I am planning to fly?>

Bob had a look on his face that I assumed meant he doubted my ability to make myself fly. That or a disparaging comment about my sanity. He opened his mouth to say something, but luckily, a phrase on the peripherals of my thoughts caught my attention.

<One second, Bob. An interesting business opportunity has come up,> I told my favorite Goblin. I focused on Dale and pushed my thoughts at him. Ever since he had set up mental defenses—and actually gotten good at them—I had needed to work to project my thoughts at him. I was careful to never tell him this. If he knew I was using his defenses against him, he may lower those defenses a bit. Then I couldn’t have private conversations while he was around anymore!

<Oh abyss yeah, he can!> I spoke into Dale’s mind. <All he needs to do is be ju-u-st about dead or swear a binding oath to me!>

Dale then blatantly lied to his teammate about what I told him.

<Oh, you rat bastard,> I called at him, pretending to go silent again. <Dale! Dale. Can you hear me? Hellooo. Okay, back to you, Bob.>

Bob was still looking stunned. “You are going to learn how to fly?”

<No, no, I already know how to fly. It is just falling with style, after all. What I really need to figure out is how to make the dungeon float and move around while under my control,> I cautiously explained, not wanting to ruin the surprise. <I don’t want my movements to be dictated by whichever breeze is strongest that day.>

Bob seemed a bit out of it this morning. He blinked blearily before responding. “That seems… difficult.”

<You are correct; it will be difficult. I’m not going to lie, the other options seem more feasible. Letting someone else do the traveling feels like the dungeony thing to do, in all reality. But this comes with a fringe benefit. I’ve always wanted to travel,> I admitted bitterly. The full truth was that I had wanted to travel with Dani.

Bob smiled. “Ah, yes. Travel the world, see the sights…”

<Absorb objects from faraway lands…> I agreed dreamily. I shook myself, knocking a few unprepared people off their feet. <I am on the cusp of reaching the B-ranks, but I have been putting it off. I want to build the next level of the dungeon as a defensive layer while I work on breaking through to the Mage ranks, but I just have no idea how much time remains before something bad happens. What if something terrible is done to Dani. What if I am too late to save her?>

“Well, Great One… may I speak freely?” Bob seemed to be psyching himself up. That or hyperventilating. “I must warn you, you won’t like what I have to say.”

<Uh. Yes. Of course, Bob. Go ahead.>

“You are kind of being a… whiny little toad,” Bob announced as soon as he got permission. I released a sharp gasp of bewilderment. “You hold the power of creation, life, and death! You can create stone from air and fire from water! You plan to make a mountain fly, for abyss sake! Now you are allowing yourself to be held up by ‘what ifs’? No! You enter the Mage ranks! You become powerful enough to shake the heavens! And, blast it, you go rescue your Wisp!”

Bob was glaring around him, looking for a focal point. Deciding that I was the wall, he jabbed a finger at the granite. “Do you understand me?”

<I do!> I yelped in consternation. Then I went silent. <Thanks, Bob. I may have needed that,> I admitted ruefully.

“Everyone needs tough love sometimes.” He smirked as he leaned on his staff. “Even overpowered rocks, apparently.”

<Hey, maybe I was just a whiny brat in my past life.> We both chuckled at that as I began coalescing my power. Bob hurriedly walked back to his fort. <There is no rush. It will take a week for me to even begin to ascend.>

Bob slowed down. “You will need to teach me how to reach the Mage ranks someday.”

<I look forward to it!> I let him leave as I started rearranging my short and long-term goals. I felt like I had my purpose back, a direction in life! Reaching for the Mage rankings would leave me potentially defenseless while my mind expanded, so I needed to set up the dungeon to survive without my guidance for a few weeks.

Sealing off my doors would still work, potentially, but I felt like it would be a bad idea now. The last time I had done so, it had only been for a few days. A few weeks? Ha! Being the impatient creatures that they were, I was sure that some annoying human would decide that they ‘needed’ to get some money. There were ways to get in if they really felt the need to do so. Most of those ways involved direct damage to me, so no thank you.

My guardians needed to stay strong and plentiful. To this end, I needed to create a template for their pattern that didn’t rely on my influence. Currently, I had my aura mimicking their pattern and absorbing ambient Essence to create young versions. That would soon be impossible because I was fully removing my aura from the area, albeit temporarily.

I pondered this issue for a while but finally decided on a course of action. If Cores could be modified to hold memories, why couldn’t I use them for other things? I created the pattern needed to generate a Basher and pushed it into a Core. Happily, it seemed to successfully etch itself into the interior of the gem! Good, all is well… I poured Essence into the template. The Core stored the power for a moment, filled with blood, and exploded!

<Oh, for… ugh. Why didn’t that work?> I retried, forming the pattern again. I watched from the interior of the Core as Essence flooded into it. Ah, there is the issue! The Core exploded again, making me yelp from the unexpected demolition. I chuckled apprehensively; I had forgotten to cut off the flow of Essence.

When I was using my aura to create items or creatures, they were created on the spot, right in the center of the template. Putting the pattern in a Core was essentially an attempt to do the same thing. Unfortunately, generating something inside another thing didn’t really work. There were space requirements after all, and two things cannot occupy the same area at the same time. The Essence was flowing in, activating the pattern, and creating something simultaneously. I needed to find a way to change that.

Would it be as easy as adding an Essence output Rune? Paff! Nope, it exploded again. What if I added more Essence at once? P-PAFF! Drat, just a larger explosion. What if I tried… Hold on a moment, I have an idea! There was a type of technique that Dwarves had created, an illusionary projection they used to design models before building them. They used this for many things: buildings, weapons, armor. What if I did something similar?

It took the better part of the day, and the only thing that caught my attention in this time was Dale’s group fighting Snowball to a standstill. My massive fourth-floor Boss was hesitant about dying, and if it took too much damage, it would retreat into the deep steamy areas of its territory to heal. Hans was complaining about the lost profit potential. Heh. If you really wanted a trophy, you should have killed faster! Smelly humans. I made a rock fall on them, and Tom got a nasty cut on his head.

My experiments came to fruition, and I looked at the ungainly system I had put in place. A sprawling ritual covered a ten-foot span, and a dozen utility Runes were spaced equidistantly around the ritual diagram. Sympathetic links connected all of them, some of the Runes connecting to up to eight points at a time. Even though it was a giant mess, it worked in a fairly straightforward manner. The Mob I wanted to spawn would have its pattern recorded in the Core. This Core was then placed in a socket in the exact center of the diagram.

When the first Rune was activated, it would make a replica of the Core suspended in the air. This replica would slowly spin, helping to maintain the illusion. For some reason, if it didn’t move, the image would begin to distort and warp. This Rune was followed by another that was a… well, the best way to describe it would be a representation of time. It was a constant switchback of Essence—a maze of sorts—that slowed down the flow of power and would allow an interval between Mob spawns. Roughly ten minutes after the ritual completed, it would begin again. This meant that a Basher was made almost every ten minutes exactly. Cats were made every twenty-five, and Goblins could be done in about forty. My only explanation for the discrepancy was that perhaps sentient creatures were harder to make than animals.

The next Rune limited the Essence that would go into the process, or else a single Mob could be continuously pumped full of power. Usually, this would create… erm… really fun to see fatalities? The kind that used to make Dani leave the experiment room gagging. Was it common knowledge that a drop of blood caught in an Essence stream would make an erythrocyte swell to the size of a watermelon? This is what I imagine blood cells in continent-sized monsters would look like. Very squishy. Hmm… I might have to drop one of these on Hans, just to see his reaction.

After a quick chuckle at my evil thoughts, I inspected the next Runes. A stabilizing Rune to keep the pattern intact, a containment one to force it to follow the pattern, then size, shape, and control Runes. Looks correct now… All that was left was to activate it! Here we go! Essence flowed in, following the symbolic links. Good, good, the image is taking the Essence, the shape Rune is activ–

EEeeeiiieeEEEiiiEEE!

I blinked, trying to see through the haze and distortion of frantically twisting Essence. Rock dust was thick in the air, and my sense of hearing seemed to be damaged. All I could hear was a high-pitched noise. I moved the main part of my consciousness out of the twisted distortions of Essence, and all of my senses were instantly restored. I didn’t use the same type of easily damaged sensory organs that humans did, after all. Mine were attuned to the flows of my aura. I looked at the twisting confluence of Essence and corruption, and the damage to the rest of the area.

The stone for forty feet in all directions had been fragmentized, a blast comparable to B-rank zero cultivators intentionally shattering their Center. There were a few screams that drifted into the open air above the room; the weakened ceiling had collapsed, dropping a few unsuspecting humans through the unexpected hole. Heh, that’d be a good trap name. Pitfall? Nah, ‘unexpected hole’! It seemed that the falling humans had been non-cultivators, as none of them survived the measly fortyish foot drop.

I quickly extended my influence upward, gaining control over an area that reached all the way to the surface! Who said good things can’t come from failure? I patched the open area, quickly weaving it shut so that more humans couldn’t gain easy access where they weren’t allowed. Crisis averted. I worked my mind into the tumultuous energy in the room and brought it under my control. It took a minute, but the Essence was quickly re-integrated into my aura. A few minutes later, I had recreated walls and a ceiling, filling in the spherical emptiness that had resulted from my failed ritual.

<Ugh, it’s like I’m violating the laws of nature or something,> I grumbled to myself. <Ah well. Who’s gonna stop me?> I quietly snickered at the joke no one else would understand.

It took me an hour to reset and redraw the ritual, and I griped at the lost time as I inspected the diagram. I think I found the issue, though. The ‘control’ Rune needed to be activated before a few of the others. The segment that contained that portion would generate a fault in the links if it was referenced last, so I placed it before the ‘follow pattern’ portion. Hopefully, this would allow me to avoid a segmentation fault, but I didn’t know for sure. I really wasn’t able to gain any useful information from the last one; the diagram had just blown up without any warning.

Ritual adjusted, I began the process again. I winced as Essence entered the ‘shape’ Rune, but the ritual stayed stable this time! There was a charge building in the air, enough to make a human’s hair stand on end. With a pop, the Essence compressed like an imploding bubble, and a Basher fell to the floor! Sure it broke a leg, but it worked! You would think a second-old Mob would have better instincts for landing while falling, but I guess not everyone was perfect.

I exchanged the Basher pattern Core with an Impaler pattern and repeated the process. Sure enough, it worked as well! It failed for a Cat, but after a few minutes of dumbfounded rage, I found that the Essence provided wasn’t enough to create this type of Mob. I allowed more to flow, and a mewling kitten appeared.

<Works for me!> I happily created side rooms on each level that were well hidden and set up the rituals in them. To avoid having to personally power them, I assigned a version of Bob to each room. He would exchange the Cores powering the ritual whenever they ran out of Essence as well as the corruption that was needed for more specialized Mobs. The whole process took two days, but I think it was worth the investment. Seeing as there were other regular tasks that required a sizeable portion of my attention, in the future, I would only have to momentarily check in to ensure all was running smoothly!

I set up a ritual above each treasure chest which allowed for an exchange of tokens and created a large variation of the wooden coins. The ritual would stay one step from completion, and the token would focus the Essence into the configuration of the reward like Cores were currently doing for Mobs.

This led to the problem of how to distribute rewards, the part that I was the most excited about. The Mobs that were killed in an area now had a certain… weight to them. When they were killed, their Essence would have a numerical value associated with it, which would, in turn, affect the nearest non-hidden chest. The longer the chest went without being opened, the more valuable the tokens inside would become. As long as Mobs died nearby, that is.

If the group opening the chest had gone past a certain threshold of ‘weight’ to their kills in the area, there would be more tokens. This was a complicated process to automate, but I couldn’t expect a Goblin to go around putting presents in boxes. Even if they stocked them from below, some cultivators were fast. I would become a laughingstock if someone noticed a Goblin’s hand dropping tokens through a hole in the back of a chest. Hopefully, no one would catch on to the system and find a way to abuse it. I couldn’t think of everything so I would need to make adjustments on the fly!

The reward system took another day to perfect, leaving me just four days before I would attempt to ascend. A stray thought crossed my mind—what has Dale been up to for the last few days?

Chapter Eleven

“Ugh. Stupid Cat. Why did it have to run off?” Hans grumbled impatiently. “Now I have to stand guard while these munchkins cultivate on the off chance that a giant Cat is sneaking up on us.” He let out a long-suffering sigh.

“Oh, woe is you-u-u,” Rose sang softly, making the others snort. They were all sitting with their eyes closed, greedily absorbing the Essence of the heavens and the earth. This area next to the Silverwood tree was filled with enough Essence that it physically affected them when they walked in. Like strolling through a warm mist in the early morning with a lover, they felt both cleansed and joyful.

They were the only people in the area as far as they knew. Now, there were a few Dark Elves guarding the tree that they didn’t know about. So long as they didn’t try to damage the tree, Dale’s group wouldn’t ever know about the guards. The party sat quite a distance from each other so they could cultivate without disturbing the Essence around the other members of their team.

Anywhere else in the dungeon, Dale and Rose’s cultivation would draw complaints from other people. Simply put, they took in so much Essence that they were able to deplete the area temporarily. Here, they both had their affinity channels opened to the maximum, and there was barely a tremor in the air around them. With every breath, they pulled in purified Essence along with oxygen, allowing Essence to travel unaided through their systems.

Dale began grimacing as he tried to wrangle the new mass of Essence that was flowing into his Core. It was unruly, and he was having trouble making the spinning Essence into Chi threads thin enough to not disrupt his Chi spiral. To his great annoyance, he had to cultivate in short spurts, stopping and starting constantly as he pulled at the strings.

Rose was drinking in huge amounts of Essence as well, but her body was trying to pull it away from her Center to use for its own purposes. Twenty years of being unable to cultivate had made her body damaged, and the repairs were taking far longer than she wanted. Her cells—like everyone else’s—pulled Essence specifically into the powerhouse—the mitochondria—which allowed her to become stronger at a cellular level. Being starved for Essence for so long, they tried to take more than they needed. If she didn’t carefully regulate her cultivation, her body would literally fight itself for greater access to the life-giving power.

For differing reasons, the two of them both muttered the same phrase, “This is so annoying!” causing them to look up in surprise and guffaw at the coincidence.

Hans rolled his eyes and took a few moments to inspect the others. His student, Tom, was sweating profusely as he struggled to surpass his previous limits. The amount of fire corruption in his Center was already making it difficult for him to progress, so Hans made a mental note to be stricter with his training regimen in the near future.

Adam was cultivating with a serene expression on his face, and the light in the room coupled with his pure white robe made a halo of brilliance radiate near his head. The celestial corruption in Adam was at a point where it should have been lethal, yet it didn’t seem to be having an overly detrimental effect on him. Hans shrugged. Only time would tell for sure.

Eventually, Tom stood up, looking nauseous. He waved to Hans, who correctly took the gesture to mean that Tom had absorbed as much Essence as his body could handle and would be taking over the guard duty.

“Thanks!” Hans collapsed to the floor and began greedily absorbing the abundant Essence in the air while writhing around. Unlike the others, he was an intentionally loud cultivator. “Uhhhhhgh. This feels so good. Oh, yeah, fill my affinity channels.” His antics always made Rose scowl and the others laugh.

It took about an hour for the entire group to finally admit defeat. There were legends of people that could continuously cultivate for years at a time, but the reality was that too much Essence for long periods could permanently damage the meridians—damage similar to having lightning traveling through your body. Literally, for some cultivators. Short bursts were possible, but there is only so much of a foreign substance that the body could quickly turn to its own use. This is why cultivation techniques that allowed for large amounts of Essence to be held were so sought after; if you had as much as you could handle, you could ‘store’ the Essence in a holding pattern, slowly adding it to your Chi spiral. Dale would have had one if he hadn’t lost it to his gauntlet. A frown crossed his face at the memory.

The intrepid adventurers stood, stretching and limbering up happily. Each of them felt that they had made good progress for the day and was excited to enjoy a night of relaxation. As they were leaving, they used their tokens at the exchange chest. Their earlier suppositions seemed to hold true, as silver tokens from the third floor turned into gold bars, and average-looking weapon tokens released minor Inscribed weapons. Each of them was using a weapon more suited to them than what they found, so they happily made plans to split the profit that selling them would bring.

“Do we even know anyone that uses a halberd?” Hans scoffed after he pulled a large polearm from the chest. “These things are basically useless in a dungeon! Half the time the tunnels are so narrow…”

Tom looked at the long weapon. “I think that would be an acceptable weapon in here. Why is it such a disagreeable armament?”

“Pff! This dungeon is an outlier!” Hans jeered, twirling the shaft of the halberd in his palm. “Most dungeons really make you work to even stand up straight. None of you believe me, I can tell. There is definitely something different about this place though. Smart Mobs, fortifications,” he spat the word in disgust, “and now an ecosystem? You don’t normally see things like this in a dungeon below the A-rankings.”

“Is it really that different than the norm?” Dale inquired as he walked.

Hans bobbed his head. “Yeah, it’s special all right. Prolly why Frank has been so shitty toward you in the last few months.”

“What do you mean?” Dale asked as they started moving toward the exit portal.

Hans glanced at him with a smirk, which died as he saw that Dale was serious. “Really? The backstabbing in council meetings, the constant attempts to get more control, the plans to eke every last copper he can get out of you?”

Dale shrugged. “Seemed like just a Mage thing. You know, loss of touch with non-Mages, general snobbery, and sense of entitlement?”

Hans nodded. “All true, yes. Frank, though, he’s a good egg. Just been under a lot of pressure recently, and you know what happens when eggs are under too much pressure, right?”

“Ahm.” Dale paused, thinking it was a rhetorical question. “They crack?”

“They crack!” Hans shouted in agreement. “Yeah. Frank is just the leader of this branch of the Adventurers’ Guild. The main headquarters has been getting numerous requests from other Guild Leaders to replace Frank as the main leader for the area. So, Frank had to show that he was making strong inroads into cash flow, influencing the area, and creating strong connections overall.”

“How do you know all of this?” Dale prodded his friend with a stiff finger. “I know you are on good terms with him, but it is surprising that he’d tell you all of this.”

“Huh? He doesn’t tell me these things!” Hans looked affronted. “The walls of a tent are just really thin, and his voice tends to carry if the wind is ju-u-ust right.” Hans grinned and made a gesture and was lifted off his feet by a burst of swirling air.

Dale laughed at Hans’ antics “You are so–” Wham! Dale was thrown into the air as a staff came out of seemingly nowhere and hit his lower legs from the side. The staff whipped around and slammed him into the ground hard enough to make him bounce.

“Situational awareness, you stupid twit!” his Moon Elf instructor screamed down at Dale’s groaning figure before vanishing into thin air.

Dead silence reigned for a moment as Dale slowly got to his feet. He coughed into his hand, a bit of blood flecked the spittle. He had bitten into his tongue as he hit the ground. “Oh, right. Hey guys, my combat instructor will be testing me constantly now. So. Ya-a-ay,” he finished weakly. Luckily, he had progressed in his cultivation to the degree he had. A year ago, that strike would have broken his ribs at the least.

“That’s how you’ve been training?!” Rose gasped into the quiet. “With him? But! But! He hates humans!”

“It shows.” Tom crossed his arms and nodded as if he had spoken a great truth.

“He’s still here. Don’t say anything you will regret.” Adam gestured at a corner they were approaching. The Elf reappeared, pointing a dagger-like finger at the cleric.

“You will not give away my position in the future, or I will consider you a hindrance to my training methods.” The Elf glowered at Adam before vanishing. “This training is not for you, but I could include you.”

“Sorry, Dale. You’re on your own.” Adam grimaced as a chill went down his spine. “It’s too bad. I really liked you.”

“Don’t talk about me like I’m already dead. Just get me through the portal,” Dale whispered nervously, eyes darting around. He didn’t know it, but this type of encroaching paranoia was exactly what the Elf wanted to see. The group stepped through the portal into a cluster of people waiting expectantly on the other side.

“Dale! About time! We were just going to send a party in to seek you out,” Frank spoke in a frazzled, angry voice.

Dale looked at him with slightly unfocused eyes. “Oh. Hey, Frank. What’s the matter?”

High Magous Amber strode forward. “It seems that a delegation from multiple Kingdoms and races arrived all at the same time today. This wasn’t planned, and tensions are high as we try to find suitable accommodations for all of them.”

Dale’s gaze sharpened, and a dark look passed over his face. “Are they causing issues?”

Frank shook his head wearily. “Not as such; it is more that their presence is going to cause issues. We have a group of High Elves, a Dwarven delegation from the Stoneheart Mountain Kingdom, and Amazons from the Tigress Queendom.”

“I’m guessing they all want something from us?” Dale looked at the sunken eyes of the Guild Leader. “Hey, Frank? You know that I won’t accept a replacement for you from the Guild, right? I trust you to do the right thing, and I wouldn’t know the motivations of a different person. Take it easy.”

Frank was so surprised that he couldn’t find any words to say. He tried a few times, then simply nodded and seemed to relax a bit. “Thanks. Means a lot,” he finally voiced gruffly.

“We still have an issue, people,” Amber prodded them tersely. “What is your play on this? Should we make them wait? Make them find their own accommodations? Or act the part of the generous host and entertain them?”

Dale’s brow furrowed as he tried to precisely recall what the correct protocol for this type of situation would be. Luckily, the court etiquette memory stone he had received from the Dark Elves covered this sort of thing. Well, for all races other than the High Elves. Somehow, he didn’t think kicking them out without a word would be a good move politically, so he ignored that advice.

“Give them two hours to make ready. Have a human guard show them to the bathhouse and pay the tab if they choose to use it. Show them to the Pleasure House and do the same. We need to treat them as foreign dignitaries, at least until they show a direct threat to us or tell us what they want. Then we can gracefully boot them out if they become an issue,” Dale finally issued the orders. He turned to Tyler, the only non-cultivator on the council. “I’ll get cleaned up and put on those clothes you forced me to buy.”

Tyler smirked. “Aren’t you glad you listened?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Dale grouched. He looked at his team. “Sorry, all. Duty calls and all that.”

Rose’s eyebrow twitched. “You’d better not forget about that ‘talk’ you promised us.”

Tom had been uncharacteristically quiet but seemed to find his voice, “Dale, I think I may join you for this.”

Most of the people were surprised by this statement. Tom was well known for his hatred of meetings. Dale simply looked at him, and Tom shrugged. “I have my reasons.”

“Go get cleaned up then,” Dale conceded, cracking a smile. “Can’t have you smelling like rotting animal in an enclosed area like the council room!”

They all parted ways, and Dale hurried off to bathe and prepare himself. The wind had picked up, and the driving snow was impeding his mobility a bit. Only slipping once, he got to the bathhouse and quickly paid a full silver for the privilege of skipping the line and getting a hot bath. As he disrobed and sank into the heated, scented water, he sighed in contentment when his bruises and sore muscles began to be soothed.

He didn’t have too long, but he figured that he could spend a good quarter of an hour here. Thoughts of the day were spinning in his mind. He replayed his use of the earth shattering technique, trying to figure out what he had done wrong in his battle with Raile. Dale closed his eyes and extended a string of Essence into his surroundings, working with it in an attempt to get better at controlling Essence outside of his body.

Surprisingly, his Essence moved through the water easily. Dale looped the string a few times, and in a moment, there were small waves flowing away from him. He felt like he was swinging a rope lasso, and the pattern of waves seemed to reflect that. He chuckled and watched the moving water, only to see the waves break against seemingly nothing a few feet from him.

Confused for only a moment, his eyes widened, and he gulped. “Uhm. Teacher?” His eyes remained locked on the empty space. His Moon Elf teacher appeared in the large pool of water, a bitter smile on his face.

“Pure luck. You brat.” He vanished again, and Dale watched as ripples of water followed an unseen form to the edge of the pool. The door opened and closed by itself. Dale held his bare knees and rocked back and forth while taking deep breaths.

He slowly stopped panicking and continued experimenting with his Essence. Dale was surprised at how easily the water seemed to react to his extended Chi thread as he was used to having to force earth and stone to do what he wanted. Curiosity overcoming common sense, he stood up and looped his Essence in the pattern needed for the earth shattering technique. Instead of passing the thread of power through his earth affinity channels, he went through his water channels. Unbeknownst to him, doing this caused the thread to pass through the Core in his body that accumulated water corruption. He completed the technique, and as Dale forced the Essence back to himself, a detonation of water shot as a geyser to the ceiling!

Shocked, Dale almost didn’t re-absorb the partially used Essence. He barely remembered to control it as it slammed into him, his mind enthralled at the water pouring like rain from the wood above him. The door to the room slammed open as a guard rushed in.

“My Lord!” the guard called frantically. “Are you safe…” he trailed off as he noticed Dale standing in an odd position in the bath, nude but for the gauntlets on his hands. A drop of water landed on the guard’s nose, causing him to sputter and take in the whole scene.

“I was… um. I was testing something,” Dale managed to say as he quickly turned red from embarrassment. Nearly half the pool of water had been emptied. “It. Ahhh. It worked.”

“I… I see.” The guard backed out of the room. “There is a Mage impatiently waiting for you in the entrance room. I’ll let the attendants know that they may need to… draw some water for this bath.” He gently closed the door.

Chapter Twelve

Smashing a Core in his hand and instantly feeling more alert, Dale strolled into the church. The amphitheater had become the standard gathering place, as it was currently the only place large enough to allow for the residents of the area to listen and participate in council meetings. Several tables had been set together to form a single large table, specially placed for this occasion. There were many people that had arrived today, and the meeting had a far higher attendance than usual. The raised seating of the amphitheater was filled with various groups of scribes who sat with quills poised, eagerly awaiting the discussions and negotiations that would be taking place.

The angry muttering that had filled the area quieted a bit when the City Lord entered, but the noise was not fully silenced. Appraising looks were turned on the outwardly calm human striding toward the head of the table. A few, looking at his contained Essence density and therefore his ranking, snorted and crossed their arms. Others wore stiff smiles, while a few looked outright hostile. When he sat down at the head of the table, a golden-haired human huffed and sat forward.

“Where is the woman in charge?” she demanded aggressively. Dale looked at her calmly, his eyes flashing an electric silver-blue as he assessed her ranking. A high C-rank, either eight or nine. He was still getting used to this process and hadn’t perfected his abilities.

“No woman is in charge. We do have several on the council, but the final decision on all legal matters is mine,” Dale calmly stated with an attempt at a professional smile in the face of her scowl. “There isn’t even anyone in the shadows pulling the strings either. I’m not married.”

“How do you ever get things done?” She snorted rudely, looking at the others in her delegation with mirth. “This is ridiculous. A man can’t be in charge. We should go.”

Madame Chandra, who had been silent to this point, cleared her throat. “I assure you, it is no joke. Baron Dale has taken great strides forward in his ability to be a good leader. He works harder than anyone I know, he trains in the harshest but most rewarding ways, and his efforts to rebuild after the recent ‘Wailing War’ have been immensely successful. Notice how our little town has buildings? Walls? All but the church were a pile of rubble or scorched leavings a month ago, and even the church needed significant repairs.”

The Amazonian tensed as she looked closely at Chandra. “Ah, the betrayer of womankind, the herald of necromantic war, Madame Chandra the Dark Valkyrie. Taught any necromancers to hate women recently? Shown them how to cultivate? Kill off a city of defenseless children?”

“Pah, the only impressive thing I’ve seen here is this quartz we are standing on!” a Dwarf spoke into the outraged silence. “I’ve never seen quartz this clear and colorless before, and if I’m not mistaken, the whole thing is Inscribed!”

“You should have seen it a little over a month ago.” Dale wryly chuckled, more than happy to change the subject. “This used to be celestial quartz. It was shattered in the attack, though.”

“Got any left?” The Dwarf grinned, rubbing his hands together in an obviously joking manner.

“Is this what you all came here to discuss? Merchant business? Not so much? Did you come to deliver insults as representatives of your people?” Frank spoke over the sudden increase in noise. “No? Then we will speak in order of when you arrived. High Elves, you will go first, then the delegation from the Tigress Kingdom, then the Dwarves.”

“The Tigress Queendom, you ignorant, inbred oaf!” the golden-haired beauty sneered.

Chandra barked a laugh at her, “Ha! That’s funny, an Amazon calling someone else inbred! If your people were any more inbred, you’d all be sandwiches!”

“Enough!” Frank bellowed, slamming his hand on to the table. “Elves! You got here first! State your reasons for attending this meeting. Please!”

“If I knew we would be allowed to speak based on travel time… ah, drat these short legs.” The Dwarf sighed with a long-suffering look on his face and winked at Dale.

Dale leaned forward before the Elves could speak. His tone remained mild as he addressed the Amazons, “That will be enough of that, Miss. Another insult and you will be escorted off my land. I am building a meritorious society here. Anyone who has the skills needed to perform a task better than others will rise. Male or female. Human or otherwise. Elder or child. Cultivator or not. Please try to respect that.” He sat back, ignoring the glare she was sending his way. “High Elves, thank you for coming here. How can we work together to reach a mutually beneficial friendship?”

“What a lovely way to start the conversation!” A male Elf leaned forward, flashing a beautiful smile. “As a matter of fact, we have arrived because we heard about a heavily propagated rumor that a Silverwood tree was in the area?” His eyes held no hint of anything but happiness as he was speaking.

Dale nodded, having assumed that was the reason they were there. “A Silverwood tree is indeed growing within the dungeon below.” His bold claim made the Elves nearly dance with glee as they broke into excited chatter. The main Elf smiled beneficently and asked, “What would we need to do for you in order to have access to this lovely specimen?”

“Unfortunately, that small detail is not within my purview.” A deep breath escaped Dale’s lips. He wasn’t looking forward to this next part. “I have an exclusive agreement with the Dark Elves. If you want access to the tree itself, you will need to talk to them.”

“What?!” The joyful face twisted into a hateful mask. “The Darkies? You went to them?”

“They came to me,” Dale calmly replied as the High Elf seemed to be having a breakdown.

“Y-you can’t trust Darkies!” the Elf sputtered caustically. “They are little better than mercenaries! They will break an agreement as soon as it is more beneficial for them to do so! As a matter of fact, they completely stopped all contracts with us in the last few…” His voice trailed off as a look of realization appeared on his face. He continued weakly, head held in his hands, “Of course they did. They have no need for access to our trees anymore… You have no idea what you’ve done. Idiot human!”

Having obviously waited until this announcement, the Dark Elf princess, Brianna, strode into the room smugly. “He basically freed us from the position of little better than barely-tolerated slaves?” She sat in the only empty council chair. “Dale doesn’t need to worry about betrayal. I was the one to sign the Mana contract we agreed upon.”

The High Elves stood. “Well,” the speaker spoke pseudo-sadly, “I do hope the next person in charge of this area will be more inclined toward intelligent contract agreements.” With that thinly veiled threat delivered, the group started to leave the room.

“Ah. Planning to have me killed off?” Dale plainly and boldly questioned.

“Unfortunate accidents happen to humans all the time.” The Elf shrugged carelessly. “Best of luck in the coming days… hours… whatever you have remaining.”

“You would do well to realize exactly who you are threatening,” Brianna stated in a bored tone. “Dale here is a landed Baron in both the Lion and the Phoenix Kingdoms, and a Duke of the Huine nation. Attacking him would start a very large scale war against the High Elves.”

The group leaving slowed, looking at each other. They grudgingly walked back to their seats and sat down. The main Elf—frowning—opened his mouth, but Dale cut him off with a slice of his hand, “Nope, your turn is over for now. Amazons?”

“We heard that there was clean Essence and powerful weapons in the dungeon. We want access.” The spokeswoman jumped directly into conversation, ignoring the annoyed squawk from the Elf.

Frank coughed into his hand, eyes lighting up. “Are you registered with the Guild?”

She shook her head sharply. “Sign on to a Guild run by men? Please. What would be the point? Get drooled on by cattle as we walk around in tight leather armor?”

Tyler took over, as business and taxes was his area of expertise. “For non-Guild affiliated parties, the tax rate is currently twenty percent. For a foreign group such as yourselves, there is a ten percent rate that you must pay directly to Lord Dale’s personal account. There is also an export tax of fifteen percent for both the Lion and Phoenix Kingdoms. Though Dale is a Duke of the Dark elves, they have no authority to claim taxes, else it may be higher.” Dale was startled at the amounts stated; he had no idea it would cost them that much to go into the dungeon.

Apparently, neither had the Amazon. “Y-you want us to pay a sixty percent tribute of the goods we collect in the dungeon?”

“And I will require a binding Mana contract to that effect,” Tyler finished cheerfully. His eyes were alight, and he was happily thinking of ways to invest the money they would bring to the city. Maybe Dale could finally get his city-run bathhouse. The lady tried to argue, but her attempts at negotiation met only stony yet merry resistance.

Having failed completely to get concessions, the Amazonian ground her teeth, leaned back, and nodded. “Fine. Expect trainees to arrive at the start of the week. We’ll get your contract signed, even if it is an abyssal deal.”

“To the Dwarves!” Dale spoke with gusto, pointing at the stout people and moving the meeting along before tempers could flare higher.

The Dwarf gave a friendly wave. “Hey there. We tracked a recent purchase of Mithril to this Dungeon. We also want access.”

The council looked amongst themselves; they knew this information would leak out, but it was faster than they had expected. Tyler sighed as he uncomfortably broke the silence, “It is true; the Mithril came from this location.”

A mad rush of noise followed this statement as the other delegations suddenly started speaking over each other. Tyler waved his arms. “Hey!” he shouted sharply, calming the groups down. “It has only appeared once in a way someone could claim. Once in over a cumulative five thousand different dives into the dungeon!”

“And who got it?” The Dwarves were eyeing the merchant with undisguised greed.

“Th-that isn’t for me to say.” Tyler swallowed at the glares that were being directed his way. First the Amazons, now the Dwarves!

Dale interceded on his friend’s behalf, “We have a policy of discretion, which I am sure you can appreciate. If they want you to know, they will come forward with that information themselves. We’ve had issues in the past with people attacking someone for a large sum of money or a powerful, Inscribed item.” Tyler nodded sadly at this, remembering the time when he nearly lost an expensive pickaxe to thieves.

“You aren’t making many friends today, lad.” The Dwarf sat back and steepled his sausage-like fingers.

Dale sighed and wryly smiled. “Truly, I am trying to make friends, but none of you are giving me good incentive to help you out. They threatened us,” he waved in the general direction of the Elves, “they have been needlessly rude,” he waved at the Amazons, “and you hit against a city regulation. To your credit, at least you’ve been polite about it and haven’t threatened me. Is that about to change?”

The Dwarves gained a considering look, and the spokesdwarf slowly nodded. “Alright, you make a good point. What would you say if I told you I’m authorized by Thane Moonshadow to open trade routes between our cities? Could that grease the wheels of our discussions?”

There was silence for a few moments. Most of the gathered people were quiet due to shock, but Dale kept his mouth closed out of confusion. “I’m sorry to say, I don’t–”

“Dale, hush!” Tyler gave a small panicked laugh as he squeezed Dale’s arm hard enough to bruise a non-cultivator. “This needs to be a private negotiation.”

“… I see.” Dale nodded at the Dwarf. “If you would be so kind, can we resume this discussion after this meeting?”

“Certainly,” the Dwarf magnanimously agreed, giving a self-satisfied smirk at the Elves. “Let’s have a drink later?”

Dale turned to the High Elves. “Access to the Silverwood tree will have to be granted by the Dark Elves. I’m sorry. There is nothing I can do. We made a deal. Now, access to the dungeon is a different matter. That is under my control and mine alone.” His eyes darkened. “As of this moment, you will not have access to the dungeon.”

“What?” the Elf roared for the second time today. “Then what in the abyss is the point of talking to you! Even if we successfully bargained with these trumped-up marauders, we couldn’t do anything about it!”

“You are going to have to earn access,” Dale asserted powerfully. “It will not be easy. It will not be cheap. You think the Amazons have a high rate?” His voice was rising in volume as he whipped himself into a fury.

“They, at least, didn’t waltz in here and threaten to kill me! I’ll agree to whatever terms the Dark Elves negotiate on my behalf. Have fun with that! Good day to you!” With this declaration, Dale ended the meeting and walked out with the Dwarves, leaving behind the fuming Elves as well as the Amazonians, who were now feeling much happier with the bargain they had made. The Dark Elves also looked pleasantly surprised at the gift Dale had just handed them.

Dale, the council, and the Dwarves were taking a tour of the area to cool their tempers. By the time they found the tavern, the snow was turning to sleet and running down their cloaks. They stepped indoors to a groan from the general populace as the heat was instantly leached out of the building.

“We need to find a way to block that,” Tyler muttered as they got jokingly dirty looks from the people drinking inside.

“Can I buy you a drink?” Dale offered the group of Dwarves.

“Oh-ho! You sure do know how to open talks correctly!” came the jovial reply. Dale grinned; he really liked Dwarves.

“Thaddius?” a confused voice came from the bar, catching the attention of the entire negotiating group.

“Beor?” the spokesdwarf roared in surprise. Dale looked over and saw the Dwarves that had raised the city’s defensive wall drinking at the bar.

“Y-you! Why are you here?” Beor was pointing a shaking finger at them and looked like he had been hit by a curse of confusion.

The Dwarven delegate’s face turned red. “Why are you here? Did you know that your father put out a bounty for your safe return? Did you know he’s been worried sick?”

Dale suddenly realized a very important fact. The monarch they had been discussing was ‘King Moonshadow’. Beor… Moonshadow and his brother had been exiled… oh, boy.

“We knew about the bounty! He’s a twisted ‘father’ isn’t he, Stonewall?” Beor nudged his brother, who only nodded.

Thaddius stomped his foot on the floor and bellowed, “You nitwits! He’s been sending delegations to every kingdom in an attempt to pull you back to his side! He’s dying!”

Beor fell silent for a moment, but when he looked up, his eyes were blazing. “I’m sorry… for the kingdom,” he uttered mercilessly as he crossed his arms and arched an eyebrow.

Thaddius’ voice became meek. “He rescinded the exile. He built an orphanage, just like you wanted. He even sent me to open trade routes when he heard of the Mithril coming from here.”

Beor was completely flabbergasted at this piece of news. Speechless, he and his brother looked at each other in silence. Dale—in a flash of brilliance—decided to capitalize on this moment.

“Beor, would you like to join us for a drink? On me, of course. We were just about to open negotiations for those trade routes.” Dale smiled as Beor realized what he was doing.

Beor’s face cracked into a smile for the first time this evening. “You’ve treated us good, Dale. Real good. Let’s see what kind of bonus we can get you in your trade talks. No one negotiates like a Dwarf, and none better than the Princes.”

Thaddius seemed like he wanted to say something about this until Beor continued, “After all, if the exile was rescinded, that means I was reinstated as Crown Prince. Following this logic, I have full power to set up trade agreements and treaties.”

“How about snackies?” Stonewall giggled drunkenly, smacking his lips loudly after finishing his pint.

Looking surprised at first, Thaddius then turned crafty. “Of course, my Prince. So long as you return with me to present the signed documents to your father.” Beor looked a bit put off by this but nodded in agreement. Motioning to Stonewall, Thaddius smiled. “On a more important note, how many has he had tonight?”

Beor looked at his swaying brother, “I think that’s his second.”

“Second? Second pint?” Thaddius seemed very interested. “Is it good or just powerful?”

“Oh, yes. Very good. The ‘dungeon special’ is brewed exclusively with materials from the dungeon below us. From the hops to the water. Even the barrels are made from a tree that grows down there. The stuff is packed with Essence, and even the high rankers can get pretty loopy. They have normal beer too, if you… aren’t up to it.” Beor chuckled at the excited faces of the Dwarven delegation. “Not your brightest moment Dale, offering to buy the drinks tonight.”

Dale looked at all the happy faces and smiled. “I think I can manage for one evening.”

An hour later, Dale was wobbling in his seat as he tried to finish his second drink from the special ‘Dwarfhunter’ keg. Surprisingly, the Dwarves had thought the name of the brew was hilarious. “Nuh… no, guys! I don’t want to be ahn askhole,” he drunkenly explained to Hans and Tom, who had joined him in the tavern. The Dwarves were across the room, making frantic arm motions as they tried to make their reinstated Prince get better deals for the Dwarven nation. “Ikt’s jush tha, if I come off as too nish, they try and take advantage! I haveta, ya know, seem like a—buuuurp—Noble. Haughty, unbending, stuck up. They wanted to kill me becaush I wouldn’t let ‘em have the tree—urrp! How messed up is tha? How’m I the askhole?”

“You aren’t an asshole, Dale. Every politician gets into situations like this eventually. You can’t please everyone.” Hans patted him on the arm, ready to dodge away if Dale looked like he would hurl. “I get it, I do! That’s why you’re pushing yourself so hard, yeah?”

Dale grandly nodded. “Yesh. Any advantage I can geht, I gotta take. You taught me that! They… why do so many people wanna kill me, Hansel bread? Khee-hee, Hansel Bread. Like gingerbread. Thatsh your new nickname.”

“No, it isn’t,” Hans gently yet firmly disagreed, seeing the mirth in Tom’s eyes. “You just keep doing your best, buddy. There’s a reason you have guards all the time now.”

“Cause someone tried to kill me and dump me in the dungeon,” Dale helpfully explained. “I bet the Elves wouldn’t evhen put me in the Dungeon. Just lemme rot in the open,” he grumbled, swaying heavily.

“Let’s get you to bed.” Hans gingerly swung Dale’s arm over his, half lifting the young man. They stumbled out of the area, moving into the blowing snow in search of shelter. Tom watched them go, quietly fidgeting with his mug… and thinking.

Chapter Thirteen

“Ow! Ahh! God!” Dale awoke to a simultaneous series of slaps, buckets of frigid water, and strong blows from a flat piece of wood. “What is happening?” he roared, leaping from his bed and swinging at the invisible assailants.

“What’s happening is that you got drunk, fell asleep, and decided not to come to your training session!” Though not a fire cultivator, his Moon Elf instructor’s eyes seemed to be blazing with an abyssal fury. “We need to catch up, so I will be beating you until you get to the training ground. Feel free to take your time.” The cantankerous Elf vanished, but the slaps and heavy blows had not abated. Dale was knocked to the ground from a particularly vicious strike.

“Celestial feces! I’m going!” Dale leaped to his feet only to be knocked forward again. He dove through the entryway to his tent, having lost his room in the church to the wounded that were still in recovery. He took off sprinting, but somehow, the invisible blows kept pace with him. By the time he got to the training area, he was bleeding from a split lip and had bruises forming across his body. His instructor was waiting there impatiently, obviously faster than Dale could dream of being.

“That’ll do,” the Elf muttered, allowing the torrent of strikes to finally abate. “You’ve been getting complacent, Dale.”

Dale thought he knew better than to argue, but his mouth raced ahead of him. “Things are going well! I’m not getting complacent, I’m just feeling confident about my progress…” He trailed off as the stare turned to a glare.

“What progress?” the Elf demanded spitefully. “You are like a child that plays at fighting, and you’ve outgrown your old toys so you are getting bored! I see you in the dungeon, being careless, taking risks, missing an attack upon a monster entirely and letting it close on your cleric. You almost lost a member of your group today because you decided that you wanted a one-on-one duel with an overgrown Cat! You’ve never landed a blow on me, and you still have trouble controlling your Essence! So tell me, brat, where is your progress?”

Dale clamped his mouth shut tightly. He knew the Elf was right but was shocked at how long he must have been following him to know all of this information. Dale seemed to deflate, nodded, and smoothly moved into the ‘ready’ position, showing he was prepared to begin training.

The Elf scoffed. “Ready, hmm? Well, not everything you do is the worst I’ve ever seen. I saw you take a technique designed for earth and use it as one for water. Somehow, you were able to instinctively grasp the changes that needed to be made for the element. You could be an overwhelmingly powerful Essence user someday; it seems you are a natural!”

Dale brightened a bit, but the Elf heartlessly continued, “Too bad you suck at everything else. Today, you are on protection duty. That scarecrow,” he pointed to an effigy awkwardly dressed in ladies clothing, “is a princess. Keep her safe.”

A howl resounded through the air, and the area seemed to brighten as eyes opened all around them, reflecting the moonlight. A massive wolf—easily as large as the Boss Mob Snowball—stepped into the light. With a snarl, it charged the scarecrow. Dale ran at it, pumping his legs and jumping. He knocked the shadowy beast aside, and it rolled to a halt with a yelp. Dale jumped on it, pounding away until it was still. His final blow was interrupted as he was suddenly impacted from the side, his ribs groaning in protest from the abrupt shift.

“Your mission was a failure!” the Elf ranted over the sounds of tearing cloth. He pointed at the destroyed mannequin that was being torn apart. “Was your job to kill the wolf, or was your job to protect the princess?”

Dale looked up to see two wolves fading away, chunks of scarecrow dropping from their vanishing maws. “I was trying to stop th–”

He was interrupted. “Do you want to be a duelist or a cultivator? If you can only handle one thing at a time, being a warrior of cultivation is not for you. Situational awareness, Dale! You focus too hard on only one thing, and people will die! Namely you. Again!”

Dale rushed at the wolves nearing the scarecrow, landing a heavy blow and then moving to the next animal. He stopped six wolves this time before the sound of cloth tearing announced his failure. Then an unstoppable force smacked him to the ground.

“Again! Save her! She is going to die, and it will be your fault!”

Dale’s mind was buzzing; there had to be more to the lesson! This time, instead of fighting the wolves, he grabbed the scarecrow and ran. The chuckles of his master made him grin until he felt a sharp object tear into his side. He screamed and dropped the ‘princess’ who was subsequently torn apart.

“Better, smarter.” The Elf nodded at him as Dale looked for what had stabbed him. He finally noticed that the scarecrow had a knife. “Sadly for you, looks like the princess didn’t want to be saved. Today’s lesson, Dale. I’m sure you’ve heard it before, but let me reiterate. Trust no one and nothing. An attack can come from anywhere, at any time. Also, never again get drunk to the point that you are unaware of your surroundings!”

The training progressed. Wolves became warriors, then assassins. Spells were introduced, and Dale soon had second-degree burns and minor frostbite. Every simulation was different, but they all had at least two things in common: Dale was subjected to extreme pain each round he failed, and he failed all of them eventually.

As dawn approached, Dale was allowed to stumble back to his tent. He unstoppered and drank a large health potion, passing out immediately after. Hopefully, that would boost his regenerative capabilities to the point that he wouldn’t need a cleric when he woke up. There was no energy left in his body.

A few hours later, he was shaken awake by a concussive boom followed by a flash of light and a few screams. He groggily got up, crushed and absorbed a Core with a shudder of pleasure, then raced toward the thunder, hoping to help whoever was under attack. Dale got to the point he was sure had been the origin of the noise, but there didn’t seem to be any issue. There was a large area without snow but no signs of combat or destruction.

He glanced around and noticed a few shell-shocked witnesses, right away marching over to them. “What happened?”

He received a blank look in return from the cowering man. Dale slapped him, and the man finally mumbled, “Cindy… Cindy. She… she’s so good to me.”

Dale gripped the man, and spat out through gritted teeth, “What. Happened.”

Unfocused eyes looked up at him. “So thin. Ow. So strong. Very wow.” Dale shook him again. “Jeez, stop! A column of light came out of the ground and ate her. The ground ate her!”

“Dale, what’s happening? Let him go. You are hurting him!” Rose strode over, looking at the gathering crowd. Dale let go of the man, who already had a bruise in the shape of a hand forming on each arm. The man sunk to the ground sobbing.

“Sorry, buddy.” Dale handed the man a healing potion from his pocket. He always had spares in his pockets these days. “Rose, it looks like the dungeon somehow opened a pit or something. I think a few people fell in, and it closed on them.”

“It got to the surface? That isn’t supposed to be possible.” Rose gasped at the revelation.

“I… I don’t know what to do about this,” Dale admitted ruefully. “I’ll let the council know; they can come up with a plan.”

“Sounds good. Um. When you are done, come to the dungeon. I assume you’ll miss breakfast, so I’ll grab you something.” Rose turned and went to find the rest of their team. She looked back at him with a grin. “By the way, we have some new toys to try out.”

Dale had no idea what that meant, so he nodded and went to tell the council of his findings. Running into Frank, he quickly gave him a synopsis of the situation and went to find Rose. As she had told him, the rest of the team was already there, sly grins on their faces as Dale walked up.

“Hi, all, what’s going on?” Dale looked around at the nearly dancing members of his team.

“Can I tell him?” Hans begged the others, nearly jumping up and down. Normal for him, but the others were just as excited.

“No!” Rose exclaimed, glaring at him. “Tyler will be here any second. Just let him have his moment.”

Tyler came up to them just then, huffing and puffing as he carried a large case. A few people were carrying boxes for him, and he thanked them and gave them a coin for their trouble. “Dale! You are going to love this!” Tyler started opening boxes. “We were up all night testing various methods to use the materials you all brought us and came up with some interesting innovations!” He pulled out a quiver of arrows and handed them to Rose.

“I call these ‘Oppressive Arrows’. As the name suggests, we use material from the ‘Oppressor’ type Basher. What it should do is generate a spiral of wind around it when it gets to a certain speed. This will make the arrow spin in place ten times faster than feathers allow for, greatly increasing accuracy and penetrating power!” Tyler explained gleefully. “Not exactly an Enchantment but far more cost-effective!”

Next, he pulled out a small net that was sewn to be a bag filled with a plant. He looked a little nervous about this one. “Alright now, let me explain something. We have tested the weapons, and they work in a controlled environment… but most of this gear is untested in reality. The reason we are giving all of this to you is that we were hoping you would test it for us in the dungeon. But… well, just keep your weapons handy.”

Some of the excitement left the faces around Dale. Tyler blithely continued, “This handy little satchel is filled with crushed and invigorated dungeon catnip. It can be used for two different purposes. If you aren’t currently fighting them, tossing this satchel at a Cat should be sufficient to make it ignore you. Otherwise, you can use it as a lure to draw more Cats in. If you burn it, the smoke will make them come running. Careful with this.” Tyler handed a few to Hans, much to the horror of his comrades.

“You say be careful with it, then hand it to Hans?” Adam spoke in a hushed tone.

Hans’ jaw dropped. “I’m careful!”

Tyler looked around to see if they were serious. He shrugged expansively. “I’m just gonna keep going. Essentially, we were able to make weapons or armor out of most of the Beasts. From Raile, we were able to make a disposable shield. If you touch it to the ground, it’ll stick there and basically become an immovable barrier. It is stone though, so it will shatter given enough force. We made something similar out of the Smashers, but we’re marketing it as instant handholds. Touch it to a wall, and bam, you have a hand or foothold. Slightly larger ones can be used as platforms.”

“You did this in a night?” Dale wondered incredulously, awed at the variation between the items.

Tyler cracked his knuckles. “It pays to have people from such differing backgrounds to work on these. We even have…” He looked around. “Don’t laugh, but we have a scientist.”

Hans chortled against instructions, getting a glare for his trouble.

“What is a scientist?” Adam asked the question everyone was thinking.

Tyler started to reply, but Hans interrupted and took over the explanation, “A scientist is a person who tries to measure the world, saying that there are ‘immutable’ laws that affect everyone equally. Laws that can’t be broken. They try to explain things in terms of the effect they have, how ‘dense’ they are, or anything rather than by the Essences they are composed of.”

Tyler rubbed his head. “He has some great ideas though. His work on gravity alone could–”

“I’ve heard of that!” Hans interjected. “Yeah, gravity is real, but it isn’t a universal constant!” He picked up a rock, dropping it. It landed on the ground. “Dale, lift that rock with Essence!”

Apologetically looking at Tyler, Dale lifted the small stone with a speck of Essence, and it hovered in the air. Hans looked smug. “Oh, look. Something gravity isn’t affecting. Theory disproven.”

Tyler wryly retaliated, “Dale, stop using Essence, but don’t drop the rock.” Dale cut off the flow of Essence, and the rock thudded to the ground. “Oh, look. Now that the rock isn’t being acted upon by an outside force, gravity reasserts its dominance.”

“It doesn’t affect everything! It can be disproven by, uh, Dale, lift that rock and–” Hans started saying.

“No!” Dale barked. He grinned at the looks he got from the arguing men. “We have things to do. Argue with each other later.”

“Fine!” the two men spoke in unison, then glared at each other.

Tyler coughed, trying to recapture the moment. “Uh. The other items are still being worked on, but if you would test these, I would appreciate it.”

“Sure thing, Ty.” Dale waved and joined his group as they walked toward the dungeon portal.

Dani

The cloth that was covering the cage Dani was being held in was yanked away, and her light revealed a strange stone formation. “Where are we?” she demanded of the man suspending her in front of himself.

Dark eyes landed on her. “Where are we…?”

Dani sighed in frustration. “Where are we, ‘The Master’?

“Still in the sewer, little Wisp.” He motioned, and a few people stepped forward. The Master set Dani’s cage on a stone outcropping and spoke over his shoulder at her, “You are about to witness a great miracle.”

Dani had no choice but to watch as one of the people stepped forward from the group, a fanatical look in his eyes. “I beg of you Master, use me for this task! I have been your most loyal follower and will continue to be, forever!”

The Master looked at him with a cold smile. “It will be forever if you do this. I will confer immortality upon you, allowing you to avoid the trials of human cultivation and weakness. Are you prepared for this to be your afterlife?” He waved to indicate the world.

“We have all seen what awaits us in the afterlife, Master,” the man spoke sincerely, shuddering a bit. “If you allow me this honor, I will prove my faithfulness every day!”

The Master was quiet for a long moment. “So be it,” his voice thundered out, and around them, a cheer rose into the air from the assembled forces. He looked out into the crowd and began to speak, “Ten years I have been working on this, ten long years of my attention on a single object. This and the sacrifice of our brother will open the path… to our ascension!” The cheers were deafening.

“I have never led you astray; I have never lied to you,” The Master spoke again as the cheering quieted. “Do you trust me to lead you into the future?”

“Yes, Master, YES!” the crowd bayed.

The volunteer was being stripped by the two attendants standing with him, and he joyfully lay on a stone altar, tears of happiness rolling down his face.

“What in the abyss is going on?” Dani muttered, looking at all of these psychopaths.

Infernal energies began to flood from The Master, a miasmic aura that seemed to howl in rage. Dani was far more terrified when she realized that this must be spiritual energy. It was far too powerful to be Essence or even Mana. The world seemed to shudder in its presence, colors fading to gray. The monotone hue spread throughout the open cavern, allowing vision to what had been the darkest corners, but there was now no light nor darkness.

“Behold the monotony of the void, Brother.” The Master rested his hand on the man lying on the altar. “There is no escape for your soul here, no way for you to be yanked away by the piddling God that demands a natural death for all things. Are you prepared to save us all?”

“Yes!” The man howled in excitement. “To immortality! For the will of The Master!”

The Master nodded and turned to the crowd, raising his arms. “Now, shall we begin!” he roared, not as a question but as a way to rile up the awaiting fiends.

The crowd was loud enough to shake dust from the low ceiling. “Sacrifice him! Sacrifice him!”

In his hand, The Master held aloft a chunk of purest opal. “In this artifact, there is one item that will save us all, nay, it shall push us into power the world over!” He turned to the altar. “To victory!”

“To victory!” the man lying down echoed along with the waiting masses.

The Master raised his hand… and slammed the opal deep into the eagerly awaiting heart of the man before him. A concussion of power flowed from The Master into the glittering stone, trapping the soul of the man before him. In a moment, the twisted ritual was complete.

Covered in gore, the dark cloaked man stepped toward the strange rock formation. A pitch-black stalagmite and stalactite were nearly touching. The Master pulled the opal out of the fresh corpse with a wet slurp. He placed the stone between the unnatural rock formations just as the opal crumbled away. “It begins!” he intoned solemnly. “Bring forward the offerings!”

Dani watched in horror as the newly born infernal dungeon Core began to glow with a dark maroon light.

Chapter Fourteen

“Haven’t seen Evan in a while,” Dale commented as they arrived on the third floor. He missed the Dwarf Orc hybrid. “I bet this floor is dripping with gold at this point. He’d like that.”

Adam grunted, an odd sound coming from such a lustrous face. “I am told that he is on vacation.”

“Oh? Who told you that?” Hans questioned the cleric. “Who’s your source?”

Adam’s eyebrow twitched. “People will answer questions if you ask them for information.”

“Eavesdropping is more fun.” Hans strolled through what—for all intents and purposes—seemed to be a meadow. “I could just take a nap in here, ya know?”

<Please. Please do it. Nap.> Dale shook his head as if an annoying fly was buzzing around him.

“Look, another person alone in here,” Rose commented, pointing to the east. The person she was referencing was hidden behind a grove of trees by the time the others turned to look. “Strange, I saw someone like that the other day, too.”

Tom shrugged and changed the subject, “Why are we on this floor? Cultivation is best done near the Silverwood tree.”

“We have a job request,” Adam informed him. “Someone saw the Wandering Boss with a staff that he was using to blast infernal Essence as bolts of darkness. We were asked to acquire the staff and trim down the Goblin population.”

“It does look pretty crowded over there.” Rose was staring at a fortification in the distance.

“Apparently, a couple parties were wiped out recently, so people got too nervous to fight regularly on this floor. Not enough adventurers are hunting down the Goblins, so if something isn’t done soon, they are worried a breakout will occur,” Dale quickly explained. Looks like the council meetings were good for something after all.

“Rose, wanna soften them up?” Hans offered quietly. They were getting close enough that speaking too loudly would draw very unwanted attention.

Rose shook her head. “Sorry, they are still out of range.”

“Try out the new arrows,” Hans suggested, pulling out an Oppressive Arrow. Rose glared at him.

“Hans, I said that I am out of range.” Her frustration was boiling over with this maddening man!

He waved a hand frantically to remind her to keep it down. “Tyler said these would be more accurate, right? More penetrating power, too. All this adds up to longer range on your shots. Try it. I believe in you.”

Rose was quiet at that point. She grudgingly set an arrow to her string, drew back, and fired. The arrow screamed through the air, hitting a Goblin in the chest and punching through the fresh corpse to hit the stone wall behind it. She stared down at her bow, happily surprised by this development.

Tom raised an eyebrow at her. “Did you forget that your bow has a force enhancement enchantment? You should have been able to hit him even if using a regular arrow.”

“It hasn’t activated before this,” she muttered, looking at her faintly glowing bow. The light vanished almost instantly.

Adam chimed in, “Maybe you need to aim at things beyond your normal range?”

She slowly nodded as the Goblins began to howl a warning. “That would explain it. I haven’t practiced at this range before, ever. I’ve been practicing other things.”

“Well, don’t stop now!” Hans called as a few Mobs started running in their direction. “Berserkers incoming!”

The Berserker Goblins charged at them, howling their fury. They wore no armor but were agile enough to dodge normal arrows at close range. Tom and Dale started to move forward to intercept them, but Dale stopped himself.

“Wait, Tom!” Dale shook himself from his battle-lust. “We need to stay in formation!”

Tom looked over with a face full of disgust. “Why the change? Our combat to this point has been effective, to say the least.”

“Get in formation, Tom,” Dale barked as the Goblins reached them. Goblin archers were also running toward them, hoping to get in range before the Berserkers fought. Tom reluctantly yet swiftly rejoined the formation. He swung his ingot hammer in an upward arc, cracking the chin of a Goblin which had lost its footing. With Dale and Tom holding the Goblins back, Hans worked to move between the small battles. He appeared to vanish, popping up next to a Goblin and delivering a swift strike then moving to where he was needed next. The teamwork began to pay off as more melee fighters joined. Without the team working together, they would have been trampled by the sheer numbers of furious Goblins.

Rose focused on sniping the Goblins that were preparing to launch a volley of arrows, her shots devastating now that she had figured out how to activate the enchantment on her bow. She accidentally used a normal arrow, and it detonated into splinters as the bowstring tried to send it off. Rose shrieked as the splinters dug into her, slicing through her left eyelid. Adam grabbed her face to stabilize her, coating his fingers in luminescent golden light. A quick pull removed the shard from her eye without doing more damage, and a muttered Incantation healed her eye to its normal state.

Tears were flowing down her face as she angrily jumped to her feet and started firing arrows again, being far more careful in her selection of ammo. “Thank you!” she called to Adam as he moved to address a deep cut Dale had taken on his bicep.

“It’s what I do!” Adam called back with a grin, already working on holding Dale’s skin together as the flesh mended. As soon as Dale could use his arm again, he launched forward and delivered a devastating punch to a Goblin that was running at him. Dale twisted his fist as he activated the Runes on his knuckles, and a wet splatter of demolished organs hit the ground just moments before the Goblin did.

“Where are they all coming from?” Dale shouted over the clang of Tom’s weapon hitting a shield.

“That fortification!” Tom called back, continuing to put dents in the shield in front of him. With a snap, the arm holding the barrier in place broke, and the Goblin howled. Tom swung at the open target, and the howl cut off abruptly.

“Thank you, Tom, master of the obvious.” Hans thrust his dagger into an unprotected Goblin’s artery. “They must have been gathering for a reason, don’t ya think?”

The Goblins stopped leaving the fort, and the adventurers quickly finished off the last few that engaged with them. Adam looked at the closed gate, and the Goblins hatefully glaring out at them. “Why did they stop?”

“I have no idea.” Dale shook his head as the clangs of armored feet running toward them alerted the group. They turned to meet this challenge, only to see a human running toward them, completely covered in plate armor. “Who is that?”

“No idea,” Hans replied carelessly, “but if he doesn’t stop running at us in about three seconds, I’m goin’ to put a knife in him.”

“Hey!” Rose shouted at the still-running man. “What do you want?”

Adam’s face had turned as white as his robe. “That’s not a man! It’s a Mob! Take it down!”

“Don’t have to tell me more than once!” Tom happily spouted, running forward and delivering a powerful blow with his hammer. The armor ducked, dodging under the strike. It twisted at the waist in a way that a human never could, shooting a powerful punch straight upward. Catching Tom just above the elbow, the metal fist fully dislocated his arm with that single attack.

Tom fell over, his balance completely destroyed. He tried to roll to his feet, but in his haste, he forgot that he had no leverage and fell again. The armor drew back its sword, preparing to decapitate the half-risen man.

“Oh, abyss, no,” Rose growled as she launched a fat-tipped arrow. With the force enchantment active, the arrow flashed across the distance faster than the arm could swing down. The arrow impacted with a harsh gong sound, and the empty armor was knocked back several feet. Impossibly, it twisted again, landing on its feet and seeming to glare at Rose.

Tom hurried to his feet, glad the sword had only grazed him. He was bleeding freely from the head wound but still held a battle stance. “Can someone shove my arm back in its socket? I cannot grip nor swing a weapon as it stands.”

“Fall back, I’ll get it,” Adam called as Dale and Hans converged on the armor. Hans lashed out, scoring a shrieking line on the armor but failing to penetrate the metal. Dale began throwing heavy punches but may as well have been hitting a wall. He thought that the force enhancement Rune on one of his hands would be more effective, but the armor would pivot to absorb the force of every solid hit, its knee armor allowing it to fall to a ninety-degree angle before springing upright.

All the while, the armor was swinging its sword. This too was moving in a bizarre way, the arm holding the weapon rotating freely at the shoulder, elbow, and wrist. This allowed for a dizzying array of potential movement, and the two fighters had to be very careful to watch the weapon as it was swung.

“Dale, duck!” Dale heard, dropping to the ground as an arrow passed where his head had been a moment before. The arrow whined as it impacted and bored through the visor of the armor, which subsequently clattered to the ground.

“You really felt strongly that I would listen, huh?” Dale took a deep breath as he stood up. “That arrow was… wow. Nice shot.”

Hans patted Dale. “You have good listening skills. Good boy!” Dale shoved the offending hand away with a chuckle.

Adam looked over, eyes widening. “Look out!”

Dale and Hans launched forward in a synchronized roll, barely avoiding the writhing darkness that had swung at them. Seeing what had attacked, they started sprinting toward Adam, who sputtered as he tried to cast a banishing Incantation.

The man-shaped cloud of evil was barreling at them, claws of hellfire reaching outward, when it just… stopped. Tom was panting, the only sound the men could hear. Dale moved carefully away from the extended claws, which had been inches from his eyes. He looked at the crawling darkness, noticing chains of violent, shifting light encircling it.

“Guys! Adam!” Rose shrieked as they just stood still. “Banish it! I have no idea how long that will last!”

All of them came to their senses, yet as expected, Hans was still the first to react. His hand dipped into his satchel, and a dart-like knife flashed between him and the consuming darkness. The dagger stopped inside the still body and began glowing quickly. With a paradoxical flash of darkness, the being and knife vanished.

“I knew those demon busters would come in handy.” Hans shuddered in disgust.

“What was that?” Dale looked at Rose. “How did you stop it?”

Rose sank to the floor, trying to catch her breath. Her hands were shaking from the adrenaline, but a wide smile stretched across her face. “You aren’t the only one in training, Dale. That’s a technique unique to people who can combine celestial and infernal Essence. It is called ‘bindings of chaos’ and is a last resort of sorts.”

“What do you mean?” Dale pestered her. “Does it take a huge amount of Essence to use or something?”

“Not so much,” she admitted. “It is just that… the uh, bindings? They will ensnare whatever they catch, holding it perfectly, flawlessly, for an… indeterminate amount of time.”

“What does that even mean?” Tom joined in, rotating his arm to try and reduce the pain of having it pushed back into its socket.

Rose flushed the color of her namesake. “It means that it will be held anywhere from forever to less than a second. There is no way to know for sure. Whatever is caught won’t be able to move, but the captive can still cultivate and think. It just cannot activate abilities or move on its own.”

“So it could be really useful or totally useless,” Hans clarified in a slightly freaked-out tone. “Next time we see one of those, we have demon busters handy, yeah?”

“Agreed!” Tom nodded fervently. “In the meantime, we should have this armor inspected. It has a repulsive feel to it, like bathing yourself in a latrine during midsummer.” He held up the breastplate of the fallen Mob like a person holding a dirty loincloth.

Chapter Fifteen

My aura was condensing down nicely. While I didn’t think the ambient Essence was being reduced, it was strange to have my senses diminished to this level. Right now, I was retracting my aura from the third floor, and a large group of Goblins had gathered to wish me luck with my ascension.

Bob stood forward as the last tendrils of my mind were flowing out of the floor, slinking down the stairwell. “Safe travels, Great Spirit!”

I sighed. <Bob, I keep telling you to call me ‘Cal’. That’s my name. How many times do I have to say it?>

He bowed, a grin on his wide mouth. “At least once more, Great Spirit.”

<I could pop you like a cleric’s zit,> I jokingly threatened him.

“Yes, yes, now we get to the whining portion of today’s talking.” He laughed as I started drawing Runes on the ground. “I’ll be good. I’ll be good!”

<Yeah, yeah. You are lucky I’m in a pleasant mood.> My aura was retracted from the area, and I could no longer sense the third floor. My mood spiraled into a grim outlook as I condensed myself further. I had to do this. I had to become strong enough to find Dani and make sure nothing—and no one—could threaten us again.

I was also a bit nervous. Until I extended my aura—my influence—again, anything that died in the dungeon would just… go to waste. Bodies would pile up, and the Essence from dying creatures and adventurers would just be released into the air. I really expected to have to give myself a thorough, deep cleaning when I came back. Conversely, I was very intrigued about the heady power I was gaining as I brought myself to my Core. My aura was normally too diffuse to affect things directly around non-dungeon-affiliated creatures, but as I condensed, my aura started to become threatening.

I would bet that if I had gathered all of my aura into a single room, I could snuff out a D-ranked adventurer as easily as eating moss. Sadly, there was no way to test this, as people that weak didn’t bother to venture down this far anymore. Well. Almost no one, but Tom wouldn’t get here in time. My aura retracted along the walls of my labyrinth, leaving behind a sense of emptiness. Ick. I really didn’t like not knowing what was going on around me.

I caressed Snowball with my mind as I passed him, getting a sleepy look in reply. Eventually, I was in my Core room, alone but for the Silverwood tree. Soon, I passed even that. My Core was glowing with an intense light, brighter than I had ever made it. I looked like a blue star and would have blinded non-cultivators if they looked at me for too long. Sinking into meditation, I focused on my cultivation technique. This next part made me nervous.

I opened the hole beneath me to a far wider degree, and instead of a stream of evaporated Essence, liquid Essence poured out of the reservoir and started replacing the water in my puddle. It didn’t take long—the water boiled away in a few seconds—but I didn’t notice through the agony I was experiencing. The liquid Essence was dangerous; it attempted to force its way into me, not wanting to follow the paths of my cultivation technique. I fought, hard, to force it along the pathways. Allowing it to win would mean my destruction as it ruined my Chi Spiral, entering my Core as a mass instead of a neatly ordered Chi thread. If I could sweat, I would have been soaked.

With constant force of will, I held the power back, only allowing it to go where I wanted it to, even as it started to surround me fully. Soon, the hollow formed in my stalagmite was overflowing with liquid Essence. At least it would have been, but it was vanishing into the air as it left the confines of my rocky depths. It would be pulled back to my reservoir by the Runescript surrounding me, so I wasn’t overly worried about the loss.

As I worked to control this power—which I was only able to do thanks to long hours of practice and controlled breakthroughs of my Essence to this point—I sank deeper and deeper into my cultivation technique. Hours passed. I needed to meditate and retain control, which was harder than it sounds. I finally reached the center of my Chi spiral and the hole in my soul that it hid. I passed through the hole, pulling a wash of dense Essence in with me. The hole widened, agony for me as my soul was stretched. I looked around, and even in this time of tribulation, I was reassured by the beautiful galaxy of hypnotic Essence this place was made of. In each point of light, I saw Dani and what she had done to help me, push me, and guide me to this point. For this moment. I steeled my will and pressed forward against the mental barriers holding me in the C-rankings.

My Core, the physical shell that held me in this world… vaporized. I was awash in Essence, my soul bared to the ravages of the elements. Essence no longer had a physical medium to pass through and slammed into my cultivation technique from all sides, doing all it could to destroy my mind, my connections to everything I had created. The world seemed to darken as I was compressed, driven deeper and deeper into the pocket dimension of my soul.

I screamed in mind-shattering agony, an unprotected soul being torn asunder. As I was flayed, the realization of my fate if I was to let this continue entered my thoughts. I steeled myself and fought back! No! I would not be torn apart! I would not cease to be! I. Would. Ascend!

The world was instantly dark, and mercifully, the pain was gone. Oddly, as if through a veil, I could see myself still being slowly destroyed by the corroding forces of untempered power. It was oh so very slow though. I looked down and saw a beautiful mosaic of interconnected power. I looked up and saw a tower that was higher than the tallest point of my mountain. I tried to move, and around me, six paths of various colors appeared. I looked at the paths, and they seemed to be angled toward a floor above this one. There was no other floor in range of my sight, so I was confused.

I looked again at the paths, noting their color and feeling the impressions they exuded. The light that created the chroma for each differing option flared, and at their endpoints, they combined to create a globe of accumulated power. As I watched, that globe released a beam of light, creating a spiral that led higher. That light connected to the light from another, forming a new globe, in reality, a ‘node’ of various combinations of Essence. Mana? Something else? Those pathways branched again, connecting, connecting, and connecting. The light reached higher and higher, coming to rest against the ceiling of the immense tower.

Each place the paths connected had created a node, and each node level with me was whispering into my mind. Luckily, they were arranged in tiers, and the higher tiers were silent, else the whispers would have been overwhelming. I looked upward, trying to get my bearings, and the combinations appeared limitless. I looked deeper into the lights and smiled. The paths were not limitless. There was a finite amount of possible combinations. If my calculating mind was reading the combinations correctly, there were six factorial tiers, meaning seven hundred and twenty different levels of unique combinations. Each tier except the first—where I was—had exactly twelve options, meaning I had the affinities and control to choose one specialization out of… eight thousand six hundred forty possibilities. Plus, of course, the six on this level.

For some reason, I was not able to stand at the highest tier from the start. I had to climb. Somehow. This proposition was troublesome for many reasons, but the most compelling was that the nodes made offers that were hard to ignore.

‘Come to me! I am healing and light. Your pain is over; ascend to the heavens, and you will know righteousness.’ This promise came from the pathway leading to the node made purely of celestial energies.

I scoffed and immediately ignored all the murmurs coming from the singular paths, and they went silent. They were the weakest laws of the universe, if the most individually pure. I wasn’t ascending to only reach for the basics! As I made this decision, I started floating. Oh? This is how I climb? I ignore the offers of the nodes? Seems easy enough. I’ll be out of here in twenty minutes. Tops. Twenty-minute adventure!

‘Come! Grow with me! Alter reality with the plants! I bring patience and encourage life!’ Another weak node on a short path piteously begged. I wouldn’t become a plant Mage! I ignored this tier of paths, climbing ever higher toward where true power lay waiting. Moving to the next tier drained a small portion of my Essence, and it continued to slip away as I was forced to interact with this next level.

‘Burn! Consume it all! Reduce the world to ash!’ The third tier, and already, hellfire was screaming to me. I reluctantly swallowed, turning from this path of all-consuming anger. After hearing all the other descriptions from the nodes, I was allowed to move higher.

Each tier took more Essence to reach, and each node called out with more compelling offers; the laws of the universe dangling hidden knowledge, secrets that hadn’t been seen in the age of mankind. But… I wanted more than these low levels could offer. If only I weren't forced to listen to all of the offers before moving on! My progress began to slow. At the halfway point, I was nearly trapped by my strong connection to the universal law of disease.

‘Rot the flesh from your enemies… let the world be born anew in the fertile soil they will provide.’ A dark grin was in my mind, and I almost, almost, gave in. Then I remembered the standards I held myself to. There was no way to outsmart a disease, no way to grow as a person from the loss that it brought to others far away. I steadied myself and once again moved upward.

I climbed higher and higher, striving against the oppressive, universe shattering offers. Some of the ideas volunteered left me sobbing. They professed peace and wholeness of soul once again. I reached out… no! I would only take the best, for celestial sake! I turned away. I was weakening though and using Essence at a prodigious rate. I tried to hurry.

After months of so, so slowly climbing the tiers, I was nearing my breaking point, listening a little too intently to the offers. When I had arrived, I had assumed that the nodes were just accumulated power. I was wrong. They were the embodiment of universal laws. Complex, immutable. They were also… alive, after a fashion. They had goals and personalities. I was only one tier from the top, but the laws of space and movement were tickling my mind, invoking my long-held fantasies of freedom and flight.

‘Flight? Why be satisfied with mere flight? I will teach you how to remove your bonds, how to move in a straight line, or not at all. Do you know what happens to a planet that hits an object that is not moving at all? The planet is obliterated. Why settle for such a lowly goal as flight?’ This law almost had me. I had taken a step on the path and was ready to take a second. A mental step. I still didn’t have feet.

Luckily for me, the whisper had made a fatal flaw in its attempt to ensnare me. I stopped, finally silencing this tier after a month of being here. <I promised Dani that we would one day fly together. I promised her… that I would be the best. Do the best. I would be unique and bring her fame. I would unravel the mysteries of her race and how I came to be. I won’t fail her!> I pulled myself up to the highest tier, the most complex laws that I would eventually bind my very soul to. My mind was on the verge of breaking; the intensive exhaustion I was feeling was trying to get me to pass on to eternal slumber.

I stood on the top tier and looked at the twelve highest laws I could attain. They searched me as well, and a few willingly went silent. These were the oldest laws of the universe, and everything below them was simply a dumbing-down of their intricacy, a single facet of their being. Only three still whispered, but each syllable was a planet’s population screaming for my attention. The words beat against my battered form, and I nearly faded then and there.

‘I am creation! I am the brush that forms a line, the hammer that beats the iron, the chisel that shapes the stone. I am creativity, and insight, and thoughtfulness. To bring into the world, to make something new, is my purpose. Step on my path, join to me, and it will be your purpose as well.’ My mind was elated at this offer, and I went to joyously throw myself along the path. I was stopped mid-lunge by the next, a breathy voice.

‘I am love.’ I turned, waiting for more. That whisper had brought me to tears, and I didn’t even have eyes. ‘I am boundless, endless. I am what brings together others. I am the end to loneliness. Join me, and you will never be alone again.’ Laughing with happiness, I turned toward this voice.

An organic, disturbing mutter brought me to my senses. It seemed to be speaking to itself. ‘Loneliness?’ A sound followed, a laugh like feces hitting water. Bloop. ‘Loneliness is success. It means everything has fallen to you already, that you have killed them all. Bring all things to their end. Give yourself to me. Through you, I will reduce the world to nothing.’

I turned slowly to this voice, a voice I knew well but somehow had forgotten. <Hello, Madness.>

‘I am so much more. Madness is only the least of my names. I am the end of all things, the final destination of the long-lived. I am Kings and Queens. I am all things forbidden. Release me into the world once again, young one.’

I slowly shook my head. <No. Not you. I would rather go to a lower tier than become what others expect me to be. I won’t go insane. I won’t destroy everything. Just mostly everything. Be quiet.>

‘No.’

I was startled enough that I nearly toppled over. Before now, I had been able to silence every susurration. I looked over the other two, but Madness continued to breathe into my ear like a lover. I did my best to ignore the disturbing feeling.

‘Feel free to choose another. Unlike them, I won’t be angry. I won’t refuse you when you come back to me. I’ll be here. I will always be waiting. Willing.’ Madness tickled my ear, causing me to shudder. ‘If you live long enough, you will be mine. You almost were… so recently.’

I looked at the other two laws wide-eyed, trying to see the secrets they held without committing to them. The entire time, they were an undertone to all noise. They enticed me. Offered glimpses into their power, always tantalizing, never committing to me. I sighed and thought. I meditated, trying to decide, all the while, they slowly got louder. Suddenly, I came to a realization. My head snapped up, and the laws went silent, even Madness, though begrudgingly.

<There’s more.> I was sure of it. I looked around the tower of ascension. I looked down at all the tiers I had passed. The tier I was on was still a circle, still a separation of paths! I was here for Quintessence. The source. I was not here for a pale shadow! I forced myself higher, pushing into the murky barrier of nothingness that formed the ceiling above me. I strained, putting everything I had into this action. The barrier pressed down, the pressure building to unbearable levels. <I know you are there! This ceiling is a lie!>

I began to break. All of me, everything that I am, was beginning to fracture. My Essence began to vanish at a horrendous rate. Unbeknownst to me, at that point in time, my Silverwood roots surrounded my body and somehow entered the trial with me. The roots punched through my consciousness, penetrating the darkness above. The roots writhed, pulling open holes in the barrier. I strained as my thoughts began to fade, but I began to pass through! Every inch was a battle, but I was going higher! Higher! Yes!

I stood on a platform of slowly swirling darkness, looking up at a shining, iridescent, flawless node. The paths from below all stemmed from this, and it was the only law on this tier. Unlike all the others before it, this one was silent.

<Please. I want to know you. I want to bond with you, to become a Mage with you as my law,> I gasped out, the strain of this level a constant pain on my mind.

It uttered a single word to me. ‘No.’

The force of this word sent me flying, crashing into the floor miles away, yet not having moved at all in relative position. The node was still directly above me. I tried again. <Please! I want to be the best, the strongest, the most versatile! I want to unravel the mysteries of the world, and I want to find Dani! Let me bond with you, please!>

‘No. Go away.’ I was sent away again, this time with far more force. I landed in a piteous heap, a jumble of soul and thought. I rose again. I would always rise again.

I screamed up at the pulsing node, <Got you to use three words that time! Soon you will be telling me your Name, and we will be the best of friends!>

‘We won’t.’ I’m flying again but not really in the way I’ve dreamed about for so long.

Dani

Dani watched in horror as the infernal Core was force-fed sacrifices. There seemed to be an endless trail of creatures: Beasts, people, Runes, weapons, and other various artifacts. The wealth of a kingdom could not have purchased all of these goods. The influence of the dungeon was exploding outward. All the while it had reaffirmed its loyalty to The Master and was beginning to reproduce the artifacts that had been brought to it. A huge pile of weapons, armor, and accessories sat off to the side. Runes covered them, and most were inset with at least one chunk of flawless opal.

“What a good pet,” The Master spoke, smiling as he watched the pile of weapons grow. His gaze turned and landed on Dani, his smile falling away. “You are bound to this place. We feed you. Why are you refusing to cooperate? If you don’t start soon, you will become just another sacrifice.”

“What you are asking is impossible!” Dani yelled at him, having held her thoughts back too long. “I’m bound to my dungeon, Cal! And I will stay that way until we die!”

The gaze turned thoughtful. “Oh? Or will you stay that way until… he dies, I wonder?” The Master began thundering orders as Dani became speechless.

“Cal,” Dani released a horrified whisper.

Chapter Sixteen

<Dani?!> I had heard a whisper, a far-off part of me hearing my name being called. I forced myself up from the inky darkness of the floor, looking up again. The node hung there, suspended in the air like the sun. I began to scream at it, <Why won’t you let me…>

‘You are flawed. You are imperfect. You are broken. Joining with you would be a waste, as my power would likely only shatter what is left of your wasted soul.’ The voice was still as potent as before and still without anger or malice. I didn’t get blasted into the distance at least. That was a plus. At least we were on speaking terms now.

<Everyone and everything is imperfect!> I shouted at the haughty globe.

‘Untrue. For I am not.’

<I would argue that you are!> I screamed in frustration. <You are an arrogant mass of energy!>

‘Yes. I am all laws perfected, and all laws stem from me. Arrogance was a third-tier. Which you silenced, if you recall.’

I smiled. I had it now. <If you are all things, then you are imperfect! Refusing me because I am imperfect is denying yourself!>

‘Even your logic is flawed.’

<Your face is flawed!> I instantly retorted.

‘I don’t…’ I waited a while, but no further response seemed to be forthcoming. An hour passed, and right as I was about to try again, the law finally began to speak, ‘You are not going to go away, are you?’

<I will literally die first,> I agreed, settling in for the long haul.

‘I think that would be sooner than you seem to think. But…’ the law hesitated, ‘it may be interesting to be used in the world. My descendants seem to enjoy it. Madness even more so than others. Plus… you have fulfilled the requirements.’

<Requirements?> I opened my ‘mouth’ without thinking.

The law was silent for long enough that I thought it had changed its mind. It did speak eventually, to my great relief, ‘You pushed higher than anyone before you in the tower of ascension. You work to purify your Essence to the best grade possible. You refuse to settle for less or an easier path. There are other reasons, but those are not for you to know. Are you sure you want me? Your path will be harder, slower to grow than other, easier paths. With your knowledge and understanding and a lesser law, you could enter the Spiritual realm in only a few years.’

<Yes,> I replied without hesitation. <I want you.>

‘It is decided. Allow me to explain what happens now. The cultivation of laws is not as simplistic as the cultivation of Essence. To advance, to grow stronger, you must form deeper ties to me. You must deepen your understanding of me and become closer to our shared purpose. Still, you must draw in Essence and use it to feed the portion of myself that resides within you.’

<And this lets me use Mana somehow?> I queried, trying to memorize every word spoken.

‘Pah. Mana. Yes. Until you have formed a connection with me that has fused your spirit with my concepts, you will only be able to use the byproduct of that joining. Or Mana, as you so eagerly call the leavings.’

I thought of more questions. <Will larger amounts of Essence help me join faster?>

‘Not in the way you ephemerals seem to think, but, yes, it will. Giving me offerings of Mana or Essence will allow me to generate more Mana within your soul and its container. The more dense the Mana, the higher the chances of you finding a new facet of me, deepening your connection and making you closer to me. Study everything, and look for my truth within it.’

<Will I be able to ask you questions once I leave this place?> I quickly begged, sensing growing impatience.

‘No. It is time. Do you accept me as the law you will live by, my goals as your own, in an attempt to grow as the other does?’

<I… yes?> I had been caught off guard by the abrupt turn in conversation.

‘Then I accept you. Come to know me, and I will, in turn, grant you my power.’ There was light streaming down, forming a path to step on to. I did, racing along it as fast as I could. At the lowest tiers, I felt that I could have dove in and soaked in the knowledge offered. Here I was barely able to brush the surface of the node before flattening myself against it like an unbreakable barrier.

‘I offer you this knowledge, as much as you can take without outright dying at this time. I hope that you will be the first to progress on my path and hope you get past the least and lowest of my names. For now, this will have to do. I am all that is. I am Quintessence. I am Acme.’

I screamed as my mind was flooded with thousands of images and concepts. My consciousness fluttered, darkness taking hold for a bare moment. When light returned, I was in my body again, looking out into my final room and up at the Silverwood tree. My mind shook as I worked through the meaning of the law I had attained. Acme. The definition of the word was hard enough: ‘The highest level or degree attainable, the peak of perfection.’ How amazing. How wonderful. How… the crap was I supposed to progress in that? Most of the flashes of inspiration had faded from my mind, and I was nervous about pushing too much right now. I felt so weak.

Too weak. Way too weak. I looked at myself and felt very confused. I was no longer a diamond. I was a hexagon, and I was huge. Well, comparatively. I was the size of a human fist with six perfectly symmetrical sides. My concern at this moment was that I was empty. I could see my Chi spiral as only a pale, weakly spinning ghost of Essence, and not a hint of Mana to be seen. I looked outside myself and saw a raging torrent of Essence bubbling around me. Odd. Normally, that Essence would be trying to force itself into me, why is it…? I looked at the shell of what I assumed to be Core material around me and finally noticed the truth.

<My outer shell is Mana?> I was pretty happy about that, as Mana is basically indestructible but also worried as it seemed that Essence also couldn't permeate it. There were no openings, no imperfections, no ways for the Essence to flow into me. The shell was too… perfect. Oh. Oh feces.

I sat in the cistern of burbling food, quickly starving to death. What was the difference between what was out there and what was in here? I tried to think, but dying is really distracting. Maybe that is why Dale was so twitchy all the time. Heh. Maybe I should… no, focus! My Mana is based off of the ‘peak of perfection, the highest grade available’. Maybe that is why this Essence cannot get through? My Runes created a huge suction force for Essence, condensing it to this level and purifying it. Why would this not be the best available? Did I have the process wrong? …No. It is the Essence that is wrong. I looked at it closely, and with my discerning vision saw tiny flickers of corruption. Sitting here waiting to be used must have allowed it to interact with other types of corruption again.

I reached out with my Essence—luckily, I could still do so—and with nearly the last dregs of my strength, I willed Cores into being. They sat at the center of each face of my facets, one for each type of corruption. Then I pulled Essence through those Cores and shouted in relief as Essence flooded into me from six angles. For a day, all I did was pull in all of the Essence around me until, finally, all but the most recent drops were inside my Core. It was interesting to see because while my outer shell was Mana, everything inside was either my soul or Chi spiral, surrounded by liquid Essence. I looked like a three-dimensional hurricane to the untrained eye. Dang-nab, I’m sexy.

All of my newly refined Essence was being filtered into the hole in my soul, the pocket dimension inside of me. From there I could ‘donate’ it to the law in exchange for Mana. I could do as much or as little as I wanted at a time, so long as there was a constant trickle going in. From this point forward, there was never a time that I could simply not have Essence. I would be forced to make a continuous effort to improve and provide Essence. Otherwise, I instinctively knew I would die.

The reward though… the sweet reward of Mana was worth every moment of agony I had been subjected to during my ascension. I mean that in every way possible. I would go through that torture again and again if that was what it took to keep this power. I had just donated over half of all my remaining Essence, and now, the new energy was flowing through me. It began to take the place of all connections in my body. First, the pocket dimension of my soul was swept clean. Then the swirling galaxies of Essence were replaced by the icy perfection of Acme. The swirls became more pronounced, my soul being gently pushed toward the best configuration possible. I didn’t resist the change, knowing that every step closer to my law would help me move through the rankings.

The Mana flowed up and out of the hidden hole, bubbling out like water from a new well. It flowed over my Chi spiral, transforming the Chi threads to thin bands of Mana. The new threads set like stones dropped into the earth from a great height. They seemed immovable, yet followed my commands readily. Just like that, cultivation was changed for me. I no longer needed to do anything and I would still be drawing in the Essence around me like I had at C-rank nine. The Cores would collect the taint, and the Chi threads would take the Essence from my environment by force.

My body finished with its alterations for the moment, and I began to extend my influence back into my dungeon. Aura expanding like a forest of vines in explosive growth, I swiftly reached my greatest range and filled the room. I then flowed into the next room and allowed my aura to unfurl across the entire floor. There was a slight problem though.

Before my ascension, my aura was disparate, thin, easily ignored. Now as a B-rank-zero being… when I extended myself, every Mob in the area died of sudden and massive blood loss. Their veins burst as I came in contact with them, so I quickly stopped my reaching. They looked like they had been crushed by a giant stone! What in the…? There was no help for it, I was simply too strong for these creatures. The pressure of my condensed aura in such close proximity was apparently lethal. Before I reconnected to my dungeon, I would need to add a new floor.

Chapter Seventeen

“What an odd day,” Rose commented as they entered the second floor of the dungeon. “Is it just me, or does this place feel kind of… empty?”

Tom nodded sagely. “I agree. The creatures of this floor are not attacking with their usual gusto! Come fight me, rabbits!”

“Maybe something happened after we left yesterday?” Dale offered his input, receiving shrugs in return. “I still think it was the right thing to do. We had to get that armor to the Spotters and warn people about the new Mobs we came across.”

“Eh, we figured it out. Why can’t they?” Hans complained darkly. “Take the warnings off of things, and let nature solve the problem that is annoying brats.” He got some shocked looks from the others.

“Are you feeling alright?” Adam gently placed a hand on Hans. “You look ill.”

“I’m fine, I’ve just had enough of this snow!” Hans kicked at the powder they were walking across. “Look at this, we are two levels down, and still, the wind blew snow this far! I’m sick of this constant white bullcrap!”

“You should have been in the mountains two years ago when there weren’t walls up.” Dale laughed at the shivering assassin. “I think only Tom and I are hardy enough to make it through that kind of winter.”

“Well, you can have it!” Hans grumped, pulling his cloak tighter. “Let’s go somewhere warm! Not even a whole vacation. A day trip! We need a break.”

“Thou doth need a break.” Tom released a booming laugh, getting Hans to stick out his tongue at the small giant. “This weather is already a vacation for the Northmen like Dale and myself!”

Rose decided to join the conversation, “Dale lived here, way south of the northern kingdom. How is he a Northman? Also, while I hate to agree with Hans, a vacation to somewhere warm sounds nice.”

“I can already hear the wedding bells!” Hans exclaimed while dancing in place.

Rose closed her eyes. “And that’s why I hate to agree with you.”

“Well, maybe the dungeon will add some flame traps. Just for you.” Tom smirked at them.

“Puh-lease don’t give it ideas,” Dale exasperatedly begged, waiting to hear a snarky comment in his head. He started to get a bit nervous when he heard nothing. “Something is strange.”

They completed their time in the dungeon with no incidents, getting lost in the labyrinth for only an hour today. Almost as though nothing were working against them. As they sat by the Silverwood tree and cultivated, Dale kept his eye on the area where he assumed the dungeon Core was. “Hans, you see anything different in here?”

Hearing the seriousness in Dale’s voice, Hans looked around the area thoroughly. “No, everything looks about the same. A little brighter, perhaps? Why, you think Snowball is trying to creep up on us? I’ll skin you, you giant ball of fluff!”

Snowball had gotten quite good at running away when it was seriously injured, and no one was foolish enough to chase it into the deep steams in its territory. Since they had been unable to bring him down today, they once again had to watch out for potential sneak attacks while cultivating.

“No, I just have a strange feeling,” Dale explained away his nerves.

“Maybe it is the fact that the dungeon hasn’t even bothered to look at us today?” Adam presented this idea quietly. His words made the others look at him, then at Dale for confirmation.

Dale nodded slowly. “Yes. No contact at all today either. Even when it was not exactly talking for a month, it would at least give us a cursory glare and mumble a few nasty slurs about our parentage.” He shuddered as he remembered the last month and a half. The people who knew about the dungeon being alive all found it odd that the being seemed to think it was perfectly sane when it was obvious to most that its mind was slipping.

Normal details of the dungeon had been sloppy. Walls and floors that were damaged from attacks or traps remained scarred for days or, in some cases, indefinitely. Half-formed devices that failed to do anything, sickly mutant Mobs ran rampant. Most often, killing the Mob was a mercy to the pathetic creature. Still, the denial the dungeon was hiding in had not fooled anyone but itself.

“It seems that its mind has stabilized, at least for now, Dale,” Adam told him quietly, guessing at his thoughts. “Things have been getting better in here. I think it found motivation somehow.”

Hans had a crooked smile on his face. “Sure, but is that a good or a very bad thing?” he wondered aloud.

“I think… good,” Dale slowly decided, nodding to himself. “I am also thinking that it is going to get very dangerous in here soon, and we need to train harder. Sorry, Hans. I don’t think a vacation would be good right now.”

“Workaholic,” Hans muttered with a huff of breath that stayed visible in the freezing air. “Can we get going, then? I’m going to be training my liver in the tavern if any of you need me.”

They all agreed on a time to meet the next day. Moving into the portal and stepping out into the church, they found a dangerous political argument raging.

“This will not stand, I tell you!”

Apparently, they had walked out into a heated debate among the visiting royal delegations. Dale looked around and was surprised to see people that hadn’t been in the prior day’s meeting. At a glance, he was able to see Crown Prince Henry of the Lion Kingdom as well as Crown Princess Marie of the Phoenix Kingdom. They must have rushed here to be a part of the current negotiations.

“These restrictions are stifling! There is no point in participating in any event from this place! No weapons, treasure, or access to the Silverwood tree? Why would we bother?!” the High Elf ambassador was shouting, cheeks tinged red, hair askew.

Princess Brianna of the Dark Elves calmly explained herself, for what must have been the sixth time, “The point is to build up goodwill so that you eventually might have access. You think these restrictions are stifling? Try to get access to Silverwood pollen from the High Elves as a Dark Elf! We’ve been reduced to begging in order to barely sustain our population!”

“You brought it on yourselves,” the High Elf retorted coldly.

Brianna smirked, a dangerous glint in her eye. “As. Have. You.” The area settled into an uneasy silence as Dale stepped forward to take a seat at the table. He snorted as he saw Hans sprint toward the room’s exit.

Remembering his etiquette training at the last second, Dale gave a deep bow to both the Prince and Princess before sitting. “So. How are things?”

His words brought forth an explosion of noise as tempers flared. Henry gave him a look before chuckling and shaking his head. “Baron Dale!”

“I think the town is going by ‘Mountaindale’, actually. Not Barondale,” Dale responded jokingly, not bothering to keep the smirk from his face.

“Subtle. Humility suits you.” Henry gave him a real smile this time. “It is good to see you looking so well! Healthy. Alive.”

“I am surprised every day that I awaken, Your Majesty,” Dale spoke formally. The High Elf snorted something that sounded suspiciously like ‘me too’.

“I just don’t see what worth there is in becoming allied with this… work camp,” the Elf’s voice sliced through the air, drawing attention back to himself.

Brianna cut off any further words from him, “Oh, yeah. Me neither. After all, there are neutral-affinity dungeons that create artifacts, have portal systems built-in, and are growing Silverwood trees all over the place. This particular dungeon definitely won’t be an important place in the future. You’re right. You should go.”

“Nay, Princess, he does have a point,” the Amazonian delegate spoke with more deference than Dale had ever heard from her. “This is a work camp and mining facility with a sprinkling of herbalists and deranged alchemists. While a potentially excellent place to cultivate, the cost-effectiveness of the action does not make it viable—at least on a scale large enough to make it profitable.”

“It all comes back to one thing!” the Elf jumped into the conversation feet first. “This place is desolate, remote, and useless but for the dungeon. What do you export? How do you get food? Is it all just weapons and money? That is nice but achievable elsewhere. The price of food is so high that we would be hemorrhaging money if we tried to stay here for any length of time.”

Dale was aghast at the ideas being bandied about. He hadn’t even thought about it. If the portal was to close, this place would likely starve. Wait, no! They could eat the Mob meat from the dungeon, and they had a source of clean water. There were more logistics involved, but… it was true that the town had no greater purpose beyond cultivation and the other reasons they had listed. What could he do to draw others here? Make this a proper city? He was so deep in thought that he almost missed the answer when it was given.

“Excuse me!” An awkward man stepped forward, nervous energy making him cough and smooth his shirt repeatedly.

“Who are you, and what do you want?” a guard asked, weapon already in hand and leveled at the intruder’s heart.

“My name is Mason Masonson,” Mason proudly announced. His name drew a few chuckles from the assorted royalty. “I am the official city planner for the city of Mountaindale, and I think that my plans and notes will be able to solve at least some of the issues we are facing here.”

A few people snorted at the non-cultivator and started to argue again, but Dale motioned him forward. Mason nodded at him and continued, “It is true, Mountaindale has little in the way of food or city splendor, no wonders of the world, nor easy access. But! It has one thing that most other places do not.”

The High Elf sighed, happy that his point was being made for him. “Yes, yes, the dungeon is impressive, but–”

Mason cut him off, “No! That isn’t the point I am trying to make! Also, could you move your seat a bit to the right? You are making the whole pattern of chairs asymmetrical. No? Ahem. As I was saying, this town is a bastion of cooperation and political equivalency between multiple races and kingdoms.”

Taking a breath, he charged forward with his explanation, “My suggestion is this: form an academy on this spot to house and train cultivators. The political neutrality will allow Nobles from most known lands to interact without great bias or territorial urges. This may well allow connections to form between them. Furthermore, neutral Essence will allow for a student body impossible in other locations. Clans, families, and cultivators will be able to remain in a singular location! This combination will bring trade, revenue, and greater bonds between the kingdoms!” He looked at the glowering Amazons and hastily added, “And queendoms.”

The suggestion was met with an interesting mix of reactions. Most people seemed troubled, but it seemed that the overall consensus was a moderate to positive acceptance. The High Elf spoke up, “That is all well and good for all of you but does not particularly help my cause.”

“I’m sure,” Henry’s baritone voice stopped the argument that threatened to return in full force, “that we could find exceptions to the trade embargos for students as well as people that come here to teach. An academy fits very well into my hopes for my people. Marie? Would you agree?” He looked at the Princess sitting near him.

“I do agree. Although competition for teaching positions may quickly become fierce. Especially if we reduce restrictions on teachers to a greater degree than even the students,” Marie stated blandly, as if there wasn’t a room full of people hanging on every word she spoke. “Of course, the teachers would need to actually be good teachers. Not just figureheads that ignore their students. I can also see benefits for the Guild; having access to a center of learning could streamline Guild admission. Imagine not having to spend years on each new recruit. Kingdoms could use it to train their own talented youngsters as well.” Her speech was met by almost unanimous glee.

The High Elves furiously discussed amongst themselves, shooting glances at the nearby Dark Elves. They eventually turned back to the meeting. “We will need to know exact details, but we will… tentatively agree to this. For the time being.”

Thaddius, the Dwarven ambassador, smiled broadly as well. “I would love to offer the services of my people as well! We can have the campus built in no time! For a long-term modest reduction in the taxes and tariffs, of course…”

“I will leave the details to my trusted councilors.” Dale nodded at the council members and excused himself. He had a few questioning glances thrown his way. Dale simply nodded at the people vying for his attention and quietly reminded them that this was council business, and he trusted them to make the best deal for the area. Father Richard smiled at this indirect praise, and Frank bobbed his head seriously at the young lord, determined to prove his worth and live up to the trust that had been given to him.

Dale kept smiling until he was out of the building. Then looking around to ensure he was alone, dipped his hand into a pocket and crushed a Core. Essence flowed into him, and he started to sweat as he brushed against the barrier to the next ranking. His fully open affinity channels and daily cultivation—coupled with shattering Cores—had pushed him to the brink of D-rank-six. He was having trouble progressing at this point and so kept trying to force a leap in ranks. Breaking Core after Core, he did his best to force a breakthrough. He was close, he was…! Dale suddenly stiffened and bent over. After violently vomiting on the ground—an unwelcome reminder that his body currently couldn’t handle the amount of Essence contained in it—Dale stood and hurriedly wobbled off to find Craig.

Craig was currently giving a lecture to a few new members of the Guild, sharing a few pointers on their combat styles. Dale tried to be patient but ended up puking again. After glancing over at him, Craig nodded at the men, dismissed the people trying to learn from him, and hurried over.

“Dale is everything alright?” Craig’s eyes widened. “Ah. You are already at this point? Why do I keep being surprised by you? Come with me.” He turned and led Dale to a secluded area.

He shook his head at the trembling Dale. “You went beyond your limits without comprehension of the consequences. You aren’t too far over though… Why didn’t you use a technique and remove some of the Essence before coming to me?”

Dale opened his mouth to reply and then snapped it shut. “I…”

“Didn’t think of it?” Craig put a hand on Dale to guide him to a large rock. “Well, at this point, you should just use it to fuel your advancement. To get into the sixth of the D-rankings, you need to learn how to store excess Essence in your aura. Currently, your cells are saturated, meaning they cannot hold more in them. Your Center… my pardon, your Core is able to hold the Essence, but locking it all away is detrimental to your growth. I believe you are already familiar with the act of tightening your aura? Preventing empaths and weak mind readers from gaining access?”

Dale nodded, too sick to respond properly.

“Good, that will make this easier.” Craig motioned for Dale to sit. “Now, similar to using a technique, release Essence into your aura, where you normally work to keep it compact. It will be a strange feeling, like bleeding heavily. Worry not, you aren’t losing your Essence, just moving it to an unused storage area.”

Dale did as instructed and would have panicked if Craig hadn’t given him the warning he had. He kept releasing Essence into the aura around him, until finally, Craig told him to stop. Dale opened his eyes to see Hans sitting right in front of him, their noses almost touching.

“Boo!” Hans barked, almost making Dale wet himself. “Ha ha! Always fun. D-rank six, huh? First time boosting your aura? Feels a lot like letting out a fart after holding it in for a long time, yeah?”

Craig slapped Hans to the ground. “Must you always be so crass?”

“Uh-huh,” Hans affirmed, hopping to his feet and offering a hand to Dale.

“Work to keep your aura as close to your body as possible, as tight as possible,” Craig demanded as Dale rose. “As you approach the C-ranks, your aura will become dense enough to slow down many normal attacks. It isn’t a shield, but a few tenths of a second can mean victory or death.” It was already dark, so Dale thanked his teacher and hurried off to find his combat instructor—before he came looking for Dale again.

Craig watched the young Lord go, turning to Hans after Dale was finally out of earshot. “He is going to tear his body apart if he keeps cultivating at that rate. Did you try to get him to take a break?”

“I suggested a vacation. He was adamantly against it.” Hans grimly watched the silhouette of Dale disappear. “Poor kid thinks things are going to start getting dangerous below, and I agree. At least the way he is training, his body should mitigate the effects of Essence poisoning. His work ethic would put a royal to shame.”

“Too bad his cultivation technique isn’t at their standard,” Craig agreed begrudgingly. “His current formation is having a hard time processing what he is taking in. If he gets even a little corruption in his Core, I highly doubt he will ever be able to even enter the C-rankings. I have no idea how he is able to refine so much corruption out in so short a time with such a sub-par cultivation technique.”

“Well, actually, let me tell you about that…” Hans threw an arm around Craig and started walking away, explaining a few things he had learned recently.

Craig stopped moving after a short discussion, turning and trying to chase after Dale. Hans grabbed his robe and held him back. “Let me go! I want him to talk to the dungeon for me!”

“Ha! I already tried that!” Hans’ body began shaking from laughing at the struggling monk.

Chapter Eighteen

I was really having trouble getting more Essence into myself. I wasn’t starving, per se, but I needed to find a way to create greater throughput or I may have trouble in the future. I think a part of it had to do with my current restriction to this room; without my aura spread throughout the dungeon, anything that died did not have its Essence rushed to my Core. Right then, I was relying on the Runes around me to pull in ambient energy. Hopefully, the Runes would overpower other flora or fauna that are trying to draw it in, but the current, diminutive trickle of power was making me doubt their efficacy.

My ‘eyes’ rolled as I chastised myself. Realistically, my plans wouldn’t change because of the lack of energy. If anything, I needed to accelerate them. So. Creating a new floor. Because I did not have a great glut of time, I knew I needed to do something drastically different than the floors above. Having decided on a minuscule floor only measuring a few hundred meters in diameter, I began sinking the entire area I was occupying including the Silverwood tree. Similar to the fourth floor, my Core area was attached to the main room of this floor by way of a short corridor. The space I had previously occupied was covered over by a reinforced clear Quartz ‘window’ to allow light to filter down. When I found better materials to hold corruption, I would replace this as well as all of the material in the ‘windows’ above.

I released my aura, and my mind fully engulfed this new floor. Ahhh, much better. I had been feeling a bit claustrophobic. What to do with the area though…? It was too small for a maze, really had no room for tunnels either. Oh! Why not a floor devoted entirely to a Boss? My floor Bosses to this point were… decent but still fairly easy to circumvent or defeat with enough tactics and knowledge. On top of that, Snowball had taken to running away! Running. Away. What was even the point? Stupid Cat, doing whatever it wanted. I wanted something… more. More deadly, more vicious. Harder to avoid. No more sneaking around to get past it and move on to a deeper floor after emptying the chest it was guarding. From this point forward, I was going to place restrictions on movement. Something along the lines of—you want to get past this room? You need the key in the chest. Where is the chest? The Boss ate it! Good luck getting to it without taking down the Boss. Viable option? We’ll see. I believe in myself.

Still, I wasn’t sure what to actually make. I struggled with my thoughts before nearly slapping myself in the face. Creating a Boss was not the point of this floor right now! I dug deeper to give myself a way to dampen my aura enough for the creatures above to survive. Now that I was fully entrenched in my new home, I released my aura and started expanding. I flowed up to the next floor like an unstoppable tsunami, needing to reassert my influence in the area. Snowball roared happily as I reestablished a connection with him, scaring a group on this floor enough to make them decide to leave.

My bond with the great Cat seemed odd, and I thought about it as I moved on. Oh! I see, since I had reached the B-ranks my bonds were now made of Mana instead of Essence. I paused, reached out, and stirred the ambient Essence, just to make sure I could still use it. I could, very easily in fact. It made me wonder why Mages only ever seemed to use Mana. Ignoring a resource like this was just… wasteful!

I pressed on, flowing to the third floor. The Goblins began to rejoice as they felt their connection to me reform, stronger than ever. The group of people fleeing the third floor hesitated and ran to use the portals instead of retracing their steps. I laughed at their fear. They were running from noise, not even a real threat! Interestingly, there were several creatures that had been born while outside of my influence. While their parents were indeed made by me, it seemed that the standard rules were lifted for the few births over the last… um.

<Bob, how long have I been gone?> It had seemed to be months, possibly years, so I was prepared for some weird stuff to happen.

“Roughly a week, Great Spirit,” Bob happily informed me while assessing my increase in power.

<That’s it? Huh. I guess torture of the soul is far faster than for the body,> I wondered aloud.

“Torture?” Bob gasped in righteous fury. “Who would dare–”

<The ascension process, Bob. It was very… harsh,> I told him solemnly. <You’ll get there someday, and I hope that I can be there to help guide you through it.>

“You would do that for me?” Bob seemed surprised for some reason. “What tier of Mage are you? If that question makes sense. In the past, I’ve heard Mages boasting about their ‘tier’. Oh! Also, congratulations! The world has another Mage, and we are all the greater for it!”

<Hey, thanks, Bob! As to tier… top, I guess? The highest possible? Does that mean anything to you?> I warmly kept a bit of attention on him as I refilled the dungeon with my aura. It seemed smaller than I remembered. <Just for your edification, I also completed a new floor, but am uncertain of how to populate it. I have a few ideas, but I think I will let you hear about it through the mutterings of terrified adventurers. More fun that way.>

Bob chuckled at my vehemence. “I look forward to it! I am unsure what the differences between the tiers are, and I don’t know why it matters. All are still ranked in the normal way. Also, on an unrelated note, you should keep an eye on the walking armor. They have gathered quite a kill count, though a few of them have stopped functioning.”

<Oh? Are they that strong?> I looked around in interest. Bob had good taste; his recommendations were usually correct.

“More that they have a… unique way of moving during combat. I think that it will pique your interest.” Bob allowed a frightening smile to cross his face.

<I look forward to watching them! Until then, any news from above? Has Minya contacted you, by chance?>

“Not yet, though your ritual for digging has been throwing odd things into the room that you have not been able to absorb. I’d suggest you clean that out soon. It is going to start overflowing otherwise,” Bob informed me with a grimace. “It also smells terrible.”

<I’ll look at it.> I turned my attention to the room and would have winced if I were a human. Bob had not been joking when he said it was about to overflow. Beyond the dirt and rock, there was a variety of… stuff. There were gemstones, metals, and shards of bone. The most concerning though was a fountain of black fluid that was spewing into the room. It had apparently been a pocket of pressurized fluid because now it was splashing against the ceiling. I began absorbing all of the refuse in the room, collecting a few things I had never seen before. The black sludge coming up was an oddity. It stank, but it contained celestial corruption of all things!

I looked into the makeup of this crude oil—for that is what it was—and was amazed by what I found. Every bit of it was slightly different than the rest! It was an amalgamation of concentrated life! There were plants, animal tissue, and various minerals. I poured a small amount of celestial Essence into the room to see what happened, and it was instantly sucked into the fluid! Had I found the best absorber of celestial corruption? I think so! I played with it for a bit, trying to find a way to turn it into a solid form. I was startled when I noticed something. I was wrong. Rare, I know, but it does happen. Ask my wife—I mean, my Wisp.

The oil was full of celestial Essence, yes. It absorbed more when offered Essence, correct. But, oddly, there was an issue with my earlier supposition that it was a celestial Essence gathering device. Lurking under the celestial Essence was something that should have been impossible and had been impossible for all of known history—infernal Essence. I was looking at a source of chaos Essence! While these two were the main types of corruption present, every type of Essence was contained in this amazing solution! I tried a few experiments with it. I solidified it by adding earth corruption, creating a sticky tar. I poisoned water with it, creating a dangerous liquid that could likely kill via prolonged skin contact. For fun, I burned it. This released actual chaos Essence into the air! What could this gas do to a person? Was it poison? Would it affect their mental state? I needed to know! I needed more.

I followed the hole in the floor downward, extending my influence swiftly. I kept going and going. I was amazed by the depth of the hole; that ritual was worth every bit of Essence it drained from me! I finally found the source of the oil, a massive cavern over forty thousand feet below me! That’s twelve kilometers! Seven and a half miles! Why am I converting between Dwarven and human standard measurements? Because I am in shock! I felt around the cavern, and as far as I could tell, it stretched for miles. The crude oil was also swirling in a massive whirlpool. I was confused for a moment until I looked for the source and found the disk of spinning Essence from the boring ritual.

Huh. It seems to have stopped digging after finding nothing solid for a while. It was a fail-safe I had built in, but I had not expected this scenario. I figured it would have stopped after finding a lake of lava. Magma. Whatever. This worked well for me right now, though. I could not make this cavern a part of my dungeon yet; there was too much distance between my main area and this huge space. The hole to get down here was now a part of me, but I would need to be much more powerful to hold the entire area as my own. For now, I relaxed and allowed the flow of oil to continue.

I settled back, thinking hard. I was feeling bad for being so excited without Dani here, but I needed to get stronger in order to get her back. Quite the conundrum. With the source of Essence and corruption I had just found, it was time to start putting my plan into action. It was time to start writing Runescript.

Chapter Nineteen

“Can we go?” Dale elbowed Tom in the hip. This most recent meeting was dragging on, as various groups were trying to leverage for better deals.

“I wish to adjourn as well, but the treacherous Amazonians are speaking currently,” Tom ‘whispered’ in reply, his voice loud enough to garner nasty glances from the supremely muscular women.

“We are not treacherous! Who let this filthy brute in here anyway?” one of the Amazonians spoke loudly in response. “I think it is shedding.”

Tom reddened. “My most sincere apologies. You were not meant to hear that–”

“Well, I did! I think that recompense is–” the Amazonian was cut off by Tom’s next words.

Tom calmly finished his small speech, ignoring her interruption, “–because I was sure that you would try to find a way to twist my words like the filthy liars you are.”

The Amazonian threw herself across the table, hands grasping for Tom’s throat. “You are little better than breeding stock, you disgusting man!”

“You don’t even make my top one hundred list for potential breeding companions!” Tom laughed in her face as Dark Elves appeared to hold back the furious Amazon.

“Tom, I think it is time to go,” Dale firmly stated, standing and lifting Tom from his seat. Tom tried to resist, but much to the mirth of those around the table, Dale easily carried the huge barbarian away. Cultivation was everything.

The Amazonian laughed spitefully as she was led back to her seat. “Hah! And he is so tiny. Like a doll.”

Dale set Tom down when they reached open air, assuming the blowing snow would at least cool the huge man down. “What the abyss was that about, Tom? That is a table representing one of the largest diplomatic deals in known history!”

Tom stood and brushed himself off unnecessarily. “You cannot trust them. Do you know what they did to get around a treaty they had made with the Kingdom of the Wolf?”

“Obviously not, Tom,” Dale spoke in a hard tone.

“They killed their own Princess!” Tom roared, slamming his warhammer into the frozen earth. The ground shattered, throwing a huge amount of dirt and snow into the air. “She had been the one to sign the accords, and the Mana of the contract enforced all oaths! Her people moved without her knowledge, on the Queen’s orders! Her mother’s orders! As soon as they struck, the Princess withered! She died screaming as her body was ravaged by Mana! That is the honorless people you are making a deal with!”

“When was this?” Dale was shocked by the fury in Tom’s voice. Wouldn’t he have heard about this somehow?

“Four hundred years ago!” Tom spat to the side. “It has not even passed from living memory yet. It will not, so long as I, my brothers, or my father continue to survive.”

“Four hundred years…?” Dale shook his head at the vast time scale. “Why is it so meaningful to you? You are not even close to being that old.”

Tom tried to calm down, his hands shaking. “It was my mother. My father’s first wife. No, not the woman who bore me, but all of my Father’s wives are my mother. We are given the memories of all the male children my father has, to tie us together as siblings. You know the power of memory stones. The memories become your own.”

“How many childhoods do you have in your head?” Dale was astonished by this revelation.

“Fifty,” Tom stated bluntly. “It is needed. To help us train faster, to see the folly of weakness and lethargy. You want to know why we train so hard? One of us… the happiest of us… was allowed a pampered childhood, filled with love and lavished with toys and gifts. That is the first stone we are always given. We are then given memories of how that one died, how weak he was. Then we are trained as true Northmen. Failure is allowed, but weakness is not.”

“That sounds terrible,” Dale admitted softly. “I am sad to say I do not know my companions very well.”

“You know me now.” Tom shrugged his broad arms. “I would have held my words, but I needed you to know what you are getting into. Their ruler will never sign a contract herself, just in case she decides to break it. She will sacrifice anyone, obviously even her own daughters, to attain her twisted goals.”

Dale was silent for a bit as they walked toward the tavern. “Thank you for telling me this, but I cannot restrict them entirely if I want this to work. I will keep a close eye on them, I swear to you. Why did they break their treaty?”

Tom huffed at the memory. “They killed off all of their men. By accident or design, I am uncertain. The treaty was a way for our people to be joined, slowly. Then they got sick of allowing men to have any rights whatsoever in their society, so they attacked us, trying to capture ‘breeding stock’. The only reason they failed their cowardly assault was the onset of the Great War. The necromancers seemed to focus on their front. We have never learned why. I dislike the thought, but in truth, I am grateful for necromancers.”

Hans walked out of the tavern just as they were walking up and caught the last bit of the conversation. “They have their uses. Tend to go insane though.”

“I thought they were the worst thing ever?” Dale looked between the two.

“I’d say they get… led astray. No one starts as a bad person.” A dark look crossed Hans’ face. “If you ever have the misfortune to chat up a demon, you will understand. I’ll try to get you free of them before you start killing too many people.”

“…Thanks?” Dale had a lot to think about as they went to dinner.

Later, as night was falling, Dale sprinted away from his Essence control class taught by Craig, who was eying him oddly and greedily. No matter how Dale phrased his question, Craig wouldn’t say why he was acting strangely. Not pressing the matter, Dale had decided to hurry away. He was fretting about the next round of tonight's training, as he had been told that his Moon Elf instructor had something ‘special’ for him. ‘Nervous’ could not fully explain the way Dale was feeling. Fortunately or unfortunately, he didn’t have to wait long to find out what was awaiting him.

“Good! You are early. That should make this easier for you. Smart move.” The Moon Elf appeared with his customary abruptness. “Tonight is special because we get to see if you have made any actual progress. Tonight, we test your ability to shape Essence under pressure as well as how devoted you are to surviving!”

Dale nodded, bracing himself for combat. “What do you want me to do?”

The Elf’s eyes twinkled as he walked towards Dale. “Isn’t it obvious? I just said it! Survive, brat.” He grabbed Dale and threw him, hard. Dale twisted himself, preparing for the impact of landing. He was terrified as he turned and saw that he had passed the edge of the cliff face a dozen feet ago.

“What the abyss!” Dale screamed as he entered free-fall. He tried to ‘swim’ in the air, attempting to get closer to the sheer rock face he was falling past. As he got closer, he realized he was falling too fast to grab the passing rock without the potential of seriously injuring himself. He looked at the ground far below him, trying to ascertain a place he could land without dying. The chill winter was not as bad at the base of the mountain, which was moving toward him unpleasantly rapidly. This was good and bad. The milder temperature meant that ice wouldn’t be as thickly set into the earth but bad as the snow would not have deep drifts to soften his landing.

He eyed the lake, which was frozen over. If he was going to smash into it, he needed to time the use of his Essence correctly. Or he would die. At least he knew better than to let the Moon Elf ever get near him again. Dale started trying to form his Essence into a pattern, but his new, strengthened aura kept blocking his attempts to send out a Chi thread. Dale began panicking. Was he about to die because his aura had gotten too strong? Because it was blocking him from using his own Essence?! In desperation, he reached into his bag and pulled out a Core. If he was too strong externally, he needed to boost his internal reserves to match it! He crushed the Core in his hand without looking at it.

The Core had been pulled from a Wither Cat and contained far more Essence than he had ever attempted to absorb through his gauntlet. His hand went numb as the Core shattered, and Dale was surrounded by a halo of Essence as it tried to simultaneously rush into him and escape into the environment. Dale’s eyes blazed with blue light as he formed and completed the technique he was after. Harsh screams escaped his lips as he activated the technique that had not been intended for use with water. A tower of light visible to the naked eye shot from his hand, collecting the majority of Essence from the halo around him. The bolt shot down into the ice, passing through it and detonating a dozen feet underwater. The shattering technique forced each drop of water away from any other that was near it, creating a massive cavitation bubble that shot water in the only direction it was allowed to go. Up.

A massive geyser of water, shattered ice, and somehow… steam, shot toward Dale, slamming into him and arresting his descent. He resumed falling, but now it was with multiple thousands of gallons of water. The water fell ahead of him, and with a great crash, all of the liquid slapped back into the lake. Dale was in the midst of the water as it landed, his body horrendously bruised but unbroken. Luck and cultivation had saved him, and now, he was swimming madly for the surface. The water was oddly warm, most likely from all of it being agitated and forcefully moved. He burst through the surface, drawing in a lungful of life-giving air.

As he pulled himself on to land and sat, he began shaking first from reaction, then from the cold. A gust of wind reminded him that he was soaking and slowly drifting into a state of numbness. Staggering to his feet, he tried to ignore his body as it attempted to shut down from shock. Dale understood what tonight’s test was about now. It was less about ability than willpower. Did he have what it took to survive?

Dale shook himself like a dog, trying to dry his clothes before they became too icy. With a start, he realized that there was a simple solution to this problem. He cycled his Essence aggressively, then made the same motions as when he had been bathing. The water around him sprayed away in loops, and within a moment, Dale was mostly dry. His teacher’s favorite saying was ‘adversity breeds innovation’, which made sense to him for the first time.

“Nowhere to go but up,” Dale muttered, looking at the imposing hike ahead of him. He was near the base of the mountain, far from any easy path. He knew this mountain very well though, having lived here all of his life. If he climbed the sheer face there, he could cut a few hours off his trip. The climb should bring him to a trail, and from there, it would just be walking. He started climbing; his enhanced body and tireless muscles allowing him to make good time. For an hour, he climbed almost vertically. Pulling himself over the edge, he stepped on to the path he had been aiming for. Dale grinned; it was good to be proven correct.

He took a few steps before a vicious roar tore the satisfied grin from his face. Dale flinched and dropped into a combat pose quickly. What was that? He saw a blurry shape beginning to rise from the snow and quietly began moving away from it. He stepped as softly as he could, making his way toward home. The form began snuffling at the air, groaning and grunting a bit. Its head whipped in his direction, and a pair of reflective eyes stared right at him. Dale grimaced, preparing to fight.

The beast stepped forward, coming into view. Dale swore softly at the size of what had to be a natural Beast. As in, a minimum C-rank creature with a stable Core that grew to that rank by killing others. It looked like a cross between a rhinoceros and a bear, a Bearocerous? A Rhinobear? Its paws were large and seemed designed to keep its bulk out of deep snow, and it was heavily furred. Tiny eyes peered at Dale’s still form, and a large double horn on its snout rose above dangerously sharp teeth.

“What are you doing here?” Dale whispered to himself. The Beast pawed at the ground and bellowed, charging at him. Dale knew that he had no chance of beating this creature in a stand-up fight, so he did the thing anyone trying to survive would. He turned and ran. “Abyss, abyss, abyss!” he called over and over like a mantra as he poured on the speed. The Bearocerous was gaining ground, obviously better suited to the drifts of snow that were becoming larger and harder to traverse.

Just before the charging Beast could catch up, Dale remembered that he was not the same as he had been years ago. He was so used to relying on his physical form at this point that he had trouble adapting to situations that called for something more. He activated his earthen movement technique and suddenly shot forward on a wave of earth. The Beast behind him roared in frustration but slowed and turned around after ensuring the puny human was out of its territory. It chuffed and growled, but Dale was safe from this threat.

Dale rode his minor earth ability for a few minutes, covering ground as fast as a horse could sprint. A break was needed between uses of this ability; he was not used to using it in a continuous fashion. Riding along the wall of the cliffs, he was able to avoid a half-dozen Beasts that were wandering the mountain. Those creatures weren’t native to this area; why were they here? An hour of pure running and hiding later, the newly rebuilt wall of his town appeared over the horizon, and his heart soared as he rushed to the gate. A few minutes after being admitted to the town, Dale approached his training ground and spotted the Moon Elf patiently waiting for him.

“So has tonight been a productive night?” the Moon Elf called with a smirk. Dale waited until he was close, then took a vicious swing at the pompous Elf. With easy grace, the Elf avoided the blow and frowned. “Well, it didn’t make you smarter. Let’s try again! Bye-bye.” He grabbed Dale and threw him toward the edge of the cliff again.

This time, Dale was prepared. With a flare of Essence, he sent strands of Chi into the air around him. He gripped the air, not trying to form a technique but to simply interact with it. The result was akin to what a snowshoe did on snow; it evened out the force of his weight and movement. He came to a stop in midair and slowly dropped to the ground.

“Well, that’s new.” The Moon Elf’s eyes were glistening as Dale stood firmly. “You got back early enough for us to continue, and it looks like we can finally start your training.” He seemed to flicker, and Dale felt a fist smash into his stomach. It was going to be a long night, full of harsh, painful lessons.

Chapter Twenty

<What would you say is the most difficult portion of cultivating, Bob?> I murmured to my Goblin as I played with a ritual that would almost certainly do a massive amount of damage if I got the components wrong.

“For my people, it has always been surviving long enough to get any substantial amount of it done,” Bob answered calmly. “Now though, I would say the tedium of refining through meditation is what drives our people from taking advantage of it.”

<Hmm. Good point. Why bother to cultivate when killing my enemies gives you a portion of their Essence?> I mused sardonically.

“Just so.” He nodded, flinching as my Essence shattered a rock that was in the way. “Your power has grown substantially, Great Spirit. You must have bound yourself to a powerful law.”

I chuckled. <I did, but it is a real jerk to talk to.>

Bob just looked confused.

<You’ll know soon enough. We’ll get you to be an actual Mage soon enough,> I promised as I carved another line into the floor. I stopped, inspecting my work. A small breeze kicked up, blowing the dust out of my carving. <For me, the issue of cultivation is not the doing of it but having access to enough space to drain the Essence. This ritual should—if I have thought it through correctly—take care of that problem for me.>

“Ah, to have such issues,” Bob wistfully joked.

<Pah. You laugh, but breaking into the higher ranks is going to be really difficult for me. I’m going to need knowledge and a quantity of Essence that I cannot even fathom. My law is absolute and demands perfection from me.> When I said the last word, Bob cried out, holding his head in pain. The ambient Essence around my Core was drained into me, and the liquid Essence I had been storing was forcefully ‘donated’ to my law, my ‘word of power’. Internally, I felt a rush of Mana as a few more universal truths suddenly made sense to me.

Bob looked around, blood streaming from his ears. I quickly healed him, wincing mentally as I found his eardrums had been pulped. “What just happened?” he shouted, clapping his hands over his ears as sound came rushing back to him.

I felt my Core in astonishment. <I… I think I just ranked up? I’m B-rank one now?>

Bob shuddered. “Well. I’m glad I was this far from your Core then. I think perhaps you misjudged your needs for ranking higher?”

I thought about his words. <No, I think that I stumbled upon a bit of truth that I needed. I admitted to myself and aloud what I had to do to connect more fully to my law. It recognized that, and I was able to move slightly further into its embrace.>

My shaman nodded. “That is plausible, especially seeing now that you have already grown in strength. Maybe in the future though, you bounce ideas like that one off of adventurers? It may make a good trap. Killed by complaining.”

<Funny.> I ignored him as he laughed, still wiping away blood from his face. I finished my carving. <I can’t activate this yet, but we need to make sure that we didn’t miss anything. Take a few days and a few Bobs, and really go over this. Tear it apart with critical thinking. It literally needs to be perfect for me to activate it.>

“Your will, my command.” Bob bowed as the pressure of my presence exited the room.

I sighed. Everything I was doing was feeling like busy-work. Like I was just marking time until I…

“Cal?” a voice called out.

My attention whipped toward the intrusive noise. <Minya! Welcome back. How are things going?>

Her voice had preceded her into the dungeon via the portals, and when she stepped in, a look of horror crossed her face as she grabbed at her chest and collapsed to her knees. It took a second for me to realize what was happening. Our bond was being updated via my Mana, replacing the Essence that had connected us. After a moment, she shuddered and stood.

“Celestial…” she muttered, holding her hand to her head. “That was unexpected. You moved into the Mage ranks? You are a B-ranked dungeon now? Congratulations! The church of Cal will grow wonderfully when this news is spread!”

<Thank you! I have a church?> I was going to say more, but she started to barrage me with questions.

“You must have bound to a powerful law to have that kind of effect on me just after reaching this rank! What did you bind to? Or can’t you tell me? Is it a jealous law? I know some can be overly secretive, so don’t worry if you can’t let me know, but what is it?” She finally stopped to take a breath.

I quickly cut her off and explained my ascension. She was a good audience and got really excited at all the right parts. When I explained about how the Silverwood tree had intervened, she actually squealed with delight.

“The question of Silverwood trees has bothered me my entire life! So that is how they help? They let you push into a higher tier you normally wouldn’t be able to? Amazing!” Minya gushed happily. “This is going directly into the dungeon manual I am writing!”

<So, I’ve told you my story. You, uhm, have anything for me?> I tried to jog her memory.

She nodded, reaching into her bag and pulling out an assortment of goods. “Don’t absorb these yet—let me explain them.” Good thing she told me, I was ready to take a bite. She started pointing at the items in sequence. “These are Runes that are forbidden in the cultivation world outside of actual wartime emergencies. If I were to have been found giving these to you, I would be hunted down for treason. As the lowest charge.”

<The black market was that good?> I would be dancing if I had feet. A few nearby Bashers were forced to do it for me. They were pretty good, too.

“You have no idea! I got the good stuff,” she promised with a scary grin. “This is a Rune known as ‘taunt’. Anything that sees it while it is active is drawn to it like a moth to a flame. It ignites hatred and fury, causing those afflicted to attack it and the one using it. There are a few conditions to use it properly though. It has to be moving, at least a little. Like bait. For example, you can’t connect it to a wall and expect it to force people to pound on the stone.”

<Okay. That seems doable. So set it on to helmets or something for my Goblins?> I offered examples for clarity sake. <Or I could just make the wall vibrate?>

“Use helmets only if you want people to bash them in the head over and over, sure. I’d suggest shields.” Minya chuckled warmly. I would have blushed if I could; that was so obvious! “This one over here is known as a ‘catapult defense’ Rune. It has the ability to affect the weight of things that pass over it. The heavier the object, the more it affects it. In a siege, these are placed in strategic locations. When a rock or ballista bolt goes over them, they suddenly are much heavier for a second or two. This forces them to drop to the ground much faster than intended, which can be really beneficial.”

<Sounds like a gravity altering Rune,> I muttered softly, looking it over. <Maybe a weak version of that crushing Rune formed from Dani’s Mithril armor breaking?>

“What? You broke Mithril armor?” Minya was so surprised that she stopped explaining. “Is that a joke?”

<Don’t worry about it, keep going,> I forced the conversation back on track.

“Uhm. Right. This is a wound-healing Rune. This was certainly, by far, the best find!” she told me excitedly.

<A healing Rune?> I scoffed a bit. <Minya, I was kind of looking for dangerous Runes.>

“Oh, this is dangerous.” She nodded as if in deep thought. “Improperly used or used overmuch, it causes the target of the Rune to be in a state of extreme metabolism. Their body is trying to divert all resources to healing, but without a wound, it just stays in ‘high alert’ if you will. The stress damages the body, which is then healed, which causes more damage. They can’t sleep, they make mistakes, they fall apart. This draws heavily upon all the resources of the body.”

She looked at the Rune with a creepy grin. “Outside of actually healing, this Rune has a different name. It’s called a ‘starvation’ Rune.”

<Well, that’s ominous.> I looked at these Runes in a new light. Sure, they might not seem overly useful, but in the right context… who knows?

Minya shook herself out of her reverie. “Sadly, those are the only Runes I found that were unknown to you. I have a few traps though. This one is similar to what was used to capture… Dani. It creates a net of Mana that constricts around a target and holds them. If they aren’t Mages, they won’t be able to free themselves. Even if they are Mages, it’ll take a moment to break out of it. This version over here is similar, but instead of holding, it cuts. Think full-body bear trap. Next, we have a sleep trap, a ‘slow’ trap, and a ‘speed’ trap.”

I interrupted her, <Whoa, whoa! Slow down! What do those do? The sleep one is self-explanatory, but…>

“The ‘slow’ trap is used to hinder movements. If you have a really fast animal you are after, and it goes through this, it will move like it is stuck in honey. Very slowly,” Minya explained impatiently. “The speed trap is just the opposite. Say you have a large, powerful creature chasing you. If it goes through the trap, its momentum is increased drastically in whatever direction it is moving. Suddenly, the creature sprints headlong into a wall or off a cliff. Useful for that kind of thing.”

<Fun! I’ll need to see if I can replicate the effects for more interesting combinations.> I started to go off topic, but Minya pulled me back.

“One more thing!” Her teeth were showing in a wide grin. “I found a collector…”

<Of?> I asked with a dubious tone.

“Well, there is a group out there that studies animals, Beasts, and all manner of plants and minerals. A subset of them likes to prove their studies, or encounters, by taking samples. This started a group that collects samples of perfectly preserved blood. I bought his whole collection.”

She opened a case filled with dozens of vials. Each vial was marked with a tag, and each tag had a small entry in a journal. All of these entries had a seal on them, guaranteeing authenticity. Reading over a few of the entries, I got as excited as Minya.

<Oh… my. Oh, yes. This will do nicely. You’ve done really well, Minya. Can I reward you somehow?> I was staring at the vials, practically drooling. If they were fresh blood samples, I could recreate the creature it came from easily.

“Just let me know how your research goes. Maybe let me bring some of it into polite society and present it as my own work?” she requested with a grin.

<Sure.> Then I grumbled a bit, sourly muttering, <If I ever make progress.>

Minya shook her head. “The way you use Essence and corruption is revolutionary. That alone would be more than enough to make a compendium that would be studied the world over. What is getting you down?”

<Corruption. Turns out, you were all wrong about the best items to use for directing Essence. Emerald to contain earth Essence or corruption? Please,> I scoffed.

She had a look on her face like I slapped her. “Those aren’t the best? What makes you say that?”

<Opal,> I informed her. <The transfer rate of infernal Essence and corruption along opal is more powerful than any other type by a factor of three. I just highly doubt that there is no other material that would be a better conductor for the remaining types of Essence. What is the likelihood that infernal Essence is the lucky one?>

“Huh. Well, if you think that… why not just pass some Essence or corruption over a bunch of things at the same time?” Minya casually offered with a shrug.

I felt stricken. <Why didn’t I think of that?>

“I’m unsure. Also, Cal…”

<Yes?>

“You seem… better. More awake.” Minya squirmed as she talked, clearly uncomfortable.

<I’d guess that ascending to the B-ranks gave me better mental fortitude?> I was wondering what she was getting at.

She spoke in a conciliatory manner, “I know that something changed for you recently and getting to the B-ranks seems to have further slowed the degradation of your mind, but who knows how long that will last? To that end, I am going to start hiring entire mercenary companies to begin searching. I’m going to need a lot of gold. Platinum would be preferable, actually. I need to take care of you, and that would help a lot.”

<I… don’t have platinum,> I dazedly muttered. I felt numb, I hadn’t realized she was actually this devoted to me. It was incredibly touching.

“I figured.” She flipped a coin into the air which I snapped up like a dog being tossed a treat. “Take this, and let’s get to work.”

<Okay.> I steadied myself and began absorbing the vials of blood. <I will be opening a new floor in a few days, Minya. Anyone below the B-ranks will be walking into near-certain death. Don’t tell anyone.>

“You got it, Boss.” Minya left with a happy smile and a treasure trove of platinum coins.

Chapter Twenty-one

“So we are going straight to the fourth floor today?” Tom boomed, flexing his muscles to generate heat in the sub-zero wind.

Dale nodded. “If that is alright with you all. I had a really rough night, and I’m not feeling up to a full dungeon dive. I’d like to cultivate for a while, clear the floor, make a bit of money, and then sleep for six hours.”

“I’ll let you do all of that except the sleep.” Hans poked fun at the team leader. “You’ve been lazing around too much recently.”

His joke fell flat. Dale was coated in bruises, had deep bags under his eyes, and was still painfully thin despite the large portions of food he forced himself to eat at each meal.

Dale tried to play along, but his voice came out a bit too close to sounding dead to be funny. “Well, you know me—a useless, lazy guy that can’t get anything done. If I were in a storybook, I’d be a side character.”

Tyler found them just then, braving the snow and wind. “Hello! I have a new toy, er, weapon for you all to try! Also, a request, if you don’t mind.”

“Good morning. We are only going to the fourth floor today. Will that be a problem?” Adam spoke for the group in his melodic voice.

“No, on the contrary! It is perfect!” Tyler rubbed his hands together. “You see, we think that we have found a way to make that floor’s Boss’s fur into more than just a stylish cloak. Sadly, the process is… well, not perfected?”

“You need several because it gets ruined a lot?” Adam supplied a translation.

Tyler nodded, unabashedly rubbing his hands together. “Precisely!”

“He used to be so timid and quiet…” Hans teared up, sighing like he had lost a longtime friend.

“We will do it if we can, but Snowball is getting a lot smarter these days. Fewer and fewer people are able to end him before he runs away,” Adam told the merchant.

“Not a problem! Do your best! Also, this new dagger. Hans, you use blades like this, yes?” Tyler gingerly held out a blade.

Hans took it, testing its balance and bending it a bit to see how flexible it was. It had an oddly curved, serrated edge. “This is…”

“Yes?”

“Garbage.” Hans shook his head and tried to give it back. “It is balanced like a lead warhammer and as flexible as a brick. I can’t throw it, and I can’t use it in a fight.”

Tyler frantically backed away just as Hans tried to push the knife back to him. “Careful with that!” he yelped and tumbled to the frozen ground. “There is a reason it is so awkward. This is a blade made from the claws of a Flesh Cat. When it is swung with any force, it seems to project… something. About six inches from the blade. That something tears apart bodies. It ignores anything in the way. Try it out on something heavily armored? Ah… also, after it is swung hard, it tends to shatter.”

Hans stared at him with dead eyes. “So it is a single-use garbage dagger? No thank you.”

“Oh, just try it!” Tyler huffed as he wiped snow off his butt. “We want to start marketing it soon as a way to kill Raile without blunt weapons. Also, it is called a ‘Rune Tooth’. So, when you want to buy more, now you know what to call it.”

Hans looked at the dagger. “At least you seem confident in it. I don’t see any Runes on it though…”

“Oh it works well.” Tyler nodded at Hans’ perception. “No Runes, you are correct. Actually, the original creator got to name it because he nearly bled to death trying it out.”

“Hmm. Seems misleading.” Hans tucked away the dagger and walked away without another word.

“I guess he is trying it?” Tyler muttered into the empty area. “Maybe?”

The group stepped through the portal into the fourth floor, quietly discussing their plans. Dale stepped out and dropped to the floor forthwith.

“Dale?” Rose prodded him with her bow. “Dale is unconscious. Guys?”

“What happened?” Adam tried to heal him.

“A new foe!” Tom looked about excitedly.

Dale spasmed, and his eyes popped open.

<I would have warned you if it had been possible to do so,> I whispered to him apologetically.

“So you are up and about, then?” Dale thought at me as he got to his feet.

<More powerful and sane than any dungeon out there!>

“You’re a B-ranked dungeon, then?” accused my original dungeon born.

<I am, but don’t tell anyone,> I playfully ordered. Dale started to glare, but then his eyes glazed over for a moment and he acquiesced, slowly nodding. This was new. Interesting.

“Dale, are you alright?” Adam asked the blank-faced Dale.

“Yeah. Sorry, something came up.” Dale looked at his worried friends blankly.

Adam nodded. “I figured it was the dungeon. I felt its attention on us like a weight as soon as you collapsed.” The weight of a watchful glare increased at these words as if to confirm their validity.

Dale heard muttering in his head, <Stupid corrupted human…>

They started discussing which direction they wanted to take. Standing at the entrance to the labyrinth, they were looking at the four doors that each opened into a different tunnel. Remembering from past experience that it didn’t matter which path they strode, they started walking, going through the ‘fire’ door. Too bad for them; I had been making changes whenever I got bored. As the door shut behind them, fire corruption started to thicken the air. Now, the fourth floor was a time trial as well as a maze. Pass through quickly or suffer.

“Is it getting hot in here?” Rose was fanning herself. “Or is it just me?”

Hans waggled his eyebrows at her. “Oh, it is you. It is also getting a bit warm, though.”

Cue the fire traps! A blast of flame spurted from the wall in front of them, splashing across the wall parallel to its point of egress.

“Wha!” Tom jumped back, swinging his hammer at the sudden light. Sorry, big boy. That won’t hurt fire. The next flame sprayed out, and soon, a consistent pattern was followed by the flames. So numerous were the traps that the entire fire portion of the tunnel was lit up intermittently. The air began to rapidly heat, sucking away breathable air. Among the flames, Coiled Cats were sometimes revealed, flickering into and out of view.

“All of this overnight?” Adam looked at the light show with wide eyes.

<When you don’t sleep, and your other projects are maturing… you find ways to entertain yourself,> I spoke, making a familiar look of annoyance cross Dale's face.

Hans—oddly—was the only one to notice the seriousness of the situation. He spoke in a tone full of urgency. “We need to get moving. The fire in the room is producing corruption, and wind Essence is rapidly depleting. We need to go, or the flames won’t be what kills us. We will just stop being able to breathe.”

After Hans spoke, the others paled. As much as the blistering heat would allow them to while their facial capillaries opened, at least. They tried to simply dash through to the end of the hall, but the intermittent flames forced them to stop and retreat several times as their hair started to burn. It took a few minutes, but Rose suddenly perked up.

“They are moving in a pattern!” she gasped out through a dehydrated mouth. The others looked at her in confusion until she pointed at the fire. “Three, two, one… fire!” As she said ‘fire’, roaring flame shot from the wall and floor. Rose kept talking. “Two, one…” and the way was clear. She kept staring as the flames appeared and vanished.

“Here we go. Move forward when I tell you to!” Rose moved, and the others stepped forward with her, careful not to move until she spoke. There were several repeated patterns, then she suddenly yelled, “Back!” They lunged backward just as a flare appeared and shot forward again just before they would have been incinerated. They made it to a clear platform at the end of the hallway and had to choose which way to go.

“Good job, Rose. You really saved us there!” Dale smiled at the slightly singed archer. He looked around, intending to speak again but instead frowned. “Where is Hans?”

There was a moment of panic as the others didn’t see the eccentric assassin, but he suddenly strolled up to them, flames parting around him without issue. He looked at their stricken faces. “What? I’m a C-ranked fire cultivator. This level of heat can’t hurt me. Actually kinda tickles, I guess.”

“…Then why were you so worried?” Rose growled at him.

Hans smirked at her. “I can’t do everything for you. If you couldn’t work out a simple repeating pattern, how could you call yourselves assass– …Err… adventurers?”

The others stared at him for a few moments. Rose made a rude gesture.

“Well, that’s uncalled for,” Hans grumbled, looking around for something to fight.

Minion of The Master

Two very unremarkable men stepped out of the portal into Mountaindale, eying everything—and everyone—around them cautiously. They casually strolled through the slowly growing city, taking note of any interesting landmarks. The roads were straight, which was beneficial to moving around but unfortunate for those with weak constitutions, as the wind at this altitude had nothing to slow it down. The men eventually gravitated toward the tavern after taking note of the looming steeples of the church and spitting.

After the normal grumblings about the door being open to the wind, the men slowly ingratiated themselves with the drinking people, buying drinks and hearing gossip. They were interested in all news of the place, from the start of the dungeon town to the new rumors circulating about trade agreements. When Amazons were mentioned, the two men paled and made eye contact. Eventually, they had wrung their conversations dry and left. Without a word, they made their way to the shimmering, humming portal run by the Portal Guild. They paid the fee and stepped through. Halfway across the continent, they hurried past other people and swiftly made their way to a safe house.

The men hustled along the winding tunnels under the house, eventually coming to a place that caressed them with insidious Essence. They smiled; the infernal dungeon had been expanding at a prodigious rate. They bypassed various undead as they delved deeper. Skeletons, rotting zombies, drifting wraiths, and towering abominations simply ignored the men. Traps were stepped around, and they soon found themselves kowtowing to The Master.

“Report,” his sonorous voice rang out.

“Master, all is as we expected it to be. There have been recent developments, but as expected, the dungeon has been acting erratically. Various plans to help it recover have been brought to the council, but apparently, nothing is working to balance the thing’s mind,” the first lackey reported succinctly.

The second lackey began speaking as soon as the other stopped. “There is talk of trade dealings and alliances between multiple factions. Dwarves, High Elves, Dark Elves, Barbarians, and Amazons have been seen speaking together amicably.”

The Master quietly digested all of this information. “I see.” His silence after these words stretched for a long time. “Yes. I see. We will need to hurry along before they do something… foolish. I need three teams assembled. If the dungeon is imbalanced, it will not need too many of our resources. Are you certain of your report?”

Lackey number one nodded. “I am, Master.”

“Good.” The Master gestured, and a person appeared near him. “The first two teams will include a summoner each. Their job will be to cause havoc and disrupt the town. While the forces are concentrated above, attempting to contain our threat, the third team will go after the dungeon’s Core. A ‘normal’ five-man team. I want at most one lower-ranked Mage to accompany them. Any more will raise too much suspicion, and they may be found out before even entering the dungeon. Bringing the dungeon’s Core here intact would please me, but destroying it is acceptable. Is this understood?”

“Yes, Master. To hear is to obey.” The Mage The Master was speaking to flickered, soon vanishing from sight.

Dani—who was trapped on an altar just beyond the conversation—wept bitterly at this confirmation of Cal’s mental state… and her impending loss.

Chapter Twenty-two

I looked over my storage rooms, pleased with the results of the last few days. When a Core was too full of corruption to be able to absorb more, I put the dull stone in here, switching it out with a fresh one. Before my ascension to the B-ranks, the elemental Cores like earth and fire had by far outnumbered the more ethereal ones, such as infernal and celestial. Now, those two rare types were catching up! Oil is awesome!

I was focused on this area because I was about to start flooding a contained space with these corruptions then drop items into the fumes and see what stuck. I began, and soon, I had six small chambers filled with a thick, deadly-to-life miasma. For hours, I dropped various materials and minerals into these rooms. As I had expected, almost everything was a dud. A few things took in a bit of the taint, but nothing was even comparable to what I already had access to.

I was getting annoyed, so I started throwing in common, everyday usage minerals. Iron? Useless. Dirt? Nope. I threw in platinum and got a strange reaction. I focused in on the material and saw that a little bit of it had absorbed a huge amount of earth corruption, relative to its size. I tore the platinum apart, looking for what was different. This coin was an exact replica of what Minya had given me, and as I looked closer, I saw that it was an alloy, a mixture of metals. I pulled out the strange metal and analyzed it closely. I had seen this before, I realized, but only in conjunction with other things. Osmium. This was the most dense metal I had ever had the pleasure of finding, and it was sucking up enough corruption that I wanted to test a larger portion.

I stopped dropping other things, just so I wouldn’t get distracted and made a large ingot of pure osmium. It took a surprisingly large amount of Essence due to its density, which was about double what lead was! I dropped the bar into the small chamber and was amazed by how quickly it took in corruption. It left a blank space in the air it passed through as it fell, taking the taint in fast enough that the corruption couldn’t refill the area instantly. It hit the ground, and the swirling fumes were quickly pulled into it without my assistance. Soon, the room was clear!

<Yes!> I shouted in joy. <I have found it!>

“Found what?” Dale’s voice interrupted my glee. “What are you doing, you psychopath?”

<Oh, be quiet, Dale. You have no part in this,> I shushed him nonchalantly.

“You found something interesting?” Minya’s voice sounded in my head.

<Minya?> She wasn’t in my dungeon, was she? I glanced around. Nope.

“You found Minya?” Dale seemed very confused. I ignored him, focusing very hard on bypassing him and only talking to Minya.

<Can you hear me?> I carefully called into the ether.

“I can!” Minya spoke excitedly. “Let’s test the range of this. We will start really far away, I’m on my way to the portal now.”

<Great!> I was really lucky to have such a good person bonded to me. I shot a glare at Dale and directed a few more Cats toward his direction. I returned to my osmium and started playing with it. A beautiful metal, it had originally been a blue, shiny material. Now, it was dark green and gave off an earthy, brutal feel. I made a bit of it as rewards and rare finds for miners, just to see their reactions to it. Was this something useful or known to others? I had to know!

On that note, I was struck by a sudden idea. <Minya, are there elemental weapons out there? Legendary materials, anything like that?>

“I can still hear you! This is excellent! Could you hear me before you tried to talk to me? Can you hear me now?” She seemed happy. Good. Happy meant safe.

<Not before, but I can now. Must be a thing I need to initiate…> I called back. I also could ‘feel’ her general location. She was far, far away to the east.

“Legendary metals or weapons… hmm.” She thought for a bit and got back to me, “Well, different factions have something that they use in their own way. Humans discovered that opals could enhance infernal essence collection. Elves use some kind of glass that they refuse to share the recipe of, which does something they won’t share.”

<Useful,> I scoffed with great annoyance.

“Right? Hmm, Dwarves use Mithril when they can get it but have something they use in their furnaces that makes them hotter than any other kind of furnace. Maybe that is worth looking into? Orcs have a weapon they revere that is green, like really shiny, old copper, and–”

<Wait, green? Shiny?> That sounded familiar.

“Yes, it is called ‘Orichalcum’. We call it ‘mountain copper’ usually because we can only get it off their corpses, and they come from mountainous areas. It is pretty rare.”

<I see. Go on!> I had made orichalcum, it seemed.

“The church leaders all seem to wear some kind of golden artifact. I don’t know if it is actually gold or not. I think it is just for show, but somehow, they are always stronger than others around them. I think there must be more, but I can’t seem to think of any others right now,” Minya finished her stray thoughts. I thanked her and moved on with my experiments.

I would keep on with my research, but as I was underground, it was important to get the osmium spread through the dungeon. There was a lot of earth corruption generated each day, and if I didn’t collect it, the taint would get as dense as the Essence in the air. No one wanted that.

The tendrils of osmium flowed out from my Core room, slowly grinding through the rock. It took almost a full day, but at the end, I had veins of the material for the corruption to flow through. I opened the veins up to the air, and quickly, it was easier for everything in the dungeon to breathe. The lower levels were much more affected by the change, and I was getting a steady stream of the corruption delivered.

Feeling better about my life decisions, I decided that it was time to create the Boss of the fifth floor. The fourth floor was getting much more dangerous, but I wanted the fifth to be terrifying for even those that came prepared. To that end, I started making monsters. I had absorbed the vials of blood Minya had brought me and needed to create the creature they correlated to. Realistically, I was unsure what they would turn out to be. I knew their names and capabilities, but what about their personalities or habits?

Soon, I had a swarm of various creatures I had never seen before. I quickly eliminated all of the herbivores and non-predatory species and was soon left with only a few options to choose from. I had my Cats wipe them all out and started trying to create combinations. I looked, measured, and tested, often having to call in a few Mobs to destroy the failures. I literally could not let them live if they were imperfect in their pattern. My law was absolute about this, and it seemed to have a strong obsessive need to always be correct. At the end of my experiments, I had a single monster that was entirely unified in its purpose and design. It was beautiful.

All that was left was to design the arena it would use for battle. I already had a circular room, so I made it utterly flat. As a defensive advantage for my Boss, I added tunnels under the floor. They were long and curved, with one entrance per exit. I tried to think of anything else I could add in to help him out, but looking at his towering, imposing form made me shrug. He really didn’t need a greater advantage. A bit of poison dripped to the floor from my Beast’s mouth, pitting the rock as the acidic toxins came in contact with it. Yeah, this guy was ready. He was all sorts of set.

Since I was done with what needed to be done, I took the time to create some distractions and cosmetic changes on my new floor. There were levers in the room that would open windows in the ceiling, allowing daylight to pour in from above. Along the roof and halfway down to the ground, I made a mirrored surface that increased the brightness of the room a hundred fold—but only if the lever was pulled and the light was allowed to enter through the crystal windows above.

The extra light could be helpful, in theory, but it would hamper the people using it more than they would realize. The room was filled with fog, not steam, and the light would make it very difficult to see through. I still expected the lever to be pulled, simply as a natural response to, well, a lever existing. Most people will pull an unknown lever or push a random button, just to see what happens. Even if they knew what it did, there was a good chance of it being used. Humans prefer light, even if they had been in a dark dungeon all day and it would destroy their night vision.

They would likely also think it would help them destroy the Boss, and this could distract them from actually fighting. My new Beast was waiting hungrily for challengers, so after a few finishing touches, I created the stairway. The fifth floor was open for business.

Minion of The Master

Stepping into this frozen mountain air was disgusting to the bronze-skinned man from the southern isles. He looked around at the people cheerfully moving around and crossed his arms. Someone walked into him, causing him to stumble and glare at the boorish man who had done the unthinkable atrocity of touching him.

The filthy man that had run into him turned. “Get outta the way, ya stupid shit. Standing at the exit to the portal like a fishy! Never seen a portal before? Need a hand getting up? Do you have any raspberries? Look at that, it's a male. Wouldn’t have guessed it with the hair and purty face!” The flow of words slowed as the man squinted at him through ragged, matted hair.

“Oh, a necromancer, eh? Well, good for you. Not too many people these days are willing to do things the hard way! I hope you aren’t planning to do anything stupid. Though I suppose if you decided to cultivate in an ‘illegal’ manner, you wouldn’t be as stupid and ridiculous as to go to a place swarming with cultivators. Have fun, youngster. Don’t do anything I wouldn’t!”

The bronze-skinned man watched in horror as the filthy—old?—man walked away from him, intermittently skipping and humming. How had he been able to see that he was a necromancer? Only his cultivation ranking should have been noticeable, but as an A-ranked summoner, he had long ago been able to hide his affinity. He began to worry that this was an ill-fated mission, but as the rest of his people started coming through the portal, his resolve solidified as he issued orders. The Master’s commands would be followed.

A few minutes after the necromancers moved off into the town, the portal shimmered again, and an agitated, regal looking man stepped through. He looked around carefully, the twin swords on his back swaying gently in the wind, creating a slight chiming sound. Sighing, he turned toward the portal attendant.

“Pardon me, child. Have you perchance seen a greasy, old pervert come through here?” The unkind words didn’t match up with his mellow voice.

The attendant didn’t look up from his ledger. “My job is to monitor outgoing, not incoming. If you have a question or complaint, please feel free to contact the department of magical vergence located at the Portal Guild in the capital–”

“I get it, you aren’t going to be useful.” The man began to walk away gracefully, his every movement flowing and screaming that a master of the sword had appeared.

The attendant finally looked up from his book over a minute later. “Hey, there’s no call to be rude.” He blinked owlishly as he noticed no one was around. “Ugh.”

Chapter Twenty-three

“…and that is why it is so important for you to stabilize your cultivation after increasing in ranking. Your body can and will break down. Burnout is a real possibility.” Craig was just finishing his most recent lecture of Essence usage. “One that you seem to be avoiding, but by the look of you, it will start tearing you apart pretty soon if you continue at this pace.”

“But burnout is just the temporary damage of your meridians, is it not?” Dale questioned. “If you use too much or absorb too much, it just means you need to take it easy for a while afterward. Like catching a cold.”

Craig looked thoughtful. Pondering the answer he should give his student, he stroked his chin. “Well, initially that may be true, but I believe you need to think of it in a slightly different way. For example, if you build a sturdy wall and a chunk of it is smashed out, you can repair it, correct?”

“Yes. Fairly easily, too, I assume.” Dale nodded along as he re-read his most recent notes.

“Now, say that you keep putting holes in that wall and slowly patching it,” Craig continued, knowing that he had Dale hooked with this parable. “Wherever you have many patches, the overall wall becomes weak. Now, say you have patches all over the place and you take a solid hit to the wall. What happens? The entire wall crumbles, no longer able to support itself. That is real burnout, the total collapse of your meridians. Burnout is something everyone under the Mage ranks is fighting against, and it is a race against time.”

“Because reaching the Mage ranks fixes your meridians to their original perfection?” Dale inserted a question while furiously scribbling fresh notes.

“It does. Also, it is normally a very slow race, since it takes decades to enter the Mage ranks. When done by following the standard practices, anyway.” His voice was getting quite pointed, which Dale didn’t fail to notice as he wrote. Though he would prefer to have the lad looking at him while they talked, Craig was pleased to have such an attentive student. “The fewer ‘patches’ that Mana needs to fix, the higher your overall strength and control will be to start with. This is why people getting into the Mage ranks very young is cause for them to be celebrated as geniuses and massive talents. A very young Mage and a very old Mage are things to be afraid of.”

“The young because he is very skilled, and the old because an elderly looking Mage is exceedingly powerful?” Dale was continuing to write rapidly as he asked this.

“Correct.” Craig smiled warmly. “I think that is all for tonight. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“I have more questions!” Dale protested anxiously, finally looking up from his paper.

Craig shook his head. “We have time. If you progress correctly, you are essentially immortal. Take your time. Really learn what you are taught. Maybe take a vacation, as well.”

Dale sighed and stood up. He bowed, thanked Craig, and left the small room they had been occupying. His mind was in disarray as new ideas whirled around his brain. He wanted to find a quiet place to look at his meridians, which had been forcibly opened. How long did he have before he burned out like Craig was talking about? If he did, would the dungeon be able to fix him?

A splashing sound jarred him from his thoughts as he took a step. A puddle? No way, it was the middle of winter. Puddles didn’t happen naturally this time of year. He grimaced and kicked his shoe, trying to stop his feet from getting soaked. As he did so, a very familiar smell assaulted his nostrils. The coppery tang of blood. Instantly, Dale was on high alert. He wanted to shout a warning to the town, but he didn’t know what kind of enemy they were facing. Dale looked around, seeing no one standing. He peeked around the corner and found the source of the blood. A trio of Dark Elves were unceremoniously piled together, chunks of flesh torn out of them.

“The dungeon must have let out a swarm!” Dale thought in fury. He started to shout but stopped at the last second. “Wait… Dark Elves are almost all at least at the Mage ranking… and if not, there will always be at least one Mage in their squads. It can’t have been the dungeon.” He quickly spun around, hurrying back to the room he had been studying in with Craig.

Craig was already gone, having found an egress in the opposite direction. Dale hurried down the hallway, frustrated at his uselessness. He was in the newest building in the city, a town hall that was built to host negotiations and delegations. There were rooms for meetings and for sleeping quarters. Right now there were only a few people living in the building, so it was mostly empty. Where was everyone? It was so quiet. Too quiet. His instincts suddenly screamed a warning, and he dove forward, rolling away.

He jumped to his feet and looked around. Nothing there. It was just his imagination. Dale took a few deep breaths and broke into a run, scurrying toward the front entryway. He threw open the door, revealing a scene straight from a nightmare. Screaming cultivators ran through the streets, either toward battle or away from it. The sky was clear tonight, and the moon cast a ghastly glow on the city. Fresh blood was flowing downhill as a horde of undead marched the streets.

A flash of fire ignited the walking corpses, burning them terribly. All this did was throw ash in the air and create charred, walking skeletons. The flames were not intense enough to incinerate the group of bodies completely, so only the weak, leading edge was affected. The shambling zombies that had their flesh removed in this manner were suddenly able to move much more nimbly, clattering along the road. Using their bones as their weapons, they stabbed at any available target. Groups of cultivators worked together, now trying to dismantle or pulverize the animated dead.

Any cultivator that fell didn’t get a chance to rest peacefully, as they were soon inhabited and worn as a carapace for an infernal soul. The cultivators were losing and losing badly. The reason for this was abundantly clear; the entire battle was absolutely silent. Someone had obviously used a powerful technique or incantation to block sound from traveling. Because of this, there were far too few defenders showing up. They trickled into the fight one by one, and because of this, they were rolled over and assimilated into the attacking force.

Dale was furious. He ran as fast as he could toward the Guild area, noticing that there seemed to be a barricade of the dead preventing people from getting into the entrance, and the new wall around the Guildhall made other entry points nonexistent. If he had to guess, no one in the central Guild had been informed of—or noticed—what was going on in the rest of the town. Stupid shutters on windows! Why hadn’t he just forced everyone to stay in tents?

He looked for any way that he could get into the area, and his eyes landed on the church. For the first time, he was happy that Father Richard had built such a grandiose building. Dale raced to the church, finding that there was a similar series of undead blocking the entrances. Luckily, they had not done more than cluster around the main door yet. He ran at the wall, hidden from the view of any undead, and focused on his Essence. With a rapid series of movements, he released his Chi as an attack. With a soundless explosion, the wall in front of him shattered—well… a small hole appeared, just large enough for him to squeeze through in a very undignified manner.

A cleric ran up as Dale stood, dust covering him. “Are you out of your mind?” The cleric blustered at the dust-covered man. “Father Richard paid a fortune to have those walls made and reinforced! You are coming with me right now to get held accountable for your actions!”

“You want me to go with you to Father Richard?” Dale stopped his current plan to just start shouting and looked at the red-faced cleric. “Is he in here?”

“Of course he is! And yes, you are coming, whether you want to or not!” The cleric was literally hopping mad. “Follow!”

Dale started jogging, making the cleric sputter as he tried to match the pace and lead the way. “Hmph! Well! At least you are in a hurry to make amends!”

Dale wanted to grin, but the situation was grim. He held his tongue until the cleric began pounding on a door. Father Richard opened it almost instantly, though there was no way he had been standing near it. “Yes?” he asked the cleric respectfully, knowing that he wouldn't be interrupted without a good reason.

“Father Richard, this man–” the cleric began, instantly being cut off by Dale.

“Father! The city is under attack by the undead. We need to alert the Guild and launch a counter attack!” Dale shouted over the now-white-faced cleric.

“Are you joking…? Of course you aren’t.” Father Richard stepped into the hall. He looked at the cleric. “Good job getting him here quickly. Go alert the remaining chosen. It is time to fulfill our duty and protect our flock.”

Dale and Richard ran toward the arena where the clerics would begin gathering. They ran to the top of the arena wall, jumping to the edge to look at the bloody scene. Father Richard looked grim. “I can destroy the majority of these easily, but there must be an A-ranked summoner here. Look.” He pointed at the mountainous abominations. “Those are actually a swarm of bodies, a huge mound of fused flesh. Only High Summoners can control them—barely—and they are moving easily. This is someone powerful. I don’t see any behemoths, but these abominations will be more than enough to wipe out this city if we don’t act soon.”

“What should I do?” Dale began warming up, preparing to fight his way to the Guild.

“Hide like a scared little Forest Elf?” Father Richard suggested offhandedly. “Dale, I am serious. You don’t seem to understand the difference in power here. You’ve been defeating enemies you should not be able to and surviving situations you shouldn’t have. That won’t happen if you try to fight these things. You need to go find a defendable place, take others of similar ranking with you, and hope that the monsters outside don’t look for you too hard.”

“I can help!” Dale insisted, shocked that he had been told to flee like a coward.

Richard looked at him angrily. “Boy, I think you need another lesson. I am an A-ranked Mage. Let me show you what we are up against. What you are volunteering to go fight.”

Father Richard looked out at the gathered undead and began to chant in a sonorous voice. The first syllable that fell from his lips made the air shake, “And in Thy loving kindness, cut off mine enemies and destroy all those who afflict mine soul; for I am Thy servant.” As he chanted, it seemed that dawn had come. The heavens lit up, and the stars dimmed to indiscernibility. “For Thou doth connect all things, and all things are connected to Thee. By the power Thou hast imparted upon me, reduce all things unnatural to their unbound form, that they may be returned to the earth to be used in Thine works.”

Dale had blood dripping from his eyes as he struggled to stay conscious. The air was thrumming with accumulated power, and what sounded like a great blast from a horn was heard throughout the city. All of the undead in sight were torn apart as celestial Mana ravaged them. They began falling into piles of meat or dust, depending on their original state. Whatever had been sealing sound was broken, and screaming was soon filling the night. Wounded were everywhere, and the celestial attack had not been perfectly targeted, damaging many that were not undead. Not just a few were bleeding from their ears, and survivors of the night caught in the vibrations would be urinating blood for at least a week.

“That seemed to work,” Dale quipped when he was again able to speak. Richard shot him an uncharacteristic glare.

“Think so? Take another look.” The priest gestured at the largest mounds of flesh as the abominations began shifting and reconfiguring into mobile forms. The piles of destroyed undead around the mounds flowed into them, and the formless masses rose higher and stronger than before. One of them grasped its arm, tearing it off and throwing it into an area where many dead people were strewn about. The arm landed and swiftly expanded, covering the bodies and forming into a small, new abomination.

“…So where would you like me to hide? Who should I bring with me?” Dale turned toward the now-smirking priest.

“I am sure that the necromancers are in the dungeon by this point. The open rooms and even the fortifications will be useless. I want you to get everyone into the fourth floor, find an out of the way tunnel, and bunker down. Your only hope is that they ignore you in favor of whatever they are after. Now that the Guild is alerted,” indeed, the Guild was now moving like a kicked anthill, “we will soon have several Mages on their way. We have me, Frank, Chandra, and Amber for certain. We may have more in the way of Dark Elves, but it is unlikely that any of them could challenge an A-ranker.”

“Can Frank challenge an A-ranker?” Dale was surprised. Frank was well-known to be in the B-ranks. His hopes for an easy victory were crushed.

“Doubtful. But if there are A-ranks, there are certainly subordinate B-rankers as well. All of our Mages will be needed tonight, I’m afraid,” Richard finished heavily, jabbing a finger toward the door. “Now go!”

Dale rushed down to the gathered clerics and began to relay Richard's orders. Soon they were all moving to the fourth floor of the dungeon as Dale held the portal open for them.

Chapter Twenty-four

I knew they were Necromancers almost as soon as they walked in. Their auras stank of death and fear. Also, they soon began throwing around infernal Essence. It didn’t help their case when they brought a Basher back to life, either. I glared at them as they walked along my tunnels, using the poor bunny to set off each trap in their way.

“Too bad we had to lay low. I’d love to be there when the ranks are ‘bolstered’.” One of the reeking men giggled at whatever twisted thoughts were niggling along his puny mind. “Gonna need a lot of ‘em to finish off the Lion Kingdom.”

“Not really. They are so weak from that mushroom plague that they are on the verge of collapse already,” another commented, making me annoyed. I get it, I did something dumb. “I bet we could finish the Lion off with one solid attack.”

The Mage in their group spoke suddenly, making the others flinch at the venom in his tone, “Rushing ahead is what got us into this mess! First the lost war and now a mere ten years after what happened with Kantor, where we found the key to victory, you want to rush again?”

What the abyss? Kantor? What did they do to Kantor? How did they do something to Kantor? I was sucked into the conversation, listening raptly, even while boosting the traps and outfitting the Goblins with better gear. Even my Cats were getting a bit of armor on them. The Bobs were frantically drawing Runes and preparing for a full-scale war against the five men. I started pulling out the weapon we designed after the terrifying greasy man threatened me.

“It isn’t about rushing, per se,” the first invader wheedled. “It’s more… getting a nice place in society while young enough to enjoy it! We’ve been on the outskirts for so long, pushed down whenever we got close to respect. I think it is time we got ours! Got our chance to be on top!” The other C-rankers grinned and nodded along with the impromptu speech.

The Mage had a look of fury on his face. In a fit of anger, he swung his fist and reduced a Basher to a shower of gore. “You fools,” he breathed softly. “What have you done to earn a place in society? You self-righteous, entitled little shits. Have you learned nothing from The Master? You think that we are here to play at being better than others, to lord our victory over them? That when we inevitably win, we are going to be the oppressors? Fools.” He cursed loudly and marched past them.

“Well, then, what’s the abyssal point?” the ornery speaker broke in. “Why bother with all of this?”

“Why indeed.” The Mage looked over coldly. “Since you seem to have forgotten, I’ll make sure The Master gives you a refresher course.”

“Hey, hey. No need for any of that! I’m just making conversation!” The man had broken out in a sweat now. Apparently, this ‘Master’ was a scary fellow.

“Let’s get the job done, and we will talk more about this later.” The Mage groaned. “I hate people.”

“You know you love us.”

The Mage seemed to have a permanent scowl by this point. “I’d sell you to a demon for a copper.”

“That’s cold, boss-man.”

“So is the abyss. Wanna visit?” The Mage had a bit of a smirk now.

“Hey, now. I’ve been at that lecture. The abyss isn’t cold; it isn’t anything. It just… is.”

“I thought that was the void?”

“Oh dang. Yeah, you’re right.”

They eventually made it to the second floor, not stopping for treasure or going out of their way to look for other things of interest. This told me that they could only be here for one thing. Me. I wasn’t sure why or what they were planning to do with me, but I needed to make sure they failed.

<Bob, abandon all other forts and make for the Boss area. We are going to be having a Goblin's last stand,> I ordered each of the Bobs. <Hurry. Make sure everyone gets going.>

They looked up in surprise. One of them asked the question they were all dying to know. “Are you going to let us use… it?”

<Oh, you know it, Bob-oh. I’ve been opening its box since these necromancers entered the dungeon.> They could hear the glee in my voice, even though it was a serious situation. I began preparations, and an entire section of the wall moved to the side, revealing a huge, pointed opal. <You know what to do. Get it ready.>

This was one of the ‘last resort’ weapons that had been suggested by the Goblins after some of the changes we had been able to make in the dungeon. An oversized opal on a pedestal didn’t sound particularly frightening, but this was a weapon based off of Bob’s staff. While it wasn’t nearly as quickly accessible and couldn’t be used in standard combat, if used correctly it would be worth the wait. It took quite a while to charge the Runes that would send Essence into the Opal, so I hoped that it would be ready in time. The necromantic Mage walked into the room containing Raile, sighing as the massive Mob rushed him. With a simple backhand, Raile was dead, brain splattered along the inside of his armor.

<We don’t have much time. They aren't sprinting, but they are moving at a steady pace. Five minutes until they are at the base of the stairs,> I informed the oddly calm Bobs. <I’m setting out a target for you to aim for. This way we can test the effectiveness of the taunt Runes as well. I can’t guarantee they will be standing in the perfect spot, but by the abyss, I can try!>

“Target point acknowledged! Charging now, Great Spirit!” The first Bob to make it to the opal began pouring infernal Essence into the wooden frame holding the gemstone in place. The Runes in the wood began to activate, directing the Essence to create a single-use charge. The frame began vibrating as the flow ran unchecked and would explode eventually if it had to store the Essence for a long period of time. If all went according to my plan, they would be using the charge well before that point. More Bobs began arriving, and the flow of Essence into the Runes increased and stabilized. Some were activating the wind-based Essence receptacles, and the combined power began to fuse together in the opal.

<This is a serious threat, so I will help directly as long as I am able.> The Bobs were startled as an Assimilator floated up to them. Reaching out with a tendril of its overgrown jellyfish body, it began firing a focused stream of Essence into the Rune. With my direct help, the charging process became much faster.

The Necromancers stepped into the third floor, groaning when they saw the size of it. The Mage shushed them. “At least we don’t need to wander around tunnels like a bunch of morons. It’s an open room. The exit is in sight. Walk. Your legs aren’t for show.”

<Yoo-hoo!> I called, knowing they couldn’t hear me. At the same time, a Rune on an armored Basher began to glow intensely. <Over here, boys! Take a gander at that pretty accumulation of everything you hate! What a pretty little taunt Rune!>

The ‘taunt’ Rune on the poor Basher utterly captivated the C-rankers, but the Mage only looked at it and frowned in consternation. The C-rankers sprinted forward in a brutal rage and began pummeling the rabbit into the ground with earth-shaking force. Only the inherent durability of the Rune kept the floor the Mob was now splattered across from breaking immediately, but it would not last long against this level of power.

I gave the order to the Bobs, <Targets in range! Specified point of aim is focused! They are being held in place. Commence attack.>

“Runes prepared! Essence levels critical! Clear the area!” Bob ‘one’ spoke.

“Back blast area clear!” Bob ‘two’ announced as Goblins dove away from the pedestal. “Go, go, go!”

The opal discharged. A ray of darkness raced in a straight line across the floor, spiraling as it did so. This bolt flew at the speed of darkness, and there should have been no possible way to dodge if you weren’t already in the process of doing so. This Mage though… he was something else. He plucked at the empty air, and his motion somehow scattered the C-rankers like they had been hit in the chest. Only one of them was still in the path of the attack, and the hissing darkness passed through the unfortunate man without slowing.

The beam reached the opposite wall and silently vanished before the man even hit the ground. There was no mark on him, nothing to show how he had been killed. The others gathered around, looking at the dead man. I watched as well, fascinated by the effects of my previously untested weapon. The Mage inspected the carcass and shook his head. “A direct assault on the soul. It was… ripped out of him whole! Genius! We should look for the means behind this after we complete the job.”

The others looked at him in horror. “He’s dead, you bastard! You’ve known him for years. How can you be so cold?”

The Mage looked confused. “What are you talking about? Death is what we do.” He made a motion, and a flow of Mana went into the corpse. An outpouring of Essence cascaded from the body, and it hopped lightly to its feet.

“Hmm.” The undead man looked at his hands. “Very nice. Clean. No need to fight for the possession but somehow incredibly fresh. No rot at all.” The body looked at the Mage with a smile, its eyes now completely black. “Thank you, Master, what a thoughtful gift.”

“Yes, well. We have determined that this dungeon is using a new weapon that launches a direct soul-tearing attack. I needed another Mage-ranked creature here; these C-rankers are not cutting it.” The Mage looked askance at the men on his team.

“Hey, hey, that is not fair, boss!” The surviving C-rankers were looking at the demon-inhabited man that was staring at them hungrily. “We are… useful.”

“Let’s find out who is more useful?” The demon had an unnaturally wide grin on its face. “If you are less useful than I am, at least promise to let us use your bodies when I tear you apart. I’m going to go kill everything on this floor, ‘kay?” The C-rankers went white-faced as the demon sprinted off toward the clustered Goblins.

<Oof, looks like they were sent here as fodder for the Mage’s spells. Yikes, that’s harsh! Bobs, you all have incoming. Get the opal tucked away; there won’t be another chance to use it. They are moving too fast now, and they are alerted,> I warned as the demon began approaching speedily.

“Runes are ready,” Bob seemed nervous but was keeping it together nicely. Maybe I’d give him a raise. To the next ranking. They don’t use money. The Bobs were chanting, and with a final push, a surprisingly large number of wraiths appeared. “Go, slay the invaders!” Bob ordered the pack of wraiths. They began drifting towards the demon.

The Goblins arranged themselves into formations, getting ready to defend themselves. <Bob, do we have any more of those hollow armor guys?> I wondered aloud.

“Sadly, no. They were all destroyed in the first few days, and I have been unable to lure more people into the needed ritual-trap,” Bob answered with tension evident in his voice.

<I understand. I can’t seem to make them, as they require an infernal soul. They don’t really die, they just kinda go ‘poof’ and vanish into the abyss,> I lamented. <If they weren’t so useful, I’d call them a waste of Essence.>

Bob looked around, a bit uncomfortable. “Is this the best time to be discussing this?”

<No, probably not. I’ll join this fight, by the way. I’m pulling out the Goblin Amazon.> I really didn’t want to, but desperate times…

“Oh, really?!” Bob seemed elated. “That will be excellent! Oh… I know that must be hard to do…”

<Just stop, Bob. I know I won’t be as good at controlling it as Dani, but I need to work to save myself. I…> I fell silent. Dani was captured because she was in the Goblin Queen’s body. She was amazing, being able to hop into a body and use it perfectly. Comparatively, I was only decent at controlling it. I had not bothered to create another since she was gone, leaving a gaping hole in my defenses. No floor Boss, no real struggle to get to the next floor. A coffin-like object rose from the floor, swinging open to show an immobile body. I poured celestial Essence into the aluminum armor it was wearing, transforming it into a powerful weapon against the infernal. A box appeared from the floor next to the Amazon, holding my swords and a large amount of demon-banishing weapons.

These weapons were quickly handed out. Now, all we needed to do was land a single attack and the demon would be banished, using its own power to accomplish the task. I took direct control of the Amazon, opened my eyes, and stepped into the courtyard. There was golden light reflecting from my armor, and my swords shifted to a golden hue. I took a few exploratory swings, jumped in place, and did a few stretches.

“Alright, let’s do this.” My voice startled me; I was unused to my words causing vibrations in the air. I was also not used to the feminine vocal cords. “Words! Words. Speaking is fun. Words.”

Bob seemed concerned. “Are… you okay?”

“Yes. Ye-es. Words are fun to say.” Gah! I bit my tongue! The demon hopped over the wall at that point, a disconcerting smile on its face.

“Hellooo.” He waved at the assembled Goblins. “If you would hold still, this will be much easier. No less painful though.” The possessed body charged forward, weaving between a storm of arrows. Not a single one touched him as inhuman contortions allowed his body to move out of the way of each shot. I heard his bones snapping as he bent backward, his spine unable to take the abuse. He started laughing and continued to do so, irrespective of the normal human need for air.

The Goblin Berserkers charged forward as a wave and began shrieking in glee as their weapons began to find the mark. The demon was fast, but a dozen weapons swinging at it was near impossible to avoid at the speeds it could muster. The demon’s face twisted into a scowl as its bones snapped from the pressure.

“I just got this body! If anyone is tearing it apart, it’s me! Back off!” The demon punctuated his sentence by swinging at the Berserkers, bones elongating from its hands. The bones burst into a flame I knew well—hellfire. A few of my advanced Bashers had the same flame coating their horns. His claws sliced through the minimal armor the Berserkers had been convinced to wear, leaving long gashes that continued to burn. The flames quickly spread, ravaging their bodies as they continued to throw themselves at the demon. Bones shattered under their blows, and as the last Berserker fell, the demon dropped to the floor.

Legs twisted into highly damaged shapes, the demon sprinted forward on its hands. Like a sick jester, it wrenched and contorted its body. Bones that had been poking through the skin became weapons as the demon swung the mangled limbs into my Goblins. The possessed body began laughing as my Mobs fell, somehow killing them though its own form was being pulverized.

“Just banish it already!” I barked in exasperation. “Why are you using blunt weapons? Stab!” We had just talked about this!

A warrior Goblin jumped forward at my order, his new war pick catching the demon in the chest. The residual momentum slapped the body to the ground, pinning it in place as the Runes on the pick activated. A wash of fire spread from the point of impact, and the demon looked at me in fury, unable to move as its power was drained to fuel the Runes.

“No! No! You made a big mistake, dungeon,” the demon furiously hissed, all pretense of humanity gone. “Before, I was only under orders to capture you. When I get back here, I will torture your soul for eternity.”

“Shoo.” I waved off the threat as the thing collapsed into itself, flakes of burnt skin were soon all that remained. I directed my aura to begin absorbing all of the bodies of my fallen Goblins, didn’t want to leave anything here for the incoming necromancers to use, after all. Speaking of… “Here they come!”

The Goblins that had relaxed after seeing the demon fall became the first casualties. They were easy prey for the invaders and potential bodies to be possessed. Bob and the others quickly began a counter-attack but were greatly outmatched. The black bolts of Essence from the Bobs’ staffs seemed to vanish as they approached the Mage, though not always perfectly. The bolts that did make it to the Mage seemed to do no damage, and he simply strolled through the other attacks. That ‘near physical immunity’ feature was beginning to piss me right off. The other Goblins were having better luck against the C-ranked invaders, but all of the wounds inflicted were superficial. We were completely outmatched in terms of raw power. Time for me to join the fight.

I pushed my new body to the absolute limits, screaming through the air at the Mage. There was a brilliant line of light along the edge of my weapon, and as I swung, I pushed a touch of Mana into my sword. Since I had waited to add Mana, the Mage had been ignoring my attack. His reaction time was insane and was also the only thing that saved him from being sheared in half. He created a shield of infernal Mana right where the sword was set to impact, but the power of my attack sent him flying across the room. The forced interaction of celestial and infernal created a dazzling light show of chaos, for a moment blinding and confusing anyone who saw it. He hit the wall hard enough to crack the reinforced stone and dropped to the floor coughing blood.

“Oh, really?” The Mage stood up, smirking. Great. That was always a good sign. He strode forward, then turned into a blur of speed. He kicked, and I managed to get my swords in the path of his attack, but it was a feint. His fist snapped out, crushing my C-ranked Goblin head. Just like that, I was simply a part of the dungeon again. A spectator. Drat.

I would need to form a body and forge it with Mana if I wanted to be able to directly interact on this level. I watched dispassionately as my Goblins were systematically butchered. I was unable to help them right now, though they would be back soon.

“Hey, boss-man. Look at this.” One of the C-rankers held up Bob’s staff. “Looks like a cylinder of opal surrounded by aspen! This thing is a relic! If we got a good Inscriber to work some Runes into it, our Incantations could be boosted to almost triple the power for half the cost!”

Yikes. If he was that excited about the staff, I was even happier that the infernal soul-ripper had been returned to its underground armory.

The Mage seemed passingly interested, but the other C-rankers were so excited that only a stern warning kept them from abandoning the mission they were on in favor of better equipment. They stepped into the stairwell and descended to the fourth floor.

Chapter Twenty-five

Dale stepped into the dungeon, allowing the portal to close behind him. The walls and floor this deep underground were tremoring slightly as the powers above began to throw around vast concentrations of Mana. Dale took a deep breath, looking at the four doors ahead of him. Which one would be the easiest to defend? To barricade themselves in? The ‘fire’ hall was no good; with over a dozen clerics, there was no way they would be able to move as a group to get past the torrents of flame. He didn’t trust their judgment in a high-stress environment like that. Someone would panic, and Father Richard would blame him.

Making his choice, Dale took a deep breath and gave an order, “Come on, through this door.” He stepped forward, crossing the threshold for the ‘earth’ tunnel. If he was going to be trying to protect someone, Dale wanted to do it in an area where he was most comfortable with the element at hand. The group walked behind him, nervous and jumpy. The majority of them were in the F or D-ranks with only one C-rank to act as a mentor to them. They should not be on this level, and at any other time, they would have likely been picked off very quickly.

My attention flicked on to them just long enough to see Dale. Then I focused my ire on the other invaders. Dale’s group was lucky though. If the situation were any less dire for me, I would concentrate all my efforts on destroying such a large group. But… not now. The main focus for this evening was the necromancers, and I needed all of my creatures to be focused on ending them. That didn’t mean my exceedingly deadly traps were just going to let the assorted people pass, of course.

“Stop!” Dale called suddenly. “That area is dangerous, go around it.”

“What are you talking about?” The cleric mentor scoffed, making a sweeping at the tunnel. “There’s nothing there.”

Dale agreed with him. “Exactly. It is clean. Too clean. There are small marks all over the place from the Mobs down here, but there is a circle on the ground here without a single scuff or imperfection. It’s screaming ‘trap’ to me.”

The cleric looked at the space and sighed. “I really hope that there was a good reason for Father to put you in charge. I am not used to this… this… dungeon diving, so I am going to trust your and Father’s judgment. Our lives are in your hands, Baron Dale.” The cleric helped Dale to direct the others around the potential trap, and they moved deeper.

Right about that time, the necromancers reached the fourth floor. A dozen Goblins were stumbling along with them, their eyes vacant and lifeless. They looked around and chose a path at random. Want to make a guess as to which tunnel they followed? Looks like Dale might have company soon. The Goblins started marching forward, a few feet between each one. Ugh. They are planning on using them to set off the traps. Necromancers are so annoying.

Dale’s group moved forward, skillfully avoiding traps and encountering almost no Mobs. They did have a few scares as assorted Cats sometimes ran past them, hissing at the group before moving on. The group reached a branching path and went to the left. Moving forward, the tunnel widened into a full room, and they all looked around in interest. There was a stone pedestal in the center of the room, but there seemed to be no exit. After the last person filed in, the entryway was quietly hidden by a sliding stone door.

Approaching the pedestal in a circuitous manner, Dale inspected it for traps. He was unsure how he felt being down here with all of these unknown people but was doubly responsible for them. One, because they came into the dungeon with him, and two, because they were residents of his town. He set his mind toward ensuring that they all survived the night. He got close enough to the pedestal to read the writing on it.

“You have entered the trials. Trial one: Carry your weight, and the rewards shall be great. Else; one for all.” He read aloud, catching everyone's attention. He kept reading as a stone slab unfolded itself from the pedestal. “A challenger appears. Will this end in victory or tears?”

“What is that supposed to mean?” A young cleric started panicking. Were my poems really that bad?

“The roof! It’s collapsing!”

Cal

I watched as the two groups closed in on each other. As expected, the necromancers were allowing their zombies to take the lead. I looked on as they started across the large trap that Dale had pointed out, laughing as a pillar of stone launched upward into the ceiling. I liked this trap. The pillar was about ten feet in diameter, and when a certain percentage of it was crossed, a reaction occurred underneath it, making a huge amount of pressure build. At the halfway point, the pressure was released, and the whole thing blasted upward. Eight Goblins were caught in the trap, and as it receded, a thick paste was all that remained of the once-three-dimensional Goblins. I winced at the sight; those were my Goblins. Though I was pleased with the effectiveness of the device, I still was upset about the desecration of their bodies. The necromancers would pay for this. Somehow.

With the trap disarmed, the group of men hurried along, silent and serious for the first time. That trap could have killed any of them except the Mage, and even he may have been slightly damaged. The zombies weren't allowed to shamble anymore, breaking into a light jog. Traps began to spring, all of them earth-themed to go with the path they chose. Spikes shot out of the walls, rocks fell, pits opened up, and acid sprayed! The last Goblin corpse collapsed, unable to sustain itself.

“Good thing we had those with us,” one of the men sneered and kicked the melting body out of his way. “Would have been a pain to go slow enough to move around those.” They walked up to where a fork in the path would have been, but the smooth wall in the left doorway forced them to the right. They walked into a room that was identical to the one Dale was in, sighing when they saw the pedestal.

“What do you think it will be?”

“Either the place will fill up with sand, the walls will close in, or the ceiling will slowly drop. Just like every other dungeon out there.”

“Hey, another piece of the poem on this rock just uncovered. It says: A challenger appears. Will this end in victory or tears?”

“Yup, there it goes. The roof is dropping. Why does this trap show up in practically every dungeon?”

The Mage interjected, “I’ll hold it up. Smash the wall where the exit should be.” The C-rankers pulled hammers and picks from their interspatial storage bags, one of them finding the exit by pushing a burst of necrotic Essence through the walls and finding empty space. These people… as much as I needed them to fail and die, I was impressed by their professionalism and flexibility in dangerous situations.

The men started swinging their tools, doing almost no damage to the walls. The walls had been built with a combination of corruption and Runes; they would need to be way stronger if they wanted to break my work. I was gloating to myself, watching the ineffectual attacks. The Mage held up a hand, the ceiling coming to rest on his palm. Seemingly bored, he simply held it in place as I increased the weight. I kept adding layers of stone on the top. This trap was designed to match the strength of the people in the room almost exactly, so I had created a way to reach that point! I started noting signs of strain on the Mage as I reached the ten-ton point. Both his hands were now being used, and he had adjusted into a much more solid stance.

“Yah need to hurry up, boys!” the Mage grunted through gritted teeth. “Starting to get annoyed over here.”

<Gonna do him in with a trap. Ironic and fitting.> I gave a self-satisfied sigh as I talked to Bob. <Bob? Oh, right, all of your iterations are dead…>

I glanced at the room Dale was in, silently applauding their tenacity. All of the clerics and Dale were working to hold up the ceiling, none of them diving for the little room off to the side that would deactivate the trap. I had created this trap to get rid of disloyal people, people who couldn’t be trusted. After the fiasco with The Collective—when the leader had joined Dale’s group and used them to get close enough to steal Dani—I had thought of this design. Anyone trying to save themselves and let their people die would instead end up saving them at the cost of their own life. To escape, all they needed to do was attempt to hold it up. Just long enough to almost collapse from exhaustion.

Of course, when two groups met and went into the rooms at roughly the same time, they would compete to have a winner. Losing team would be crushed. Of course, that was only if the game were fair. Right now… it wasn’t looking good. The necromancers were infusing huge amounts of Essence into their weapons, and with each swing, they pushed infernal taint into the Runes holding the stone together. The Runes were weakening, the Essence causing interruptions and damage to their structural integrity. Feeling they were getting close, the invaders shifted tactics.

One pulled out a strange weapon. It was an awl connected to a pickaxe shaft. The others exchanged their picks for hammers. The awl-man swung, chipping into the stone and holding in place. The next swung a hammer, driving the awl in deeper. The hammer dropped just in time for the next hammer to land. Each strike released Essence and drove the awl in.

“Just a little more!” the awl-man cried out. The hammers flew, fast and furious. A final blow shattered the Rune in the stone, creating a chain reaction of force. Half the wall exploded, the Runes detonating and odd shapes forming. Before anything could be resolved from the shadows, the Mage released a wall of black flames, incinerating any life that had been trying to form from the twisted paths in the air.

“Out! Out!” the Mage screeched, directing Mana around himself. His shadow seemed to drift forward, raising itself from the floor as it did so. In a moment, there was a pitch-black version of himself safely outside of the room. His form flickered, and he and the shadow exchanged places. The stone slammed to the ground, and the men cheered as dust rose around them. I frowned, also releasing the pressure on Dale’s group. Technically this team had lost, so Dale’s people were free to go.

A blast of hellfire roasted Snowball as he leaped from the concealing steams, making me grunt in annoyance.

The Mage’s team rushed onward, thinking their goal was in sight… and found a stairwell. “Those lying Guild bastards!” the Mage roared as he found the empty room. “This was supposed to be the end!”

“What do we do, boss?”

“We hurry up!” They rushed down the stairwell as Dale began to speak.

“Cal, I don’t know if you care, but there is an attack going on above us. Necromancers invaded and are killing people. I’m trying to protect these clerics, but I need to rescue more people. Will you help us?” Dale’s words echoed hollowly like he was not expecting to receive anything but scorn.

He deserved scorn. Dale was weak; he was lying on the ground trembling from exertion. He couldn’t fight these people, he couldn't inflict a bit of damage to them if he shattered his Core while hugging them! But. But, he wasn’t giving up. It was something.

<Dale, dig into that chest. I didn’t want to unveil this area because it isn’t finished yet, but I think it will serve a purpose tonight. I need to go. Don’t judge too harshly, or I won’t let you back into it later.>

Dale

He was so shocked that the dungeon had answered. Especially that it had answered nicely! Dale looked around, wincing as his torn muscles twitched in pain. There was the chest! He stood up, cycling Essence through his body to speed the healing process. The clerics were still on the ground, but the strongest among them were beginning to heal themselves, then the others. Dale opened the chest, pulling out only a keygem. He looked at it, confused. It was a soft pink color and didn’t match any of the others he had found to this point.

Dale felt a sudden relief, looking to the side to see a cleric working to fix his damaged body. The cleric suddenly grimaced and paled. “Ugh. You have a lot more damage than the last one. It goes so deep too… What have you been doing to yourself? This isn’t all from just now, some of it is beginning to scar. Good God, man!” He almost puked as Essence flowed out of him. “That’s all I can do for now. You need to get to the church after this is over. Have you been living on a diet of healing potions or something?”

“Thank you, either way,” Dale stated abruptly, shaking the cleric’s hand. “I feel better than I have in weeks! Let’s get moving.”

The entire group started walking, stepping into the heart of the maze. Dale looked around, expecting to see Snowball appearing from the steam. Noting a chunk of seared flesh and the acrid smell of burnt fur, Dale blanched. “They’re in here too…”

Looking around, he noticed that something was different. The Silverwood tree was gone! That meant… “The dungeon grew again. A new level?” He walked to the stairwell, inspecting it for a moment before turning to the portal. Dale held up the keygem, and a soft pink light matching the keygem emanated from the portal. Stepping through, his eyes widened, and he grinned.

“Get in here!” Dale ordered the clerics. They piled through, looking around with great interest. “I’m going back to the surface. I’m going to start sending people through as I find them, so get ready to take care of the wounded!”

The clerics nodded to him. Dale switched his keygem, stepping through the portal into hell on earth. An entire wall of the church had been shattered, exposing the arena to the natural and unnatural forces at play on the mountain. Wind laced with snow howled through the gap in the stone barrier, pushing some less balanced undead off of their feet as a layer of ice rapidly formed. A small crowd of people had collected in the arena, trying their best to hold off the ravenous dead. Dale called out to them, getting their attention at once.

“Start evacuating into the portal! I need someone to get over here and be in charge of keeping it open or closing it if we start to get overrun!” Dale ordered as loudly as he could, his voice just barely being heard over the wind and screams. The non-combatants charged at him, nearly trampling others in their rush to escape. Dale had to scream at them in order to be paid attention to, and they still dove through the portal like maniacs.

“Good to see you, Dale! Having a good night?” Hans’ cheeky voice cut through the hubbub. Dale turned to see him poking holes in the undead, his daggers punching through their spines and incapacitating the bodies. Then the remainder of Dale’s team would smash the skull, and the body would stop moving as gray matter leaked out.

“Two points of repair if the necromancer tries to raise the bodies again,” Hans explained as he caught Dale’s disgusted look. “It’d be better to burn them, but we don’t have that kind of time right now.”

Dale had to take a deep breath. “I cannot tell you all how much I missed you.”

The others rushed over and fell into formation. Hans snorted at Dale as he threw a dagger that seemed to ignore the wind. “No need to get all weepy! Are you going to break into song? Cry, perhaps?”

Dale studiously ignored him. “Has anyone else seen any survivors? Anyone at all that we can rescue?”

Tom spoke loudly, pretending not to be impacted by the cold, “There are pockets of resistance at the Guild, a few shops, and almost any building made of stone. That is, if they weren’t destroyed in the start of the fight.”

“We need to get to the shops first,” Adam demanded insistently. “They will have fewer fighters and a greater chance of being overrun, and we need to go now if we are going to have a chance at saving them.”

“Let’s go, then!” Rose turned and ran for the demolished wall. The others behind her caught up just as there was a break in the storm.

The area was littered with shambling bodies, and tree-tall abominations were moving, shaking the earth with each ponderous step. The Mages from the area were counter-attacking, the energy moving through the air hot enough to vaporize the falling precipitation. Mist was beginning to settle across the ground, further hindering visibility. One of the abominations screamed. Not in pain but fury.

It was surrounded by a huge wall of thorns, each of which was barbed and oversized. The thorns drove into the diseased flesh, grasping and refusing to let go. The abomination thrashed, tearing itself free but leaving huge tracts of tissue behind. It tried to reabsorb the flesh, only to find that it was trapped again. The brambles got thicker and denser until movement was impossible. An opportunistic Mage used this chance to light the brambles on fire and burned the abomination with unmatched heat.

The Mages were fighting the undead, but this was palliative; they were the symptom, not the true cause of the night’s horrors. While the most powerful members of the council were pausing the advance of the towering flesh, others were searching high and low for the necromancer acting as puppet master. Dale’s group ran across the open area, drawing the attention of many lesser undead. Han’s advice and tactics were followed exactingly when fighting the dead, and the party targeted the brain and the spine whenever the opportunity presented itself.

“Where are we going?” Tom shouted as he swung his warhammer in a half-moon arc. When he attacked something, there was no need to slow and finish the job. Usually, the upper half of what he hit would turn to a pulp, painting crimson whatever was behind his target.

Rose responded harshly, her voice damaged by the cold and yelling, “We’re going to Tyler’s store! It is doubly reinforced since they’ve been conducting experiments on things that explode!”

“They’ve what?” Dale yelled in shock, almost halting his attacks.

“Are you really surprised about that, Dale?” Adam laughed as Dale’s face contorted.

Rose continued, “I’m betting they’ve gathered as many people as they can and then barricaded themselves inside. Oh…” Rose trailed off as the group skid to a halt. Five necrotic Mages stood in front of them, almost as astonished as Dale’s group.

“What the…?” The dark Mage closest to them laughed. “Really? Volunteers! Excellent!”

A ripple of inky darkness sped toward Rose, who was standing in the front of the group. She yelped, twisting unsuccessfully to dodge out of the way. She squeezed her eyes shut… opening them in a moment when nothing began to hurt. Rose stared at the form before her. Golden white hair spilled down from the head, a body standing erect in a noble pose. What surprised her most were the twin sheaths hanging down the person's back. Rose took a step back to fully take in the view of the man who had saved her.

“Assaulting youngsters like this? Villains, your time has come. Justice has arrived!” The man raised his twin swords, their edges reflecting the necromancers’ wide eyes.

Chapter Twenty-six

“What kind of a cheesy line was that?” a dark Mage howled with laughter. “‘Justice has arrived’! Ha ha ha!”

The golden-haired man blushed slightly. “Your taunts only highlight thine craven nature. Answer two questions for me and thou shalt perish swiftly.”

“Sure, why not? We are only ransacking a city. We have time to visit.” The Mages laughed again as weapons were raised.

“It is much appreciated,” the man spoke peacefully. “Firstly, hast thou seen a disturbing, greasy, perverted old man?”

“We weren’t being serious. Get out of the… you know what? Why not.” The Mage seemed to deflate. “No, we haven’t seen anyone like that.”

“Secondly then, where is the person controlling yonder abominations? They must needs be held accountable for their despicable actions.” The swords were beginning to shine, garnering everyone's undivided attention.

The Mages ignored his words, throwing themselves forward. Mana rose like a wave, crashing down upon the golden man. A beam of light slashed the wall of darkness, and the man stepped through the resulting mephitis calmly.

Adam grabbed Dale, his eyes wide. He was trembling. “Dale. We need to leave. We need to leave now.”

“I agree, let’s slip away, and–” Dale started scooting backward.

“No!” Adam shouted, shaking him harder than his thin form should allow. “Run! Run now, all of you! There is only one person who that could be! That’s Kere Nolsen!”

Adam turned and started sprinting away, slipping once before scrambling to his feet. The others, bemused by his oddly changed personality but still trusting him implicitly, ran with him. Dale heard Kere speaking behind him. “Let the trial begin! I judge you as…”

Dale’s group had only made it a few meters when the world turned white. Not in the same way as an explosion, but as though all pigment had been drained away. Only shades of black and white remained. Every sound seemed to echo strangely, and Dale, concerned, looked at his friends. A scream slipped out of his lips as he did so.

Each of them had also been drained of color, leaving them looking flat. Only one color returned then. Black. The darkness crawled across them, leaving tracks like mud. For some reason, the hue was terrifying. Dale turned to Hans and nearly fainted. Hans was coated in black, with only his central being still shining with a flat white. He tried to avert his eyes, and his gaze landed upon a man dancing on the roof of a building.

This must be the person the golden man had been looking for. Dale didn’t know why or what it meant, but the man didn’t have a speck of black on him. He was stripping erotically though, prompting Dale to look away from him in shock. Dale’s eyes flashed back, trying to keep track of him, but the man was already gone.

“Guilty!” Kere announced, his words echoing across the desaturated space. “I can see the sins crawling up your back! Your soul craves redemption, but all I can offer… is justice!”

Dale looked over his shoulder as color seemed to return to the world. There was a small mushroom-shaped cloud of blood in the area behind them, where Kere had last been seen.

“Why did we run from that area?” Tom snarled as they approached Tyler’s shop. “We could have helped.”

Adam’s hands were shaking, his eyes still wide. “That was Cardinal Kere Nolsen, the High Inquisitor of the Holy Church, the man known as ‘The Slayer of Shades’. The single most terrifying embodiment of pure justice known to mankind. When he accesses his power, he needs to mete out punishments for your sins. He makes them visible to all around him so that everyone can see that justice is being done. There are no people that are immune to his influence. If he decides to give you a ‘trial’, like he just did with those necromancers, and you are found guilty… he erases you from the face of the planet.”

“Sounds like a really fun guy to have at a party,” Hans quipped, attempting to lighten the mood.

“He is very highly respected,” Adam tried to explain defensively. “He is the role model for a huge amount of clerics, myself included.”

“And yet… you run from him in terror,” Tom softly added his thoughts to the conversation.

Adam glanced at Hans. “Not all of us were as good in the past as we are now. If we have sin in our souls, it is visible during a ‘trial’.” Adam’s words made Dale think about the man he had seen with no black on or in him. Did that mean the man was a total innocent?

They stopped their conversation as they approached a group of undead trying to break into Tyler’s shop. Just as the heavy door cracked from the repeated blows falling upon it, the zombies at the rear were assaulted by the adventurers. Tom was using his ingot hammer, and each swing against an unprotected head allowed gray matter to slosh to the ground. Rose pulled out an arrow and aimed far beyond the zombies, activating the enchantment and allowing her first arrow to pierce through a half-dozen heads as it flew along its path. Dale and Hans’ arms turned to blurs as they attacked furiously, one with glinting daggers and the other with metal-capped knuckles.

The low-ranked zombies stood no chance against this group, and as reinforcements came around the corner, Hans glanced at Tom and nodded. Tom half spun, planted his feet firmly, and blew air over his outstretched hand. As he did so, his technique took hold, and a gout of flame launched into the undead. The sustained flame made even the most robust amongst them fall to the ground, too charred to continue moving.

“Good form.” Hans nodded as Tom dropped to a knee, exhausted from using so much Essence at once. “It was a little wasteful, but it is designed to be that way. Keep it up, make sure to refine your Essence more carefully, and I’ll get you a better technique when you are ready for it.”

“Purposely wasteful?” Adam looked at them oddly. “Why would you do that?”

“Well, he had too much corruption in him. He needed to reduce it. Ergo, he uses a wasteful ability so that he can shed some corruption.” Hans chanced a glance at Adam. “Father Richard hasn’t told you about this? With your abundance of corruption, I thought he would…”

“He offered to help, but I thought he meant in a more… direct way,” Adam mused with interest. “I thought it would mean me swallowing a Core, and I decided that I’d be fine without. Hmm.”

“Talk to people!” Hans admonished him sternly. “Just because you can do freaky stuff with your eyes doesn’t mean you should stop taking advice.” He knocked on the damaged door. “Tyler! Let’s go! Your chaperone has arrived. No more hoarding all the beautiful women for yourself!”

“Hans!” a muffled voice came through the damaged wood. “You came back for us?”

“We did, yeah. Hurry up! There are Mages going nuts out here,” Hans spoke in a conversational tone, ignoring the gravity of the situation completely.

“I have dozens of people!” Tyler spoke as he tried to pull open the battered door. Its hinges were twisted enough that Tom had to break it down fully. “Do you have a shelter we can all fit in?”

“I do,” Dale said as people began streaming out. “We need to hurry. Is there anyone who can’t run?”

“I’m a bit out of shape, but I think that in these circumstances I can be convinced.” Tyler released a half-hearted chuckle. “These are all non-combatants. Non-cultivators. You okay with helping us out?”

“Yes, let’s go,” Dale ordered as they began jogging toward the church. “You sure you have everyone?”

“Absolutely certain,” Tyler stated after a quick headcount. They made their way to safety, but the people near the rear began to scream as they saw the abominations moving their way. The shrill sounds, in turn, drew more undead to them, forcing Dale and his team to hold a defensive line while the people piled through the portal. The undead began massing, and larger versions came sprinting.

“I do not think we can defend against this,” Tom announced firmly. “It has been an honor to fight with you all and stand by your sides.”

“For God’s sake man.” Hans grabbed Tom and threw him toward the portal. “Stop being so dramatic and get in the portal!” As the dead closed in on them, the living retreated into the portal and closed it behind them.

“Is everyone alright?” Dale called, looking around at the people huddled or crying nearby.

“Alright? Are you sure this isn’t heaven?” Tyler was looking around the area, mouth agape. He was hugging the alchemist that worked for him; both seemed incredibly happy, given the circumstances. “We are alive, right?”

Dale looked around, and he found that he could understand their joy. This was a long main hall with dozens of smaller rooms set into the walls. One of the largest portions of the open area was a workbench suitable for alchemy with tubes and vials filled and labeled. There was an area for every trade that the dungeon knew of. An apothecary lab, a smithy, leather tanning, weapons salles, archery ranges, Runecrafting areas, and what appeared to be an inn. Splashing water even signified a bathing area tucked away somewhere.

“I’m not sure what this is for, and I’m not sure why it exists,” Dale informed Tyler. “I’m certain there is more to this place than meets the eye.”

“Who cares?” Tyler was nearly crying with happiness. “Look at all of those ingredients!”

Chapter Twenty-seven

I had recreated Bob, who was keeping me company and trying to help me remain calm. He was still on the third floor, but I linked his sight to mine so that he could see the same things I did. The necromancers were at the bottom of the stairs to the fifth floor, following the only path. I had made it as a spiral, so if they went at a normal walking speed, they should be occupied for at least ten minutes. The reason for creating such a long walkway was embedded in the walls.

“It’s not worth it! Go! Please!”

“Turn back! No! Run!”

“Run away!”

“I am so tired. I am so tired all of the time…”

Bob seemed confused at my laughter. “What is saying those things? Are those… rocks?”

<Yeah they are!> I continued to laugh maniacally. <I made rocks that scream like humans!>

Bob watched for a bit longer. “So… are they supposed to scare people off?”

<Yes. No. Well, it is a kind of mental torture, to make them extra unsettled for the fight,> I informed him as I waited for low morale to take effect on the intruders.

“They don’t seem bothered.” Bob had a point. The C-ranked necromancers were just plugging their ears. The Mage didn’t even bother doing that.

<Huh. Well, it was still fun to do,> I grouched at Bob. I thought he would be smug about this, but I was wrong.

“Pff. Messed up some perfectly good rocks is what you did. Look at them! Have you ever seen rocks with anxiety before?” the Goblin demanded, eyelid twitching.

<Oh, be quiet, you spoilsport.> I watched as the men looked around cautiously, their vision inhibited by the mists and Essence swirling in the air. Bob’s rant had made me miss the intruders entering the Boss Room! They stepped forward, and one of them tripped, a hole in the floor catching his foot. The Mage waved his hand, attempting to disperse the cloying moisture, but here in the seat of my power, I was able to counteract him with ease. He frowned, trying again. Another failure. I was only able to counter him because of the large area he was attempting to effect. He’d still be able to cast spells, but large area effects on small molecules was my forte.

“Did you feel that?”

“What?”

“Something… shifted.”

“I feel heavy, what’s happening?”

The Mage snapped at them, “Silence! This is something different, something new.”

Screams broke the sudden silence as a sharp bone rammed through the back of a C-ranker, stabbing all the way through him to extend from his front. Blood and black ichor poured from the wound while purple lines traced their way across the man’s body. The bone pulled from him with a wet slurp and vanished into a hole.

“Get up!”

“He’s dead! What happened?”

“Move!” The Mage pushed the others out of the way, then formulated and cast a summoning on the dead body. It started to move again, standing violently.

“Hmm. Body is filled with an unknown poison. Hole in chest. Repairing for most efficient usage,” the thing inhabiting the body stated. “Oh? Two summons in a day? Tisk-tisk. You’ve been a bad boy, Mr. Mage! Where is the other?”

“Banished,” the Mage explained shortly. “We are under attack by an unknown entity. Find and kill it.”

“Why not? Nice to meet you, too.” The inhabited body started glowing, then coated itself in hellflame. The fire flashed across the entire room, burning away the mists and revealing my monster. The Dungeon Boss; my Manticore.

The Manticore had a head very similar to Snowball, fluffy and cat-like, though there were some obvious deviations from the norm. This creature had six eyes, three on each side of its face in a triangular pattern. It had teeth similar to a shark, jagged and multi-rowed. Wings extended from his back, heavy with scales and spikes. Runic patterns were traced on several of these scales, creating a disturbing hypnotic effect. A tail extended behind it and into the ground; on the end of it was a stinger laden with the most vicious poison I had been able to concoct from my acquisitions. His tail was uncannily flexible and could extend and contract faster than a snake could strike. I was still working on a name for him, but being a nameless Manticore wouldn’t stop him from killing!

A hiss came from the massive Beast, drawing out and climbing to a full-throated roar. Stains spread down the leg of one of the remaining C-rankers, the aggressive Mage-rank aura causing him to revert to primal flight instincts. He turned to flee and was met by the sharp, hollow stinger of the Manticore. By the time he hit the floor, his soul had fled the mortal plane.

<Two down in the first thirty seconds!> I crowed, exulting in my upcoming victory.

The Mage and demon sprinted at the Manticore, and it retracted its tail from the corpse, arching the scaled limb above his head like a scorpion. It crouched momentarily before springing to meet them. His scorpion tail lashed out, but the armored arm of the demon deflected it. In response, the Manticore swiped his paw—as large as the human body it was attacking—and tore off the demon’s leg as it tried to vault over the meter-length claws. The demon’s appendage turned black and rancid as poison began to rot away at it. Hopefully, the demon wouldn’t be able to fix its body again before it was completely destroyed. The Mage stabbed forward with the large dagger that had been unnecessary before now but was blocked by an armored wing that stopped the blade like it wasn’t even moving.

The scale that had been hit glowed and fired from the wing like an arrow. The Mage dodged, and the scale embedded in the stone wall just before exploding and reducing a cubic foot of granite to rubble. The demon—down one leg—used this distraction to find a different way to move around. He completed an astounding series of cartwheels, bouncing off of the floor and walls before latching on to a giant paw. It dug its claws into the tree-thick, scaly ankle and started releasing hellfire. A lance of flame went through the palm of the Boss and broiled all meat it passed through.

The Manticore roared in agony as it lifted its now-skeletal paw from the ground and limped on three feet. It kicked sharply, and the demon flew into the mist. With this respite, the Manticore grabbed a chunk of meat and jumped into the air, flapping its wings a few times before twisting around and gripping the ceiling. It hung there like a bat, lashing out with its tail whenever his attackers got too close. Chewing the stained flesh from a human body, the Boss’s damaged paw began to quickly recover, cells dividing and growing to cover the enormous foot. When it was mostly healed, the Manticore dropped from the roof, swirling in a murderous blur of claws, tail, and wings.

The demon sprinted to the back wall, which was an amusing sight as it had to use its hands to ‘walk’. It got to the stone barricade, turned to use its momentum, and jumped at the Manticore. The possessed corpse caught a wing as the great Beast dodged, causing the creature to stumble. The Mage took this opportunity to jump on to the Boss’s face, plunging a hand deep into an eye socket and releasing a continuous stream of necrotic Mana. The Manticore screamed in pain as its brain was assaulted. It rolled and thrashed heavily, trying to dislodge and kill the Mage causing it so much pain. My beautiful Beast was unable to do so and fell almost sullenly to the ground, dying slowly. It hacked up a key, which clattered to the ground with a ring of finality.

The Mage stood, smiling, and turned to look at the demon. His smile fell from his face as his summoned creature was sucked away with a pop. I laughed silently; all of the spikes on the Manticore were designed to break off, and each of them had the demon banishing Rune etched on to them. The Mage started toward my Core room, taking only a few steps before gasping. He looked down, seeing the poison-dripping tip of a stinger protruding from his heart.

A low rumbling laugh came from the Manticore. Its lips moved, and a gravelly voice escaped, “Rage, fury, wrath, outrage, resentment, annoyance, vexation, displeasure… I’ll… eat them… all…” The words trailed off as the Manticore expired. His first words were a little odd, but as his brain had somewhat dissolved, I’d let him try again when he was reborn. The Mage, already sweating as his body began to die, stumbled toward my Core room. He made it in, falling right before he got to the Silverwood tree and landing in a position that could be mistaken for worship.

<There we go!> I was pleased at the glorious outcome of the battle. <See, Bob? Want to go over improvements we could make? I know that Mage was a rank ahead of my Manticore, but–>

A hand plunged into the area under the tree, grasping the Core it found there and yanking it into the light. The last C-ranked member of the group smiled, looking first at the shining Core, then at the dead Mage. He couldn’t seem to resist insulting his fallen leader. “You will make a perfect vessel for my next summon. Thank you for completing the mission and leaving all the glory to me!”

The necromancer laughed as he grabbed the Mage’s body, opened the portal with a keygem, and stepped out of the dungeon. He sent a flare of light into the air and sprinted toward the exit from the mountain.

Chapter Twenty-eight

Frank was battered and bruised; his left eye was swollen shut, and he was leaking blood from many minor wounds. He shouted at a mountain of flesh that was rolling toward him and removed its kinetic energy, stopping it in place. Frank focused on blocking the motion of the abomination at a deeper level, and the flesh froze solid as the atoms were disallowed movement, the electrons freezing in place. His focus broke with a painful backlash; he could only maintain that state for a few seconds at a time against a creature summoned by an A-ranked being. Luckily, the abomination was only a B-ranked creature, and Frank’s ability was enough to get the job done. The abomination toppled, shattering on the ground. The frozen flesh joined the other ice and snow on the ground, simply becoming sanguine scenery.

A shout rang out as a flare rose into the air, and the undead repositioned themselves. “They are blocking the way to the portal!” Acrimony filled High Magous Amber’s words. “This filth thinks that they are going to mess with my portal settings? Stop them!”

Father Richard spearheaded the defender’s formation, his blessings and rebukes to the undead opening a pathway to their goal. They surged forward but were now surrounded on all sides. As Frank turned to destroy a large zombie, a form tore its way out of an abomination and grabbed Father Richard by the neck.

“Stay where you are.” The voice was decidedly calm. “We have completed our mission, and we are finished with this area. If you attempt to resist further, I will have this area destroyed.”

Father Richard was choking, his ineffectual clawing at the hand holding him proving that this was the A-ranked summoner that had caused all of the destruction in the area. He must have been a few ranks higher than Father Richard to be able to hold the cleric so casually. The undead had all stopped moving, however, and the defenders were loath to restart combat while surrounded.

“Release him, and we can negotiate your surrender,” Amber imperiously ordered, knowing that her words would be ignored.

The Mage surprised them all. “I will let him go. I only wanted your attention. Attack me and they die.” He motioned, and a large cluster of people was revealed. It was the delegations from multiple nations, all of the people here to discuss terms of trade and alliances. There were three Mages surrounding them, and black arcs of energy shaped like chains moved between them and kept the hostages from running.

“We will leave, and if you don’t attack me, I swear my people and I will never return to this city.” The air shuddered as his oath was recognized by his Mana. He stepped away, and after a minute of slow backward walking, vanished through the portal. The towering abominations collapsed wetly to the earth, returning from undead to simply dead.

“He’s gone, now free them!” Richard ordered the Mages, who gave a sly grin in return.

“Nah. That wasn’t part of the bargain.” The cocky Mage started to chant, only to be cut off as an object obliterated his brain. The other two Mages died in a mere moment as well, to the great shock of the onlookers. Someone had just silently killed three Mages in less than a second. This fact was as terrifying to the exhausted onlookers as the entire night had been.

“Boring, boring, boring!” a voice cackled into the still air. “Killing people sitting on the ground doing nothing would have made for terrible karma.” The question of who the voice belonged to was resolved when a near-nude man stepped out from behind one of the few undamaged buildings.

“I show up to try out some legendary Dwarvish bathhouses, and children like that go interrupting my fun!” The greasy old man grouched—now not quite as dirty due to a relaxing bath—and walked over to the dead Mages to retrieve his belonging still embedded in a skull. The others leaned forward, trying to catch a glimpse of the artifact that could go through the skulls of three Mages without issue.

“Ew. Now there is brain on my toothbrush.” The man sighed and tossed said item to the side. “Might as well get this next part over with. Come on out, Kere. At this point, you are just being embarrassing.”

“I was hoping you would take this chance to repent.” It felt like dawn had come as Kere Nolsen stepped closer to the man. Pulsating light seemed to collect around him, and everyone present felt at peace as his footsteps echoed amongst them. “Egil Nolsen. I stand before you in my role as High Inquisitor of the Holy Church. I shall now read a much abridged list of your sins. You have committed crimes against the church, Humanity, Elvenkind, Dwarvenkind, Goblins, Orcs, Beasts, and a variety of animals wild and domestic. You are accused of patricide, matricide, fratricide, and regicide, amongst a mountain of other crimes. Actually, you are also accused of attacking and somehow killing a mountain. As my post demands, I stand before you and am charged with granting you a fair trial and a swift death. How do you plead?”

“Would you believe me if I plead insanity?”

“Yes. Yes, I would. It will not lessen the sentence.” Kere’s eyes were hard as he stared upon the man who shared his name.

Egil grinned a mad grin, a myriad of chaotic lights shining in his eyes. “You may as well call me by my chosen name. No one else will understand what is going on otherwise… my dearest son.”

Kere’s mouth turned down into a frown. “After two decades of hunting you, Egil Nolsen—known to the world as ‘Xenocide’—I stand before you to mete out… Justice!” A plethora of differing sounds were emitted. At the pronunciation of the name ‘Xenocide’, most people gasped, screamed, or tried to run from the area. Hue was leached from the world, as Kere spoke and the spectrum of color shifted to include only black and white. Everyone caught in the area had their sins exposed, no matter how minor they may have been. “I can see the sins crawling up your… huh?”

“You can see my what now?” Egil stood with a depraved smile on his face, beginning to dance in place.

Kere seemed a bit nonplussed, his face rigid as he looked at his father. Egil had not a single speck of black on him, seeming every bit as pure as new-fallen snow. The man in question strode forward, laying a hand on his son. “Aww. Two decades of hunting for no reason. No. Reason. At. All.” He poked Kere on the nose as he said the last word, causing Kere to snap out of his shock.

“Im-impossible! I witnessed their murder!” Kere roared while drawing his sword and attempting to swing it. His arm didn’t move an inch, his connection to Justice refusing to allow him to harm an ‘innocent’ person.

“Hmm. Am I innocent because I had to do it or because I feel no remorse?” Egil laughed as his son nearly frothed at the mouth. “Ah well. Either way, you should come over for dinner soon! I found a new recipe for roast puppy that I am just dying to try!”

“You’re sick!” Kere bellowed, trying and failing to attack again.

“And you limit yourself!” Egil screamed in reply, his face twisting into something terrifying. His words caused the Inquisitor to flinch. “Following just one path, you literally see the world as black and white! Everything is shades of gray, boy! And it abyss well should be! Look at how weak you have become! Under your restrictive mindset, even breathing is a sin because you take air that another could use! Open your eyes, child!”

“You are insane! Your entire goal is to kill everyone!”

“I’m not going to argue! But as you can see, insanity has a few perks. Also, you are wrong about one thing… I don't have any goals. They are more like… things I want to do for giggles.” Egil laughed in the face of the helpless inquisitor. He turned in a slow waltz, waved dramatically at the aghast crowd that had gathered, and danced through the portal.

Cal

When the Mage died, I had only been able to speak a few words before I was forced into my inner soul. His Mana flowed into me in a rush that took me by surprise. It was different than my own and sought to overpower my law. I freely admit, I panicked at first, but then I had a realization and needed to laugh. All other laws were inferior to mine and were only a small portion of my own, broken and splintered to fill a niche. The Mana continued flowing into me, but without me fighting it, the Mana was integrated into my own. The surge from the dead Mage allowed me to have a happy little boost to my own well of power.

It didn’t propel me forward in ranking; the only thing that could do that at this point was forming a deeper connection and understanding with Acme. It did give me access to more Mana, but when it was used up, it was gone. I paused and chuckled. This had given me a few ideas. I had a dimensional bag stuffed with Mana! If I could use it as a power source, I could accelerate my plans to a huge degree!

I came back to myself, looking around in confusion. Hadn’t there been a dead body in front of me? I looked around my body and realized my decoy Core was gone. <Bob, everything alright?>

“You are still here?” Bob half-screamed-half-asked. “Great Spirit! I am so sorry! I doubted you! Your silence was… disconcerting.”

<Yeah, being alone must suck for you, sorry. I’ll remake the other Goblins right away.> I smiled at him, and he felt the warmth of my joy.

“You got good news out of this somehow?” Bob questioned as his people began to take shape around him. He shivered. “Oh, this is so strange to see.”

<Yes, the Manticore was a great success,> I informed him as he started pressing Cores to heads, allowing his people to function properly again. <I should really name the big guy. Also, Bob. All Bobs now, I guess. I have enough Mana to begin the ritual, finish inspecting it, and power it.>

“You do?” Bob was intrigued by my words. “The ritual?”

<I do.> I turned my attention to a part of the dungeon that was separate from the rest, connected only by a small portal too small for anything but a Basher to fit through. <Dale! I think the danger has passed. You can leave now.>

“I don’t think they want to leave. What is this place?” Dale seemed a bit grouchy tonight.

I looked closer, noting the alchemist and a few other craftsmen struggling to get at the workbenches only a few feet away from them. I chuckled, every time they tried to cross the Runes in the floor, gravity would increase by a massive amount, and they would be pressed to the ground. It was set up as a directional Rune, so when they gave up and attempted to back off, the weight would abate.

<Yeah, about that.> I decided to explain the function of this place to Dale. <This is an experiment of mine. I know that you have a shortage of craftsmen and thinkers, and I am as keen as you are to get access to their knowledge and production. So, this is the result.>

“That doesn’t actually tell me much,” Dale thought at me. “What is it? What do we do?”

<It is an area they can pay to enter. There is space for dozens of crafters, and no monsters will spawn in here. People can come work in relative peace and security, and I will also benefit. If they bring me items I’ve never had before, they get a time token. Based on the rarity of their offering, they get more or less time to do things. I have a few options for everyone. They can pay with refined Essence or Mana and gain time that way. The other option is my personal favorite. They can copy their memories, and I will give them time in here that equals it. Ten years of your memories? Ten years of access. They may still need to pay for rare ingredients, but that will give them a lot of material.> I didn’t tell him that I would take all of the memories either way. I was just going to credit them what they thought they were giving. Easy to check when you had all of their memories.

“No one would do that!” Dale shouted in his head, very accusingly and—in my opinion—incorrectly.

<Really? They won’t? For access to rare materials, equipment that fixes itself, free room and board for potentially decades? You overestimate people.> I snickered at his twisted expression of anger.

Dale stared at Tyler and decided to ask him directly. “Tyler, this room is a lab where you ‘pay’ to work. You can bring things in or donate power, and you’ll get a token that lets you stay here with a room and food. Also, all the materials you want.”

“What's the ratio?” Tyler whipped his head around so fast I thought it would break. “Where do I pay? There is crushed opal in there, Dale! I can see it! Is… is that powdered aluminum? I need to get in! I need to, Dale!”

<You didn’t mention the memories!> I stated accusingly.

“Bring it up to the Protectorate,” Dale scoffed at me. “No way in the abyss am I going to–”

“Look! That sign says we can donate memories instead of things for an equal amount of time! Hot dang, I can stay here for years!” Tyler was nearly jumping for joy as he ran to a donation lectern. There was a memory stone embedded in it, and without hesitation, he pressed his head to it. A moment later, he looked up a bit dizzily. The stone dropped into the lectern, and a new one slid into place. A necklace with a pendant fell into a small drawer, and Tyler snatched it up and put it on as soon as he saw it. With a touch of Essence, it bound to him, and he ran to the edge of the Runescript. He took a deep breath and stepped over the line. Continuing forward to the workbench, he laughed as he started applying heat to a vial. Suddenly, the area around him grew too blurry to see clearly.

The others groaned as they saw the privacy filter snap into place; they had wanted to see what Tyler was doing! <Well, Dale. Once again, you are wrong.> I sighed in happiness as I made a copy of Tyler's stone, smashing it to gain his memories. Wow. A far more interesting life than I had expected him to have. I watched as he tried to leave with a bag of materials—having stuffed it with opal and aluminum—but was pressed to the floor. Heh. Anti-theft. Only finished products could leave and only after they had been given to me to copy. He seemed upset, but I knew he had read the rules.

<He seems happy with his purchase,> I told Dale haughtily. <Why do you fight me so hard?>

“You are literally a monster.” Dale sighed at me, then spoke softly, “I have no idea why other people refuse to see it.”

<I think we’re more alike than you will admit. By the way, you should let them know that all the tools in here are basic. The same tools will be offered as rewards in the deeper levels, and they will be Enchanted or Inscribed. This way, all of the crafters that come here will still have something to strive for.>

“I’m leaving,” Dale announced to the mixed group of people. “I am going to go check on the surface. I think the danger has passed.”

Chapter Twenty-nine

“Moron! Imbecile!” The Master threw the Core to the ground at his feet. It shattered, the Essence inside of it being sucked into the Core of the infernal dungeon.

“Master! I am so sorry! I had no idea that it would have a decoy! I will return immediately and–”

“You will do nothing of the sort!” The Master growled. “Your leader swore an oath that we would not go back if he wasn’t attacked. We don’t exactly have a plethora of A-ranked summoners, and going back would end him. We need to find a way to make them attack him, then we will go back. At least he kept the wording vague.”

Behind them, Dani did all she could to keep from laughing aloud. Her mirth dwindled as she felt the attention of the infernal dungeon fall on her. It seemed to leer at her, reaching tendrils of Essence toward her as if it could sneak its way into a bond with her. “Shoo,” she hissed at the looming presence.

<Oh, come now, little Wisp… I already approach the Mage ranks again. Even after finding a new body, I am bound to my law. I don’t even need to ascend, just store enough Essence to pay tribute to my law and regain access to Mana. What can your old dungeon do for you… that I cannot?> the infernal dungeon whispered into her mind. It seemed to be licking imaginary lips.

“Show mercy? Have a good soul? Not allow extraplanar demons into our lives?” Dani brutally rebuffed the dark presence. “The real question is what could you offer that he can’t? I can already tell that he is smarter than you.”

The dungeon’s presence seemed to twitch and slowly retreated. <You will be mine, one way… or another.>

Cal

<Whew!> I grunted as the Manticore stood, shaking itself like it had been soaked in water. <You are really difficult to resurrect, you know that?>

The Manticore really freaked me out when it responded in a deep, rumbling baritone, “I will do my best to ensure that you don’t need to do so very often.” It laughed, a rolling vibration that would terrify a normal being.

<Oh right, you can speak.> I laughed along with it for a moment. <Need anything? Food, a bed, company? I can make a plushy rug for you if you’d like.>

It answered, rolling it’s Rs as it spoke, “I only desire prey. I will feast on them and find comfort in their demise. For the time being, they will be more than enough sustenance. I assure you that I am pleased.”

<Well. Alrighty. Let me know if you need anything else!> I began talking to Bob next, <Bob, while the surface is mainly empty of people, I am going to extend the obelisks.> Obelisks were very simple structures, essentially just a tower of stone. They began to pierce the ground, growing like odd, petrified trees. There were six of them, arranged in a hexagonal array around the entirety of the town. Each of them was slightly differently sized, but each stopped moving upward at the same time, their points at the exact same elevation.

I had been working on this plan with Bob for some time. This was only the start of my machinations. Since I had used the obelisks to demarcate an ‘enclosed’ area, I was able to extend my influence upward. Cores inset into the top of the obelisks began to glow softly, releasing a tiny amount of Essence into the air. The Essence fed my influence, which grew into ‘walls’ around the town. To the trained eye, they were more like soap bubbles. A seventh, much larger obelisk grew in the exact center of the zoned-off space, which just so happened to be where the entrance to my dungeon lay. I smiled as the Core on its tip began to glow, and lines of Essence flowed between it and the six others. A bubble of influence began to form over the town, upon completion becoming a dome-like structure that could only be seen by cultivators.

It didn’t do much right now, but over time, my influence would fill the area. It would take quite a while, as this was me technically adding another floor to the dungeon. I hoped that no one was stupid enough to destroy the stone, as this would help the town greatly. As a matter of fact, likely everyone would enjoy the benefits, and only Dale would complain about it. Already, I felt the beginnings of an influx of air Essence as the wind howled over the mountaintop. A trickle of influence began to seep across the ground, avoiding places where living people were standing. There seemed to be a conversation happening, and I noticed Dale was involved. Looking at all the blood, bodies, and damage, a flash of inspiration hit me, and I chuckled. Time to prove that the obelisks would be useful and that destroying them would be a terrible idea.

I actively began breaking down the bodies. They turned to goop, then nothingness as I finished decomposing them. I absorbed blood and other liquids, even tasting a new kind of snow for the first time. It had an odd yellow color, and I couldn’t understand why people talked about catching this on their tongues… I found more snow, white this time, and cleared pathways between buildings, the snow simply vanishing. Rubble sunk into the ground, and I replaced it with usable bricks and various building materials. I wouldn’t repair the buildings; they would get too lazy if they thought I’d just fix everything for them. I laughed to myself. When daylight came, I was sure there would be quite a bit of confusion.

“Great Spirit!” Bob called, pulling attention to my depths. “The ritual… after much study, we believe it is ready.”

<Excellent, Bob.> I began collecting Mana in the air around him. What little hair was on his body began to stand on end. <I had checked it earlier, and I agree with you. I just needed a second opinion. Would you like to stay and watch or try to find somewhere you might be able to survive if this goes wrong?>

Bob, all of them, shared glances and nodded. “We will stay. This is not an occasion that we feel we should miss.”

<I’m glad. Shall we find out if it works?> Without waiting for an answer, I began to pour Mana into the activation Rune. This was the first time I had used Mana for the purpose of using a Rune, and I was as excited to see it happening as the Bobs were. The perfection that was Acme began streaming into the Rune. Not too fast, not too slow, it went at the exact rate needed. There was no concern of a portion of the ritual activating before it should; this Mana was perfect for anything it was used for. I laughed as I watched the ritual complete and activate.

There was no flash. There was no sound, no waste of excess energy. The only way I was able to tell that the ritual was complete was the slow, constant drain of my Mana. <I… I think it worked.>

“Follow it!” Bob demanded shrilly, eyes alight with the thrill of discovery. “I need to know if it is doing what it should!”

I gave him a ‘look’ due to his tone, then looped my Mana through a Core. I poured the entirety of my excess Mana from the dead necromancer into the Core, allowing the ritual to sustain itself without my direct intervention. Then I followed Bob’s order and dove into the earth. I sank down, down, following the hole that had been bored by my previous ritual. I got to the appropriate depth and looked around, daring to hope. I saw nothing. I looked closer, but still, no change was visible.

<Drat,> I complained softly. <This would have…> I saw it. I saw a change! Ha! I had simply gotten here too early! The ritual just hadn’t reached this point yet! At a microscopic level no human eye could see, a Rune was being Inscribed into the rock. The rune finished, and another was drawn next to it. They slowly created a perfect, unbroken ring around the smooth surface of the hole. When that finished, I needed to extend a bit of Essence to see into the stone behind each of the runes. The Runes were so small that there were well over a hundred Runes in the initial ring. Behind each of them, another Rune was being created. That one finished and then another and another.

<Bob. It worked as expected!> I screeched in excitement. <A ring of Essence-releasing Runes, followed by interconnected lines of Essence-gathering Runes being created behind them!>

“That’s great!” Bob yelled, all of them hugging or shaking each others’ hands at the good news. “How are you going to activate the Runes?”

<Oh. Dammit.> I pondered this for a moment. <No, wait! They are small enough that any sufficiently Essence-rich area should activate at least one of them. That will, in turn, activate each in sequence along the chain until all of them are active. Also, the ritual is set to expand at any area that is sufficiently dense with Essence, so this will work in our favor.>

“Expand? How so?” Bob shrewdly questioned me. He hadn’t been able to check the full effect of the ritual after all.

<The Runes will create a circle like the one below, off of the main line. Each line will then begin heading out along its own path. I got the idea from the tower of ascension, actually. You will see it for yourself eventually, but that is the gist of it.>

Bob nodded along sagely. “This could have interesting effects on the world at large if they last a long enough time. Essence will naturally be drawn to these lines, and where they cross and expand, there will be more Essence than is readily absorbable by the lines. I wonder if that will lead to people settling in locations that contain them? Will that help cities spring up? Make centers of learning? Currently, power in the world is chaotic, unevenly spread. I look forward to seeing what will happen…”

<Not our problem,> I cut him off happily. <Though I do have an idea of what I want the next floor of the dungeon to look like.>

Chapter Thirty

Dale walked out of the church into dead silence. He made a face at the impropriety of that thought. At least it felt inappropriate. After sharpening his ears with a thin thread of Essence, the ambient noise jumped into an audible range. Dale heard the crackle of fires, thankfully small due to the vast majority of buildings being made of stone. Screams in the distance, not of horror but just normal screams of pain. Dale grimaced when he realized that he thought screams of pain sounded normal. He perked up when he heard some tired voices; he recognized that tone!

Dale hurried over to a small group of people who were quietly talking but slowed when they drew weapons. Father Richard looked around and was the first to speak. “Dale! You survived!” He looked around at the weary faces around him. “Ah. Weapons away, we all know Dale.”

There was a man in the group that took Dale a moment to place. He snapped his fingers after a short silence. “You are Kere Nolsen, then? Did we have that correct last night?”

The man seemed to be startled that he was recognized. “Yes, I am High Inquisitor Nolsen. I am also going to need to re-think my exploits if just anyone from such a remote village can recognize me.”

Dale had a sly thought, remembering an old conversation with Hans. “Well, Sir, it is all because of the song! The ‘Ballad of the Slayer of Shades’ is quite popular around here. We have a bard from the capital that recently came to live here. Everyone can recognize you now!”

Kere looked mortified, his face draining of color. “Please… please tell me you are joking.”

In response, Dale burst into song, “The man puts up a dome of white, purifies the evil with his holy might. The ladies swoon as Kere stares at the moon…” Kere seemed to deflate, his knees buckling.

“No… no!” The S-ranked man was pulling at his hair, almost collapsing to the ground.

Father Richard shot a look at Dale, a cross between amusement and annoyance. “Dale is joking. That song doesn’t exist.”

“It’s true. I just needed to inject some humor into this situation.” Dale chuckled as the man looked at him with hopeful eyes. “Is having a song made about you so terrible?”

Frank nodded gravely. “Well, lad, you made that song up on the fly, correct? Let me put it like this: that was better than the majority of songs minstrels actually put into circulation. For instance, you’ve heard the song ‘Killer of Her Loneliness’?”

Dale nodded in the affirmative. It was a popular song in the tavern, as it had a catchy tune. Unfortunately, the lyrics were as bad as the title.

“Well,” Frank smiled under his bushy mustache, “maybe you ask your old friend Hans how that song came around?”

“No!”

“Oh, yes.” Frank grinned deviously.

“I should think that we have more important matters to discuss?” Madame Chandra interjected impatiently. “We have over two hundred people unaccounted for, at least a hundred dead, and dozens wounded. Also, the clerics are nowhere to be found, so the wounded are getting substandard treatment. Buildings are destroyed—bodies and trash are everywhere.”

“I have the clerics in a safe location,” Dale responded quickly. “Thanks to Inquisitor Kere, I was also able to complete a rescue mission. There was a large group settled into Tyler’s shop, and we collected them and returned them to the dungeon.”

“The dungeon? You brought non-combatants into the dungeon?” Frank glared at him. “How far in are they? After the second floor, the place becomes D-rank and above only!”

“This is a special place,” Dale attempted to calm the Guild Leader. “There are no monsters and no traps that we have been able to find. It doesn’t even seem to be a part of the main dungeon.”

“Let’s go collect them and get to cleaning this place up,” Chandra loudly broke up the quiet huddle. “If we leave them to rot, we are opening the area to disease and–” Everyone snapped to an alert status as a whiff of Essence passed over them. “What in the…?”

Dale looked around, marveling at what he saw. All of the rubble, blood, and trash had been eradicated from the area. He looked at the few buildings that had a chimney with smoke coming from them and noticed that the smoke vanished mere inches after exiting. It had begun to snow, but the flakes weren’t collecting or even reaching the ground before vanishing. The ever-present smells of a town diminished and were slowly being replaced with a faint hint of minty goodness. There were neatly stacked crates of building materials wherever a building had been damaged, and pathways were neat and clean.

“Who in the what now?” Dale managed to spit out a garbled question.

“It looks like a painting!” Chandra exclaimed with a clap of her hands. “What a beautiful change! Even the bodies are gone! Well, job’s done. I am going to take a nap.”

The group dispersed, walking around to look at the changes. Dale shook his head and walked off to collect the people in the dungeon. Seeing as he had the only key, it was his responsibility to let everyone–

The portal was open, and people were freely moving in and out of the crafting floor. Tyler was standing nearby it, holding his new pendant toward the portal to keep it open. “Danger is over, and it looks like the dungeon even cleaned up the town for us! Hop to it! Move, move, move! Who knows when my arm will get tired?”

Dale shrugged and was about to leave when an oddity occurred. High Magous Amber was waiting to enter the portal, but when she walked through, she bounced off the church wall. “Ow!” she cried out. She was obviously not in actual pain but simply quite surprised. Old habits die hard. “What? Why can’t I go through the portal?” She tried again, but there was no change.

“That’s odd…” Dale looked at the portal, looked around at the clean area and decided to try talking to the dungeon, “Why can’t Amber get into the crafting area?”

As a confirmation that the dungeon now had access to the surface, he heard a voice in his head, <Well, Dale, the Runes in there aren’t powerful enough to stop a Mage from just ignoring the instructions. They could walk through the portal, fill a bag with raw materials, and leave. Where would that leave me? Certainly no benefit in letting them come in and steal, you know?>

Dale tried to ask more questions, but silence was his only answer. “High Magous,” Dale quickly had her undivided attention, “I think that the portal will not allow Mages through.”

“What? No! There are so many things I want to make! I heard that there is a pile of aluminum in there!” Amber was getting dangerously worked up. “Do you know what I could do with a Mithril portal frame? I could triple the range of our portals! Triple, Dale! I could put a portal on the moon with that range!”

<Well that sounds fun…> Dale heard in his head.

“How about you find a talented Inscriber that isn’t a Mage and have them build it?” Dale offered hurriedly, trying to stop her from giving ideas to the dungeon. “Why don’t we focus on the plans for the academy? Then you will have your pick of talented trainees!”

Amber shook her head, groaning. “No one wants to be an Inscriber without being a Mage! The training can take over a decade, and the creation of each Rune can take years depending on the complexity! Have you ever seen the books spotters have? The complete listing of all known Runes? It’s huge! Massive! Not possible for non-Mages to memorize!”

<There’s a book! Are you kidding me right now?> Dale dropped to his knees from the force of the scream, prompting Amber to grab him in an attempt to steady him.

“Apparently,” Dale responded through gritted teeth. He wiped away blood that was dripping from his nose.

<Get me that book and I will absolve you of any obligations you have to me except rescuing Dani, and I’ll help you with town projects! I’ll even make a copy of the book that you can keep! Two copies!>

Dale’s first thought was to deny this request out of hand… but the offer was tempting. Dale frowned. Why was he always fighting the dungeon? It had never done anything to him beyond letting the Mobs attack and had made him rich and long-lived beyond his wildest dreams. He slowly nodded. “Deal.”

Amber was looking at him like he had brain damage. Dale shrugged at her. Maybe he did.

Cal

<I can’t believe that worked.> I chuckled to Bob, who had seen the whole exchange. <He didn’t even notice my influence! He was totally convinced it was his own idea to work with me!>

“The power of a Mage versus a D-ranked human mind.” Bob raised his glass of juice in salute to me.

<I didn’t think it would be so easy is all.> I laughed as I watched Dale go about his day to day business. <I am so confused by their habits. Why do they–>

“My apologies, but I need to interrupt,” Bob interrupted apologetically. “It seems that the grand ritual has… faltered.”

<It ran out of power? Already?> I frowned discontentedly. <I don’t have the Mana reserves to devote to getting it going again.>

“I was just bringing it to your attention, Great Spirit,” Bob returned calmly. “I’m sorry to say I don’t know how to fix it for you.”

<Also, why did you call it a ‘grand’ ritual?> Much as I liked the term, I didn’t want to use it incorrectly in a sentence.

“Ah. A ‘grand’ ritual is one that has the potential to affect the world as a whole,” Bob answered me before turning to his own line of questioning, “Why do you not have enough Mana?”

<I am able to get Mana by exchanging Essence to my law. I don’t really have a large surplus of Essence right now, especially if I want to continue my projects. Plus, I did just expand to the surface…> I trailed off. I didn’t have unlimited Essence, I was just inordinately efficient with my usage of it. This allowed me to accomplish projects with much less Essence than it would take from a less skilled individual. My hope had been that the ‘grand’ ritual would solve these issues for me. I wasn’t too upset. After all, as the common saying went, you needed to spend Essence to make Essence.

“There is no way to speed your Essence accumulation with your currently available assets?” Bob intelligently pried, keeping his eyes on his glass. A drop of juice was licked off the rim just before it could fall.

I looked at him, meditating deeply on his words. <Bob… you seem more intelligent than you should be. Don’t take this the wrong way, but my alterations shouldn’t have been able to bring you to this level. What changed? Not too long ago you were hissing and scrabbling for the best cut of meat.>

He had the grace to look uncomfortable. “Ah… you remember how the Berserkers came to be?”

<Accumulating all memories of the various Goblins that started with the original template? That is, the first Goblin of the Berserker line?> I could see where this was going. <You do remember that he is now a screaming combat moron. He was reduced to mostly primal instincts? Ringing a bell?>

“Yes, well. We—the Bobs—felt that we should test the limits of our mind. Whichever of us is going to be Bob prime, the one that is our spokesperson, gets the memories of all the others. We have several of us reading at all times, studying, experimenting. When we combine the memories, we ensure that Bob prime doesn’t lose his sanity. Then he becomes the baseline for the next iteration of Bob,” Bob nervously explained to me.

<Brilliant.> I was seriously in awe of these Goblins. <Bob, that is amazing. You know that you don’t need to hide things from me, right? I wouldn’t ever tell you ‘it is too dangerous’.>

“Yes, well. It has simply been a study on our mental capacity.” Bob coughed nervously into his hand. “Back to my point, is there no other way for you to gain additional Essence or Mana?”

<No, I would need quite a bit of Essence or a Mage to die in here to collect their Mana, and–> I fell silent, prompting Bob to look around questioningly.

“Great Spirit?”

<Stupid, stupid, stupid!> I ranted, mentally banging my head against a wall. <The infected! A bunch of Mages died in here! I redirected their Mana to a dimensional bag! I’m a moron! I was thinking about that recently, too!> Rant complete, I sent Bob to the hidden storage room that held Cores filled with Essences and corruption, items that were in the process of being made for the first time, and one small bag that held six Mages worth of Mana.

<Alrighty, Bob-oh.> I cleared my nonexistent throat. <I could open this bag myself, but I’m not sure I could focus enough to close it again if the Mana started to overcome me. I want you to get next to my Core and open it up for only a few seconds.>

Bob followed my instructions, breaking into a nervous sweat as he passed the seven-meter-tall Manticore. It watched him hungrily but allowed him to pass after I asked nicely enough. Luckily, he was distracted by munching on an Elf that had been trying to get to my Core for guard duty.

“That thing is terrifying.” Bob shuddered as he stood next to the soothing presence of the Silverwood tree. “What is it?”

<I call it a Manticore,> I jovially explained.

“Why is that?” Bob wondered.

<It is a ‘mutated amalgamation of nascent terrifying existences’ with a beastly Core!> I exclaimed proudly. I had been working to improve my naming schema.

Bob thought about that for a moment. “Wouldn’t it be a Mant-e-core then?”

<Quiet, you,> I grumbled. <Manticore just sounds correct. How about you just open the bag?>

He shrugged and started to open the bag. <Bob!>

“Yes?” The Goblin tore his eyes away from the bag. He desperately wanted to learn its secrets.

<Don’t point it at your face when you open it. It is filled with various types of Mana from infected Mages. Might be a bit dangerous.> I chuckled as his face paled. It made him look sickly as his dark green skin turned a pale lime color.

Opening the bag, carefully pointing it away from himself, the Goblin grunted as he struggled to retain his grip. There was a massive kickback from the bag as Mana blasted into the open air, finally granted a release from its imprisonment. Bob struggled to close the bag, and while he was eventually successful, it was a few seconds after he had been instructed to do so. There was a rumble as the air was charged with power. Various spacial distortions and mind-bending phenomena caused Bob to dive for cover. He glanced nervously at the area under the Silverwood tree where the naked power was swiftly draining.

Several minutes passed. Bob was almost ready to give up hope when my voice reached him, <That hurt like salt on a hellfire burn. That’s if I were a snail who was especially susceptible to salt damage and fire.> All of this was stated in a calm tone.

Bob began kowtowing, “I’m so sorry! The bag got away from me, and I didn’t close it fast enough!”

<Noted. Frick.> I groaned softly. <Well, the ritual has plenty of power now. I diverted into it almost seven times the amount it originally had. That should make it last for a few weeks at least. Honestly, I’d be surprised if it didn’t last a couple of months. I even had to give Manny a boost, or else I would have likely self-destructed.>

“Manny?” Bob was caught off guard at the abrupt shift in conversation.

<Yeah, I just came up with it. New name for the Manticore.>

“Manny the Manticore? I thought you were trying to make better names for your creations, more… intelligent.” Bob coughed to cover a grin as he finished his statement.

<Ouch. Well, his full name is ‘Manny the man-eating Manticore’,> I told him while trying to keep my tone serious. <It is all about puns. Intelligent naming comes secondary to that.>

“I… see,” Bob unconvincingly replied.

<On a more serious note, I think I have decided how I am going to be going out to find Dani,> I told him, all mirth removed from my voice.

“Oh? How is that, Great One?” Bob was refocused on me, his eyes burning with a desire to help me regain my lost Wisp. “Are you creating a body? Riding along with one of your dungeon born?”

<No. That is too impersonal, too risky. What if they were to fail? I have to be more direct; I need to be there in person. You know that I have been researching flight, yes?> I demanded, fury and passion tinging my thoughts as I used him as a sounding board for my plans.

“Yes. What can I do to help?”

<Hold on, Bob. I will be flying, but not in the impersonal ‘go with the wind’ floating of my mentor, Kantor. No, Bob. I will have full control of my flight path. I’m not sure how I will find a way to control the mechanism, but I have decided on the method.> I trailed off, thinking of the scale of this project.

“Well, what is it?” Bob stomped his foot. “You can’t just say that and leave me wondering!”

I smiled, a deadly and dangerous thing. <It may have been a bit before your time, but I once created a weapon for Dale. It was a morningstar that used Runes to move the spiked ball portion away from the handle. When the handle turned, so did the ball. Distance didn’t matter; objects crossing the path didn’t interfere. We are going to recreate that system on a much larger scale.>

“Sounds challenging.” Bob smiled as he realized that he was going to get to work with very dangerous items soon.

<It will be, but I’ve been working on making this idea a reality for quite some time. I’ve replaced the walls in the lower areas with much lighter stone. This should help reduce the cost in terms of Essence upkeep. I’ve sent out scouting bugs that no one has heard from since being released; they are either dead or closing in on their target by this point. Possibly most importantly, I am in the Mage ranks. I will hopefully be able to fight or outright destroy any obstacle in our way. Soon, we will just need to know where to go. Together, we can work out the mobility issues. We will be ready.> My voice was raw from emotion.

“That we will, Great Spirit.” Bob ran off to inform himselves of the recent developments.

Chapter Thirty-one

“A place of peace and enlightenment enthralled by a murderous dungeon and beset upon by necromancers…” the Dwarven ambassador, Thaddius, commented wryly. “That is what you are proposing when you pursue your idea for an academy here. What an interesting life you must lead, Baron Dale.”

Dale scowled, nodding his head. “I understand your hesitation, Thaddius.” He looked around the table at the council and each delegation leader. “I understand everyone’s hesitation in this matter. Recent events are disheartening, but we can–”

“Disheartening?” The High Elf ambassador stood sharply, chair falling to the ground behind him. “I lost a half dozen Elves! Do you even understand the loss that signifies? That is the birth rate for three entire years for my people! Am I to believe that the Dark Elves weren't behind this? That they just happened to let the necromancers through to my people? These are the ‘trustworthy’ beings you surround yourself with? Incompetent fools who–”

A dark wave of Mana washed through the room, coalescing into the Dark Elf princess Brianna occupying a chair near the head of the table. She looked stern and angry. “Do not,” she growled at the suddenly silent High Elf, “try to push this on to my people. You refused to allow us to guard you, and you paid the price. If you want to blame someone, blame your fallen for being weak.”

“That’s enough!” Dale slammed his fist down on to the table which splintered, surprising the crowd into silence. “I am sick of this! We have a plan. We have worked out details. My people were attacked and took far greater casualties than any other group, and I am still here discussing how to better this area! You have all heard the terms; if you do not want to be here, then get the abyss out! If you are still here in ten minutes, I will assume you are agreeing to the most recent proposals, and we will have a contract drawn up! Until then, we are taking a break.”

Silence reigned as Dale stood and stomped out of the room. Chandra walked over to him, and he glowered at her. “Dale, stop acting like a child. That cut to the heart of the matter but made you look like an unstable despot. Some of them may leave or withdraw their support because you cannot act according to your station.”

Dale snorted and crossed his arms. “Support. Sure. At this point, if they are going to remain a pain in the ass to work with, I’d rather have them gone. We need to do a lot of work in the area, and instead, we keep getting caught in meetings with people that are only trying to get themselves a better deal.”

“We were battered by a horrible sneak attack, Dale. There was nothing you could have done to prevent it.” Chandra placed a hand on his arm.

“There is now.” Dale’s eyes glinted as he made his decision. “From now on, I am going to be working with the dungeon. We will get stronger as it does. We will have vetting systems for people that come here. We need to arm ourselves and find weapons we can use against these powerful enemies that we seem to have acquired for no good reason. If this is going to be a place of peace, we need to be ready for war.”

Chandra watched him as he stalked back to the table. “It is always so painful to see a former innocent realize the truth of this world,” she whispered sadly. Returning to the table, she took her spot as the meeting was called to order.

“Before any decisions are committed to,” Dale began speaking before anyone else could, “there was another discovery this morning. The dungeon has created a place devoted to various crafts and training. There are alchemy tables, mining areas, forges, training rooms for various weapons, Inscription equipment, and so on. There is also every rare material the dungeon has ever produced, including Mithril, aluminum, and opal. All of this is accessible for a small fee and certain donations to the dungeon.”

There was a confused roar as people tried to speak over each other. Dale hushed them and took their questions one at a time. Thaddius started the talks greedily. “There is Mithril and aluminum? Just there and ready to use?”

“Yes. As I understand it, the donations you make to the dungeon determine what resources you are allowed access to. The first person to go in offered his entire life as a memory gem, and was granted unlimited access to all materials with an endless amount of time to use them. Other people offered less and were given less to work with. But yes, there are entire chests filled with powdered aluminum, gold, gems, and books that detail various knowledge.”

“Chests filled with Mithril? Ughh.” The Dwarves at the table shivered slightly and flushed a bit. The ones that were standing moved objects they were holding—not-very-subtly—so they could cover the front of their pants.

The high Elf ambassador sneered at them. “Gross.” He turned back to Dale. “What else can you tell us about this?”

Dale explained the limits and benefits of the area, which was shortly followed by everyone agreeing to the offers made in terms of trade, academic expertise, and political alliances. The meeting ended, and Dale hurried off to find his team when he heard some words that froze him in his tracks.

“Necromancers attacking, giant spider-bugs swarming into our city, and now a dungeon that plays at being a scholar!” There was a deep female laugh at these words. “Next, you’ll see barbarians carrying us a fresh plate of cookies!”

Turning, Dale looked over to see the Amazonian delegation speaking to each other. He slowly walked toward them, as though he were in a dream. “Did you say… giant spider-bugs?”

He was eyed carefully, and the Amazonian almost didn’t answer. Pursing her lips, she relented, “Yes. Dog-sized flying spiders swarmed our capital. They wove webs over every street, most of the larger buildings, and every sewer hole in the city. The city stank for days until we burned through enough webbing.”

“I need to see. I need to go there,” Dale announced in a shaken tone, then mumbled to himself. “Maybe I’m wrong?”

“As if you’d make it through the gate!” The Amazonian laughed in his face. “We learned our lesson hundreds of years ago; no man is allowed in our capital without a slave collar. Filthy animals like men need to live as animals, else you get ‘ideas’. Like you, pretending to be Noble.” She walked away, leaving a shocked Dale behind. He almost told her to leave, simply due to the fact that he had warned her that her brand of hateful speech was not allowed, but he simply had more important battles to fight right now. Plus, without even trying to, she had essentially just saved his life with the forewarning of what his trek to her city would result in.

Dale walked outside, coming to face a crowd that had been gathered. There were signs of exhaustion, trauma, fear, and anger. He quietly crushed a Core and shivered, now filled with confidence. Dale walked to a podium that was prepared for him, taking a deep breath. “People of Mountaindale. Above all else, I am horrified by the events of last night. We were attacked, harshly and without warning or provocation. Lives were lost. Friends, family, brothers-in-arms. I want to be the first to tell you that this assault will not be forgotten. We will find these cowards that attack in the dead of night and destroy them root and branch. We have made an agreement today, here in our humble town. The combined might of the Dwarves, High and Dark Elves, two of the Human kingdoms,” Dale turned a stony glance upon the Amazons, “and the Northmen have all decided to devote resources and troops to eradicating this infestation. When we find them, we go to war.”

Ragged cheers broke the stillness left by his words, and soon, people were clamoring to ask questions. Anger and fear had turned to righteous fury as people were given an outlet for their loss. All those gathered felt a surge of powerful emotion as they dedicated themselves to the destruction of their attackers.

“Today though, we mourn our dead.” Dale motioned, large casks of ale and wine were tapped, and full mugs were passed around. “I ask that you not drink just yet but wait until everyone holds a stein.” There were a few guilty faces as men tried to get the foam out of their moustaches. When everyone was holding a mug, Dale raised his own tankard. “A full cup is a sign of joy, happiness, and plenty. Today though, we are damaged. We do not have our entire populace, and within all of us, there is a place that is empty. Today, we mourn.”

Taking a few deep breaths, Dale let the silence reign for a moment. “We all hold a full glass. In honor of those we have lost, who took a shard of us with them, let us pour out a portion of our drink and, hopefully, some of the sorrow we hold within ourselves.” He tipped his mug, and the bubbling liquid slashed on the ground at his feet. Dale poured out more than the others around him, attempting to showcase his deep feelings of loss. Around the area, his actions were mirrored. He tipped back the remainder, drinking as much as he could in a single gulp.

Looking around, all eyes were on him. Dale nodded respectfully at them. “We mourn, but we must go on. Food and drink are provided for anyone who would like to partake. Death is everywhere in the Phantom Mountains!”

“Death is everywhere!” the crowd chanted in reply. The mood remained somber that evening, but at midnight, Brakker the bard decided that it was time to leave the sadness behind and get on with life. He started playing merrily, and soon, people were laughing and sharing stories of the departed.

Brakker asked if there were any requests, and Dale chuckled evilly, snuck a look at Hans, and asked the bard to play “Killer of Her Loneliness”. It was a popular drinking song, so people were soon singing and laughing along with the terrible lyrics.

“The killer of her heart; he had stolen her love like a thief in the darkest of nights!” Brakker drunkenly sang. People were clapping along and whistling. “His dangerousness forced them to part. His taste on her lips, she watched him go-o…”

As the song was coming to an end, everyone who knew the final refrain joined in, “He was dangerlicious!” Cheering broke out as people laughed and drank.

“Wow. That was unutterably terrible.” Rose chuckled at the bard's antics. “Why oh why would you ask him to play that song, Dale?”

Dale looked at Hans, who was glowering at the bard and drinking heavily. “Oh, it just has deep, personal meaning to me.” Hans choked on his ale and slowly lowered his cup. “I mean, how often are you found to be dangerlicious?”

Hans’ eyes were locked on Dale, and if he had been a higher cultivation rank, his look may have killed the newly nobleman. “What do you think you know?” he whispered hoarsely.

Dale feigned innocence. “What do you mean, Hans?”

The ex-assassin narrowed his eyes. “You don’t know… G’night all!” He got up and started hurriedly moving into the crowd.

Tom blocked his way seemingly unintentionally, then broke into a grin when he saw his mentor's face. “Hello! Heading out?”

“Ah. Yeah… tired or something,” Hans mumbled as his eyes darted around.

“Sure you aren’t off to steal love like a thief in the darkest of– oof!” Tom’s sly grin vanished as he doubled over from a punch to the stomach.

Turning around with a jerky motion, Hans had a skull-like grin on his face. “So. You. Do. Know.”

“Yeah, we do!” Rose released a deep belly laugh, shaking in her seat. “C’mere, killer, have a drink on me!” Hans rejoined the group and dealt with the good-natured ribbing, but no matter how they begged, he refused to tell the story associated with the horrible song.

Adam laughed breathily. “At least we know why Kere Nolsen was so adamantly against having his name immortalized in song.”

Dawn was threatening as the revelry ended, and Dale took a deep breath, dreading the next thing that he needed to do. Saying his goodbyes and good nights, he wandered over to his room, sitting heavily on the bed. Almost hyperventilating, he called out to the dungeon, “Cal.”

A few moments passed before he heard an incredulous response, <Dale? You called to me? Are you dying again or something? I saw your speech. Very uplifting.>

“No, Cal… I… I have some news.” Dale swallowed, his throat drier than he believed possible.

<Well, spit it out then.>

“I need assurances from you first. I want to make a deal,” Dale announced firmly.

<Oh? We’re doing this again? Well, what are you offering, and what do you want?> The curiosity was pouring across their connection. The dungeon was getting a bit worked up, making Dale even more nervous.

“I want you to work with me. For the town. Help us build, grow, and learn. Help us look out for dangerous people, and give us warning when it looks like we might be under attack. Regulate the first couple levels of your dungeon so that we can train new people without the majority of them dying. You can charge for all of these services, but I want you to agree right now to do it and only charge a fair price.” Dale almost coughed but didn’t want to interrupt the seriousness of his words.

<I… see.> There was a pregnant pause. <In return?>

Dale nodded; he had expected this question. “In return, we will work to make you larger and stronger. A force to be reckoned with, with a city of protectors. If you need something, we will try to get it for you, for a fair cost.”

<While that sounds fun–>

“In return,” deciding it was time, Dale dropped the big news, “I also think that I have found where Dani is being held.”

Cal

<What? Why didn’t you start with that? Where is she? Tell me!> The reverberations in Dale’s mind made his eyes roll into his head, and he fell to the ground. <Oh, for abyss sake.> At this distance, my aura was too weak to either force itself into his mind or heal his body. His own aura interfered too much. I needed to be subtle to make changes. Like adding pleasing smells to the air around him when he was happy and using that to sway him to my side by making that scent when I wanted him to agree with me.

I waited a few minutes, and Dale started to stir. <Dale? Are you okay? I’m sorry about that, I was just–>

“Shut up,” Dale ordered bluntly. “That proves it. I knew that you had been affecting me somehow. I can see that my mental defenses aren’t strong enough to stop you anymore. My friends told me that I said things—and did things—in the dungeon that I don’t remember doing. So we will add that to the deal. You will further agree not to insert thoughts or control me directly. Only I will control myself. I will not be a puppet.”

The resolve in his eyes was as hard as my Core. “If you don’t agree, I will not come into the dungeon anymore. I won’t risk losing myself. I also will not tell you where Dani is and order people not to let you find out.”

Well, he certainly had me over the coals. I thought about his deal, and really, it was more than fair. Mutual protection, mutual benefit, mutual gains. I sighed when I realized that I needed to agree. <Okay, Dale. If you accept my terms, I will swear that if you uphold your part of the deal, I will uphold mine to the best of my ability. This does not mean that I will give you anything you want. I reserve the right to refuse payment or exchange. If you break the deal, I am free of all constraints unless we make a new deal. Here is another point that you will have to deal with—if there is less danger, the rewards are going to drop sharply. If my Cats are corralled on the fourth floor and the monsters have a hard cap for what rank will be on each floor… you are looking at coppers in chests across the entire floor. Not silver, certainly not gold. Agreed?>

“Agreed.” A dollop of my Mana constricted around my Core, signifying the agreement and how I would die if I broke it. Looked like painfully. Fun times. Dale gave me the news I had been waiting for. “Dani is in the capital of the Amazon’s Queendom. Your ‘love-bugs’ swarmed the place, covering streets, buildings, and the sewers in webs.”

<Thank you for this information, Dale,> I sincerely stated. <How are you going to get her out? Do you have a plan yet? How can I help?>

He was shaking his head as I started asking questions. “I can’t go there, Cal. The Queendom enslaves any man that attempts to enter the city. Not to mention that there are dozens of at least B-ranked necromancers that attacked us. There is sure to be more there.”

I digested his words sourly. A flash of inspiration struck me. <Minya is a woman! And a Mage! I’ll send her!> I focused on her, doing my best to interact with her at this distance. <Minya! Can you hear me?>

After a tenuous moment, her voice reached my mind. Her words were faint but understandable. “Cal! I heard you were attacked! I’m on my way back now, but the Portal Guild is refusing to allow me to skip the queue! It could be days!”

<Don’t worry about it. I’m fine! I need you to go to the capital of the Amazon Queendom. My bugs swarmed it, so Dani must be there!> I shouted along our connection.

“Got it! Do you have any specifics as to where she might be? Since that city is built from the slave labor of an entire nation’s men, it is truly massive,” Minya informed me regretfully.

She was going to go! Yes! I thought about the information I had and came to the most logical conclusion. <They are holding her somewhere in the sewers! I am almost sure of it!>

There was silence from her end. I almost spoke again, when her wry words tickled me, “You always send me to the best places. The black market, the sewers, what next? Undercover at a brothel?”

<A what? Will that help you find Dani?> Minya was confusing. Did Dale have a brothel? Did he need one? Was it some kind of soup?

“… Just try talking to me again in a few days. I’m going.” Her voice abruptly stopped coming to me.

<Well, Dale, hopefully that is taken care of now,> I joyfully informed my now-somewhat-willing minion.

Dale had fallen asleep, but he cracked an eye open when I spoke at him. “Lovely. Now get out of my room,” he muttered tiredly.

I left, quietly fuming. Dale had been able to blackmail me into making promises to him. For Dani, I would do anything, and he used me! He would have withheld information about Dani. The next time he stepped in my dungeon, he was going to have a rough day. For now, it was time to prepare weapons. <I’m coming for you, Dani,> I swore aloud. A band of Mana wrapped itself around me as my law acknowledged my oath. Good.

Chapter Thirty-two

It had been two weeks since Dale told me about Dani, and I had been throwing myself at my various projects. I was almost ready, but I needed more power than I currently had if I wanted to be able to retrieve Dani by force. I was also beginning to become worried about Minya, as she hadn’t reported in when she was supposed to. My attempts to contact her were met exclusively with silence.

“Arsenopyrite,” Bob’s words blared into the air, startling me from my current brooding.

<What? Um. Bless you?> I awkwardly tried to figure out what he was saying.

“Arsenopyrite. Chalcanthite. Cinnabar. Torbernite. Heliodor… Opal.” Bob’s grin stretched as did the silence.

I looked at him, waiting to have the joke explained when the last word he had spoken allowed me to make the connection. <You found them!> I gasped in shock and wonder.

“All of them.” With a flourish, he produced a sample of each of the minerals he had just named. “At least we know why no one has found that these are the strongest conductors of their Essence type. These are unbelievably toxic. To my point, I am very dizzy and think I am dying.” He swayed, collapsing to the ground.

The stones clattered away from him, and I ate them all by reflex. While Bob was unconscious, I looked at the damage in him and winced. I was amazed he had lasted this long. While I fixed him, I made sure to catalog the effects each stone created. Arsenopyrite, or iron arsenic sulfide. Air Essence and corruption absorbing. How strange. I have no idea how it damaged his lungs so badly.

Chalcanthite, or water-copper as it is known. It was in his blood and killing everything—blood cells, bacteria, nutrients. Left behind was pure water suffused with the mineral. I had seen this material before, but it had never had this effect!

Cinnabar, an amalgam of sulfur and mercury. Fire corruption and chunks of stone were coating Bob’s hands, and rapidly burning through the muscle. I absorbed it and cringed at the damage that had been done to my Goblin from a simple touch.

Torbernite. Torbernite? This was all over the place in small amounts! Well, to be fair, it was only in the granite portion of my surroundings, but there was a lot of it around. With earth Essence swirling within it, the mineral released a soft green glow. The light that touched Bob was making his skin decompose, so I quickly removed him from contact with the stone.

I looked for any damage that had been done by the Heliodor, but as far as I could tell, it was just yellow beryl. No damaging effects that I knew of. Having fixed everything I could find, I gently woke Bob up.

“Huh? Whazzat?” Bob blinked sleepily as he stretched. “Oh! Right! I need to get these stones to… the stones are gone!” He burped upon saying the final word, robbing his statement of any tension.

<No, you got them to me. Don’t worry about that. What happened though? Did you take that much damage from these rocks just because there was corruption in them?> I allowed him to become more fully awake and could practically see his memory of the situation coming back.

“Ah yes!” He stood, then leaned on his staff. “It seems that these will absorb corruption for a time, but once they are too full of the taint, they begin amplifying the dangerous and harmful effects they contain.”

<You did good work today, Bob.> I was already growing a woven rope of these minerals toward the surface. Thanks to my experiments with opal, threading this rope would only take a short amount of time before it was fully set up. <If these do what they are supposed to, we will see an eighty percent increase in Essence purity within the dungeon.>

“Excellent news!” Bob happily chattered, waiting for instructions.

<Speaking of news, how goes the preparations for the flying rituals?> I was watching him carefully, but even if I hadn't been, it would have been hard to miss the flinch.

Bob squirmed, then sighed. “They aren't ready for you. We have been working tirelessly, and the extra dozen Bob’s you made have helped, but… they aren’t ready.”

<What is the issue?>

“Too many Runes and effects.” Bob rubbed his head as if he had a headache. Impossible, since he was at peak health right now. “We keep dying. Even the small-scale effects are so draining that we cannot fully activate them. Keeping them active would be too much even for you.”

<I see. We need to make them more efficient, in that case. We need to find a Rune that encompasses multiple effects that we are after and find a way to have the Essence that is being wasted get transferred into areas that need it. I’ll spend a day with you soon, and we will work that out.> My voice trailed off a bit as my mind was already deeply engrossed in the issue.

“Realistically, I don’t even know how you are able to keep your ley-line ritual going. Every second, every day, it is growing and carving Runes farther and farther away from you,” Bob scoffed at the sheer amount of resources that were being invested into the ritual.

<Hmm. You know, that’s a good point. It’d have to be due to its function. Unlike the rituals we’re working on now, that one does just one thing at a time and at such a small level that the individual cost is nominal. The total amount of work done is quite large though. Sadly, that isn’t applicable to the current issues we are having.> Returning to my task of replacing all the stone in the dungeon with pumice, I continued speaking. <No, what we need is to find catalysts and reagents that will trim down the cost of activation and sustainment for us. We are really busy, so let’s delegate a bit. Offer a reward in the workroom. Whoever can find what we need will get some kind of reward. You choose what it is. I am barely paying attention to what people are after right now.>

Bob nodded and walked toward the hidden room behind the workshop walls. There were always a few Bobs in there recording information, taking notes on projects, and trying to replicate the effects themselves. I could duplicate a completed potion, weapon, or Rune, but right now, there was nothing I could do to experiment. It wasn’t like I could mix up a potion, or… wait a minute… I could make potions and experiment! All that was needed was the ability to stir and add ingredients over heat! I was intrigued by this idea but quickly frustrated as I remembered how little time I already had to devote to my current goals. I’m bad at delegating; I always feel that other people work too slowly. I can work for weeks straight, but there is only one of me.

I had tried to make another of me—a second Core with my memories—but when I tried to copy my thoughts to another Core, either it did nothing or tried to pull everything out and leave nothing behind. I would most likely ask Bob to become a dungeon Core eventually, but I was leery about sharing my territory. I was pushed from my thoughts as a rainbow lit up my room. What was going on? I almost lashed out, but luckily, I realized it was condensed Essence and corruption. I watched in awe as the taint remaining in the dungeon disappeared faster than a chubby knight falling into a pitfall trap.

Everything in the dungeon took on a crisp look, coming into better focus. With every breath, my Mobs became stronger. A few half-forgotten advanced Bashers—who had been flooded with Essence when I shouted at Minya a few weeks ago—started evolving! An Oppressor and an Impaler, the wind and infernal type Bashers respectively, grew larger. The Impaler grew claws on its feet, which became sharper and even sturdier after a few minutes. Its horn also grew and curved, gaining a decidedly sword-like quality. The Oppressor now had wind swirling around it constantly, albeit gently, and every move it made was enhanced. I watched it run around, no longer needing to jump off of walls in order to turn sharp corners.

Both were quite large at this point. They could look a young child in the eye while on all fours and would be able to look a tall man in the eye if they stood on their hind legs. There was an interesting side effect of a second evolution; they were hungry. No longer were they prey animals as they hunted and ate meat. They left their fellow bunny-type Mobs alone, but everything else seemed to be fair game. I pointed them at an adventuring party and watched as they charged in.

“Look out! Extra-large dinner incoming!” One of the invaders made his last joke, and the others chortled as they prepared for an easy fight. Normally, they would have been correct to assume this, but today was not their lucky day.

The… Oppressor—I’ll need to rename them to keep them separate in my mind—accelerated to triple its previous speed. He was behind the adventurers even before the stupid grins were off their faces. The bunny jumped an impressive height into the air before contorting and releasing a howling gale. While this didn’t have the same cutting power as its previous form, it had a much wider area of effect. The compressed air knocked three people off their feet and staggered the other two. The Impaler charged at the downed men, using its horn-sword to great effect. To be blunt, with a quick flick, the men’s heads were parted from their bodies. Three strikes, three kills. It then jumped on to one of the standing men, raking him with his claws before slashing him with his horn.

The Oppressor wasn’t idle during this time and was attacking the final man with blistering speed. A hit and he was already gone by the time the human could try to muster a counterattack. The human fell after the third attack shattered his knee, and he was quickly finished off by the Impaler. The Bashers swiftly fell on the humans, devouring them like starving animals.

<What the abyss,> I stated flatly. <You aren’t allowed on this level. Heck no. I’d have to offer gold again. What are you…? C-rank? Yeah, no.> I thought about where they would fit in and struck upon an idea. Raile had turned into a joke with his easy to read attacks and ponderous movement. I would place them in with him and let them be a group. That would make the challenge much greater.

<What to name you… > Thinking about the battle that had just happened, I smiled and nodded to myself. <You shall be Raile and… the Hopsecutioners!>

Dale

Dale smiled as the roof of the final building slid into place. Dwarves had an unbelievable connection with—and understanding of—the earth. The sheer size of the academy would put a palace to shame yet had been completed in just over two weeks! Now he knew why everything they built was so intricate; doing things on a large scale was easy for them. As a nation, they could likely hollow out a mountain range in a few years! The intricate work though, that took time and dedication.

Dale looked around his city, smiling at the result of his bargaining. There were six large buildings, each of them dedicated to one of the affinities. There had been a bit of pressure not to include infernal in the school, but the angry voices eventually acquiesced. Opposite the infernal hall was the church. Dale hadn’t even had to ask—Father Richard came to him and asked to be an official part of the academy. The buildings were evenly spaced from each other with the walls connecting them forming a huge hexagon. There were inner walls surrounding the dungeon entrance as well.

Between each building was a courtyard spectacularly designed for the affinity type a student would be training and had specialized materials donated from multiple nations to help with focus and cultivation. The professors would all have a place to stay in the buildings, but there were large student housing buildings being added outside the walls. News of the academy had flown across the sentient nations, and offers for teaching and requests for admittance were flooding in.

Dale’s political power was soaring as well, to his great satisfaction. He had made a deal with the dungeon, and he was darn well going to honor it. Political power was going to be his contribution to the expedition, as he had already had his fill of being around Mages and the higher beings they had been fighting. He shivered as he remembered the lumbering mounds of flesh, the nigh-unstoppable abominations. No, thank you. Convincing people to fight for him, sure.

Dale’s treasury was filling nicely as well. He was entirely out of personal debt and was finally saving most of the money that he earned. The city treasury was also doing well but was draining quickly as more and more buildings were added to the public domain.

“Excuse me, your Nobleness, we have a question for ya.” The Dwarven foreman strolled up to him with his customary disregard for rank. Dale liked him quite a bit.

“What can I do for you?” Dale politely smiled at the enthusiastic Dwarf.

“I was wondering if you wanted more space to expand. You have a fairly large area, but the rest of the mountain over there means that you can only expand down or up. It would take a week or three, but we could knock the top of this mountain off. Make this the summit, and give ya a much larger flat area. Now, that sort of thing is expensive and not in the current contract but could be worth it. No worries about rockslides, lots of space…” The foreman trailed off, already knowing the answer he’d get.

“I’m going to give you a tentative yes, but this is something I need to discuss with the council before approving. I’m sure the city planner will lose his mind over… how much extra space would that give us?” Dale paused to hear the answer.

“It’d easily quadruple the space you have.” The Dwarf looked a bit pained for a moment. “Errr… that means it’ll–”

“Have four times as much space. Got it.” Dale’s face twitched as he saw the confusion on the Dwarves face. “Ah, right. I was able to get a memory stone with the Dwarven mathematical system in it.”

“Ah. Well. Let me know, and we can start as soon as these buildings are done. We still need to finish a bit of Runework on them.” The Dwarf started to leave.

“Wait!” Dale called. “You are putting Runes on them? What will they do?”

The Dwarf shrugged. “Standard stuff. Connect all the stone with itself, so that if you try to break it, you need to put in enough force to destroy the entire building at once.”

“You do that on all buildings?” Dale’s eyes were bulging. He was so glad this building was being donated by the Dwarven nation.

“We have a reputation to uphold! Can’t let the Elves be the only ones that use Runes on their buildings!” The Dwarf chuckled at the thought.

“Elves use Runes on their buildings?” Dale yelped. “What do they do?” Now that he thought of it, he did remember… something.

“Forgetfulness. They use chaos-powered Runes to make people forget about their buildings and the locations they are in. Really useful to make people forget about them unless they really need something.” The Dwarf picked up the pace, obviously trying not to get sucked into conversation again.

Dale’s face turned red. “The Elves owe me technique memory stones!” He started to storm off but changed his path toward a certain redhead walking toward him. “Tom! I’m going to see the Elves! When I come back, ask me if they gave me the stones I am due!”

“Uh…” Tom tried to answer, but Dale was already running toward the Elven embassy. About twenty minutes passed, and Dale was walking by with a happy expression. “Ah! There you are! Did you get the stones you were after?”

Dale looked confused, then angry, and finally resigned. “I’ll bring it up to her at the next council meeting. This is ridiculous.” Dale dropped to the ground as a knife soared above his head. “Speaking of ridiculous…”

“Oh? My training is ridiculous? It must be ridiculously easy then, as you have barely been paying attention to my attacks. Good to know.” A column of fire exploded upward, fully immolating Dale. He screamed, diving out of the fire, only to be met by a blast of wind. Dale slammed to the ground, bounced once, and screamed again as a stone spike slammed through his leg, pinning him against the road.

“You graduated from basic attacks to novice attacks. Feel pleased. Hopefully, you won’t get too bored with this.” The Dark Elf went silent and vanished, leaving only a shocked group of onlookers and a moaning Dale.

“You did kind of ask for that,” Tom admonished as he pulled the stone from Dale, needing to put in a bit of force to allow it to come free of the ground under him. “You are acting arrogant again.”

Dale glared at his friend as he was pulled to his feet. Tom started dragging him towards the clerics. “I know you think that you have it rough, but my training as a Noble was similar. This is what all Nobles go through. A variation of it at least. The difference is that this version of my training started when I was eight years of age. You are at least an adult, but you are far behind another Noble of your own age group. This is good for you. Your chances of survival are increasing. Slowly.”

“Sure doesn’t feel like it,” Dale stated through charred lips. They walked into the church, and the cleric assigned to him winced when he saw the severe burns.

“Can’t regenerate carbonized cells. Gonna need to heal a new layer of skin to the surface,” the cleric apathetically stated. “Hope you haven’t been trying to get a tan.”

Dale painfully shook his head. “Nah, I don’t bother. All I do is burn.” His comment was met with total silence.

“…Is he in shock, or was that his actual sense of humor?” the cleric asked Tom. The barbarian shook his head in sad acknowledgment.

“I am in a lot of pain right now.”

“Right! Sorry…”

It took about a quarter hour for the last patch of skin to flake off of Dale, revealing healthy skin beneath. As they left the building, Dale looked at his silent friend. “Tom, what is the trick to this? How do I find him and avoid his attacks? How do I not take damage from his elemental attacks?” He wasn’t expecting an answer, but Tom gave him a huge smile.

“Finally! We aren’t allowed to offer assistance; you have to ask for it! Now that you have though, we can begin by speaking to your instructor!” Tom threw a punch into the air, then patted Dale on the arm.

“You can help? Hey! Your hand is back!” Dale gripped Tom’s hand and gave it a firm squeeze. “Excellent!”

“Personally, I greatly enjoy having my body back together. The answer to your issue, my friend, is personal shielding. You have been adding Essence to your aura; you need to alter your aura so that it contains a bit of your elements. While it won’t protect you fully, it would have given you time to escape that column of fire without damage.” Tom rambled on longer than Dale had ever heard from him at one time.

“You really know a lot about this, huh?” Dale was grinning at the thought of not succumbing to fire again. “I’m impressed!”

Tom was silent for a moment. “As you know… Nobles go through this training. At my age, I should be in the C-ranks in order to have my family acknowledge me. I was. When I was exiled, I was stripped of my cultivation base and forced to forget my family’s techniques. All that remained was my years of combat instruction, but now, thanks to Hans, I once again have a chance to redeem myself.”

Chapter Thirty-three

The academy was about to open for business! While it had only taken a month of construction work, there had been more than enough time for the available instructor positions to fill up. Students were pouring into the area, most of them followed by retainers and house guards. You didn’t need to be a Noble to attend, but the tuition was not cheap. Dale ensured that there were scholarships for naturally talented poor people, but those were distributed quickly even though the testing was rigorous. On the plus side, the entirety of the student body was held to a high standard. With the dangers of cultivating and the easy access to the dungeon, there would likely be plenty of room for new students throughout the year.

Several of the sentient races were represented, and guards’ rotations were increased so they could ensure that there were no ‘accidents’ among them. This area was intended to be free of politics, but no one really believed it was possible. Looking down from the balcony of his new room, Dale marveled at what he saw. This area was now a fortress! The original site used by the camp was a walled city, and the academy had its own reinforced walls as well. With great fanfare and a festive atmosphere, the Dwarves had pushed the summit of the mountain off the northern face just days ago. The thunderous rumbling of stone tumbling into the valley below had echoed for hours as rock continued to fall. Now there was room for a true city to be created!

Dale sharpened his gaze as he saw a protuberance that shouldn’t have existed. What would otherwise have been a perfectly flat plain had odd shapes jutting out of it! It took a few moments to register, but he growled when he made the connection. The dungeon had lifted more of those blasted obelisks! At least they were in a predictable, set pattern. In fact, if he looked at it from this angle, it was almost as if they were forming a–

“Dale! It’s time to make a speech!” Rose called up to him. Dale was unceremoniously pulled from his thoughts. He blinked and looked down. Sure enough, hundreds of people were in the courtyard chattering. Right. It was time to officially allow entrance to everyone and open the school!

Clearing his throat, Dale started talking into the hoop on a rod he had been given. Wind Essence lifted his voice, carrying it across the city. “Hello, people of Mountaindale! Many of you know me, but most of you don’t. I am Duke Dale Phantom, Lord of this wonderful city. It is my great honor—and pleasure—to announce the opening of the Phantom Academy! As you all know, this is the only center of learning that can boast the cooperation of many of the great races as well as grant access to a neutral affinity dungeon. We expect nothing but excellence from all of you! Know that when you graduate from here, you will have resources, connections, and combat potential higher than any of you had ever dared dream!”

Cheers greeted the start of his speech, and Dale smiled as he felt a rush of emotions. “There is cause for concern! This is not a safe place! To become stronger, to have greater personal power, you will be risking much! Our teachers will be harsh because that is what you will need in order to survive! The rules will be strict, but know that they are there for your protection! You are taking your life into your own hands here, and in return, you will be treated like adults, no matter your age.” This caused a few dark mutters as well as a few of the younger faces to light up.

“The last thing you need to know!” Dale boomed, face now dark and serious. “This is not a tame dungeon! It will attempt to kill you! Don’t let it! Learn your limits, learn your strengths! That is what we are here for, as an academy. If you need help, ask! But expect that you will be called on to help others in turn. Welcome… to the Phantom Academy!” Cheers burst out of the assembled people, the odd speech not putting them off, but instead, getting their blood pumping! Excited to begin training and in some cases learning to access their Essence, they quickly broke into groups and filed away to their various halls of affinity.

<Wow, Dale, that was really impressive! You didn’t stutter once!> Dale groaned as his mind was invaded. <Hey, buddy, you haven’t been coming deeper into the dungeon lately. Aren’t you excited by the newest challenges and Mobs?>

Flopping on to a nearby chair, Dale responded aloud to the intrusive voice, “I’ve heard all about your new Boss Monster. No one who goes down there survives, so I’m certainly not going to try my luck.”

<If no one survives when they go down there, how do you know ‘all about it’?>

Ignoring the question, Dale kept speaking, “I am glad that you are honoring our deal though. No Cats have been seen on the first through third floors, though your Hopsecutioners have been doing a number on unprepared groups.”

<Not my fault they are unprepared to fight in an area they were warned is trying to eat them. I won’t feel bad for other people’s greed and thoughtlessness. About the Cats, I wanted to let you know that the labyrinth has now doubled in size and complexity. I needed to add large, jungle-type areas to keep the Cats happy. They were getting cooped up and even more aggressive. Also, since we are being nice to each other, I am giving you warning that Snowball has gotten bored being alone and is now wandering around that floor. So. Yeah.>

“Thank you for the information, Cal.” Dale pulled a box out of a chest sitting next to him. Opening the box, he pulled out a book. “This is for you. It is borrowed from the remaining Spotters, and I only get to study it for a day.”

<I-is that what I think it is?> Dale had never heard the dungeon sound so awestruck. <All Runes known to the Spotters guild?>

“This is it,” Dale confirmed his words by setting the book down gently and stepping away.

<Wow. I am amazed Dale. Because of that, I’m going to give you first a warning, followed by a hint about something. You might want to turn around.> Dale looked confused but turned around. All that was behind him was the balcony and the chest. What was–

A screaming Goblin shot out of the chest, knife leading. Dale yelped and collapsed, rolling backward as the blade swished through the air. Coming to his feet, he launched forward and threw a massively powerful punch. Hitting the Goblin in the chest, blood tore out of the creature’s back, and it collapsed to the ground, dead.

Before Dale could say a word, he felt a mental shrug. <Not my fault you put a chest in your room. About that hint, the Dungeon Boss you know ‘all about’ is no longer on the lowest floor.>

“That monstrosity is roaming?” Dale blanched and turned to run out of the room. People had to know!

<No, no. No need to get all personal. There is a new floor I built under it, and this floor has secrets that a few of the races have killed to keep secret. Soon, especially with these Runes I now have, a few of my floors will be impossible for ninety-nine percent of your population. I’d say at least ninety-five percent of groups would die to the Dungeon Boss, but at least there is only one of him.> Dale really had no idea what to make of this information. He resolved to pass it on to the council. <Also, I have a gift for your city!>

Instantly wary, Dale was able to spit out the needed question. “And what might that be?”

<Since there is a Mana storm about to begin, you finally get to see what I have been slaving over for the last month and what those obelisks are really used for! I’ve been wanting to do this since I learned how to create Runes!>

“Cal, what are you doing?” Dale formed a fist, struggling to keep the nerves out of his voice.

<Oh, stop whining, and go back out on the balcony.>

“Mana storm!” an amplified voice rang through the city. Alarms shattered the peaceful mountain air, and Dale rushed to stand outside. Hans threw open the door to Dale’s room, making sure his team leader wasn’t doing anything foolish. But, of course he was.

“Dale! Get in here! There is a Mana storm starting!” Hans bellowed as he saw that Dale was standing unprotected on his balcony.

“Hans, come here. Something's about to happen.” Dale sounded resigned enough that Hans did a double take to ensure Dale was not a body double.

Trusting his team leader but still wary, Hans slowly walked toward the balcony but stopped while he was still inside. “You can see pretty good from in here, you know. Like any other normal person can.”

Dale was looking at the multicolored thunderclouds appearing above the city. “Looks like a big one,” he commented calmly. It started to rain, or… at least, it looked like rain at first. Grain seeds were pouring out of the clouds, pinging off the stone like hail.

“Come on inside, Dale,” Hans cajoled his friend. “If you stand in the grain, you are going to get all wheat.”

The horrible joke snapped Dale out of his apparent stupor. He turned and glared at the snorting assassin. “Why Hans? If Rose were here, she might have shot you for that.”

“Dale. Dale. Look…” Hans had stopped laughing and was now pointing a shaking finger out at the storm. The clouds were doing something… different. Something that had never been seen in the previous storms. They were twisting, forming a funnel cloud. The twisting Mana and Essence released lightning bolts and raw chaos, but oddly, none of it seemed to strike anything. The funnel descended, finally making contact with the tallest obelisk. The obelisk lit up, and the clouds started to boil.

Cal

<Funnel cloud has touched down!> I shouted to the gathered Bobs. <Obelisk Alpha has reacted. Various Mana is streaming to the Core room! Avoid leaks. This is deadly! I repeat, do not touch any leaking Mana! It’ll destroy your meridians so badly that even I won’t be able to fix them!> The obelisk directed the Mana toward me, but small leaks were expected in our trial run. There was chaos in these streams after all. The Mana touched me and began to be assimilated by my personal law. Unlike my Goblins, I was protected from the effect of absorbing the ‘wrong’ type of Mana. As far as I knew, only my Mana could take in any other type of Mana and use it fully. No doubt a benefit of my law being what all other laws descended from.

The process wasn’t perfectly smooth, but my Mana reserves were starting to become huge and dense. <Keeping the stream incoming! Now activating Runic formations on all other obelisks!>

“Understood! All Bobs are watching for anomalies; feel confident in us and focus your efforts on Mana redirection!” Bob retorted quickly.

I was glad for his words and followed his advice, focusing on directing the Mana as he had suggested. One by one, the obelisks the people on the surface could see began to light up. The clouds were still descending, twisting with fury and pseudo-sentience as it tried to escape my pull. Not a chance! I had my hooks in now, and months of work would not go to waste! I needed this Mana; there was no telling when I would be able to gain such a huge windfall again! Now, the obelisks below the surface began to light up, and Mana began to flow along the channels I had cut in the rock with thousands of painstaking hours of work.

The clouds were half gone, and the first layer of Runes activated! So much Essence rushed towards the mountain that the sky lit up as if a rainbow dawn had graced us. I had etched my cultivation pattern into the stone and lined it with tens of thousands of Essence absorption Runes. I had wanted one massive absorption Rune, but even this amount of Mana I had gained would likely have not been enough to initially power it. I kept the Mana flowing, forcing it—and not Essence—to power the Runes. The second layer was smaller with nearly half of the amount of Runes. When it fully activated, the Essence draw became even greater. The air was humming now. With the third layer, the ground started to tremble as the cultivation pathways filled with power.

After the fourth layer, Essence began to accumulate on the surface; no longer was it all able to be drawn into the ground or to me. Next, the fifth, sixth, all the way to the twenty-third layer of cultivation cut into the stone where the Essence became liquid and began to pour into my Core room like a gentle rain. It had passed through so many filters and taint accumulators that this Essence was entirely colorless. When looking through this pure Essence, only a distortion of the image behind it was visible, like peering through a heat wave.

An unexpected event almost made me lose control; the Silverwood tree began to grow! It shot up, basking in the thick rain of Essence. The tree grew over fifty feet high, stopping at the ceiling only because it couldn’t easily cut through the stone. It began to widen instead, only growing to about four feet in diameter before stopping. The roots were now thicker, more numerous, and those began to push through the stone of the dungeon. They didn’t grow over Runes or Essence pathways that I had made, but they did wind around them. The tree began to shine, but nothing else appeared to happen.

With great relief, I refocused on the Mana draining from the now-small clouds. The sun was again warming the surface, and I smiled as I poured everything I had left into the not-yet-activated Runescript Bob had been preparing for me. The Runescript was built into a marvelous toy I had blatantly stolen from a child. It had been designed by the reclusive Gnomish people, and I wasn’t about to pass up an opportunity like that! They rarely made contact with the outside world, but when they did, their mechanical creativity was shown to be second to none.

I had built the Runescript on to a ‘gyroscope’. The ‘toy’ had opened possibilities I would have never discovered otherwise. I felt confident the Runes would work, as I had prepared similar versions on one of the first weapons I had really set my mind to creating. Of course, we had tested this on a smaller scale, and it worked there, so I was almost positive nothing would go wrong… or the mountain would explode. The Runescript activated, and the last of the Mana poured into a specially prepared Core. This was what Dani had once dubbed a ‘Mana accumulator’. The name was disingenuous, as it didn’t accumulate Mana; it only stored what I gave it—efficiently, to be fair.

I finally relaxed, panting heavily as the storm faded and the cheering began. The Goblins were celebrating, and the new students of the academy on the surface were astounded at what they thought was a masterstroke by the city. The Essence density on the surface was now the same as a young dungeon, nearly triple the standard! At the academy where Essence was leaking out of the dungeon entrance, it was even higher. Suddenly, being enrolled at the academy was something that Kings would pay a Crown Prince’s ransom to visit!

“Cal!” Dale called softly. “What is this? What just happened?”

<I made a way for both of us to benefit and a way for me to get to Dani. I heard from Minya, by the way. She confirmed that there is… if not a base of operations, then at least a swarm of necromancers in the sewers of the Tigress Queendom capital. Right after she made her report, she stopped responding to me. I don’t know if she is captured or dead. We are going after her and Dani,> I told him, knowing his reaction would be fun to see.

“We are going? Who is we? You are somehow going?” Dale couldn’t seem to focus on what he wanted to ask.

<Yes, Dale. We. Not just you and I… the whole city,> I finished smugly as the building he was in trembled a slight amount. I looked deep inside of myself and directed the gyroscope to begin turning. It had to be moved very, very slowly. The same Runes—as well as a few new ones—that had been on Dale’s old morningstar came to life. As the gyroscope changed position, the clay that surrounded the perimeter of my new territory broke apart as we ever so slowly lifted into the air. The area now lifting was—roughly—diamond shaped. The middle was a huge disk with the mountain proudly standing on top. I had also brought along plenty of room at the bottom to expand and protect the dungeon. Somehow, I had even managed to bring a portion of the forest and a lake! With these resources, I could easily be considered a flying island now! I looked at the amount of power the Runes were consuming to remain operational and winced. The Essence drain was huge, monumental, dare I say… mountainous?

“What are you doing, Cal? Why is my room… my building… the city trembling?” Dale seemed a bit underwhelmed even as he noticed that things were changing. I may be understating his anxiety a tad, but it was my prerogative.

<That is what you are concerned about? Dale. Come on, buddy. Look at the big picture here.> When he couldn’t seem to make the connection, I sighed and gave him a hint. <Watch the horizon for a moment.>

“Is something coming? Are we coming under attack? Is… is the world sinking?” Dale finished his thought with dread as he finally noticed what was happening.

<Literally the opposite of that last one, actually. Dale! We’re flying!> Dale seemed dazed at the news, and I am fairly certain that he looked resigned to his fate.

“I should have known it was too good to be true,” he whispered to himself.

<What are you going on about?>

He looked up, shrugged, and laid down on the bed. “You are going to lift us up into the air and then crush us by dropping too fast aren’t you? This is a mass execution. I knew things were going too well. You are insane after all.”

<That’s pretty dark.> I snorted at his attitude. <No, Dale, we are going after Dani. She is in the Amazon’s city. You can’t go there alone, or you become a slave. I can’t go alone either, so I am bringing everyone!>

Dale was quiet for a moment. When he finally spoke again, it was not words of encouragement. “I think you are underestimating the odds you are up against, Cal. The Queen of the Amazons is S-ranked. She could destroy the entire mountain to the point of not allowing even light debris to land on her people. You are what? B-rank two?”

I checked and found he was correct about my ranking. My use of assimilated Mana had likely given me a better understanding of the components of my own law even if I didn’t understand the nuances right now. <Yes. I know it is a long shot Dale, but it is something I need to do. I… I lost my mind for the first month after she was taken. I wasn’t aware. I was a beast, a place of death. Then a greasy, old guy showed up and shouted at me, and I could suddenly think again. He only seemed like he wanted to fix me. I don’t know what happened, but I’m afraid that if I wait too long, I will become an animal again.> I was feeling vulnerable and had really wanted Dale to be impressed that I was moving an island around. I may have said too much…

He closed his eyes. “Greasy guy? Looked like a hobo? You were going insane, and he only needed to visit you to fix… ugh. Cal, that man is known to the world as Xenocide. As far as we know, he is currently the highest-ranking cultivator on the planet. Legends are told about his brutality and lack of morals.”

<You know him? Do you know how he was able to break me out of the haze I was in?> I was desperate for this information! If he could fix the issue, there was a chance I would be able to avoid it in the future!

“All I know about him is that he is a cultivator of insanity. Madness. Psychosis.” Dale started to shiver as he recounted what little he knew. “He is the only cultivator for that particular concept, though others have tried going down that path. No one knows why.”

<I know why. He kills anyone who tries. Now it makes sense. He told me to stop stealing ‘his whispers’. When I agreed, he seemed surprised and left.> My words were filled with dread, perhaps a tiny bit of admiration as well.

“Don’t think that he took your madness out of kindness, Cal. His name, Xenocide, was earned when he killed off an entire race. He liked the name so much that he has done it twice since then.” Dale’s reveries were cut off as members of his council burst into the room, the new door tearing from its hinges with a piteous squeal.

“Dale! The mountain is rising!” Madame Chandra started the conversation with a bang.

“The Mana storm has been… absorbed?” Father Richard seemed confused, making me laugh.

“Last but not least,” Frank dryly input, “the Essence density of the area has at least tripled. What in the abyss is going on?”

“Isn’t it obvious?” Dale rhetorically stated. “The dungeon learned how to fly.”

Chapter Thirty-four

Overnight, the type of person delving into the dungeon had shifted radically. The first floor was positively swarming with F-ranked groups being led by a C-ranked ‘assistant instructor’. I listened to their conversations and was able to bask in their awe for a while. Ahhh, being amazing is so rewarding.

“We are flying. Are we sure that this dungeon isn’t Kantor reborn?”

“No, Kantor only floated. I hear we are going against the wind!”

“I don’t know why we are going south though. There is only ocean that way.” Oh dear. Seems that a course correction is in order. I checked in with Dale, stole a few maps from the Guild, and carefully rotated the direction-controlling gyroscope. There we go. North-east. Pretty sure. At this rate, we would be there in only a few weeks. I was still proud of the speed. For one, because I was able to move at all. For another, because I was now fairly certain we wouldn’t fall out of the sky for lack of Energy to power the Runes.

The massive cultivation technique filled with Essence-gathering Runes was pulling in enough Essence per hour to raise an F-rank human to the C-rank in one giant leap. There were a few… caveats to this process. We needed to move continuously as the ambient Essence I was taking in depleted the area too fast for it to naturally refill and keep us afloat. Moving to new territory allowed us to gather at the highest rate possible. Keeping us moving while flying took ninety-seven percent of the Essence gathered, which allowed me to keep a bit for myself. Most of the excess went to large Cores for emergencies, but by my estimations, it would take a week of travel to store enough power for fifteen minutes of hovering. Moving was key. Moving was surviving.

Using small portals, I remained connected to my original area so that I had access to the massive pool of oil under where my mountain had stood. I had been nervous that my plan wouldn’t work and my island would crash. So, I guess it may have been an escape route as well if the worst came to pass. I think I’ll keep that tidbit from Dale. Bob started shouting, trying to capture my attention.

<Go ahead, Bob, I’m listening.>

“Great Spirit!” Bob was more anxious than anything I could see would explain. “We are flying into a thunderstorm. Not only that, but the area is extraordinarily dense with lightning Essence. I am almost positive that where we are passing over will hold either powerful cultivators or Beasts. Possibly both. I have an idea though, which may be profitable but will certainly be dangerous.”

I told him to speak his mind. He thanked me and laid out his thoughts, “Since there is such a thick amount of Essence in the area naturally, I am almost certain that your ley line ritual will have extended its Runes to this area. If we can get close enough for you to activate them here, we won’t have to wait for a build-up or accidental influx of Essence in order to make the entire series of Runescript activate.”

<You think that it will take an accident to activate the whole thing? Why didn’t you mention this sooner?>

“Well, it was never an option before! You just started to fly.” Bob cringed as I stuck my ‘tongue’ out at him. Must have felt creepier in his mind than was intended.

<I could have made Dale or Minya go out and activate it!> Bob gained an ‘oops’ face at that moment. <Yeah, exactly. If you thought it wouldn’t work, why did you let me spend a huge amount of Essence on it for months?>

Bob seemed to have no answer for me. He kept trying and failing to speak, which I admit made me laugh and cheered me up a bit. <It’s fine, Bob. What do I need to do?>

Visibly working to calm himself, Bob walked me through the steps I would need to take. “You need to descend to just above ground level and find where your Essence is creating the line of Runes. Yes, it will be deep underground, but since the ritual is powered by your Essence, you should be able to find it easily. Then all you have to do is activate one of the Runes. I wouldn’t be surprised if this whole area is drained to power the Runes in a cascading activation effect, so we should leave as soon as possible when finished.”

<Which is why you are concerned about Beasts or cultivators in the area, I assume. They will be looking for whoever took their source of easy Essence.> Bob nodded at my words, confirming my thoughts. <We should be able to do that. I’ll start the descent now.>

Descending was never going to be a problem. Descending in a controlled manner, on the other hand, took quite a bit of doing. We couldn’t go straight downward, as we would run out of ambient Essence to keep us afloat, so we inched down while continuing forward. I started to hear worried noises coming from the city above me, but I ignored them in favor of ensuring that we didn’t crash into the ground or other terrain features. After about an hour, I started hearing screams coming from the entrance to the dungeon. Not human screams but screams of my Mobs dying. I chalked it up to a fresh group of too-powerful people entering at the first floor.

Working with Bob, I reached out and looked for my Essence signature. While it took almost an hour, I was able to eventually find a ley line. I inspected the line and found that it became a powerful node about a half-mile further ahead. Since a node was an intersection of multiple lines, I decided to wait to reach that point before spending the Essence to activate the Runes. We would get there soon enough, and activating the lines at a node would have a far greater efficiency than along a single line.

Deciding to investigate the screams of pain while I waited for us to arrive at our destination, I looked at my third floor just in time to see the Boss area half-hex get obliterated in a blaze of light. If I had a jaw, it would have dropped. When the light and rubble cleared, I was even more surprised. <What are you doing, Dale?>

Dale

“Anyone else feel that? My ears hurt!” A light buffet from the student’s sparring partner drew the complainer back to the present.

“Try yawning, that seems to get rid of the pressure,” someone called in response.

“That blow to the head probably already fixed it.”

“I don’t know many problems that can’t be fixed by a blow to the head!” A few laughed at this.

“Flying dungeon. Island. Eats storms. Commoner, now a Noble. This is going to be amazing.” The bard, Brakker, was writing about everything that he could see. His muttering was starting to get into people’s heads, but he never even noticed. Noting the time with black-ringed eyes, he stumbled toward the Pleasure House for his daily performance. “Gotta warm up. Sixth sick sheikh's sixth sheep's sick. Sixth sick sheikh's sixth sheep's sick. Sixth sick sheikh's sixth sheep's sick…” When he was finally out of the area, people started to cheer brightly.

“Rose, does it look like we are dropping to you?” Tom was on the ground, looking at the sky when he asked this. Adam was working to pull arrows out of him, and Rose was looking a bit embarrassed. Her eyes held a spark of true annoyance, though.

“Tom, you can’t just charge directly at a person shooting at you.” She lightly kicked the incapacitated man. “Straight lines are great for me. You need to zig-zag. Change it up. At least try to make it harder for me.”

“Noted. Again, I ask, are we falling?” Tom pointed at the swirling colors of the thunderstorm they were passing through without ill effect, then gestured to the side. “I feel like I’m falling. I feel light.”

Rose frowned and looked up. “There is no way to tell; we are in a cloud.” Her gaze sharpened as her perceptive eyes locked on shadows being cast with each peal of thunder. “What in the…? Someone find Dale!”

Three forms fell out of the clouds, impacting the ground hard enough to make the weakest in the area fall to the ground from the shockwave. Red cloak fluttering around him, a sharp pair of electric gold eyes looked out over the suddenly silent crowd. “Who dares bring a flying fortress into the lands of thunder? This is an obvious act of war!”

There was silence for a moment, then an awkward cough could be heard. A trembling F-ranked student spoke up. “Er… we had nothing to do with this. We’re just students. Pretty sure that the city had nothing to do with this either. This is a flying dungeon, and it’s not really under control.”

“Cease your lies!” The man's thunderous voice echoed through the area. “Kantor was the only known flying dungeon! He has been destroyed, which means that you are a flying invasion force!” The man stumbled suddenly, face paling. A heavy force fell on the area along with the existential feeling of dread only felt in a suddenly silent ancient forest.

Madame Chandra was walking up to the group, eyes shining a brilliant green. “If we are assumed to be an invasion force, why were simple Mages sent to deal with us? B-ranks one, two, and three.” She pointed at the Mages in turn as she spoke. “Where are your elders? Where is the threat you are trying to deliver? You are yowling kittens. Where is the tiger?”

A slight crackle and a smell of ozone suffused the air, followed by a man appearing in front of the weighed-down Mages. He chuckled as he noticed who he was talking to, the bloodlust in his eyes vanishing. “Madame! How good it is to see you! These lads were just the scouts; please pardon their rudeness. You know how it goes, fifty years on guard duty and you get excited over every little flying island you see.” He looked around, noting the silent people around him. “Is this a… school of some sort? Is this really a flying dungeon?”

“Indeed it is, Perun!” Chandra’s demeanor seemed far warmer now, almost shy even. “It has been far too long! We should find somewhere to chat.”

“I’d love to do that! Maybe you could take a few minutes to explain why this island is floating toward our city? Oh, and these lads will need a bit of exercise to calm down. Can we send them through the dungeon? What rank is it?” The man had an electric personality, and charisma seemed to ooze off of him.

“B-rank… two? I think that is correct at this point.” Chandra looked over and noticed that Dale was running over, escorted by a few Dark Elf guards. “Ah, here comes the City Lord. I’ll have him get them into the dungeon ahead of the line, and we can go… catch up.”

“B-rank two and already a flying island? It must have found an interesting solution to the Mana draw needed to take flight! Even Kantor was in the S-ranks when he lifted off the ground.” The man seemed pleased by this fact. “How spectacular! I truly hope we will not need to blast you all out of the sky.”

After a quick explanation of the situation, Dale was happy to escort the Mages to the opening of the dungeon. A few people booed them as they passed the line, but most were confused students planning on going into the dungeon for the first time. The Mages signed the standard non-Guild agreement, so Dale waved at them and turned to leave.

“Wait, child! My name is Jasper of the clan Azguardia. These are my brothers. Would you be willing to be our guide?” The Mage imperiously pointed his finger at Dale, beckoning him closer.

“I can certainly find you someone to act as a guide, but as City Lord, I have duties to–” Dale’s smile started to become frosty as he was interrupted.

“Nonsense! A D-ranker like yourself should be thrilled to have tutelage from Mages! Do not fear, we will protect you from whatever dangers lie within!” Jasper joyfully wrapped his arm around Dale and walked into the cave. Arm acting as an irresistible force, Jasper dragged the Baron along while ignoring his complaints. Despite his protests, Dale was fairly pleased to have an excuse to avoid the meetings that had been planned for him today. Dancing lessons? No thank you. He would find a memory stone somewhere with that particular skillset instead.

The Mages laughed as Bashers threw themselves to their doom, screaming in fury as the humans took no damage whatsoever. The screams of the Mobs grew shriller as the Mages counterattacked. A simple flick of a finger turned anything hit into a red paste.

“What a young dungeon!” Jasper chuckled boisterously as they walked past the first floor Boss Squad. What remained of them, that is. “Are all the creatures this weak? How in the world did it find a way to fly?”

Attempting to convince the Mages that there were much, much more dangerous beings within only made them laugh. He explained that the dungeon ‘didn’t get more dangerous slowly, it was exponential danger growth’ only gained him confused smirks. Explaining concepts by using math always had this reaction. Dale decided that they would have to experience the dungeon for themselves before they would bother to listen to him. He nervously absorbed a small Core, shuddering and relaxing a bit as the euphoria rushed through him.

After Raile was dealt with as easily as the standard Bashers, Dale started to have fun. One of the lightning Mages tried to keep the air-affinity Hopsecutioner as a pet but was ruthlessly shot down by the others. The mage shrugged and broke its neck, pulling out its Core and tossing it to Dale. He was very happy he came along now; they gave him all the Cores as they were ‘useless to B-ranked cultivators’. As a fringe benefit, if the Cores were absorbed in the dungeon, they weren’t subject to taxes! Dale revised his original opinion of these Mages as they kept lavishing gifts on him. He thought about what was coming next and tried to form a plan of attack. The Goblins should pose no problem, so he could breathe easy. At least until floor four. From there it may be more touch and go.

There was a terrifying moment when the B-rank three Mage noticed the Goblins trying to build up a charge of infernal Essence. What sort of attack could that deliver? They seemed familiar with the weapon they were using. Had they used it in combat before? Jasper frowned and created a huge spell circle in the air. A quick burst of Mana entered the circle, and a tree-wide bolt of lightning lashed out and impacted the wall of the Boss area. The entire fortification was blown to smithereens, and anything that had been alive in there was cooked beyond recognition. Dale stepped out of the cloud of dust, coughing and heard an incredulous voice. <What are you doing, Dale?>

“Not me, I swear!” Dale waved his hand in a dismissive motion. “We have guests, Mages, who are wanting to challenge the dungeon.”

<You have really bad timing, Dale. I’m unholy busy right now, and if I get too distracted, we could fall out of the sky.>

“Please, please, feel free to focus on anything but us.” Dale hacked up a small ball of mucus and dust before rejoining the Mages. “A bit of overkill, wasn’t that?”

“Overkill is the best kind of kill. No chance of retaliation,” the Mage replied in a chilly tone. “How about you go bother Jasper? I think he sees you as a mascot.”

“Don't mind him, boy!” Jasper slapped Dale on the back hard enough to bruise. “He is always shockingly rude.”

Dale winced and not from the slap. “Got a lot of, ah, lightning jokes you are planning to use?”

“You should be amped to hear how many I currently have.” Jasper had a strange gleam in his eyes. Dale shrugged at him; he didn’t understand the joke. He had no knowledge of how electricity worked. “You don’t understand any of these, do you? Re-volt-ing.”

The impromptu team walked down the stairs, entering the labyrinth below. Looking at the four paths they could choose from, they ignored Dale’s suggestion of the earth tunnel, instead walking through the door marked with water. “I haven’t been down this path before! I have no idea what to expect!” Dale tried to reason with the Mages, but they simply shrugged and let him know that, in that case, he was on equal terms with them.

The first dead-end they found annoyed one of the Mages so much that he tried to blast his way through the wall. A bolt of energy equivalent to the one that had destroyed the entire Boss fortification on the previous level left only a fist-sized depression of molten slag in the wall. The defenses here were decidedly more powerful, and the walls were lined with Runes.

<It tickles! Yum, yum, yum.>

Dale grumbled murderous thoughts as the Mages started trying to use Mana for every little issue they encountered. “Just making the dungeon stronger. You’re making my life harder, you useless brain-fried battle maniacs.” He was careful to keep the volume low, but he was still overheard and laughed at. Luckily for Dale, they got serious as watery traps became more prevalent.

“Does this mean we are going the right way?” one of the unnamed Mages asked Dale. There was a Cloud Cat on the ground in front of him, dead but still twitching from all the electricity passing through it. Dale was watching the Cat hungrily, hands almost shaking as he thought about grabbing its Core.

“What? Oh. Um. Usually.” Dale stammered almost incoherently. “The usual theme in here is if there are more enemies, you are going the right way. If the path becomes more dangerous, you are going the right way. The easy path is almost always a trap.”

Jasper nodded along at the explanation. “Makes sense! Just like in life! If everyone is happy with your decisions, it is because you have done nothing worthy of notice. If you are working toward a goal, someone, somewhere, will have something negative to say about it.”

“Jasper, stop trying to be all sage and mysterious. When people are sick of you, it is usually because you are making an electricity joke for the thousandth time!” The Mage’s comment made Dale chuckle softly. He didn’t want to be too loud and draw disaster down upon them.

The splashing of water around the next bend was enough to make Dale set himself into a combat pose. Cautiously peeking around the bend, he almost fell over as the boisterous Mages causally walked right past him. “Oh, this looks fun! I wonder… anyone want to just bypass this?”

The Mages shrugged, then vanished, reappearing on a platform over a hundred feet away. Since that was where the tunnel curved, it was assumed that they had to get to that point to continue. Upon landing on the platform, they were hit with several tons of pressurized water which sent them spiraling at high speed into the wall where Dale was still taking cover.

The Mages stood up, ugly expressions on their faces and seemed ready to try again. Their clothes were torn, but they seemed entirely unhurt otherwise. Dale quickly coughed and got their attention. “Remember how I am guiding you? If you keep trying to skip challenges, the dungeon will only throw harder ones in your path. While you might not be hurt, you could get trapped here pretty easily.”

“Well, then. Guide us, oh wise ‘City Lord’.”

Dale’s face colored a bit. “I’ve been trying. Now, this seems fairly straightforward, which means there is almost surely a hidden layer to it. What should be needed is to redirect those streams of water into the corresponding holes in the wall. That would be a pretty normal dungeon challenge and is a good place to start. We will likely see the actual challenge if we begin there.”

Jasper walked over to one of the streams coming from the ceiling and put his hand in it. Dale’s eye twitched as the Mage put his hand into a stream of water that was cutting into the rock it touched. “Huh, a bit of water pressure. You should probably not touch these, Dale.”

“I wouldn’t have,” Dale ground out through his tightly clenched jaw. “Thank you for finally using my name. I’m betting that there will be a… a lever, a button, or a pressure plate around here. That should let you tilt the stream.”

After a few moments of searching, Jasper lit up. Pointing at a button located between multiple high-pressure streams, he slammed his hand on to it and shouted, “Found one!”

“Don’t press it–” Dale shouted back. Too late. The streams of water around the Mages started rotating but didn’t stop after only a few degrees. Water washed over the offending Mage, and if he didn’t have near immunity to physical damage, he would have been sliced into bleeding chunks. His clothes were utterly obliterated, becoming useless tatters in an instant.

“My robe!” Jasper looked mournfully at his now scantily clad body. The volume of his shouting almost made Dale miss a distinctive ticking noise.

“Quiet!” The ticking was more noticeable in the silence but stopped after a few seconds. At the same time, the streams of water returned to their original positions. “That’s it! It’s a timed sequence!”

When all Dale got in reply were blank looks, he cracked his neck and started walking around the area. “There will likely be clues that help us know which buttons to press first, and if we do it in the timeframe allowed, we should be able to move on.” Going over the room carefully, three more buttons were found, as well as illegible words written at odd angles on the wall and ceiling.

“Are those Runes?”

“No, I think they are words. They aren’t any language I’ve seen before, though.”

While the others were inspecting the markings, Jasper got bored and started playing with sparks. Tiny lightning bolts raced between his fingers, and his eyes dilated as he played with them.

“Jasper! Are you listening?” These sharp words from his brother made Jasper lose concentration, and a bit of electricity hit the water. Dale’s muscles seized up, and he flopped, twitching, into the water.

“Gah! Grab him before he drowns!” Jasper raced over to the fallen man. “You alright there, Dale? There’s a good lad. Oh…”

“F-fine. I’m fine. Is someone making toast?” Dale’s teeth chattered as he tried to control his randomly shaking limbs.

“I think I found the solution, by the way.” Jasper spoke into the silence. He pointed at Dale, who only looked back in confusion. “Not you. Actually, move. You’re in the way. There! You see!”

The group looked at the water, seeing the reflection of the scrawled text. Read in the water, it was perfectly legible instructions. Sure it waved around a bit, but they were able to understand what it said. Pressing the buttons in the correct order made the ticking sound start again, but the streams of water went into the holes they were supposed to. A loud thunk was heard, and they hurried to get around the bend before time ran out. Rushing forward, Dale noticed that the air was getting steamy.

“There might be a Boss ahead,” Dale told the others. Much to his displeasure, they didn’t take him seriously.

“Don’t care. Under B-rank, it will just die like everything else in here,” Jasper sneered at the weak creatures they had been fighting.

They walked into the steamy room that typically contained Snowball but faced no attack. This was both a relief and a frustration to Dale, as he had no chance to impress upon the Mages that the threats were getting dangerous to their health. They continued on, but Dale slowed as he looked at the stairwell leading down.

“What’s the matter, boy?” The snarky Mage leered at him. “You look like you’re about to piss yer pants. You obviously don’t understand how happy you should be right now.”

Rolling his eyes, Dale cautiously stepped forward. “The next floor houses a Dungeon Boss. We have no information about it. Each team that comes down here to fight fails to come back.”

“Then how do you know it has a big bad Boss in it?”

Dale literally growled at the man. “I hate that question. There is something down there that affects the minds of whoever enters. A Mage scout took a look and was able to give us general information but no details. The generally accepted idea is that after you fight it and win, you will be able to remember information about the creature. There is a monster at least five meters tall and undoubtedly in the B-ranks. The room is filled with fog, and the air is dense enough with a mixture of Essence and Mana that trying to view the Boss with anything but standard vision is useless.”

“Let’s go take a look then!”

“Works for me—sounds fun.”

“Did you not hear what I just said?” Dale barked at the Mages.

“They did.” Jasper chuckled at Dale’s livid expression. “Try to see our point of view though! We just walked through a dungeon without any challenge whatsoever! The water traps notwithstanding. We need to feel the blood race through our bodies! We need to fight!”

Chapter Thirty-five

“Turn back!”

“What was that?” Dale was shaking with fear as they continued along the very long tunnel connecting the fourth and fifth floors.

“No idea! Something we haven’t fought before, boys!” Jasper grunted as he tripped over a loose stone. “How fun!”

“Five more minutes!” The rocks whimpered as they passed. “I’m so tired.”

“I just can’t deal with this today! Ugh! I just can’t even!”

“No-o-o! More people are going to die today!”

“Run away! Run away!”

The voices became louder and more numerous as they progressed, the echoes blending with the new shouts. A door came into view, ornate and dangerous looking with a skull embedded in the wall above it. The eyes of the skull were filled with Cores which lit up as they came closer. A beam of light came from the jeweled sockets, creating a flat panel that had words scrawled across it.

“That is new. My understanding was that it was an open tunnel that merged into the Boss Room. The door must have been added recently.” Since the others stayed silent, Dale stepped forward and read the words projected in the air. “Total challenges: fourteen groups, seventy people. Additionally, one scout. Total Boss losses: one. Total survivors after fighting: one. Total escapees: one necromancer, rank C-seven. One scout, rank unknown.”

“Can written words sound annoyed?” Jasper laughed as he looked at the panel with wonder. “It seems quite peeved that a scout poked his head in but didn’t fight! Shall we do our part and make that Boss loss count move to two?” The other Mages seemed to think this was a splendid idea, and the vitriol and curses that Dale spit at them as he was dragged along seemed to have no effect on their good humor.

“Insane Mages, let me go!” Dale shrieked in far too high of a pitch to be taken seriously. “I can’t survive in there!”

Jasper pushed on the ornate door, and it swung open silently. Fog billowed out into the tunnel, hiding their feet, then their knees within moments. When the last person was inside—willing or not—the door swung closed behind them. It sunk into the floor, leaving behind only a smooth, blank wall. “Huh! Looks like the only way backward is forward! No need to keep attempting to escape, Dale. You are in this with us!”

The air trembled as a growl began filling the room. It had such a low pitch that Dale could only feel it in his bones and wasn’t even aware of it for a moment. The sub vocalizations rose into the human range of hearing, but this did less to comfort Dale than the Mages seemed to think it should. For a moment, the fog seemed to clear, and Dale looked into a pair of eyes that had never existed to this point in history. Pupils were dilated, the irises were hexagonal, and the sclera was blacker than the darkness of the room.

Dale’s view was interrupted as an incredibly sharp stinger stopped in front of his nose with a discharge of electricity. There was a boom as what turned out to be the Boss’s tail was repulsed by a barrier of energy that had sprung up around the terrified human.

“Nice job on that barrier, brother!” Jasper slapped his comrade. “That could have been dangerous, Dale! You need to learn how to dodge! Good place to learn!”

“Y-you have a barrier around me? Since when?” Dale sputtered, staring at where the black eyes had loomed out of the mists.

“Since we entered the dungeon, of course! You think we are going to let a child run around with us without protection?” Jasper chuckled at the thought. He whipped around faster than Dale could see, swinging his hammer into the stinger that had been darting at him. “Now we are talking! This fluffy little creature might be able to put out some actual damage!”

“Fluffy? It’s scaled! I saw scales! Where was the fluffy? They’re insane! I’m locked in a room with lightning-driven insane people.” Dale’s words were hushed, as he did all he could not to draw attention.

The hammer strike had broken the very tip of the stinger. Not only did this anger the Beast, it also left a trail of acidic poison on the ground. The humans were forced to watch their step even as the stinger was whipping at them at a furious pace.

“Anyone have eyes on the main body of this thing?” Jasper’s stress was beginning to surface; he struggled to speak calmly.

“I got it. Over here,” the deadpan voice could have been describing his morning tea for all the enthusiasm it exuded. The Mage jumped at the fog-coated body, swinging his electrified hammer. Just before his blow landed, the Manticore’s wings snapped open, throwing the Mage across the rooms and blowing the fog away momentarily. The Manticore was revealed in all of its terrifying glory, and its aura was suddenly powerful enough to lock all of Dale’s muscles in place. He found himself unable to move.

The lightning Mages charged the great Beast, and it roared at them in challenge, “Come to me, snacks! I hunger for the flesh of the living!”

“It can speak,” Dale whimpered as fog began to cover the battle. As the condensation rolled in, the aura of terror was diffused, the ambient Essence and Mana refracting the otherwise overwhelming power of the Manticore. Dale took a few steps, attempting to walk toward the exit. A particularly powerful hammer blow created a shockwave that revealed the battle, and Dale was again frozen in place. He took the time he couldn’t move to observe the fight, moving each time he was physically able to do so.

The Mages were swinging their hammers, each individual blow having no apparent effect. The huge, room-shaking strokes made the fog disperse each time they landed, but the Manticore only chuckled and counterattacked twice as hard. Huge claws wove through the air, and when they landed, the affected Mage would be sent spiraling into the wall at bone-shattering speed. They would hop back up and rejoin the fight, but their clothes and armor were being melted away. Thus far, they had been able to avoid the sharp portions of the claws and had not been injected with any poison. It was only a matter of time until they were affected unless something changed drastically.

Dale kept sprinting and freezing as if he were in a child's game that he was forced to play. He reached the wall and heard another discharge as the barrier around him deflected a thrust meant to end his life. He looked back in time to see the Mages each land a simultaneous blow, then slide back a few feet. They raised their hands and lightning arched between them, making an equidistant triangle around the Manticore. It roared in outrage as the Mana in the air transformed to be dominated by an electric affinity. The power surrounding the Boss flashed into the exact spot his opponents had landed their recent blows. The Beast was cooked over the course of a few seconds as lightning continuously flowed into, out of, and around him as the Mages directed their ultimate attack.

Resolving not to go out without inflicting casualties, the Manticore stabbed his broken stinger forward, giving one last scream of rage before falling down, lifeless. The suffocating combined auras of Beast and Mage faded out of existence, and Dale was able to gulp down some fresh air. Fresh being a relative term, as the air was rank with the smell of ozone and overcooked meat. Jasper stepped forward and collected a key that had fallen to the floor, then proceeded to hack away at the Manticore’s skull until it was broken open. Carefully not getting any blood on himself, he extracted the Core and washed it, finally placing it in his bag.

“You want any of this?” Jasper motioned toward the giant Beast. “I’m satisfied with just the Core.” His eye was bleeding, it seemed the stinger had been able to penetrate his defenses while he was focused on the spellwork he and his brothers were using.

Dale was stunned at the offer, “Are you certain? That will be worth a fortune!”

“Sure thing, kid. After all, the city basically sacrificed you to the dungeon, you should sell this off and go find a safe place to cultivate for the rest of your life.” Jasper gave Dale a look full of pity and misguided understanding.

“I keep telling you, I’m the City Lord!” Dale huffed as his dimensional bag sucked the giant creature into its depths. “Thank you for this. It will be a great tool for research.”

“Of course you are.” Jasper smiled again, using far too many teeth. “Next level then?”

“Are you insane?” Dale looked at the very serious face of the others. “You are insane. I just… I… let’s at least open the chest.” Inside were ingot tokens with a silvery sheen, coin tokens, a small bottle, and a keygem that would open a portal to this floor. It was black with white speckles, looking like a galaxy contained in a gem.

Not understanding the transactional system the dungeon had put in place and uninterested in the keygem after Dale explained its function, the Mages allowed Dale to walk away with a potential cornucopia of tokens. They closed the door leading to the next floor behind them and a spiral stairway leading deeper into the depths was revealed. An exit portal also shimmered invitingly, and Dale looked at it with unabashed desire. The Mages cheerfully frog-marched him down the stairs, loudly proclaiming his luck.

Jasper stumbled suddenly, falling to his knees and clutching his face. He howled in pain as the poison in his eye finally found a foothold, beginning to rot away at the tissue as it sought an outlet to his bloodstream. “My eye! My eye!” he screamed as he thrashed in pain.

The others grabbed him, holding him still as they inspected the wound. With a flash of inspiration, Dale produced the small bottle found in the Boss room and inspected it. The words ‘sting-ex’ were written on the bottle in a tiny script. “I have the antidote! I think…”

“You aren’t sure?”

“Just give it to me!” Jasper screamed in pain. He grabbed the bottle and dumped the contents directly into his eye. There was a hissing sound as the antivenom counteracted the poison, and Jasper’s eye bubbled as the tiny war was waged in the cells of his eyes. He began breathing easier and looked up. His eye was gone, having been destroyed, but he seemed cheerful either way. “Looks like I’m going to be visiting a flesh Mage in the near future. Bleh, I just paid off my last bill. I guess that’s how they get you though.”

“I told you not to get that cosmetic… enhancement,” one of the other Mages muttered wryly.

“Huggin, you need to just let me live out my dreams. If I want to have horse-like aspects, I am allowed to do so! It’s my money!” Jasper groused, then he looked at his other brother. “Muninn, don’t you say a word.”

They stepped on to the next floor and stopped speaking. Words failed them as they looked around. Having an open floor plan, the sixth floor was a massive hexagon. The hexagon was divided by various paths leading toward the center of the room, which the Mages were able to recognize as being similar to the paths in the tower of ascension. There were six entrances into the hexagon around the perimeter of the room. Each path led to a platform, and each platform apparently represented one of the basic affinities. Moving deeper from the basic platforms, there were paths that branched and led to slightly smaller platforms. Whichever affinities connected to this platform created the landscape and was an unspecified mix of the basic types of Essence.

Fire and celestial led to a platform brimming with holy fire, blue and three times as hot as the previous ‘basic’ fire platform. Water and earth led to a mud-filled area. This pattern continued around the room until you were able to reach the largest platform. There were five total rings, meaning that you had to cross five platforms at a minimum in order to reach the large, center platform. The Silverwood tree grew in the center of the room, now as massive as a hundred-year-old oak. Under the tree sat a figure petting a Basher, but the details of the figure were hidden by the haze of energy collected in this room.

“It’s beautiful,” Huggin whispered in awe. “This is the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

“More than that,” Muninn stated, already mapping out the paths. “Look at the platforms. The floor plan is a guide to ascending!”

There was shocked silence, but Dale had no idea what was going on. “What in the world are you talking about?”

“The paths!” Muninn turned blazing eyes on Dale. “There! The earth, water, and celestial intersection! What do you see?”

“Trees?” Dale smiled nervously as Muninn started to get worked up.

“No! Yes, but, look!” Muninn seemed enrapt over the paths. “The path to get to that platform—the path of wood—is exactly equal for earth and water, but only half as long for celestial!”

Dale was silent for a moment. “Again, I’m sorry, but I don’t understand.”

Making a frustrated noise, Jasper turned and looked at Dale. “This room is showing what affinities are needed to cultivate in order to acquire a certain type of Mana. Having equal parts earth and water and half that of celestial when you break into the B-ranks will give you the best chance of becoming a wood Mage. Look there! The paths of infernal, fire, and metal—metal being a second rank platform—lead to a cursed weapon platform! The ratio of that is two to one to three!”

“Is this information that is difficult to get?” Dale was greatly confused at their overwhelming reactions.

“Like you wouldn’t believe,” Jasper grimly affirmed. “The clans and kingdoms of this world only help those who are beholden to them and stamp out any outsiders who learn their secrets. This map goes all the way to the fifth tier! Unbelievable!”

Seeing Dale’s nonplussed face, Huggin spoke in his normal monotone, “Dale. A lightning Mage like us is only a second tier Mage. A cursed weapon Mage would be third-tier. A portal Mage is fourth tier. Look at those paths. They show the exact ratio needed to have the best chance of getting the type of Mana you are after. This place is going to be popular enough that wars would be fought if that was what it took to gain access. People will want to measure those paths, and there are hundreds of varied combinations. Sadly, the portal is at the center of all of those, so let’s get moving. We need to see what the requirements of the room are.”

Dale resolved to get more details later since he had a cohort of Mages that he could question in the city. They stepped on to the path leading to the celestial platform and jumped back as portals opened, and all the ground not part of the path vanished. They looked into the holes that remained, shocked to see the ground far below them. The warning was clear, stay on the path or be dropped off of the flying island. Dale gulped. A barrier wouldn’t save him from a multi-mile fall.

As they stepped on to the first platform, a statue rose out of the ground. Golden and shining with accumulated power, Dale was almost unsurprised when it began moving. The entire statue was made from some kind of yellow gem, and at its center was a Core directing its motions. Jasper ran at it, swinging his hammer. His weapon clanged against a wall of golden light that had sprung into existence. The statue stepped forward, and the wall of golden energy moved with it. With each step, the wall of light reduced the amount of room on the platform, pushing the humans toward the open air at the edge of the platform.

“I can’t believe we are fighting an honest-to-God golem!” Muninn squealed like a teenage girl talking about her first crush. “I’ve only fought puppeted versions or Gnomish constructs!”

“Be happy after you kill it!” Huggin roared back at him in consternation. The wall of solidified Mana shattered from the triple blow as the Mages struck at the same moment, forcing the golem to its knees as a huge amount of its energy was depleted. Its hands were against its head, and it released a silent scream. Dale watched in awe as Jasper dealt the final blow, the golem crumbling to shards as he collected the Core.

“What is this?” Jasper muttered into the air, looking over the gem that the golem’s body had consisted of. “It seems to be a conduit for… celestial essence? Take some of this up to the church when you leave here, Dale. I’m sure they’ll be excited. Next path?”

After resting a short while, the group pushed on. After a minor debate about the best way to go, they walked across the path connecting celestial and water together. Up to their ankles in water, they watched as a golem pushed out of the ground, displacing the fluid around itself. Dale wanted to know what type of Mana this golem was likely to use, and the others shrugged.

“Could be any number of things. Unless we get the exact measurements of the path, we won’t be able to know for sure.” Jasper informed him with a casual wave. A torrent of water washed over him at that moment, nearly throwing him over the edge of the platform. His weapon dulled noticeably as lightning stopped travelling through it, and his clothes—which had been held together by a thread—were washed away. Jasper looked at his hammer in annoyance before setting it down.

“Ugh. ‘Cleansing waters’.” Huggin spat in disgust as he avoided looking at his near-naked brother.

“Yeah, looks that way.” Jasper almost threw a tantrum but decided to take out his anger against the Golem. He sprinted forward, thrusting a hand into the water surrounding the construct. He gripped the statue hard, pulling it into a bear hug. “Someone else has to sacrifice their hammer too! Hit it, now!”

Muninn ran forward, slamming the pick end of his hammer into the golem. On the second strike, the golem’s chest shattered, as did the hammer. Grabbing the Core, Muninn tossed the hilt of his weapon to the side in disgust. Dale was watching in fascination. “What just happened?”

“A very rare and very annoying type of Mana,” Jasper grumped, adding chunks of the mineral the golem was composed of to his bag after ensuring they were dry. “This is called ‘cleansing waters’. The combination to create it has been lost in time because all it does is disenchant. It renders Runes inert, gets rid of the special effects of potions and herbs, and makes everything boring and useless. It is also self-propagating, using the water type Essence and Mana it absorbs to create more of itself.”

“If that’s the case, why do we even have normal water?” Dale wondered, looking at his battle gauntlets and debating on using the water to get rid of them. They tightened on his hands as if they could understand the way his thoughts were moving.

“Exceedingly short-lived effect,” Huggin spoke blandly. “Drop some in the ocean, and it will spread across the entire sea within hours, removing any enchantments or effects it finds. The next day, the water will be normal and creating water affinity Essence again. No use storing it—doesn’t work. Preserving enchantments fail. Good for killing Mages or cultivators, but it needs to be fresh.”

Dale nodded along. “I can see why it would be lost to time.”

“Yeah, it’s a pain in the ass for everyone. Cultivating it is stupid hard too, I hear.” Muninn spat into the water. “Any training aids you use get disenchanted.”

“Should we press on?” Jasper was obviously slowing down, the fighting using unfamiliar tactics. Plus he was now weaponless.

“The real question is can we press on?” Huggin questioned, looking at the next platforms. “There are three branches that take us closer, but this path joins with wood, that one with mud, and the final with some combination of air and celestial. I think we would die on the path of wood, since the combination of disenchantment and growth would likely allow for Mana-ignoring weapons. The mud may be possible, but I just don’t know that we can go against the third tier of this area without more knowledge.”

“Turn back?” Jasper sadly inquired.

“Turn back,” the others conceded.

“Thank God.” Dale breathed out a sigh of relief. “It’s over.”

Chapter Thirty-six

<Well that was an impressive first run. What do you think, Bob? Three Mages could only get to the second tier without severe danger.> I allowed a chest to bubble out of the floor, rewards for defeating two golem guardians. I smiled as Dale excitedly pocketed the tokens and the keygem for this floor. It looked similar to the previous one, but instead of being black with white formations inside I had inverted the colors, and it was now white with black pathways and galaxies. When Dale got to the point where the keys were useful to him, he would finally be a force to be reckoned with.

“I think the golems did well. I am also surprised that those Mages seemed to grasp your intent with the floor plan instantly. I thought it would take years before they realized the significance of walking the paths.” Bob’s decidedly intellectual reply made me grin. “You should also change the layout once every few weeks to use a different portion of the tower; the changes will just keep them wanting more!”

<I love that Goblins are actually smart. Yeah, there was no way to put all the paths in here without making a truly massive floor. Maybe when I make another floor, it will be tier six through ten. I’d like to see anyone get through that easily.> I returned to my search for the ley lines below me. I was hovering over a small city, which apparently contained a single clan of lightning cultivators—basically one city’s worth of family members. If my information was correct, the clouds in this area were perpetually in a state of storming. If overheard conversations were correct, the storm raged two hundred and seventy days out of the year. That was a lot of lightning Essence. I was hopeful that they wouldn’t even notice me siphoning off some for my personal use.

“Of course we are smart, we are part Gnome. Also, remember that I am essentially the sixtieth generation of Bob since entering the dungeon. If that many generations had gone by without improving my mind, I would have been greatly upset.” Bob looked a bit nostalgic for his original body but also seemed pleased at his current immortality. I decided to leave that conversation alone for now.

<So what exactly am I trying to… never mind, I think I found it. Wow.> The ritual had created an intricate spiral of Runes at this Node. The small Essence accumulation Runes had layered, forming a circle of joined Runescript. If the ritual had been formed correctly, I could activate a single Rune at the center. As it gathered Essence, it would activate more and more of the Runes, culminating in the ritual activating and expanding the reach of the ley lines! All the extra Essence would flow back along the ley line to the original ritual, which I was still connected to via portal. Eventually, this could be the entire world’s worth of Essence. I loved the abyss out of my portals.

With an outpouring of Essence, I activated the ‘key’ Rune. It wasn’t shaped like a key, it was just the important Rune to activate. It took quite a bit of Essence to reach the Rune at this range, and it likely wouldn’t have been possible if the Rune hadn’t been carved with my power. As it was, it was more like connecting to yourself in an awkward manner, similar to a person scratching the top of their head while wearing an overly large helmet. Possible if you had flexible fingers but still frustrating. I watched the Rune glow with Essence and waited to disconnect until it had gathered enough Essence to activate the next in the sequence.

With that side task complete I twisted the gyroscope, and we started moving up, up, and away. Bob went over the results of this mission with me, discussing what we could do to streamline the process if a similar situation came up in the future. “It would be best if we didn’t need to enter population centers like that city if we don’t need to.” Bob looked with slight worry at the city that had prepared to attack us if we showed even the slightest hint of aggressiveness.

<I disagree, Bob. Think about it. This place had a naturally high accumulation of lightning Essence. That would be a huge draw for people that were cultivating that precious resource.> I focused for a moment on avoiding a mountain that seemed to rise from the middle of an otherwise flat area. <If the situation is the same in the future, it is likely that the area will be populated.>

Bob grunted in reply as I turned my attention to conversations happening on the surface. The lightning Mages seemed to be apologizing to Dale for some reason, so I listened in. Jasper was making strange faces. “Sorry, boy. That is, I apologize for not taking you seriously, Your Grace.”

“No, I’m glad you took me along. It was an interesting… learning experience.” Dale nodded at them before walking away. The Mages seemed excited to meet one of the Mages that was temporarily residing in the area. Apparently, Nez was something of a folk hero in their lightning cultivator community. They talked for a few hours before flying off toward the tavern. They would stay the night, then return to the city we had hovered over the next day.

When they were gone, Dale hurried back to the portal area with two Dark Elf guards. He stepped through, and to my great surprise, teleported to the sixth floor. <Why, hello there, Dale. Come to try your luck against the golems? Gonna jump off the mountain in a secluded location?>

“I’m not suicidal. No thanks.” He was walking with purpose though, and after looking around, I realized what was going on.

<Oh I see! You came back to use those tokens, huh? Decided to leave your zappy new friends out of the loop? Keeping all the rewards for yourself? I must say, Dale, you’re growing up so fast!> I teased him as he approached the place the tokens could be put into the slot.

“What?” Dale was obviously directing this word at Hans, who had snuck into the portal after them and made his way to the slot area.

“Oh, uh, hey there, Dale.” Hans was feverishly pushing tokens into the slot and opening the chest to see what he gained. “I’m just–jackpot!” Golden coins rained down into the chest as Hans whooped and jumped around.

“I have no idea why you are here Hans, but I need to use this thing.”

“No, wait, just… do you have a few tokens I can borrow? I’m on a good streak here, and I’m betting I can–” Hans was staring at the slot with a feverish expression.

“I’m cutting you off,” Dale bluntly told him, “and you called me an addict!”

“Dale, I’m fine, I just need some tokens! This is so fun. I keep winning!” Hans was now being restrained and dragged toward the exit portal. “Dale, nooo–” His cries were cut off as the portal closed. Dale rolled his eyes and returned to the slot, slipping in some of the tokens he had gained from the Manticore.

“I knew it,” he breathed. I swear there was a physical manifestation of greed in his eyes. “These were tokens for…” He stopped speaking aloud, remembering that there were Dark Elves watching and listening to him.

<You can say it, Dale. Aluminum! Yup, ingots of the metal those Dwarves are all hot and heavy for. Good luck using it without drawing so much attention that you give up adventuring! I’ll even give you an extra bar.> Another bar of soft metal clunked into the chest in front of him. He lifted the lid only far enough to slip his hand and bag in, scooping up the light metal and stuffing it into his bag.

Trying not to act in a suspicious manner and completely failing, Dale led the guards out of the dungeon. I performed my version of rolling my eyes, then opened the portals on the sixth floor. Wind rushed into the dungeon, fresh air flowing through the hallways and twisting pathways of the deep. The Goblins smiled as they felt the cool breeze, a few of them even shouting their thanks to me. I smiled; it was good to be appreciated.

I examined the ground below me, comparing it to what maps I had been able to acquire. We were getting close to the Amazon’s territory. Soon, I would have Dani back. Thankfully, I had created a manual option for the flight controls, so I was able to leave steering to Bob for now. I started actively cultivating, working hard to glean even the slightest hint of enlightenment about my law. Who knew if a single extra rank would be the line between victory and defeat? I sighed as I remembered the simple days, the early part of my life where all I was doing was trying to survive. Now I was a flying island. Maybe someday I would even be able to enjoy my newfound freedom.

Jasper of the Clan Azguardia

“What a joyous day this has turned out to be!” Jasper shouted as he flew a loop in the air. “A dungeon, Cores, and we met ‘Nez the Thundering’! He even gave me a spear as a keepsake! Truly, we will have tales to tell at our Father’s table this night! I am also infernally grateful that flesh Mage joined our clan this year. My eye socket itches something fierce!”

“Almost back now.” Muninn’s monotone voice sounded almost happy. “I agree, we will have–”

The sky seemed to form cracks around them, and their forward momentum could not have been arrested faster if they had hit a wall. If they hadn’t been in the B-ranks, they would have been pasted across the barrier in their path. Locked in their position in defiance of gravity, they could only watch in horror as the Essence and Mana filling the clouds condensed. The perpetual thunderstorm was swirling lower than the brothers had ever seen. A river of fluid streamed down from the shrinking thunder clouds, touching the center of the city.

Unbeknownst to the horrified Mages, a flaw had appeared in a ritual created under their fair city. The ritual was now trying to compensate for the damaged Rune in its pattern by drawing in and adding extra ambient Essence and Mana from the environment. Draining the sky of energy resulted in a massive pressure as the thick power trapped everything in range like flies in a web. The human who had been mining with a powerful pickaxe he bought from the Adventurers’ Guild was the first to die as his body became a conductor for elemental lightning. Unfortunately for the people above, his death was only the first of far, far too many.

Unable to move, the trapped Mages watched as the energy swirling over and within the city collected to the point that it went out of control. The resulting detonation was similar to a volcano in that it threw thousands of tons of earth into the sky. Instead of flaming gases and lava from deep in the earth, lightning raged unchecked through the epicenter of this disaster. The earth and air mixed together, generating even more lightning Essence. Eventually turning to liquid as plasma raged through the area, the minerals and stone fell to the ground as a rain of liquid earth and metal. Under a city’s worth of molten slag, the destroyed spell formations reformed layer by layer, powered by the ritual safely housed in a flying dungeon far away.

Now created and appearing without interference—as well as being steeped in ambient Essence—the brand-new ritual activated. The raging, uncontrollable Essence and Mana in the area gradually sank into the earth. Like water in a dehydrated riverbed, the power flowed away along the newly established ley lines. For a day after it started to drain, the energies swirled and thrashed in the sky. A point finally came where the power calmed enough to release Jasper and his brothers, and they fell from the sky, changed by the power that had suffused them.

Huggin was the first to awaken, but as he opened his eyes, all of the brothers did the same. Turning to them, Huggin tried to persuade them that they should look for whoever may have possibly survived the calamity, but all that left his mouth was a single sound. “Caw!”

Muninn turned in confusion. How had a crow survived that hurricane of force? Everything in the area should be dead! He tried to ask if they had seen what had happened, but all that was heard was a resounding… “Caw?”

Jasper opened his eye painfully, looking at his siblings in horror. “Brothers,” his voice trembled with raw emotion, “is that you?”

“Caw!”

“Caw!”

Somehow, their words translated perfectly into Jasper’s mind, and he nodded. “I don’t know exactly, but I agree that we should save those we can before hunting whoever did this. From this point forward, we seek knowledge, we hunt the destroyer of our people, and we give ourselves to rage. Until such a time as this debt is repaid, I cast aside my name and assume the mantle of responsibility for this hunt. From now until eternity if needs must, until this quest has been completed, I shall bear the name of Odin.”

Odin grasped his spear and looked into the sky, watching as Essence and Mana continued to stream into the ground. “Let’s go.” He took a step forward and collapsed on to the still cooling ground, unconscious. Two exasperated caws accompanied his fall.

Chapter Thirty-seven

Watching Tyler’s team strip the enormous Manticore’s corpse of every material was a wonder to behold. Especially because they never got close to it, not trusting their ability to avoid every drop of its dangerous blood. With practiced motions, the skin and scales were flayed off by directed Mana. The meat followed, with the blood being collected in large vats. All of the organs were separated out, and the bones were greedily stacked for later usage. Tyler looked back at Dale, still unable to believe his outstanding luck. “You are sure I can have everything that remains just by making armor for your team?”

“Yes. Well, first let me know what those Runes on the spikes do. I may need to take them. I want anything that will help us in the coming days.” Dale watched as the hide and scales were put to good use, floating in the air while being forcefully tanned. “You are sure it will make decent armor, yes?”

“Of course I am!” Tyler laughed uneasily. “While not as potent as it was when connected to the Beast properly, the leather and scales are still infused with Mana. They will be tougher than almost any other armor you could find and far more flexible than anything else. I suppose dragonhide would be better, but I wouldn’t be able to form it into anything. Too stiff.”

“How do you have all of our sizes again?” Dale mumbled his thoughts as the leather was shaped into fashionable armor.

Tyler coughed abruptly and had the grace to look embarrassed. He had never had them here to be measured. “Let’s just let the men work, shall we?”

They moved to the front of the shop, discussing changes in the dungeon and the usefulness of the items created by Tyler’s shop of oddities. Dale made sure to swear him to secrecy for the time being and told him about the secrets contained on the sixth floor. Tyler was quite pleased to have this information and made a deal with Dale to map out the paths… eventually.

Carrying large sets of leather armor, a few of Tyler’s employees walked into the room. Bypassing Dale, they handed the garments to another employee, who directed Dale to the next sectioned-off area. Tyler began to follow, but Dale shook his head. The merchant had to stay behind for this part; it was too sensitive to allow a third person to know the secret he was about to reveal. A Dwarf was waiting for them, and he almost snarled when he was handed unfinished leather armor. “Is this some kind of sick joke? Who bothers to wear animal hide into battle?”

“Not my team.” Dale tried to appease him. “Not after you finish these, anyway. I need you to swear not to reveal the details of the job I am offering you. If you can complete it, you will be greatly rewarded.”

The Dwarf looked at Dale coldly. “If I am swearing a binding oath, it abyss well better be lucrative. I reserve the right to cancel the oath if I am not paid enough for the job. You still fine with that?”

“…Yes?” Dale gulped at the murderous stare. “As long as you let me offer more if I fail to meet your requirement to the point you are satisfied?”

The Dwarf grunted and made his oath. Dale reached into his bag. “I need you to create threads out of this metal and create a fine mesh throughout the entirety of this armor.”

“That’s it?” The Dwarf snorted in fury. “Chainmail armor would be lighter and cheaper. There is no reason to do this job! You made me swear an oath… Mithril!” The last word was gasped through clenched teeth, the shift from anger to incredulousness creating an odd tone. “But why? How? If you have enough Mithril to fill all of this armor, why not just wear it proudly?”

“Just aluminum—it’s not Mithril yet. Listen, my team is still too low ranked, and we could never hold on to the armor if it were public knowledge that we had it.” Dale slowly piled the bars of aluminum higher, watching the reactions playing across the normally stoic face of the Dwarf. “Will you take the job?”

“And…” the Dwarf swallowed the saliva building in his mouth, “the pay?”

“How much of this metal is required to complete the job?” Dale fired back a question.

The Dwarf wanted to lie, Dale could tell. Because of this, he had gotten an approximation of doing it with copper wire. It shouldn’t take too much more aluminum to do the same job. To his credit, the truth fell from the Dwarf’s lips. “At least… seven ingots. Possibly part of an eighth bar; I am uncertain what the joints will need.”

Dale nodded, smiling at the staring Dwarf. “Then I want you to use a full eight ingots on this project. Reinforce areas that need extra protection and create a masterpiece that we can reveal to the world when we are powerful enough to protect it.” He placed ten ingots on the counter. “Keep the change. That work for you?”

Dropping to a knee, the Dwarf intoned, “I swear that I shall create the best armor I possibly can and will use these materials to the best of my abilities on your behalf. I will never tell another soul about your armor until you choose to reveal it.” The earth around him shuddered, showing that his oath was accepted.

Dale helped him stand, laughing. “I appreciate the sentiment, but that was a little overdramatic for me. So long as I get the armor in a timely manner, I’m happy.”

“Give me but a day,” the Dwarf made his joyful promise, pocketing two bars of the rare material right away. “I will make you impervious to your enemies.”

Cal

<Hey, we are starting to get some Essence trickling in from the ley lines! It must have taken forever to fully activate the ritual in that city. Maybe there wasn’t as much ambient Essence as I thought there was.> I sighed contentedly as the much-needed Essence flowed into the Cores keeping the island flying. I siphoned a bit of the power into the ritual creating the ley lines; it had drawn a lot of power the last few days, but happily, it now seemed to be self-sustaining. My thoughts returned to the main tactical issue on my mind. How was I going to attack a city full of warriors when I got there? I had tried various methods for creating Mobs and armies, but nothing seemed to work as I needed it to. I had even gone the other way with my bug swarms, miniaturizing them to the point that they were hard to see.

I snorted as I looked at the never-before-seen bug I had created. Sadly, it had almost zero combat potential. I had intended for it to eat people, but I had messed up somewhere. It flew slowly and was very loud. It did drink blood, but… I was going to have to label them a failure. I couldn’t bear to kill them all off myself, so I opened a small portal and dropped all of this type of bug into the world below. They had decent survivability, but against the much more dangerous creatures in the wild, I didn’t expect my Mosquitos to last long at all.

My golems were very powerful within their own territory, and powering them during combat was fine, but they took too much Mana to maintain for any real length of time. Plus, it took over a day for them to be rebuilt if they were destroyed! I had to hope that diplomacy would win out in the end, and the Amazons would help us wipe the necromantic threat from this world. The threat was growing in their own home! I was already getting furious, certain that they would deny us the help we desperately needed.

A surprising amount of auras were beginning to appear upon my surface, and I felt the need for a break, so my mind drifted upward to lazily listen in on the hurried conversations. “Get Frank! We need to talk to him at once!” Oh? At least this sounded interesting.

Dozens of people were pouring through the portal that connected cities. They seemed haggard, and many of them were bleeding. A scream alerted me to something else that had come through the portal on the heels of the latest… refugee?

A huge, clawed hand grabbed the entire torso of the bleeding man. He was saved as the portal was redirected to another location, severing the arm. Frank—who had sprinted into the area—caught the man, shock evident on his face. “Prince Henry?”

“I… I think it is King Henry now, for what little the title is worth,” King Henry bitterly stated. Bleary eyes looked up at the assembled masses, hardly seeing them through tear-filled eyes. “The Kingdom of the Lion has fallen.”

“As has the Phoenix,” another heart-wrenching moment played out as a female voice broke the horrified silence.

Henry looked over at her, and any composure he had been able to maintain was eradicated. “Princess Marie!” He ran to her, catching her in a desperate embrace.

“My title has changed… it is now Queen Marie for me as well.” She began to sob, as did Henry. The loss of their families had been sudden, terrifying. For so many people that could theoretically live forever to die in a single day heralded terror on the horizon. My full attention was on these people at this point, and the drama involved made me wish for a snack as I watched. Dozens more people charged through the portal, some with things chasing them. Soon, far too soon, the tide of refugees stopped entirely.

On the plus side, the bodies didn’t stick around to further traumatize the poor, fleeing people. Bur-r-p! Whew, pardon me. I guess my wish for a snack was granted. I watched as Amber—the High Magous of the Portal Guild—ran over and recalibrated the portal manually. I was fairly impressed. The power and control needed to do something like that on the fly showed how exceptional she was. She muttered something about ‘removing fallen cities from the network’.

The new King and Queen were ushered into a meeting with the council, and even a slightly charred Dale was found and dragged in. Henry began speaking, his voice full of sorrow, “They came out of nowhere! Undead suddenly started pouring into the streets, into the castle. They were everywhere. A man in a black robe walked into the throne room and spoke to my parents. He walked in midway through a session where the entire court was gathered! At least twenty Mages were present, and the man killed all of them! He had weapons and access to power that I have never heard even hinted at! I am only alive due to my guards hastily removing me before he started the killing.”

Marie picked up the conversation, “A similar man, possibly the same man, came to our throne and made impossible demands. When he was denied and asked for proof of his power, he produced,” she looked at Henry with great pity, “he produced a pile of heads.”

There was affronted murmuring around the table. “He told us that he was going to every seat of power in the world and ‘unifying’ all of us. The heads were from leaders that refused him. My… my father’s head joined the pile soon after. The dark power… it was completely overwhelming. Unstoppable.”

Silence reigned supreme for a long minute, eventually broken by Frank, “Well, abyss. The rulers of countries are considered some of the strongest cultivators in their respective countries. The last line of defense against the destruction of their people. For this person to kill multiple rulers in a single day… we aren’t even talking about S-rank anymore. He must be at or approaching double S-rank. Possibly triple S.”

“Do we have any clue, any hint of his identity?” Amber looked around the defeated faces in the room.

“He called himself ‘The Master’,” Henry spat out the title like a curse.

Chandra’s face blanched, and her eyes gazed at nothing. “No… it can’t be. The Master is dead. I know this for a fact! It was my responsibility to… this must be a copycat.”

“If you have information about who this man is or who he is pretending to be, you need to tell us right now,” Father Richard intoned impatiently.

“We need to warn the others.” Chandra stood up hurriedly, her chair flying into the wall behind her and being reduced to kindling. “The Amazons especially! The Elves! Oh, God!” She flickered, running from the room at speeds too great for the non-Mages to follow.

<Dale. You need to see something.> We were floating toward the capital city, and from our position far above the world, my goal was in sight. A flicker of Essence trickled into my senses, and I nearly lost all coherent thought as Dani’s thoughts tickled my senses for the first time in months. I lost the connection just as fast though. She was in the city! She was here!

“Cal, I am really busy right now.” Dale was commiserating with the Royals, but his habit had been to speak aloud for his team’s benefit.

<I’m aware.> My frustration nearly knocked him off of his feet. <Get outside; get to a point you can look at the city. Bring the others with you. Go! Hurry, this is important!>

Dale had little trouble convincing everyone to join him. Direct intervention from me was rare, and he urged them quite intensely. They hurried to get to a point where they could see over the edge, and as they stood high on the walls, my fear became theirs.

The Amazons came running, having been directed by Chandra to get to the meeting at all costs. “What is so important that you are interrupting our baths?” The leader of the Amazonian delegation screeched up at them. Her hair was still wet, and she huffed as she was waved up. She stomped up the stairs, angry and demanding answers. All she got in reply was a pointed finger. Turning, she looked over at the capital city of the Amazon people-what little remained of it.

A huge plume of black, oily smoke rose as a column from the city. What they could see of the place with their enhanced vision showed that the city had been reduced to rubble. The outer wall was demolished, and though there seemed to be massive amounts of movement going on, no one could tell if the crowds were comprised of invaders or refugees. Looking at the area with sight enhanced by Essence or Mana showed a huge accumulation of infernal Essence gathering over the city. This meant that either an unimaginably massive amount of death had been visited upon the land or there was such a high amount of powerful infernal auras in the area that everything else was hidden from view. The worst possibility… was that both scenarios were true.

“What do we do?” Marie whispered as she clutched the arm of her oldest friend, Henry.

“What can we do?” Henry replied despondently as he watched the smoke continue to rise. “Our Kingdoms have fallen. Our leaders slaughtered like animals. Our allies… gone.”

Tyler turned to the side and puked, making a few of the Mages wince away in disgust. Dale raised his hands helplessly.

<We destroy them,> I coldly demanded. Dale froze in place as he realized what I was saying.

“You can’t be saying… Cal, you can’t go to that city!” Dale’s words exploded out of him, making the others look at him cautiously.

<Dani is in there, Dale. I’m going. If you all stay on me like parasites, you are coming too. Make your peace with this fact because it is a fact.> The island tilted forward almost imperceptibly, gaining speed and losing altitude.

“Infuriating dungeon!” Dale shouted into the empty air. “You’re going to get us all killed!”

“Or…” Marie spoke up, eyes alight with calculating intensity, “or this dungeon could be exactly what we needed. Dungeon! I want to make a deal!”

<I’m listening.>

“You can’t be serious!” Dale shouted at her, catching himself after the first words and lowering his voice. “Marie, Your Majesty, you don’t know what making a deal with the dungeon entails. There is no way for you to come out with a better end of the deal! Demons make better deals!”

“If I am stronger, if I am able to take revenge and save my people,” Marie gulped, “then I don’t care.”

<I like those terms.> My nonchalant tone seemed to throw Dale into a state of apoplexy.

“Dungeon! I may not be as powerful as you would wish for, but if I reclaim my Kingdom, you will have my eternal gratitude. I will work my entire life to repay your help. If you give me the power I need, the troops, the weapons… I will serve you faithfully—second only to my people—for as long as I am able!” Her hand shot to her chest as she was knocked from her feet from the creation of such a powerful oath. The air around her hummed with power, the heavens accepting her words and preparing to enforce them. Mana restricted her soul, and just like that… I had a new dungeon born. This one had true influence as well.

<Can you hear me?> I tested our connection along the brand new pathway of Mana engraved in her soul. Her face turned into a mix of wonder and fear.

“I… I can. What have I done?” she whispered softly, eyes trembling. The whites around her irises were entirely visible. Obviously, she had made this oath in the heat of the moment and was already regretting it. Time to calm her down; I needed a powerful asset like her.

<You made the smart decision. You did the right thing. Allow me to show you the benefits. Step away from the group; make sure you have about five meters between you and the nearest person.> I directed her to the side, not anticipating her next question.

“What’s a meter?”

<Just… go over here.> A small platform of stone was created, and I had her stand on it. Everyone else seemed to be in shock at her actions and was watching the proceedings with concern. As she stepped on the platform and waited, I chuckled loudly. <This next part is going to be fun.> The stone under her vanished, and she slid into my depths with a scream. The stone reappeared as the onlookers charged at the opening. They didn’t make it in time.

Chapter Thirty-eight

<Now that you are comfy, let's discuss your capabilities. I’ll adjust you and your gear to the best possible configuration for your goals after our little talk,> I told the trembling Queen. She stood shakily at the foot of the Silverwood tree, fearfully looking at the golem protecting me.

“What… what is that? Isn’t she an Elf?” She raised a hand and pointed a trembling finger at the golem.

<Her? Oh, that’s just a golem. I mean, she does have a fully aware mind, but she’s happy to be where she is.> I looked at the golem petting a Basher, laughing as I remembered her original body. Leporiday Lagomorpha had charged into my dungeon, trying to convince everyone that the place was safe if you were nice, and the people killing bunnies were terrible examples of human refuse. She was correct about them being terrible people, but the rest… heh. As soon as Bashers had surrounded her, she started screaming in delight and hugging the furry Mobs. She had a brain aneurysm at that moment and would have been erased from the world forever if I hadn’t collected her mind into a memory stone.

Now, finally, I had a use for her. She was now my guardian, and in return, I provided her with fluffy animals to play with. Her weak constitution in life had made cultivation impossible for her, so she had died while in the F-ranks. Now filled with my Mana, she was the epitome of the cultivation paths. Her body was composed of a perfectly balanced amount of minerals, allowing any type of ambient Essence to be used. She was also the only self-sustaining golem here. Since her mind was intact, she was able to cultivate like a living person. I had provided her with my cultivation technique and passed Mana to her when she donated an appropriate amount of Essence to me.

<We are talking about you though, Marie. What do you want? What weapon do you use? How do you want to be seen on the battlefield? Shall we begin?>

We started talking, and she told me about her training, her strengths and weaknesses. She told me of her family, and I commiserated with her over her loss. By the end, she was fully committed to me and overjoyed that she had chosen to align her goals with mine. It seemed I had gained a new priestess for the cult of Cal. We began working on modifications, and while she was unconscious, I created a few… contingencies. Just in case she ever tried to sacrifice herself for the ‘greater good’ and get rid of me. It was unlikely; obviously, everyone loves me, but… just in case.

An hour later, the portal opened in the church with a faint zapping noise. The council had been debating on their course of action the entire time, while Henry had been desperate to get into the dungeon and find Marie. Dale had been able to convince him that Marie was alive, but the fear in the man’s eyes showed how deep his devotion to Marie truly was. The Queen stepped through the curtain of shimmering energy, and the people around the room almost drew their weapons at the sight of her. Her body had been altered subtly, forcing the best portions of her bloodline to surface. Elves would be jealous of her beauty and enemies would fear her. Her features were sharp, designed to draw attention and inspire loyalty. She was a foot taller, and her body was coated with sleek, powerful muscles.

Marie’s form-fitting armor moved with her, a second skin of gleaming Mithril interspersed with the most potent combination of materials for her affinities. There was a Core on each of her shoulders, which were absorbing the ambient Essence in the air as she moved. Upon her brow was a tiara mounted upon a helmet, which allowed any who looked upon her to know exactly who she was. Another Core rested in the helmet like a jewel, pretending to be decoration.

<Well, Dale! Allow me to present the newly improved Queen: Battle Tyrant Marie!>

Dale

“Battle Tyrant Marie?” Dale repeated aloud, making a few people glare at him. “Are you coated in… Mithril?”

“It’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen in my life!” Thaddius and his people had gathered, and after determining that their people hadn’t been attacked, he joined the emergency war council. The other Dwarves nodded, a few unsubtly adjusting their pants or wiping tears from their eyes.

“Thank you,” Marie’s voice echoed through the room. The Dwarves got closer, looking for seams in her armor, but it wasn’t designed in a way they recognized. This armor didn’t come off without my direct help. Good thing Mages didn’t need to use the bathroom… “I didn’t know you would be so worried.”

“Huh?” Thaddius looked up at her blankly. “Oh, yeah, glad you’re safe. Can I look at the inlay on your greaves? Kota! Come look at this.”

A new Dwarf sprinted over and almost drooled on the shiny material.

“Are you sure this is Mithril?” the Dwarf asked as he wiped his mouth.

“Duh, Kota! Look at it!” Thaddius smacked him, and they devolved into a conversation about the benefits and detriments of form-fitting Mithril.

Henry shot a glare at the Dwarves, his bloodshot eyes making the glance far scarier than it should have been. “Marie, we thought you were dead. I thought I lost the last person that I…”

“I told you she was alive.” Dale fell silent when he noticed he was being ignored.

Marie looked sadly at the man before her. “We have a war on our hands, Henry. You know that I love you, but this comes first. As we have always told each other, our people need to be protected, raised out of their troubles. No matter what. I have a chance to do that now, and I hope you’ll join me.”

“You want me to make a pledge to the dungeon?” Henry was aghast at the suggestion.

“Yes. I do,” Marie firmly confirmed. “I’ll tell you right now, it’s worth it.” After a few long seconds, Henry nodded in response. He repeated the oath she had stated earlier and stepped into the awaiting portal. A few moments passed as the changes to Marie were noted, but then the conversations picked up. The council had heard Henry’s thoughts, though he had been heavily distracted. Marie was able to calmly discuss her ideas, and a rough battle plan was drawn up. Shock and awe would be the order of the day.

An hour after he had stepped through, Henry emerged from the light. Now calm, collected, and in control of himself, he nodded to the others and joined in the planning. His armor was similar to Marie’s, a coat of Mithril interspersed with Cores and minerals. His eyes were focused and sharp, and he had a large shield on one arm and a sword for the other that was nearly humming with power.

Around the room, the other people waited to see the downside to the oath that had been made by the Royals. The King and Queen, now towering above the others by nearly a foot, started to look uncomfortable as the quiet lengthened. I decided that it was time to get things moving, so I thought I would help out my Tyrants at the same time. <So, can I send out the troops?>

“Yes!” Marie barked with relief evident in her voice, startling herself and the onlookers. “I mean… yes, please, send out the troops you are going to loan us.”

<Will do. First, can you please close off the entrance to the dungeon? I’m stopping production of all Mobs, all treasure, everything not needed for the upcoming battle. I don’t want anyone to walk around in here killing off all my defenses while I’m busy helping all of you.> Dale nodded at these words, sending a runner to close the gates. It would take a few hours for everyone currently in the dungeon to get out, but by that time, battle would be joined.

“We are ready, Cal. Send out the troops,” Henry ordered sternly.

<Watch your tone.> Henry paled and started to apologize, earning a chuckle from me. <Just kidding. I’ve just wanted to see what someone who took me seriously would do when I said that. Dale just makes rude hand gestures.>

The portal began to shimmer once again, and the first Goblin, a Berserker, stepped through. They weren’t equipped with Mithril armor or weapons, but the equipment they were wearing was high quality. I praised the details of the changes in them as well as their usefulness in combat. I needed to enunciate my usefulness and make these people well and truly indebted to me.

<This is a Goblin Berserker. This is going to be the most common type of Goblin in the army. They have no fear and will attack anything they are ordered to. They will all be using an Enchanted weapon. Force enhancement is the only ability that is granted to them via the Runes, as they can’t seem to grasp the concept of using Inscriptions. They are strong, but fairly… thick-headed.>

There was a pause, and the Goblin pointed at a thorn that jutted out of its armor. <As a last resort—or as needed—the Berserkers will slam this thorn into themselves. As they tend to do massive damage to themselves when they fight, I created this in hopes that they will be able to fight for a longer time before dying. It is a Rune designed for healing. Also known as a starvation Rune, this will heal them incredibly quickly but also will make them die soon after if the Rune remains in them and they aren’t fed.>

The Berserker stepped out of the way, allowing a shield-bearing Goblin to step through the portal. <A basic defender, this type of Goblin has Runes on its shield that—when activated—will enrage whatever sees them. A secondary enchantment allows the shield to absorb a huge amount of force. There is a downside to this Rune, in that when it has taken all the damage it can, the shield will explode. The detonation should be directed toward the enemies it is facing, but the defense of a shield is gone, and the Goblin will likely follow.>

Next out was an archer, and since they were self-explanatory, the conversation moved forward quickly. A standard fighter was next, followed by a Goblin that made the humans recoil in fear. Bob stepped out of the portal, easily as tall as King Henry. His staff tapped imperiously on the floor as he walked, the only noise in the echoing room.

<As you can all see, Bob here is a Goblin Shaman. Well, actually, Bob is a full-fledged death Mage now!> Bob had lost all pigment in his skin, turning albino. His teeth were needles, and his eyes were completely black. Beyond these changes, he looked almost human. Hair covered his head, hiding his pointed ears. An aura of power surrounded him, his connection to a law evident to those who knew what they were looking for.

“T-this… you can make warriors like this?” Tyler sputtered incredulously after the descriptions of the Goblins were repeated to those not bound to the dungeon. “Why haven’t you been using them against us?”

<Did you want me to?> This reply was met with a quickly shaking head. <I made a deal with Dale not to make the early floors too dangerous for people to move through. Bob was raised to the B-ranks just this morning after we found that he had achieved a deep enough understanding of death. These others are my elites and have been training ever since the Wailing War. The Essence and Mana cost of recreating them for frequent use is also too high. The only reason I am doing it now is that I am shutting everything else off and have to honor my deal with the Royals.>

“How many of these troops can we expect?” Frank’s direct question was met with trepidation; how many troops could the dungeon really bring to bear in a short time?

<There will be seventeen Berserkers, thirteen standard warriors, eleven archers, seven defenders, and one Bob per unit,> there was some relief, as well as some disgruntlement at the low numbers, <with a total of fifty units. All of them will follow the commands passed down by the Battle Tyrants but are also used to working together under the guidance of Bob.>

There were shouts of disbelief. Father Richard spoke up, “Does this dungeon think we will believe that he can create… uh, that many troops in this short amount of time?”

“Two thousand four hundred fifty Goblins,” Tyler stated quietly. His words made the gathered people shudder. Overdramatic worrywarts.

<No, I don’t expect you to believe that because I can’t.> Dale sat down and stopped interpreting for me, throwing his hands up. He seemed to be ‘done’, to use a term I heard frequently. Luckily, Marie took up the slack. <I’ve been making and training these units for weeks. This is not a spur of the moment creation. Now think on this—multiple cities were wiped out today! Kingdoms have fallen, and I am the only one that has a standing army at this point! Be happy that at least one of our groups was prepared for this, and remember that it shouldn’t have had to be me!>

The final comment sobered up the group, reminding them of what they would soon be facing. “Is there anything else you can do for us?” Amber nearly begged the empty air. Imagine that. A crisis hits, and the people who scorned you and called for your death are now begging for help.

<I’m done talking now, Marie. Tell her that when we are in range, I am going to send packs of Cloud Cats over the edge of the mountain. They will drift down and begin killing, hopefully softening the defenders for our arrival. Also, I am going to eventually land in the ruins, and hopefully, that squishes anything below us.>

There was a bit more discussed, but the general consensus was that everyone was as ready as they could be. “I can’t believe we are doing this.” Dale laughed a bit manically as Goblins began to march in formation out of the dungeon’s portal.

Chapter Thirty-nine

The smoke from the city was getting into Dale’s lungs. He coughed dryly in a vain attempt to clear his airway. Why wasn’t the dungeon absorbing the ash? There were only two positive aspects of the smoke. The first was that it was obscuring their location from the people below. Second… it was blocking the view of the carnage. There were areas where so many people had been killed that the ground looked like it was covered in a chunky salsa, and it would have been visible and stomach churning, even from this height. Through the smoke, Dale was still able to see the buildings and walls that they were passing over and had been passing over for over an hour. They were on a flying mountain, and they still didn’t match even a quarter of the size of the city below them. He couldn’t believe that so many people lived in one area—had lived in one area. Dale shook his head and wiped away a tear, deeply saddened by the purposeless loss of life.

A Mage had flown down to scout quite a while ago, looking for survivors or defenders. She had just returned, bringing news that someone else had apparently already collected anyone living and hauled them to a holding area on the outskirts of the capital. From the look of the rotting guards, their stay wouldn’t end up being a pleasant one. Or a long one, for that matter. Dale flinched as a huge pack of Cloud Cats sprinted past him, jumping off the wall and gliding toward the city a mile below. While they couldn’t survive outside of the dungeon for any real length of time, if they made it back within a day, there wouldn’t be too many detrimental effects. Especially if they were well fed, and the sad truth was that there was plenty of meat below.

Tom strolled up to Dale, golden armor gleaming in the weak sunlight that diffused through the choking smoke. The unit’s armor had arrived, the rush order being completed in record time by a very happy Dwarf. After being processed, the scales from the Manticore had taken a golden shine, and the leather was a soft golden brown. Dale was happy to see Tom using both hands to carry his oversized warhammer, and he waved at the barbarian as he walked up.

“Looks to be a good day for battle, Baron Dale.” Tom was very somber today, his green eyes looking down at the burned husk of a city that used to contain his least favorite people.

“It does, indeed. Outside of the smoke, it’s a beautiful day.” Dale tore his eyes away from the minor explosions and waves of darkness erupting on the distant ground. Rarely the screaming roar of the cloud Cats would drift up to them and cause him to shiver. “Are you going to be okay doing this, Tom? We are trying to rescue Amazons.”

Tom leaned on the wall, body posture relaxed in a way Dale couldn’t match when he was this tense. “We are saving their people, their man-slaves. If I understand correctly, the first action that would have been taken is to kill the leadership of the nation. If so, this means that my family has been avenged. Now, there is no place in my soul that holds anger toward the desperate people below. I will fight to the best of my abilities.”

“That’s good, Tom. I’m glad to hear it.” Dale reached over and grabbed his new helmet, slowly pulling it on. A perfect fit, as expected of Dwarven work. “Let’s get to it.” They walked over to their team, and Hans struck a heroic pose at them. Now that they were in matching armor, they really looked like a team. Of course, Adam was still wearing his brilliantly white robe. Instead of detracting from the uniform, the robe instead highlighted the armor he now wore underneath. Dale looked at each of them and felt that he had done all he could to protect them. He rolled his arms to relax his stress-clenched muscles and took a deep breath.

“Are we ready for this?” Rose looked at the pale faces surrounding her, receiving shakes of their head ‘no’ from all of them. “Oh, good. I thought it was just me.” She looked out over the sea of people waiting to attack, but her attention was caught and held by the portal Mages. They were doing… something together, and their voices were rising and falling in an intricate chant. Mana was intertwining and accumulating above them, forming a rift in the air above the city.

“Are we certain the city is populated only with the dead or necromancers?” Frank called to the scouts. They nodded, eyes wide and staring. They had seen horrors today. “Bring it out, then.” A ball of tungsten was rolled in front of the waiting army, pushed by four straining Mages. The ball was set into an indentation on the stone floor, waiting to be used. At first glance, it was just a lump of metal, but Dale could feel the dungeon’s work at play and decided to look closer. As tall as a man—roughly six feet—the ball was so heavy that it left a furrow in the ground it rolled over. What made Dale catch the breath in his throat were the Runes engraved on the ball—extra weight, force, and demon banishing. What was happening?

Tyler was glaring at the ball. “Six feet in diameter, nineteen point three grams per cubic centimeter… that is two hundred four thousand six hundred eighty-five pounds of Inscribed tungsten we are throwing away.”

“We aren’t throwing it away, Tyler.” Chandra stepped toward them as she decided to take a moment to explain what was happening. “I’m not sure you will understand the significance, but there is a Tomb Lord down there.”

Tyler shrugged at her. “You’re right, I don’t understand.”

“There is a hierarchy of undead summons. There are basic versions like zombie and wraiths, a mid-tier like abominations and minor demons, and a higher tier that contains beings like standard demons. These are all things you have seen before and are the usual things summoned by Mage-rank necromancers. Then there are beings summoned exclusively by A-ranks and higher. The weakest of these is a Behemoth, which is twice the size of an abomination and armored.”

Chandra took a deep breath and continued, “One of the strongest in the A-ranks is the Tomb Lord. This is a heavily armored being that commands armies of the undead. They are puppets of demon lords in that they are inhabited and controlled by them. This means that they not only have all the power of the dead but the infernal powers of the abyss as well. Fast, intelligent, powerful. Nearly impossible to kill with conventional weaponry. Thus, we have that.” She pointed at the ball the Portal Mages were surrounding.

The second in command of the portal Mages, James, started a secondary chant that created a harmony to the first. Next to the ball, a portal slowly opened on the ground. Ten feet above it, another portal opened simultaneously. As it widened, James’s face became more and more strained. “Now!” He gasped as his strength began to wane.

The attending Mages shoved the ball, and it ponderously began to move. Ever so slowly, it tipped over the edge of the portal and fell. And fell. And fell. The wind began to shimmer as the ball dropped from the air above, only to drop into the waiting portal and appear in the air again. The friction in the air was causing the ball to heat up, and in seconds, it was glowing a bright cherry-red. Now falling so fast that the air began to catch on fire around it, the ball was now almost impossible for people to look at directly. A huge amount of Essence began to be generated as wind Essence was torn apart and created fire and lightning Essence. James tried to let the ball ‘fall’ for as long as he could maintain the portal; just as he was about to collapse, Amber hijacked the portal on the ground and connected it with a different hole in the world.

Impossibly fast, the ball of tungsten entered the portal on the ground and exited the portal high in the air, aimed at the city below. Specifically, it was aimed at an armored form that towered over the highest of the buildings still standing. With meteoric speed, the ball impacted the form that was standing in the center of the largest wave of undead, causing a shockwave that forced the floating dungeon higher on a blast of air. The ground collapsed in all directions, and the earth of the dead city rose into the air as debris. The dust reached the edge of the dungeon’s influence and was absorbed, protecting the people waiting to attack whatever survived. Optimistically looking at the power of the artillery, they all hoped there would be nothing left to fight at this point.

It took a few minutes for the air to clear enough to see the ground below, and the view confused many. The Tomb Lord was still standing, though everything else had been annihilated by the shockwave. It looked at its hand and seemed to laugh as it tried to toss away the ball it had caught. It seemed confused that the ball wouldn’t leave its hand. It violently shook its appendage, and a furious screech left its mouth. The ball glowed brighter for a long moment, then it and the Tomb Lord vanished with a faint pop.

“Banished. Thank goodness.” James collapsed, lying on his back and breathing deeply.

“Good God!” Tyler whispered as he looked at Chandra with wide eyes. “You would have had to fight that thing?”

She nodded. “It would have been very difficult. It had the power of the Mage who summoned it as well as the demon’s strength. It was essentially two A-ranked Mages working together in perfect harmony. If it hadn’t tried to show off by catching the ball, we would have needed to retreat.”

While their conversation continued, the scouts were making reports on the city below. There had been quite a bit of damage, but the city center remained completely intact. The Amazons cleared up the confusion generated by this revelation. “The Queen’s circle. There were powerful protections in place, powerful enough to slow S-ranked attacks. Though this was a potent blow against weak creatures, that ball was not infused with Mana. It was just moving quickly. Obviously, the protections designed by Amazonians were enough to stop that mediocre damage from spreading.”

<Looks like we know where we are attacking. If I am correct and the dungeon is hidden down there, I am sure it will be using those protections to the best of its abilities.> The island began to descend. <Good luck, everyone. When I am on the ground, all the Mana and Essence I’ve been devoting to flying will be directed toward creating more troops. Expect reinforcements… soonish!>

While it took over thirty minutes to land, the time seemed to pass in the blink of an eye. After the first tremor of touching down shook the mountain, the gathered people began walking out of a portal maintained by the dungeon. There was a short drop at the exit, but the real shock came from the change in environment. With a single movement, they stepped from a virtual paradise into the ashen ruins of what had once been a great city. Ash and foul stenches clogged the air while thick infernal Essence cloyed against their meridians. The people rushed to get into formation; weaker undead were already charging across the flat expanse of the tungsten meteor’s killing zone. Stronger undead were taking their time, and intelligent demons were holding back to direct the assault of their puppets.

Mages from Mountaindale—specifically scouts and Spotters—were searching for any hint of where the necromancers in charge of the creatures were hiding. If the people controlling the undead and demons were killed, all of their puppets would return to the piles of rotten meat that they were supposed to be. Until then, the army needed to defend themselves, and barriers began appearing around the shield walls. The advantage of earth Mages in an army cannot be understated. Walls of stone rose, blocking a charge that could have shattered the defensive lines of the living.

The Goblins howled in response to a rousing speech given by Bob, and they slammed their weapons either on the ground, their shields, or else stamped their feet. Their enthusiasm for the upcoming fight was intoxicating, and the adventurers were not to be outdone! Battle cries and bloodlust-filled shouts rose into the toxic air. The Goblins cheered as Bob directed the placement of a totem. This was a mobile version of my obelisks and used earth Essence to activate. When the totem was inserted into the ground, a Core in it lit up and connected to obelisks in the city. The people smiled, feeling fresh air as my influence was spread to the area and began changing the battleground in their favor. Smoke lessened, ash stopped raining on them, undead began to melt away, and in the small area my influence occupied, everyone could see and hear each other clearly.

“How many of those pillar things do the Goblins have?” Frank yelled over the din of battle coming from the outskirts of their formation.

“No idea! Who cares?” Dale screamed back with a chilling grin on his face. He was looking forward to this fight. He didn’t think he’d need to wait long; the pounding steps of the dead were drawing nearer.

<They have as many as they need. Most importantly, they need to get one into the evil dungeon under the city so that I can directly counter its influence, or you will all be screwed. All of the totems need to be in range of each other, so make sure they stay undamaged, or you’ll need to go back!> Dale heard in his mind. For once, he had no qualms about listening to advice given by the voice in his head.

A thought struck him, and he smiled grimly. “Frank! There is a dungeon in the sewers; find an undamaged tunnel into it! I’d bet my last gold that the necromancers controlling all of this are taking defensive positions below us!”

There was a brief discussion between the leadership of the army, but Marie and Henry seemed to agree with Dale’s calculated assessment. The administration pulled an Amazon over to them and told her to direct them to a sewer entrance. After she looked at them like they were insane, she tried her best to find a landmark that she could use to locate a sewer entrance. The process was difficult as this entire area had recently been reduced to rubble at best and, at worst, the terrain had completely flipped over.

While the Amazon worked to find a tunnel opening, the army was doing their best to survive, beset upon on all sides by the ravenous dead. Luckily, the necromancers were in seclusion, else there would have been ranged Mana-based attacks to work against from more than just the demons. Arrows flew from Goblin, Elf, and human alike while large ballista bolts flew from Dwarven war machines placed on the mountain. It turned out that swords and other close range weapons were more effective against the undead, as the bodies had to be quite damaged before they would stop moving. Arrows and ranged weapons, though they didn’t destroy many of the undead outright, were useful in pinning bodies in place so the warriors could destroy them easier. On the other hand, the ballista bolts could tear several bodies apart before losing momentum. The speed at which the Dwarves had been able to create these siege weapons gave the other races pause. When all of this was over, the delegations planned to make alliances immediately. All of the people represented in the army were very pleased they had not made enemies of the Dwarves.

Another great asset in the battle was that Tyler’s shop of oddities had harvested the spikes on the Manticore then distributed the anti-demon weapons amongst the army. This forced the demons to make a choice—fight and possibly be banished or observe and make tactical strikes. While there were dedicated demon fighters such as Father Richard amongst the clerics, the weapons that allowed you to banish the foul creatures were rare, expensive, and single use. Unfortunately, the demons seemed to have decided that with such weapons in use, they should stay on the sidelines to control the movements of their minions. The ‘taskmaster’ type of demon, though not front line fighters themselves, could control the undead with a master’s touch. Thanks to their subtle influence, attacks that should have been absorbed by shields or parries were instead landing against living flesh and armor. The people wouldn’t last too long against the waves of enemies if this continued.

The dead were working as a unit, making the battle far more difficult for the living. A wall crumbled as an abomination made its presence known, walking through the mundane fortification like it wasn’t even there. Rose noticed a dark miasma of Essence on the outskirts of the platoon of walking dead that had just arrived and recognized the signs that showed that a demon was present. Her sharp eyes pierced the swirling particles in the air, and she lined up an arrow for what should have been an impossible shot. She pulled back hard on the bowstring and released with an inaudible exhale of breath. Her arrow screamed as it flew in a straight line across four hundred meters, causing a tiny sonic boom as it broke the sound barrier. The arrow shattered as it entered the demon, but the Rune on the arrow’s tip stayed intact! That was all that mattered.

Screaming as it felt all of the Essence that sustained it upon this plane vanishing, the demon furiously gave one last order to charge. It vanished with an echoing pop as the Rune came to life. After stopping in place for a moment as their withered brains processed the order, three abominations charged directly forward from where they were standing. Luckily, two of the mounds of flesh were facing away from the living army and trampled various minor undead as they sprinted off into the distance. Only one of them charged into an area that contained Goblins, but this was still devastating as the massive undead ignored all defenses and attacks. Defenders were tossed aside or trampled, and with each death, the abomination grew larger and stronger. It sucked the blood, bones, and flesh out of anything dead as it passed, nearly doubling in size before the Mages were able to counter its movement.

Incantations began to reach completion as the Mages directed their Mana and laws to destroy these unholy beings. Elements, particles, energy, and abstract thought ran rampant around the area, causing the earth to tremble, the particles in the air to be charged with Mana, and the undead to become just dead as they fell to pieces. Madame Chandra tossed seeds into the air, and they scattered on the wind. When they landed, they remained inert if they fell on living things, contrarily burrowing into flesh if they landed on dead beings. Splashes of color other than sanguine or various hues of dirt began appearing as flowers started to bloom with beautiful pigments.

The flowers released an invigorating scent, covering the odor of decay and death that otherwise permeated the area. Morale improving, the army roared a challenge to the dead and screamed their hatred toward the cowardly necromancers fighting from afar! Attacks redoubled in strength and speed, potions were chugged, and war was waged!

The Goblin Berserkers began decimating the minor undead, their blunt weapons and powerful blows perfect for the situation they found themselves in. As time wore on, the effects of the flowers began to wane, and the Goblins become fatigued, yet still, they threw everything they had into battle. The assault gained ground, and they pushed deeper toward the city center. Another totem was raised, and the Goblins cheered as they felt their connection to the dungeon reappear. The Berserkers—now approaching exhaustion—slammed a closed fist into their chest and pressed the Runes of healing into their bodies. In moments, they were feeling relief as lactic acid buildup was removed, wounds began to close, and exhaustion faded. They returned to combat, the undead in their paths being destroyed brutally and mercilessly. An hour into the battle, a voice rang out, clearly heard by those in charge of the army. “Here! There is a path into the sewers over here!”

Frank directed an earth Mage to test the sewer, but unfortunately, it had collapsed. The army—though disappointed—returned to taking ground slowly and painfully. A surprise attack wiped out over half of the Goblin Berserkers as demons and undead that had buried themselves in the dirt sprang to their feet. Like a knife through butter, the Goblins were torn to shreds only to be pulled into a waiting abomination’s body. Now over eight meters tall, the abomination howled and ran into the army. It slew over a hundred Goblins before Father Richard was forced to incinerate the horror in its entirety by dousing it with holy light.

People were tiring quickly, but fortunately, an intact sewer entrance was found. A pained cheer rang out, and people began filing into the minor protection the area provided, hurrying to get everyone inside. Father Richard was nearly overwhelmed as he felt a massive concentration of demons and necromancers within the sewer. The real battle was about to begin.

Chapter Forty

I really couldn’t do much to help with this fight. I watched the battles rage and focused on creating reinforcements and aides to send with them. Each Goblin left the area with a small bag full of potions which they were instructed to distribute to the people who needed them. Elites took far too long to outfit so they left their spawning point with standard equipment. They had their memories though, which included all of their training, so my hope was that at least some of them would survive and succeed.

Having landed the mountain and deactivated the Runes and rituals needed for flying, Essence was pouring into my domain like a river. Ley lines were collecting Essence and Mana, and I was absorbing everything I could hold. I was lucky that I had access to this extra power because every time a totem was placed by my Goblins, a rush of power left me and created a new area under my influence. As the army slowly moved further and further from me, more power was needed for me to take control of the space pinned by the totems. Without all of my various systems for power collection, I would have spread myself far too thin and been rendered totally useless.

The war was continuing apace, and Essence was moving into and out of me as huge sheets of power. Totally exhausting! For a human, it would be like sprinting a mile at maximum exertion, puking, then suddenly being full of vigor and forced to run at top speed again. When the battle turned subterranean, I lost sight of the conflict for several minutes. When they finally reached a good spot, the Goblins sank a totem into the ground and activated it. I knew something was different as soon as my influence began to spread. Instead of sweeping into the area and expanding like gas in a container, something tried to attack and absorb my aura.

<I don’t think so, you raggedy, little demon-hole!> I shouted at the pathetic dungeon trying to eat me. <You want to fight? Let’s fight!>

Essence exploded outward from the totem as I forced more and more into the area. All of it converted to influence, powering up my aura. The dungeon in my way… blinked? It didn’t seem to have a very good handle on its own aura and struggled to shape itself into a defensive formation. I stopped using Essence and instead began sinking Mana into my aura. Screaming in pain as the exceedingly powerful Mana impacted it, the dungeon I was invading fractured and lost a chunk of territory. I quickly filled the room and began drinking down the excessive infernal Essence in the area.

<Bob, I broke its hold in this area. If anyone is fighting you right now, they are doing it under their own power. There will be no help from the dungeon, so press forward! You need to get those totems in place in each room; it will help me stabilize myself. As you get closer to the dungeon’s seat of power, I may need you to place more than one so that I have a greater foothold.> A new totem began to form, painfully slowly. <I’m going to make you some extras right now so that I don’t need to do it while fighting. Try to keep people away from this area for a moment so their auras don’t get in the way!>

The Goblins rapidly formed a perimeter, blocking all the non-initiated from entering the area. I quickly created every extra totem they should need; ‘quickly’ being relative in this case. The necromancers in the area sent wave after wave of undead against the room our front line was holding, obviously trying to reclaim it for the infernal dungeon. The dead seemed a little strange, a little too smooth featured and… not rotten… to have been real people. I nodded in understanding as I realized that they were made by the dungeon. An interesting idea—create creatures and let them be controlled by other people. That would let you get around their need for sustenance via Essence… Maybe I could convince Dale to be a bunny summoner? Later, later.

Totems complete, the war band rolled forward once again. As the leading edge turned the corner, a burst of dark hellfire roared down the tunnel. Anyone caught in the flames was reduced to a charred husk, and we lost easily a dozen Goblins. I hated that the Goblins were considered more expendable than the humans they were traveling with, but it did make sense tactically. I could re-create the Goblins, but the humans and assorted sentients would need to be bound to me and have granted me a full mapping of their memories if they were to be resurrected. That was a rare combination.

I ‘caught’ the hellfire when it entered my influence, draining the Essence away and making the flames sputter to nothingness. Yum. I felt bad that there was so little I could help with, but it was up to the army to set those totems up so I could take part in the fight. Looking over the allied forces, I did a double take when I saw a Goblin collapse after taking no noticeable damage. What the…? He looked perfectly healthy! Oh… perfectly healthy. I pointed him out to another Goblin, who went over to him and pulled on the ‘thorn’ that was stuck into his body. The fallen Goblin’s eyes fluttered open after a moment, only to see a large steak dangling in front of his nose. He grabbed it and started devouring it like, well… like a starving Goblin. Messy. Before moving forward again, any Goblin with a healing Rune was checked and fed.

Allowing the army to pause so long may have been a mistake. A posse of demons sprinted into the room followed by what must have been an A-rank necromancer. The oppressive aura he exuded forced anyone under the Mage ranks to freeze in place, trembling uncontrollably as the demons began a wholesale slaughter. Fifty people in the crowd were dead before the Mages in our army counterattacked. A sparkle of light announced that Nez was fighting, and a demon fell in half as the sword-wielding speedster moved past him. Now, this didn’t kill or banish the demon, but it did slow him down enough that he was easy prey for a crossbow that fired demon-banishing bolts.

A ripple of celestial energy moved through the room, freeing the people caught in the oppressive aura. My people rallied, emboldened by the morale boost that followed while the demons faltered and hissed as the diametrically opposed power washed over them. Father Richard stepped forward, joy etched on his face as celestial Mana moved through him. “Demons, your time tainting this plane has come to an end. If it were possible, I would end your suffering. Sadly, all I can do is return you to the plain of despair, the abyss, as you await judgment for your crimes. I know this human waste called a necromancer is not your master, as Sonder tells me that your bond is held by another.”

The power in his voice held the entire battlefield enraptured. “Your master has broken a sacred taboo and will pay for his crimes against the world by joining you upon the plains of despair,” he began to chant, “but it is not this way among you. Whoever wishes to become great among you shall be your servant. Whoever calls upon the darkness to destroy another shall be returned to the darkness. The mighty shall be pulled to captivity, and those that do his bidding shall descend with him!”

A lance of golden Mana moved through the room too fast to avoid, piercing the four remaining demons. The Mana then moved past them, racing through stone and dirt to find the man who had summoned these foul creatures. Four golden beams impacted the man, and a shimmering pentagram formed, linking all of the beings. Between one breath and the next, all five vanished into the abyss. A terrified wail floated down the tunnels to the army.

The A-rank necromancer was trembling in rage, looking at the shining priest. “You will pay for that! You sent a man to the abyss!”

“He paid his own price. As will you,” Richard stated coldly. The shaken necromancer began attacking, and dark rings began swirling around him. Anyone unfortunate enough to be caught by a ring started to rot away at a terrifying pace. If they died before their body was gone, they rose again as undead and started attacking the gathered people.

Now, one Mage against an army sounds like a swift death for the Mage, right? This would be true in most cases, but an A-rank Mage is the equal of at least ten B-rank Mages. In the confining sewer, this Mage could easily block the entire force indefinitely. At the A-ranks, there was no need for food or sleep. The only way to stop him was to match him, and besides Father Richard, there were only two A-rank Mages in the army of the living: Madame Chandra and High Magous Amber. Amber had stayed on the mountain to recover her strength; the portal she created to destroy the main forces of the dead had cost her much of her Mana reserves. Chandra made her way to the fight as Richard and the other Mages worked desperately to fend off the advancing necromancer.

Walking forward, Chandra seemed to change. Those who didn’t know her looked on in confusion; those who truly did know her looked on in fear. Plants were writhing around her, and they grew with every step she took. Vines completely wrapped her like an elegant uniform, and large, leafy plants hung behind her like wings. She started jogging faster. A tree grew from her wrist, transforming first into a thorn and then into a beautiful, massive sword. A stump grew in a circle on her other arm, elongating and becoming a polished wooden shield. The leaves on her back stretched, and she lifted into the air, moving at high speeds.

A blur slammed into the necromancer, who was now coated in darkness and hovering a foot off the floor. The dark rings around him attempted to constrict around the flying rainforest but failed as she moved out of their range. Chandra shouted at the necromancer, “It doesn’t need to be like this! We don’t need to be at war! Tell him that we can make peace! Tell him his revenge has been taken! What more can he want?”

A voice responded from the blot of inky blackness, echoing like it came from a deep well, “What more? What more? What don’t we want? So his revenge is realized! So his plans are nearing completion! What about the rest of us? Unlike you, he cares for us and will ensure our place in the world! We will go from the lowest class of person, hiding, scurrying like rats, to the Kings! Dukes! Princes! The world is ours, Dark Valkyrie!” His laughter was loud and manic, then wet as roots exploded through his skin. In moments, he was fertilizer for the plants that had been embedded in him during the first attack.

Chandra landed softly on the ground, shaking her head. “I need to hear it from him. If only he would have ignored the ‘screens’ telling him what to do. He could have done great things for his people.”

“What are you talking about?” Father Richard limped over to Chandra, blessing the bodies that he passed.

“When he was young, I knew ‘The Master’,” Chandra spit the title. “He was normal, intelligent. He opened my eyes to the plight of men in the city. All my life, I was told that men were only useful for a few things, and otherwise, they were barely tolerated. Like cattle. Then one day he told me about a ‘screen’ that appeared in his vision. Practically overnight, he was a powerful cultivator. He moved through the ranks faster even than Dale has. Of course, even though I didn’t tell on him, he was found out. It didn’t matter that he wasn’t a necromancer; men were forbidden to cultivate. Long story short, he was the cause of the first necromantic war and the reason men in this land now wear slave collars.”

“Long story short? That’s a huge leap! That’s like saying a child lost his sweets, one thing led to another, and a continent was plunged into war! Do you know why he did all of this?” Richard glanced at her sharply as he finished consecrating the bodies piled knee high around him.

“I don’t.” She groaned as she looked at the devastation. “I will stop him though. One way or another.”

“He isn’t here,” Adam called to the Mages. When they looked at him curiously, he shrugged. “He wasn’t here earlier, and the Portal Mages cut off and then destroyed the portal system in this area. Unless he has a different way of crossing the continent, he isn’t here.”

The army started moving again, not encountering much resistance for nearly a mile of twisting tunnels. Rooms were cleared, totems were set, and the army was refreshed. They turned one final corner and entered the heart of the dungeon. This was a massive room where all waste had once flowed to since it would be washed away by a river that cut through the space. On the other side of the river, an altar was safeguarded by the necromantic army. Thousands of undead swarmed the room, controlled by demons and necromancers alike. A huge ritual was underway, and if Amber had been present, she would have been able to tell the group that the necromancers were preparing a one-way portal.

There was shock on the faces of the living people, and my Goblins were preparing themselves for death. Outnumbered by a huge margin, they could only pray for a miracle.

Chapter Forty-one

<Set up the totems, Bob.> My words caused Bob to jump. He grabbed four totem poles and slammed them into the rock. His strength was so great, and the floor was so brittle that the totems were easily planted. My influence in the area began to grow, but this was the seat of the infernal dungeon’s power. It was crushing my attempts to expand, protecting its defenders and creations. I stubbornly set myself against it. <More totems, Bob.>

Weapons were drawn, and the dead started charging at our meager defensive line. More of our people were arriving, but the tunnels were fairly narrow. Bob kept slamming the totems into the ground, and they connected their power together as he did so. Soon, I was able to gain a foothold. I slammed Mana into the room, and the infernal dungeon’s hold on the entryway shattered like glass. We owned the land up to the river now. Unfortunately, the dungeon must have already been in the Mage ranks, or else I’d have shattered its Core with that blow. My Mana began to suffuse the area, and I made it available to Bob as a weapon.

Tyler’s oddities were coming into play in interesting ways. The arrows he created flew into the mass of dead and exploded with holy fire, seemingly blessed by clerics and infused with celestial Essence. The Dwarves were assembling the siege weapons they had brought with them, and the Amazons were standing on the front lines with my Berserkers. The first wave of the dead reached us and drove directly through the people in the way. Completely overwhelming us, it looked like they would push to the mouth of the tunnel when Chandra strode into the room like an avenging angel.

Her sword grew and became as flexible as a whip. With every swing, scores of bodies were dismembered, and chunks were falling to the ground. Seeds flew from her, planting themselves in bodies and growing at astounding rates. Whatever she attacked soon had plants growing in it, the voracious plants eating all the flesh touched. This denied the abominations food, and they had to begin eating the dead that hadn’t been damaged in order to grow stronger.

More Mages began to pile into the room, supporting Chandra. All fighters under the B-ranks were assigned to holding off the lesser undead, eliminating the distractions as the Mages began fighting abominations, demons, and necromantic Mages. The air was thick with power, but the Necromancers began draining it of usable Mana and feeding it into the portal that was growing near the altar.

“Soon, The Master shall arrive, and all of your pathetic death throes shall have been for naught!” a Necromancer helpfully screamed at the army. He yelped as the ground beneath him exploded, tossing him backward and into a plant. The plant began feasting on him as he screamed. Being infused with Mana, the potency of Chandra’s plants was not to be trifled with.

Dale gasped happily as he stood back. His earth shattering technique had been more effective than he had been able to manage in the past. Reaching into his pocket, a burst of Essence flowed into him. His breathing evened out, and he began punching the undead with renewed vigor. Every blow was followed with either a wave of fluid as Dale’s battle gauntlet activated or a slight drain of the Essence keeping the undead moving. He didn’t know it, but by draining the undead, he was draining the necromancer connected to the walking carcass. After yet another corpse fell, drained of all Essence, an entire segment of the dead fell. The necromancer controlling them had fallen unconscious from Essence loss! Must have been in the low C-ranks…

This was going too easily for us. I looked over the remaining necromancers, studying them quickly. What the abyss? This was the great force protecting a necromantic dungeon? Most of the living people were in the low to mid C-ranks with a few B-ranks and a single remaining A-ranked Mage. Suddenly, the purpose of the portal was clear. The main troops weren’t here! They were off subjugating the world or some other nonsense. An attack upon a defeated city, which should have been their foothold, was entirely unexpected!

I laughed wholeheartedly as I poured Mana into a spell formation Bob was creating, allowing it to pull ambient Mana from the room. The Mages working the portal stumbled as they suddenly had to double the resources they were devoting to the tear in the world. Bob’s spell landed in the midst of a group of C-ranked necromancers, and the undead they were controlling fell to the ground. The Mages in our army rushed forward into the gap, reaching the necromancers and engaging in direct combat with them. They fell in droves, weaker in close combat than expected. Too much time devoted to summoning things to fight instead of training themselves, I suppose.

The last A-ranked Mage in the area stepped away from the portal, leaving its creation up to the remaining necromancers. He charged into the fray, and his first blow slapped Chandra away, leaving her buried in the stone of the wall across the room. She struggled to escape as Frank stepped forward to engage the threat.

“Come on, ya pissant little body-snatcher!” Frank growled at the unamused Mage. “Let’s see ya get in a hit!”

Frank bounded forward, greatsword flashing forward faster than an arrow. The A-ranker tried to swing at him, only to have Frank bark ‘Redirect!’ at him. The force behind the necromancer’s blow transferred to enhance Frank’s swing, and the dark Mage got to experience what being buried in the wall felt like.

The Mage made the wall around him crumble and sprinted forward. Frank planned his strike and roared, ‘Stop!’. The Mage was too powerful for Frank’s law to fully affect him, but he did stumble at an opportune moment. The greatsword came down, and the Mage had his head buried in the stone below him.

The red-faced necromancer pushed himself up and pointed at Frank. “Blight!” An orb of darkness appeared in his open hand, and the Mage slammed it into Frank’s chest. Blood shot out of Frank’s mouth, and he dropped to his knees. The people behind him could see directly through Frank’s chest. A hole the approximate size and shape of the necromancer’s hand had appeared, and darkness was spreading over the remainder of his body.

“Frank!” Dale screamed across the room. “No!”

“Frank, yes.” The Mage locked eyes with Dale as he mocked him. He stepped past the corpse at his feet and strode toward the encroaching army. “Time to deal with the rest of the rats.” He raised his hands, and his head fell to the ground, a look of glee still etched on his face.

Brianna appeared next to the body, punting the head away. “That’s why we get paid the big coins for assassinations.”

Dale ran over to Frank, but his body was already crumbling away. Brianna caught Dale, keeping him from touching the blighted chunks remaining. “Careful! That might spread to you!”

“Frank…!” Dale cried out.

“Is already gone,” Brianna firmly stated. “Don’t let his sacrifice be in vain!”

<Dani!> The remaining necromancers had completed the portal and grabbed the dungeon Core. A Mana leash attached to a limp Dani pulled the Wisp along as the Mages attempted to flee.

Dale

Dale heard the dungeon cry out in anguish and leaped into motion without thinking through the full ramifications of his actions. He charged at the Mages that were entering the portal, grabbing an overly potent Core from his pocket as he did so. This Core was from the celestial type golem and was full of celestial-attuned Mana. Having no knowledge of celestial techniques, Dale simply tried to activate the earth shattering technique while running celestial Essence through it.

As the string of celestial Essence left his hand—pointed at the Mages—he shattered the Core and infused all of the Mana into the attack. The Mana arched to the portal and impacted it, but the celestial power failed to cancel out the infernal type powering the portal as Dale had intended. Instead, the portal hummed and shifted colors. The light in it grew brighter, and it seemed to stabilize. The remaining power returned to Dale and was absorbed.

“Ha hah!” There were only one Mage and four C-ranked necromancers remaining in front of the portal. “Thank you for stabilizing this. I thought we were going to be stuck here!”

They jumped through the portal, and the dead dropped to the ground, no longer animated by another's will. The vast chamber was quiet except for the wails of the wounded. Of all the possible outcomes, no one had thought the enemy would run! The veterans of many battles groaned; this would mean potentially decades of hunting down pockets of necromantic filth. Then they remembered that the main forces they were against hadn’t even been here and whined louder.

<Dani! No! I was so close!> Dale’s heart ached for the dungeon. He grimaced. His heart really ached for the dungeon. He coughed, and blood splattered on the ground.

“What… what’s happening?” He coughed again, then vomited as blood shot from his mouth.

“Dale!” Brianna gripped him, trying to steady the sick man. “What’s the matter? Why are you bleeding? Did you get wounded?”

Trying to understand the issue, Dale closed his eyes and attempted to look inside himself. He failed at his attempt. He tried to move Essence to his hands and again failed. Hands shaking, he looked up at Brianna. “Why can’t I feel my Essence?”

Brianna’s eyes glowed, and horror crossed her face. “Dale! Your affinity channels… they’re collapsing! You used Mana somehow, didn’t you? Your body is shutting down; some Mana got into your system, and your center can’t handle it. Your… Core? You have a Core? Never mind, it’s breaking!”

“So I’m dead no matter what I do?” Dale looked at Brianna with fear-filled eyes.

“No! We can get you to a cleric, we can–” Brianna lied as fast as she could open her mouth.

“I see.” Dale stood up, nodded at her, and shoved her backward. Only because she was stunned by his actions did it affect her at all. The dungeon couldn’t help him, and Dale knew it wouldn’t help him if he lost his Wisp again. There was only one option. He turned and dove through the humming portal.

“After him!” Hans screamed in panic from across the room. Dale’s team and Madame Chandra ran, jumping through the portal after their leader. Brianna stood looking at the portal for a long moment.

“Oh, you fools,” she whispered in a heartbroken tone.

Chapter Forty-two

Dale landed on the soft ground, grass tickling the sensitive skin on his face. He painfully forced himself to his feet, looking around. Blinking at the bright moonlight, Dale tried to discern where the necromancers could have gotten off to. The only sound was wind, but his glances revealed that he was on a mountain overlooking a shadowy forest. Had they escaped down past the tree line already?

Looking at where he had come from, a portal still hung empty in the air. Good. He could escape if he returned. Dale looked at the ground and finally got a hint as to where the others had gone. There were footprints in the dirt, and the grass had been bent in a specific manner that only happens when someone barges through it without knowing how to cover their tracks. Dale laughed even as blood dribbled down his chin. His training to be a Baron was all pointless now. All the math in the world couldn’t help him; his knowledge of state dinners and dancing was pointless. His years as a sheepherder though, the tracking skills he had used to find lost lambs and avoid dangers, those would let him pursue his quarry.

He started trotting along the trail, confused at the signs he was finding. The trail was fairly obvious but looked at least a couple hours old. Dale worried that he may be following the wrong group, but what else could he do? He sped up, trying to think of how he would take Dani back from a freaking Mage as he was dying. As the predawn light began to brighten, Dale looked around and shivered. It was way too beautiful of a day for this. He felt like it should be raining, possibly snowing. That would have fit the mood much better.

Dale slowed as voices echoed down to him. “It’s been hours! If they were going to come after us, they would have long ago!”

It seemed the necromancers were fighting amongst themselves. Perfect. Dale sunk to his knees and crawled as quietly as he could through the long grass. He left the path behind, trying to come upon the group at an angle they weren't expecting.

“At least let me try to contact The Master!” Dale could see a dark form silhouetted against the sky. “He may be able to open another portal to us or at least give us instructions!”

“No!” This command had hints of Mana in it and made Dale shiver in fear. “We… hee-hee, we have our orders!” The Mage seemed to be in a good mood and was maliciously grinning. “If we escape to somewhere safe, we re-plant the dungeon and take care of it!”

“It’s basically powerless at this point, though! It had to sacrifice all of its power when we removed it from the dungeon! It’ll be back in the D-rankings, at best!”

“So we get more offerings to power it up!” Spittle flew from the Mage’s mouth, making the man arguing with him wipe his face. “We have a dungeon, which we now control! Let’s make the best of it!”

While they obviously didn’t fully agree, the others slowly moved to comply with the powerful person. Dale waited patiently as they gathered large, flat stones. After making an altar similar to what had been in the sewers—if a bit rough—they placed the dungeon Core on the rocks and poured a bit of their blood on it. Dale saw Dani attempt to avoid the rough men, flying in painfully slow circles to try and stay out of their way.

“Poor thing,” Dale thought sadly, watching the Wisp. Dale started feeling even weaker, like his Core was leaking Essence. If he didn’t move soon, he wouldn’t be able to. The Mage was the biggest threat, but if they would just be distracted for a moment, he would be able to do something. Dale’s eyes bulged. He tried to cover his mouth, but he couldn’t stop the chest-wracking cough as blood sprayed from his lips.

A rough hand grabbed Dale, lifting him into the air. “And what do we have here?”

“What is it?” the frantic Mage called nervously. “Did they find us?”

“Looks like we have a visitor!” The rank breath of his captor made Dale gag. He tried to swat at the man, but he was barely able to move his arms fast enough to hit the man. Obviously, the attack was ineffectual. “Ha, looks like we caught a fishy!”

“Perfect!” the Mage shrieked, coming toward them with long strides. “Bring him to the altar! He will help us wake the dungeon up!”

Struggling as hard as he could was ineffective; Dale may as well have been a child. The Mage was soon looming above him, smiling happily. “You won’t understand this, but you are about to help us save the world!”

Dale screamed as the knife the man was holding came down, aimed for his heart. The knife impacted his chest, and Dale felt several ribs break from the force of the stab. The Mage’s grin faltered. “Why aren’t you dead?” The knife came again. Dale screamed again as more bones broke. “How odd! What tough skin you have!”

“Is his armor stopping the knife?” A C-ranked necromancer looked at the Mage askance.

“Of course it is! Don’t question my strength or you will be able to gauge it firsthand!” The Mage looked malevolently at Dale. “I don’t know who you are or how you got armor capable of stopping a blow from a Mage, but it doesn’t matter! Strip him!” The cultivators grabbed Dale, roughly pulling off all of his armor. No matter how they tried though, they could not figure out how to remove his battle gauntlets.

“Forget it! We will take them off his carcass!” The Mage shoved aside one of the men and stabbed Dale in the leg. This time, the blade went through easily. Dale could barely manage a scream; the pain was too mind breaking. “There we go! That’s more like it! Lay him on the altar!”

Dale was pressed down on the stone, looking right up at the glowing form of Dani. He smiled at her and whispered, “Dani. Run away fast, Dani. Tell Cal I kept my promise.” Dani stilled, looking down tiredly at the man below her. She didn’t understand what she was seeing as the knife rose into the air.

“…Dale?” the Wisp managed to ask.

As the knife came down to sacrifice him, Dale gripped the infernal Core by his side. No longer able to use Dale as a power source, the gauntlet wrapped itself around the gifted Core and squeezed. Bamph! The Core shattered with a soundless scream of agony, and the Essence that managed to escape the wrapped folds burned through Dale’s skin.

The knife stopped falling, and the Mage listened to the shards of the broken Core ping off the stone altar. “No! No, no, no!” he shrieked at Dale’s almost-still form. Realizing his mistake, he swiftly looked around for the Wisp, only to see it flying away at unmatchable speeds, refreshed by an influx of Essence. “No!”

He stabbed Dale, over and over again. “No! You filthy thief! You’ve killed us all! You… you thief!” He was screaming now and continuing to stab the dying body on the altar. Seeing Dale dying too swiftly, he cursed and infused him with infernal Mana. Now Dale was temporarily trapped in his body and aware of his surroundings. The Mage kept stabbing, until instead of a squish, he heard a clink. The sound was enough to break him out of his impotent rage, and he swiftly cut Dale’s chest open.

“A Core? A Core! You had a Core in you? And it is already attuned to you?” The Mage began laughing as he looked at the gem in his hand. “Looks a bit damaged, but I can fix that…” He muttered a few words, and the Core, which was about to fall apart, was coated by a thin layer of Mana. The Essence that had been escaping instead returned, infused into the Core, and made minor repairs to the interior. Now there were no cracks on the outside, though the inside was still heavily damaged.

“Good, good,” the Mage muttered. He looked at Dale’s body which was beginning to cool as Dale’s soul struggled to flee. The dark Mage laughed breathlessly as he saw the pain the soul was in.

“Oh no you don’t!” The nasal, phlegmy voice of the necromancer shattered the silence. He loomed over the broken, tortured body Dale was fleeing. “Dying won’t let you off the hook! Hee hee hee! Stealing from me was the worst decision you ever made! Now you will serve me, beg me,” he screamed, spittle flying; his mood shifted abruptly, as madmen’s are prone to do, “to free you because of your own stupidity! Ha ha ha!” A smile was back on his face, though his eyes were manic and unfocused.

With his declaration and an arcane gesture, pain shattered Dale’s confused senses—pain more traumatizing than his recent death by repeated stabbing. “Welcome to your eternity, thief,” the malicious voice spit at the Core in his hand. Then he coughed at the Core, spitting again. Wait… spit isn’t red?

Tom

Tom landed flat on his face and had the wind knocked out of him by the others landing on his back. They all got up at various speeds until, finally, Tom was able to wheeze in a breath. “Dale! Where are you?” Tom bellowed, only to get whacked on the head by Chandra.

“Stop that!” she ordered demandingly. “There is a clear trail. Let’s hurry.”

The group began running up the trail, Chandra staying with them though she could have gone much faster. They were expecting to fall into the lair of The Master and so were looking for traps at every interval. A light suddenly appeared, bright even in the pre-dawn light. They prepared for a spell, but instead, it stopped a few feet from them.

“Hurry!” a tiny voice yelled at them tiredly. “They have Dale! They’re killing him!”

“Lead us to him!” Hans stepped forward and nearly begged the Wisp.

“I… I can’t. I’m so weak, starved, tortured.” The Wisp began floating toward the portal. “Must get to Cal…”

“Abyss take it!” Adam swore vehemently as he started running up the slope. “Hurry!”

They raced up the incline but certainly arrived too late. Chandra grabbed a few of Rose’s arrows, infused Mana into them, and threw them at the group of distracted necromancers. The arrows flew true and sprouted hungry roots as soon as they were in the bodies. The roots were meant to stop the bleeding so the target would experience every sensation until death, and the pain made them all spasm for long moments before dying. Tom saw a glimmer as something was flung from the twisted hand of their leader.

“Filthy necromancers!” Tom roared an earth-shattering cry, his voice almost unrecognizable in his grief. Distaste was evident in every motion he made, and he kicked a body and yelled at the others, “Make sure to burn their rotten corpses and everything they have with them. It is sure to be tainted by the infernal!” He glanced toward where Dale’s body lay broken and covered with blood and filth.

“Poor bastard. I’m sorry we weren’t fast enough… to save you,” he managed to say brokenly, keeping his voice low in an attempt to preserve morale in his team. Mixed emotions skittered across his face before finally settling on anger. He then turned and began barking orders, “Take his body. We’ll give him a proper burial. His armor too. The Mithril in there can be used for any number of purposes. Let’s… let’s get back.”

Cal

I struggled to direct enough Mana into the room for me to reach the portal. I was very glad I did, as I was barely able to prop it open. It had almost collapsed and was now taking a huge amount of power to keep open. A bit of my influence crept through the tear in space, and I almost was sick from the vertigo I was experiencing. I struggled to understand why it was affecting me so badly when my soul connected to something in the distance, and I forgot everything else. To my surprise, it wasn’t Dani that held my attention. I knew this place. I knew it intimately. This… this was a portal through time! I was connecting to… myself?

A part of my soul, a part I hadn’t even realized was missing, integrated into my aura. I was suddenly in Dale’s mind as he was dying. I watched as Dale was tortured for me and would have cried if it were possible when he told Dani that he kept his promise. As Dale’s mind and soul was sucked into his Core—the same Core I had originally resided within—I realized that this was my origin. Dale was turning into me. As I watched Dale… myself… die, I realized that I had a monumental choice to make. I could keep the portion of my soul I had lost so long ago, or I could leave it with Dale and allow him to grow with all of his memories intact. I could allow my youngest self to be a complete being.

But… I hesitated. How different would I be today if I had kept my memories, my human morals, or my sense of self as a person? I likely wouldn’t have survived to become what I now was as a dungeon. Reluctantly, I did what I must have done before, separating all of those memories from my soul of that time, pulling the soul-shard back, and absorbing it into myself. I felt like a terrible person. Time loops suck.

I now had all of Dale’s… my memories. I knew everything he did, and I want to say it changed me. I really want to say it made me a more compassionate person… but it didn’t. Having my unsegmented soul did make me more complete, but the memories I gained were like those I gained from a memory stone. Me… but also not me. I pulled away and watched as the Core that was me fall from the hand of the necromancer and disappear into the deep crevasse. I glanced around, nostalgic for this moment. The sun was pouring across the ground like a viscous liquid, the air temperature was perfect for comfort… Gorgeous. I had been correct back then. It truly was too beautiful a day to die.

Chapter Forty-three

I kept holding the portal open and studied it as I waited for anyone to come back through. My insight into time and space jumped by leaps and bounds as I existed on both sides of time simultaneously. It was such an interesting portal and had only come into being through the power of chaos. The intermixing of infernal and celestial had created an interspatial flux. This was an uncontrollable portal, something that couldn’t be replicated intentionally. Such is the power of chaos, I suppose.

I noticed a light in my influence and glanced over to see Dani, Hans, and the rest all come through the tear in space at almost the same time, though Dani had entered it over an hour before the others. Time seemed to have been running faster on the other side of the portal. They all fell, complaining savagely as the air was knocked out of them. They should be happy that they didn’t all explode or mesh into a single being! Crazy people, jumping through random portals. Dale’s body dropped to the floor, and if I hadn’t had my new knowledge, I would have let them keep the body for a memorial service. Instead, I quickly absorbed my discarded husk.

Wait a second… Dani came through the portal? My mind screeched to a halt as my bond to her reconnected. Her light slowly started to shine brighter, and she began moving faster.

“Cal!” her tiny, perfect voice called out.

<Dani!> I screamed in joy, causing all beings connected to me to break into an uncontrollable smile. Point in fact, the Royals had gone to free captives and were now grinning at the necromancers that were living their last few moments. The legend of the ‘Smiling Battle Tyrants’ grew exponentially during this fight for freedom.

“Cal!” she happily screamed, flying toward my mountain at great speed. She exited the sewers as a blur, only growing faster as she got closer to me. She kept emitting brighter light as more potent Essence entered her body. “You’ve gotten so strong!”

<I’m a Mage now!>

“What!” she exclaimed, moving even faster. “You’re amazing! I need to hear all about it!”

<I need to hear all about you! What happened? Are you safe? Whole? I missed you so much!> Again, I would be crying if it were possible. She was above the mountain now and briefly stopped.

“You… you brought the entire mountain?” she admonished, half awed and half horrified.

<You really shouldn’t leave me alone for long periods of time,> I sheepishly rebutted.

“I love you!” she bawled, flying down to the portal system. I approved. Going through the tunnels would be far too slow. She burst into my Core room, barely sparing a glance for the golems and paths. She reached the Silverwood tree as I registered her words.

<I love you too!> Unknowingly, she had entered my area of greatest influence. The Essence in her body glowed even brighter, and as I proclaimed my love for her, the Essence was replaced with Mana. A beam of light linked us like it did the day we met, and our souls were reintegrated and healed. The light connecting us passed through pollen that was falling from the Silverwood tree, subtly changing it into something greater. At that moment, we experienced the effect that Elves the world over were looking for, the greatest ability of Silverwood pollen. The Essence that had been in her body was mingled with mine and condensed. A tiny, purple Wisp coalesced next to Dani, slowly floating around. It seemed confused. I was more confused. Dani seemed shaken.

<Um. Dani? What just happened?>

“I… I think we just had a child!” We watched the tiny Wisp explore her new home. Oh right, apparently, the Wisp was female. I have no idea how I knew this. The whole ‘no external genitalia’ thing was coming into play again here.

<What… uh… what do we do?> I was a bit shell shocked to suddenly have a child. This was rather unexpected.

“We teach her and love her, and… we should probably name her?” Dani ended the last as a question.

<She is moving so gracefully… She’s beautiful. A true blessing…> I was more connected to Dani than ever before, and I knew that our bond of Mana would allow me to reach out to her no matter where she was in the world. Not that anyone would ever survive another attempt to steal her, so it didn’t really matter.

“Perfect. Grace. I love the name!” Dani made her final decision and named our child before I was even able to register what had happened.

I watched the tiny copy of Dani moving around and had to nod. <I agree. It fits her well!>

Dale

Dale's eyes fluttered open, and the beautiful Silverwood tree was the first image he saw. “Mmm. Peaceful.” He sighed contentedly. It was at that point that his memory started coming back to him.

More and more memories came to him—in fact, everything that he and the dungeon knew. He felt no fear anymore, no worry. He fully opened his mind, connecting to… himself.

“So this is why we couldn’t stand each other?” Dale stated with a wry voice. “We were too similar?”

<Looks like. You were the baseline for my personality. You did everything for greed, you were only nice to a select few people, and you had an enormous capacity for Essence control.> Dale nodded as he heard this, knowing that he was not receiving an admonition but a compliment.

“How did you make me a distinct personality? You’ve never been able to copy your mind into another Core before.” Dale was starting to get a slight headache from all the information he had to filter through. “Oh, wait… I know this, too.”

<You should. We only started diverging into individuals again after you were created. I’ll state it anyway, just in case some of the information doesn’t make sense. You were a missing part of my soul, and because of that, I was unable to transfer a complete copy of my memories. With your death at my birth, I regained the missing fragments of my soul, and I had two choices. I could either make dungeons, clones of myself, or I could recreate you,> I explained carefully. This was a tricky subject to understand.

“And making clones of yourself would eventually devolve into competition with yourself,” Dale took over the story while nodding. “So you shifted thought patterns and made me the dominant personality for this body.”

<Well said, me.>

“Why, thank you, me!” The air was full of chuckles for a moment. “That explains why our humor has always been so perfect.”

<Right? Listen, there are some drawbacks.>

“I know. I’m going to be stuck in your aura until I am able to generate Mana. No leaving the city for a few years.” Dale shrugged expansively. “So what’s different for me? I know what you know, so I’ll be able to progress at a much faster rate. I finally have my cultivation technique back.” He gave a mock glare at the floor.

<Ha! Took you long enough to get it. I have to say, I laughed at all your failed attempts to get the memory stones you were entitled to from the Dark Elves.>

“Oh, yeah, those Runes they have on their buildings are insidious. I’m going to need those stones though. I can’t exactly use all the ambient Essence in your aura. I need to learn to use Essence and Mana as a human.” Dale’s brow furrowed. “Should be interesting. Compare notes every once in a while? I’d like to find ways to merge how we use our power. Perhaps we can find a way to keep you safer or make us more powerful by doing so.”

<I like that. You know, you are going to be much stronger than a normal human of your ranking. Which, by the way, I was unable to boost. You have different requirements that I don’t know how to work around, like boosting your aura. When you find what you need to do, talk to me, and I’ll help you out. Also, try not to blow out your meridians in the future. That memory sucked. All in all, though, I think you and I will get along a whole lot better now.>

“I think you are correct.”

<Want to meet our daughter?>

“Wait, what?”

Epilogue

“Well, what do you propose we do?” Father Richard glared at the assembled people. The council had gathered, but without Dale to force them to get along, they were becoming quite fractious. Since there was no clear leader for the city, many people were putting their hat in the ring.

“We need someone who can talk to the dungeon!” Minya spoke demandingly. She had been rescued by Prince Henry, having been taken captive and kept in Mana-sealing bindings by the necromancers. She was intended to be a sacrifice for the dungeon and would have been if the rescue had happened even a day later.

“He would have wanted someone who wasn’t a Mage to run things!” Tyler shrewdly raised an eyebrow and quirked his lips. He was currently the favorite amongst the common people.

Amber snorted at him. “How would you propose to get the dungeon to move again? It has been two days, and here we sit in the middle of a ruined city.”

“I can’t believe this is happening now. He hasn’t been gone a week!” Chandra chided the assemblage.

“We need a clear chain of command!” Richard thumped the table. For the city and the Guild! With Frank gone, we need another trustworthy Guild Leader to take his position!”

“Ahem,” a person clearing his throat tried to interrupt.

“The city needs to train these cultivators, and we need to sort out logistics to feed everyone,” Richard continued speaking. “People are looking to us to lead, and we–”

“Ahem!”

“And someone apparently needs to go to a cleric to get a cough looked at!” Richard bellowed, turning toward the noisy individual. His next words died on his lips, as did all sound in the room.

Dale strode forward and took the empty seat at the table. “I think I can help a little with your leadership issues.”

“Imposter!”

“Nope, it’s really me.” Dale smirked at the stunned faces. “What? Can’t a guy die again and not be thought of as a fake?”

Amber gasped and pointed a shaking finger at him. “Impossible! He’s real!”

This made many people stand and draw weapons. Dale waved his hands. “Whoa, whoa! What’s the deal? Yes, I’m real, and yes, I’m Dale!”

“Prove it,” the portal Mage, James, demanded with cold fury in his voice.

Dale looked at him, eyes sparkling with mischief. “Get off my mountain.”

James forcefully turned and started jogging away. “Not again! I believe you! I believe you!”

“Come back!” Dale yelled as the people around him started laughing. The tension now broken and his legitimacy proven, it seemed Dale had a lot of explaining to do.

Cal

<It’s official, Dani,> I stated smugly, happy to have my theories proven correct. <‘Dale’ is running around, completely separate from me. It is a little freaky to watch my body doing things without me. I am even more impressed with Bob now. I’ve never heard him complain about how strange this all is…>

“Just don’t overextend yourself, Cal. I watched you working on your ‘body’ for the last couple days, and with all your memories, I think that Dale is going to be able to exploit a lot of things that other people would miss. I can imagine him needing a bit stronger armor and popping in and using a secret passage to get to a storage room.” Dani was chasing after a speeding Grace, trying to keep her from running into walls as she laughed.

<I wouldn’t cheat myself! There is no way that Dale would steal from… > I whined at her at first, then thought about it. <Maybe I shift all the tunnels a little.>

“Uh-huh,” she commented dryly. It was good to have her back.

I took a deep breath, this time with actual lungs, and smiled grimly. The necromantic filth of this world had earned my anger and deserved retribution. They should run in terror, for I was coming for them. I looked at Dale as he went about his day. This ‘Master’ had gone way too far. He had stolen Dani and killed Dale. His servants had killed me. I was going to be the first person in history to take revenge for my own murder.

‘The Master’ was going to pay for his actions. Where Dale and the people seeking refuge on my mountain had earned my amity—a time of peace and my friendship—the only amity that would be granted to these necromancers… was a Calamity.

DUNGEON

DESOLATION

Book Four of THE DIVINE DUNGEON Series

Written by Dakota Krout

Table of Contents

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-one

Chapter Twenty-two

Chapter Twenty-three

Chapter Twenty-four

Chapter Twenty-five

Chapter Twenty-six

Chapter Twenty-seven

Chapter Twenty-eight

Chapter Twenty-nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-one

Chapter Thirty-two

Chapter Thirty-three

Chapter Thirty-four

Chapter Thirty-five

Chapter Thirty-six

Chapter Thirty-seven

Chapter Thirty-eight

Chapter Thirty-nine

Chapter Forty

Chapter Forty-one

Chapter Forty-two

Chapter Forty-three

Chapter Forty-four

Chapter Forty-five

Chapter Forty-six

Chapter Forty-seven

Chapter Forty-eight

Chapter Forty-nine

Chapter Fifty

Chapter Fifty-one

Chapter Fifty-two

Chapter Fifty-three

Chapter Fifty-four

Chapter Fifty-five

Chapter Fifty-six

Chapter Fifty-seven

Chapter Fifty-eight

Chapter Fifty-nine

Chapter Sixty

Epilogue

Prologue

“I’m not happy, Dale.” Princess Brianna of the Dark Elven nation barged into the meeting room, the anger in her voice causing all other noise to cease. “Do you know why I am unhappy?”

Dale was sitting at the head of a long table that had been expressly designed for the council. The sharp words being directed at him - singling him out though the room was full - grated against his overstressed mind. It showed in his snappish response. “Please, allow me to guess. Nothing would make me happier than playing games right now. Could it be you are unhappy because nearly every human government has been toppled at the same time? Would it be the fact that the necromantic army now controls almost all of the surviving humans and we don’t know what is going to happen to them? Perhaps your unhappiness is because the High Elves were able to push our foes back and we were not?”

“You can’t believe that the general population would hold that against us.” Tyler - the only non-cultivator on the council - looked around nervously at the important people filling the space. “We aren’t even a full fighting force! This was a dungeon for beginners… what? Only a few months ago?”

“I’m still in shock that we lost Frank.” High Mageous Amber sighed and leaned back into her chair, though it was impossible for her to get sore from remaining seated too long. “He was the only reason we didn’t have high-ranked Guild leaders sniffing around looking for scraps.”

Dale nodded at that. “I am already having trouble dealing with the Guild. The main branch is trying to send a replacement and is demanding to have a vote on my council. I gave Frank that position because he earned it, not because of his Guild membership. Now, I saw Frank’s final moments and am still surprised that a single, chantless invocation was enough to kill him. I had it on good authority that he was in the A-ranks, but now I am hearing conflicting reports.”

Putting his face into his hands, Dale continued speaking, “Apparently, it was ‘well-known’ that he was in the B-ranks? I even knew that at one point, but I remember being told very specifically that he was in the A-ranks nearly the first time I met him. Does anyone know what his actual cultivation was? If he was A-ranked, are the individual steps in each rank that much more potent? If not, I thought that their equal power levels would make it much harder for one of them to gain the upper hand. Can anyone explain what happened?”

“I’m sorry, did you say equal power levels? In the A-ranks, that is not a ‘thing’. Even at the same rank, the power levels vary wildly.” Madame Chandra, the A-ranked cultivator who owned the Pleasure House restaurant in town was frowning at him and had a slight tinge of pity bleeding through her tone. “Dale, do you remember when I told you that I trained Frank for almost a decade?”

Chandra leaned forward, making sure he was focused on her. Dale nodded sharply, and she continued, “Frank was a B-rank Mage. He was not a High Mageous, or he would have held a much more important position in the Guild, a position far too high for what was a backwater dungeon like this. Who told you that he was A-ranked?”

Dale thought back, his eyes narrowing when he finally remembered. “… Hans. Of course it was Hans. I’m going to kick his-”

“It’s likely that he was trying to ‘wow’ you, Dale. What would the difference between A and B rank be for you if you were in the F-ranks? Don’t be too hard on him, just understand where your confusion comes from and rectify the issue.” Chandra sighed and pulled another report toward herself. “Also, I’d still like to learn how you got back into town. I know that portal collapsed, and by all accounts… you died. Are you finally willing to explain yourself?”

“I’m not,” Dale firmly announced his decision. The other people in the room, including scribes, couriers, and even the servers who had brought lunch, all slunk back into their normal positions or started walking again. This was a rumor that all of them had heard, and each had heard gossip wilder than anything they could imagine to be true. To be fair, only one of them was overly imaginative, and he was pretty close to guessing correctly. “How are we progressing on talks between the various races? Do we have any information on how to arrange a counterattack against the necromancers?”

“Excuse me!” Brianna lightly rapped her knuckles on the table, leaving a small dent. In reinforced marble. Dale rolled his eyes; that was the fifth time that had happened. He’d need to get an Earth Mage to come over and fix it yet again. “Did we forget the reason this conversation is happening?”

“Please, Brianna. Tell us why you aren’t happy.” Dale tried to placate the B-ranked Assassin Princess.

Speaking in a loud voice, she took a moment and tried to lock eyes with all the members at the table, “It’s been three weeks since the battle. Not only have we not made any progress in finding a base of operations or launching a counter-initiative, do you know what I saw when I looked off of this floating island? Ocean. Ocean! We are no longer over the continent, Dale. The dungeon is running away.”

Chapter One

I felt the need to fix a problem, but none of the beings around me could provide ideas or results fast or varied enough to help me. They still needed to sleep, for celestial sake! Since my mana concept is an amalgamation of all other principles of mana, I decided to try my figurative hand at using a bit of ‘creativity’ mana. If I hadn’t found out that there was a higher tier at the last second, it would have been my top pick. So why not explore it? My thoughts were along this line: why should I be the only one who comes up with the ideas all the time? I could just be the one who creates the being that comes up with a solution for a change!

I first tried making the screaming rocks a bit more imaginative, but that just made their screams more varied and expletive with mixed reactions that were hard to replicate. From there, I found that the Bashers did not take well to creation mana altering their structure since they had no intelligence in the first place. On an unrelated note, they did start growing mohawks, braids, and other colored patterns in their fur. After that, I tried on a willing Bob. Sadly, after a hefty dose of creativity, Bob just wanted to paint the dungeon walls, and then he cut off his own ear… who knew creativity could be so hard to manage?

Since the main issue was that I didn't want to have to actively devote attention to listening to speeches made by all of the various sources of bad ideas, I created a quill which could write by itself! After a few failed attempts where it would just endlessly draw a picture of itself drawing itself - it seemed to enjoy recursion - I finally got it to start writing words instead. Nothing on its own, but it would write out anything spoken in the area around it. Progress.

“Cal? Cal! Pay attention to what I am saying!” Dani was shouting at me. I ‘blinked’ and looked around. Had I just been… dreaming? Or was that a vision of some sort? I don’t dream; I don’t lose focus like that. Something was going on. “It is time for an intervention!”

<Oh, come on. You want me to intervene? It’s so cute, though!> I knew exactly what she was talking about, but I thought it was harmless fun. Our newest addition, a tiny Wisp named Grace, was zipping around the dungeon driving the Cats wild. Take the susceptibility of normal cats to moving lights, add on the alluring power of Wisps, and you might have an idea of what we were dealing with. Combine that with a limited ability to order the Mobs to play with her… <Oh, just let her play. She isn’t hurting anyone!>

“She just led over a dozen Cats into two different adventuring parties! They were slaughtered! She shouldn’t see that sort of thing at her age!” Dani was turning from purple-pink to purple-red, showing me that she was becoming actually angry instead of playfully angry. “Are you ignoring me in there?”

<I meant that she wasn’t hurting anyone that mattered,> I clarified for my lovely bonded Wisp. She was so funny sometimes! Sure, she was more empathetic now, especially since each day wasn’t a struggle to gain enough Essence to survive on, and she was a parent now…

“Cal.” Uh-oh, she was now e-nun-ci-a-ting, and I knew for sure that she was serious. Time to get to work.

<I’m on it.> I ordered the Cats back to their rooms, then pouted a bit when Grace looked around and saw all of her friends wandering off without her. Her light dimmed, making me feel like a lousy Core. She couldn’t speak yet, but her emotions were easy to understand just by looking at her. Since I knew that Dani wasn’t looking, I generated some air-aligned Essence and sent it into the tiny ball of light, knowing that it would tickle her. I couldn’t do this very often because it had a similar effect on her that candy did on human children. Sure enough, soon the Wisp was zipping around the lower level at high speeds. Leaving her to play, I turned my attention to Bob. My Goblin Shaman was busy working on a multitude of projects for me, and it was time to see what was working.

“Great Spirit?” Bob was now sensitive enough to the fluctuations of Mana around himself to be able to detect when my full attention was resting on him.

<Hi there, Bob. How are we doing?> I looked at what he was working on, a map, and was impressed by the level of detail shown on the vellum rendering.

“Decent, and by that, I mean that we are getting close.” Bob pointed at the map, where tiny golden lines were traced out. “There is a spot here where we should be getting a large amount of Essence due to ley lines converging and expanding, but instead, we are only getting a trickle of power. As you know, I am not entirely certain what is there, but I do know that this is an issue that needs to be fixed. We need to find a way to scout ahead; we could be moving toward something that could swat us out of the air like a fly.”

<Agreed. We’ll be extra careful as we get closer, but this needs to happen. This was supposed to be a new Node for the increased expansion of the ley lines. I can only think of one or two things that could be taking all of that Essence, but my bet is that it is a dungeon of some sort. If there is a single entity there, a monster or some such that can absorb all that power, we will have a much harder time taking control of the area.> I looked over the map a bit longer, doing a double take when I saw that the golden lines had expanded a tiny bit.

“Ah, yes, this is actually enchanted to update as your ‘ley lines’ expand. Thank you again for access to that book of Runes; all the Bobs have been able to make excellent progress on various utility and war Inscriptions.” Bob gestured at the map. “For instance, this map is not hand-drawn. We are taking an image through a Core and having the map update based on what we know and can see. The less well-detailed areas are what we have taken from various standard maps, and those areas change as we go along and gather data.”

<Very impressive, Bob.> I tried to think about any other use for this map but decided to leave it to him and went to work on other projects. I had been tinkering with and altering a few of the floors as we flew, and what were currently the bottom two levels were coming along nicely. They were platforms connected by various paths, and each platform had a guardian based on the concept of Mana represented by the connections that led to each platform.

There were multiple ways to arrive at each guardian, denoting the myriad ways to attain each combination of Essence, the knowledge of which would allow for more natural ascension. Whew. That was a mouthful. Simple terms: follow and measure a path, try to have that ratio of Essence in your system when ascending to the Mage ranks. Simple to say but not really easy in practice. I hadn’t expected that there would be such a strong reaction to such a simple setup, but people had been stampeding to the lower levels for a chance to document my structure each day.

The amount of people not attempting to descend to the lower levels had increased to the point that I made Inscriptions that blurred the space between the paths and platforms. If they wanted to learn the secrets, they would need to work for it! More specifically, they would need to fight for it! People had been sitting on the sidelines and drawing out of the reach of the monsters! Drawing! I was still grumbling about that.

Changes to the levels were twofold. First of all, I had been working to upgrade my golems with the new materials that Bob had nearly died researching. These components allowed for more Mana and corruption to be imparted to the golems, making them stronger, faster, and overall deadlier. Lots of ‘-ers’. I needed to incorporate multiple types of minerals and alloys into their creation; otherwise, they became fragile and brittle. I was trying to shore up their weaknesses but needed more time to experiment so that the changes were Mana-cost effective. The second significant change on the bottom floors was traps and wandering monsters that were placed merely to keep non-combatants away or punish them for coming in the first place.

The people I was specifically referencing were those who stayed on the outskirts and hung around the reward kiosks especially thickly. When I had first made these floors, higher ranked cultivators were getting rich by charging a fee to lower rankers for taking their tokens to lower levels to redeem them for higher quality and more expensive gear. So many of the weak people were slain that the few adventurers that were strong enough were able to charge a premium. This system worked well… except abyssal Hans kept showing up at the kiosks - having completely avoided the Mobs - and used a bunch of tokens whenever he was sure that Dale had gone to sleep and wouldn’t yell at him for risking himself. He threw off all of my calculations and tended to frustrate me to no end.

I was startled to hear a chiming tone, and, speak of the little…! There he was, throwing a handful of gold coins into the air and letting them shower down on him as he closed his eyes and danced! I yelled at him, knowing he couldn’t hear me. <Hey! Get off this floor, C-ranker! You don’t belong here! Cats! Where are the Cats? Go get that Assassin!>

Looking around for the Cats that were supposed to be guarding against this specific annoyance, I found that they were distracted by playing with a small bag stuffed full of… mint? No! Catnip! I absorbed the bag and its contents with a pop which caused the Cats to become confused… then angry. They looked around for Hans, as did I so I could send them after him, but all I saw was the shimmer of a closing portal.

<…I’ll get him next time.> I promised myself silently, knowing that it was likely a promise I couldn’t keep.

Chapter Two

Dale was sitting in the ground, yes, in the ground, coated in rock up to his neck. Right now, he was supposed to be working on his control of an earth technique but was finding it hard to concentrate with his grumpy old Moon Elf instructor slapping him every few seconds. Blood leaked from Dale’s broken nose, and he was pretty sure a few teeth were getting loose.

“You’d better get yourself out of there soon, Human,” his teacher punctuated the last word with a particularly vicious slap that left Dale seeing stars, “or I am going to start using something that will really hurt.”

Dale’s eye flicked to the bucket of something bubbling over a fire behind the Elf. He was pretty sure that there was some form of tar in there. He redoubled his efforts, managing to form his most well-practiced technique. As he began to send the shaped Essence into the stone around him, a particularly vicious smack and a harsh tone stopped him. “Fool! You are trying to shatter the stone that you are coated in? Are you trying to kill yourself? Thousands of stone shards shooting into you will accomplish that nicely. You probably think you’re a wit, but you’re only half right! Stop trying to cut corners, and do this properly.”

The verbal abuse kept mounting, and the slaps began increasing in severity to the point Dale was actually worried that he would be killed from one of the blows if they continued. With a burst of inspiration and power, Dale shoved the stone away from him. Unlike the barely-controlled explosion of energy leaving his body, the stone sank away smoothly. The slaps and acidic voice stopped, and Dale was allowed to clamber out of the hole he had been in.

“Finally.” The Elf seemed to be more exhausted than Dale was, but Dale knew the Elf was at least a Mage and so must have been acting. “You have finally taken your first step upon non-somatic casting. Now, do you understand that all of your enormous motions and gestures for using your techniques are merely a crutch that you should not rely on?”

“I understand that I apparently don’t need to make the motions, but… I’m not sure how to replicate what I just did.” Dale winced as he spoke, knowing that it was likely that the pain would soon begin again.

The Elf glared at him, only relaxing after Dale was fully panic-sweating. “Good. After all, that is what this training is for. Now that you have had a taste of the proper way to use your Essence, it will be easier for you to accept the teachings we will impart to you. Once something is shown to be possible, the body and mind will accept it much more easily. Let’s continue with the next exercise, but you may need some pain reduction if we are to continue. Stefan! Get over here and administer a swelling reduction potion; he needs to be able to see for this next part.”

A man Dale had never met before came walking over at what seemed to be a laborious pace for him. Dale had never seen someone who embodied absolute exhaustion like this ‘Stefan’ did. “Did I hear pain relief?”

“Don’t worry about that; I changed my mind. Swelling reduction only.”

“Yes, dark lord.” Stefan groaned as he reached into a bag at his side. Dale honestly thought the man might be a zombie. “I have been making up more potions, but-”

“We are busy, Stefan. When you graduate from Pharmacist to Alchemist, we will speak again. Until then, you are just an assistant and will be regarded as such.” The Moon Elf’s tone was bland, but his words were so sharp Dale was surprised the man didn’t start bleeding. “Dale, drink that and get ready to dodge.”

The sun was coming up by the time Dale wobbled on unsteady legs away from his brutal instructor. He felt entirely drained of Essence, and his meridians felt abused. Then again, he had functioning meridians, so he really shouldn’t be complaining too much. Overusing the ability to crush and absorb the power in Cores had caused him to burn out his meridians, which had led to his recent death. Also, the loss of all of his weapons and armor, which was almost as horrifying. Dale stumbled into his bedroom, dropped onto the bed, and cursed the fact that stairs existed. Everything should be on the same level so that when he was exhausted, he didn’t need to bother with such inconvenience. He looked out of his window and saw only an expanse of blue, reminding him of his next unpleasant task.

“Cal,” Dale groaned into the air, hoping that the dungeon would respond before he passed out. They had recently discovered that they were originally the same person and had been trying to get on better terms. It had been a very confusing time and involved a portal through time and space generated via chaos. Something they literally could not intend to happen… had happened. On the plus side, Dale no longer had an irrational fear of the dungeon. “Cal, buddy, my other half, we need to talk.”

<Hello there, Dale.> The voice resounded in Dale’s head. <By the way, I wouldn’t call you ‘half’. Maybe… I don’t know, my other tenth? One-eighteenth?>

“You always say the nicest things.” Dale closed his eyes, the stone ceiling above him not interesting enough to continue keeping his eyes open to stare at. “Question for you: why are we out over the ocean instead of hunting the undead and their masters?”

<About that… look, as much as I’m mentally ready to go seeking revenge, the only success we had was against the reserve units that were holding a decimated city. This ‘Master’ guy is the strongest necromancer in the world - most likely - and has a bunch of other people that aren’t that far off from his own strength. I’m circling the issue here, but the fact of the matter is that we aren’t actually strong enough to fight him, even indirectly. We don’t have a single S-rank individual on the entire… island? Should we call this flying mountain an island? We do have a lake…> the voice trailed off, so Dale hurried to keep the dungeons attention.

“Cal, hey! Don’t go running off. This is Mountaindale.” Dale waited a moment, but there was no instant response, so he decided to play along. “How about a ‘skyland’? Combine ‘sky’ and ‘island’, and I think you are the only one.”

<Ooh, I like that. What about a ‘Neverland’? Because I’m never going to land.> The voice was back, so Dale quickly jumped into conversation.

“I don’t think people would call us a ‘Neverland’; they don’t have any context for understanding the name. Plus, what happens if someday you have to touch down? Listen, Cal. I need a few more details from you about why we are out over the ocean.” Dale paused and stopped speaking entirely, something that he knew bothered the dungeon. It did not like to waste time.

<Ugh, fine. When our souls rejoined, I got all of your memories, and I feel like you got at least a portion of mine, right?> Dale nodded in confirmation. <Alright. Listen, the ley lines that I have been creating to regulate the world’s Essence and Mana should eventually cover the surface of the entire planet. Then it will dig, getting to the center of the planet eventually. That part will take a long time, decades at least, but the surface should be covered in mere weeks. Something is blocking the advancement of the lines, and we are on our way to destroy it. I say ‘something’, but this is happening in multiple locations. So. Somethings?>

“I see. So this will benefit you and, indirectly, us, correct?” Dale spoke thoughtfully. “Also, even the memories I did get from you are… vanishing.”

<Fleshy memory devices. Terrible design. As for the blockage, this particular annoyance is sitting at the crossroads of a half-dozen lines. When it is removed, I estimate that the surface Essence on ‘Mountaindale’ will increase in density by thirty percent. It’ll go even higher in the deep layers of myself, so less ‘indirectly’ beneficial and more ‘instant gratification’. Speaking of, real nice pick for naming the mountain, you narcissist. Why not ‘Mountaincal’?>

“Pretty sure I get that arrogant tendency from you,” Dale muttered while tapping at his mattress. “That’s a pretty large benefit; I should be able to get the others to calm down with that information. I have a small issue, though. If there is something we need to fight at this location, I have nothing to fight with or defend myself with.”

<You want me to fix every little issue you have? You have money, go buy some gear.> Dale rolled his eyes at this statement.

“We both know that there isn’t anyone that can match the quality of the gear you are able to provide. If I leave here and die outside of your influence, you lose a chunk of your soul, and I am gone forever.” Dale knew this argument was guaranteed to produce results. The dungeon was nothing if not concerned about self-preservation, and adding on flattery didn’t hurt.

<You do have a tendency to die for just… no reason. Yeah… fine, you have a good point. Take a nap; I’ll think of something. You’d better help me out on the issue I’m having, or I’ll make sure that you have no clothes. Ever.> Dale nodded and closed his eyes, his exhaustive training assuring that he was asleep in moments.

Chapter Three

Screams resounded through a small town as orderly ranks of the undead closed in on them. The gates were barred, and any cultivators in the area moved to a defensive position. Protecting the people was their duty, their calling. Heavy feet pounding, exposed bone scraping over stone, and moaning zombies all ensured that a cacophony of sound nearly drowned out the cries of fear.

All at once, the undead stopped. The echoes of their movement reverberated for a long moment, but total silence fell within seconds. A few of the undead shuffled out of the way, allowing a festering demon to stalk toward the town. As soon as it was seen, the people behind the walls understood that they were dead. There was no one around this small population center that could fight on equal terms with something like that.

“Human filth.” The demon called lazily. “I am here as an ambassador of The Master. I have been instructed to give you all a choice. You are to join us, or you will die. These are your only options, and not choosing or delaying will ensure your demise. You have one minute to answer.”

Frantic shouting came from the town, and as the seconds ticked away, they became more furious and louder. The Demon decided that enough time had passed, and spoke once more. “Your choice?”

There was a pause, but then one of the people on the wall shouted, “We’ll never join you!”

“Incorrect, but I am so glad that was your choice.” The Demon took a step forward, and the ranks of the dead did the same. The wooden walls surrounding the town were demolished in seconds. The highest ranking cultivator in the town was a C-ranker, everyone else being a D-rank, F-rank, or just a normal person. All of them joined the ranks of the dead that day.

The Demon, coated in rapidly drying blood and viscera, gave a happy sigh as he bit into a femur and crunched on a chunk of bone. “I love it when they struggle like that. It makes everything so much more… satisfying.”

CAL

I snorted a soft chuckle as Dale passed out. I suppose his previous career of counting sheep made it really easy for him to fall asleep whenever and wherever he was.             

<Let’s see… he fights with his fists and relies on high mobility to survive. Can’t really say that has worked out for him, though. Well, he’s totally out, so I can at least fit him for gear. Alright… hmm… chainmail? Too noisy and noticeable. How thin can I make this stuff… oh, wow, pretty thin. Okay then, let’s pretend to be a tailor. I can’t believe I am going to spend all this time making him armor. So boring. Could be building a new floor right now.> I continued to grumble as I spun aluminum thread into a set of silvery clothes. I used his nearby uniform as a model and even went so far as to put his crest in the proper place, seeing as he couldn’t exactly pin it onto this outfit.

<There! Shirt complete. More like tunic, really, since it was modeled… pants, right! On to pants. He better not overeat; these can’t be altered after I make them. Not that he could gain much weight, thanks to his constant need for nutrients right now. No, better to make both of these a bit looser. He could potentially put on muscle. Now he would need a belt, though…>

I made shoes next, then a balaclava. I was pretty proud of this piece. It looked similar to what the Moon Elves wore to hide their features, and since the material was so thin, Dale could wear it around his neck and still have it hidden beneath his collar when it wasn’t in use. When he needed to protect his head, he could just pull it up and have it cover his entire head. There was a layered portion so he could leave his eyes uncovered if he wanted to, but given the fact that eyes were such a weak point… I wanted to give him the option to protect them.

Gloves came next, but I made the material much more sturdy and rigid, turning them into battle gauntlets. He would need to take them off when he didn’t want to be in combat, so I added a hook for them to hang on his belt in the same place a weapon such as a sword or mace would typically go. That covered the puny human’s needs pretty well, so it was time to wake him up and explain the gear to him.

<Dale! Look out!> I screamed into his mind. For some reason, he woke up violently, a wave of earth Essence rippling out from him and shattering the walls, floor, and ceiling around his bed. I was actually impressed; that would have caused serious harm to anyone that was actually trying to get the jump on him. Of course, he was showered with rubble but was still mostly unharmed since I had created the armor around his sleeping form.

“Ow!” he coughed wetly as a large chunk of stone landed on him. Oh right, this gear mainly protected against piercing and slashing effects. Sadly, it wouldn’t do too well against kinetic impact. You really needed something sturdier for that. He should go get armor that would fit over this, though his mobility was his strength…

<Hey there! I’d like you to tell me what you think about your brand new armor!> I called happily into his mind.

“Ow,” Dale repeated obnoxiously. Seriously, he did it to himself. “Just… where is it?”

<You are already wearing it! Can you really not see your armor?> Exactly as I had hoped for. No one should suspect that he was covered in a continents’ ransom of Mithril.

“I see that I am wearing an odd head wrap and gloves. Did you make my armor invisible?” Dale voiced quizzically.

<I understand you are just waking up, but please regain your standard level of intellect. Your clothes, Dale. They look totally normal to you?>

“…Yes?”

<Well, they are made of Mithril. That ‘head wrap’ rolls down to be a thin cloth around your neck, and the gauntlets have a chunk of unbelievably Essence-conductive minerals wrapped in Mithril to create three wedges on each glove. In order: earth, fire, infernal on the left glove; wind, water, celestial on the right. To help you out, they are color coded. Direct your techniques through those, and they should amplify the damage to levels you can’t manage otherwise.> I paused a moment to let him admire his new weapons, then continued to praise myself.

<The entirety of your armor has two layers; the top layer should funnel any affinity-typed attack into the second layer, which should absorb the Essence out of the blow. You could stand in a gout of pure fire for ten minutes without getting warm. At least until the Cores collecting the Essence are full. Then you burn. So. Oh! Side note: basically, you can’t be stabbed while wearing this clothing. No, wait, correction. Though nothing is going to cut you, people can still stab you.>

< Let’s see… blunt force trauma is going to be your biggest weakness since this has no real sturdiness. So… you might want to get a helmet or something. Also, try not to get crushed. This would protect you enough to keep you from becoming a pancake but not enough for you to survive the experience. As for the armor itself, the weave of the cloth is so tight that you could drink water out of a sewer and the liquid should be filtered well enough to leave behind only pure water. Actually, you should test that; I’d like to be sure.>

“Hard pass.”

<Ingrate! I do all of this work for you, and you can’t do a simple thing for me? Tsk, tsk.>

“Why can’t you make me some armor to go over this that will help if something hits me?” Dale kept the whine from his voice, but I still detected it.

I decided to show my ire with words. <Just so you know, you ungrateful aspect of me, it took the Essence equivalent of fourteen C-ranked people dying in the dungeon to create this armor for you. Mithril is not cheap to charge with power, even though you seem to think I should be tossing it to anyone who wants it. You can thank the newest Wisp down here for the contribution. Also, there were two groups that just got wiped out on the third floor just so that you could be a bit more protected.>

“You killed two parties of people to make this?” Dale looked down at his clothing with disgust.

<Make me armor! Do it with your personal energy supply! Don’t hurt anyone else! Make up your mind, Dale. Nothing is free. How about you just try not to lose this armor and actually make sure to wear it instead of just complaining. It’s already made, after all. Good luck.> I really had to go; there were lots of things to get done, and Dale talked really slowly.

Perhaps it wasn’t that he spoke slowly; it could be that the enhanced cognition and processing speed associated with not only being a Mage but also being a Dungeon Core caused everyone to seem so slow. Well, not my fault they couldn’t keep up. I had golems to design! Well, that wasn’t strictly accurate. The golems were designed, but I was continuing to fail at creating a more potent version of them. I had some greater success with the golem controlled by the mind of a bunny-loving Elf that had died here, but while she was an impressive fighter, there were just too many flaws in her body.

Mainly, she was fragile. Not… well, certainly not to an average person but to a Mage that was able to make the trek to her? My Boss was a challenge to them, sure, but not a serious one. The issue was: I hadn’t been lying when I said that Mithril was expensive to make, and that was the only thing I could think of right now that would increase her durability. That created a problem for me because if she was defeated and taken as treasure while coated in Mithril… someone would be walking away with a vast power investment. She just wasn’t deadly enough to justify the potential loss. To fix my issues, I was trying to boost the density of Mana packed into golems by using our newly discovered materials, but at a certain point, they would just explode.

Perhaps all I should do was cover her in Inscriptions and give her armor and maybe a few weapons? She knew how to fight, and her body never tired. I sighed gently; it was becoming harder to create creatures uniquely suited to destroying my enemies. Perhaps… perhaps I should be focusing on empowering myself instead of my creatures? Should I meditate on my law, Acme, the concept of perfection itself for a few decades?

Nah. I decided to go make my traps more deadly instead.

Chapter Four

“Well, I now know why we are going the wrong way,” Dale mentioned to the councilors at the morning’s pre-conference meeting. Hopefully this information would be beneficial for the morning’s post-conference meeting and perhaps even inspire people to be polite at the luncheon for the afternoon’s pre-afternoon forum. Dale was sick to his stomach as he realized how many meetings he was forced to attend on a daily basis. “As I understand it, there is a dungeon that we are moving toward. If we take the Core from this dungeon and feed it to ours, we can expect a thirty percent increase in unaligned Essence on the surface of Mountaindale.”

Madame Chandra rolled her eyes and spoke in an uncharacteristically sharp tone, “Now we are going to be doing the dungeon’s dirty work? How will this help our goals? Were you able to get the dungeon to make any concessions for our assistance in this matter?”

Dale thought about the incredible armor that he had gained for himself and felt a bit guilty that he had something that he wouldn’t be sharing with the people that were relying on him. “I felt that having an understanding of what was happening coupled with the benefit that we will see from increased Essence would be enough. Realistically, what can we do right now? Can we fight this ‘Master’ directly? Can we fight any portion of his forces on equal footing? The answer to all of these questions is ‘no’. Why not focus on something that we can do? Why not grow stronger and prepare for the day when we can fight back?”

“Well said, Dale, but there are facts you are not considering.” Father Richard ambled toward his chair. He had been wounded multiple times in the last few months, and though he recovered quickly… it still took time and energy. “One of the most important being that The Master did not kill the people of the cities. In fact, from all reports, it appears that they are being treated well. This is concerning for many reasons but especially because we do not know what he intends to do with them. We know that human sacrifice is not off the table. If that is the case, we need to save the tens of thousands of lives that might be sacrificed for power due to our inaction.”

“So you are saying human sacrifice is on the table? Or on the altar?” Dale looked around the solemn faces, his coy smile slipping. “I’m very tired.”

Madame Chandra glanced around the room with bloodshot eyes. “Or it could be that The Master does not intend to hurt them in any way. For goodness sake, in his own mind he could be trying to help those people!”

“By murdering our families and destroying the armies?” Prince… no, King Henry stalked into the room, his footsteps clinking against the ground with each step. “I refuse to make concessions to this monster. We will be fighting a war against him, and he will pay for his crimes. Even if I need to spend eternity hunting him and empowering myself, I will eventually bring him down like the beast he is.”

Madame Chandra could find no argument to refute him and just shook her head sadly. “I know that your loss was shocking, but at this point, there is nothing we can do against them. Pursuing peace may truly be our only option.”

“I will have war!” Henry bellowed into the now-silent room, crashing his metal-clad fist against the table. Thanks to its recent enhancement, the table weathered the blow admirably, not even chipping.

“Your Majesty!” Dale loudly disrupted the shouting. “With all due respect, we will be doing whatever we can to save lives. If that means that we find a peaceful option, we need to consider it. Otherwise, it is the people that you were sworn to protect that will suffer. Your. People. The ones counting on you to rescue them from the predation of the infernal. Please, think on that… Your Majesty.”

“You… you people don’t…” Fuming and trying to surreptitiously wipe his eyes, Henry turned on his heel and marched out of the room, exuding a bloodlust that caused the ordinary people in his path to freeze in place.

“War isn’t off the table, and neither is a peaceful option,” Princess Brianna bit into an apple with a wet crunch, swallowing before finishing her sentence, “but have you thought of a third option? The one where you ask the Elvish Assassins you live with to intercede?”

There were many glances thrown around the table, and it was surprisingly the merchant Tyler who spoke, “Are… are you offering? Do you even have anyone who could take out an above S-ranked necromancer?”

“He isn’t a necromancer.” Madame Chandra rubbed at her eyes once again. “At least… he never was one. The law he is bound to is far too strange for it to be so simple.”

“Then what is he, Madame? Where does his specialty lie?” Father Richard seemed excited to finally have a starting point; surely they could find a counterpoint to his law and use it to weaken the S-ranked ‘Master’.

Chandra shook her head hard, “I don’t know. He has always just been good at… knowing things. I do know that he has access to the void, but I am uncertain how or what that means for him… or for us.”

“Sorry to say, but assassinating The Master is off the table. Simply put, none of you could afford the cost, as it would involve sending my mother after him. No, what I am thinking is more to the effect of a war of attrition. We can go after his generals, his leaders, and strike them down. Without competent leadership, his plans may fail.” Princess Brianna only started to get serious near the end, her flippancy giving way to strategy.

“Assassins? I cannot condone…” Father Richard looked around at all the faces that were turned toward Brianna. “Surely this cannot actually be up for debate!”

Tyler turned his intense stare upon the priest. “Father Richard, I know that this issue is serious for you, but I don’t think you understand quite where some of us are standing on this issue. The necromancers had my neighbors and myself trapped in a basement as the building above us crumbled. We did everything we could to keep ourselves alive, not only because we wanted to stay living but because of what happened to our dead.”

Heaving a few deep breaths to calm down, Tyler continued speaking, “Two of my new employees were struck by falling rubble and were slain. They turned into jelly and oozed out of my building to join into an abomination. We were afraid of dying for more than the normal reasons at that point. We were afraid that our souls would be used as ammunition against our people. That is the reason I am here right now, and I will push for anything that allows me to sleep without waking up in terror. If that means a distant necromancer dies without getting anywhere near me, then I say so be it; send in the Assassins. I believe I can and do speak the will of the people.”

The room was quiet again, so after a few tense moments Dale cleared his throat and moved the conversation along. “We will discuss this later, in a closed session. For now, we have another issue to think on. The academy is full, but the classes are becoming a bit sporadic. We need a Headmaster to run things there and rein in the instructors. We have had dozens of applicants, but after background checks, knowledge tests, and determining general amiability, we have narrowed it down to these three.” Dale handed out a packet of information to each person, who scanned through each and determined who they wanted to offer the position to.

“We can rule out the High Elf off the bat, can’t we?” Brianna tossed a small booklet of information into the fire. Dale watched it burn with resignation; that had cost quite a bit of money in terms of paper and research.

“Please don’t burn things that I give you. It’s… rude.” He stopped himself from shrieking but only just barely. It wouldn’t be a good idea to yell; Brianna had guards in the room that might react poorly. Dale had gained a few benefits from the dungeon that he didn’t think even Cal knew about. One of those was the ability to connect to the dungeon’s senses and use them as his own. It had a very limited range, but he could sense the disturbances in the areas’ Essence as the invisible folk continually scanned the room for threats.

“This one is promising. Emilia Nerys… A-ranked blood cultivator.” Tyler shook his head in wonder. “She is far and away more than qualified. A healer, a background in taking on F-rankers to mentor…”

“There are complications, unfortunately,” Father Richard spoke up as Tyler trailed off. “My order has been working to recruit her, as she specializes not in healing, but in hunting necromancers. She holds a deep grudge against them, and I feel that if you are serious about opening an infernal wing, she would slay any applicant. Either way, I cannot say she is suited to the position.”

“She applied for a professor position, as an instructor of water and healing,” Tyler pressed onward. “Can we consider her for the dean of one of those wings?”

The others agreed to his proposition and decided to offer her a pick of the two availabilities.

“That leaves this man… Artorian?” Amber flicked the paper, and it lifted into the air and hung there with a picture of a man on it. “Why is he even being considered? He is in the C-ranks.”

“These people aren’t necessarily being considered for their cultivation bases; they are being considered for their ability to run an academy.” Dale knew it would come to an argument; typically, cultivators didn’t respect others that were at lower ranks.

Amber’s eyelids fluttered as she thought. “How is he supposed to keep the students in line? Let the other teachers do it? Who would keep them under control?”

Dale slapped the table, much less impressively than the others had been able to do. “By being an administrator. I don’t want a school to be run only by those that can use force on others; that will lead to a corrupt faculty nigh instantly! Look at the treatise by the Scholar D. Coda; his study done on the Amazonian Queendom clearly lays this out. If they hadn’t only given authority to people with the physical power to back it up, their capital would not have fallen, and they wouldn’t have lost half their population in a cataclysmic uprising. Let’s learn from the past, not dive into their mistakes in the present.”

“A scholar! That’s a good one! You are citing history that I was there for, Dale. It is the history of The Master as well. In any case, I think you have used enough memory stones if you are able to learn about esoteric case studies and find a way to use them in general conversation.” Madame Chandra chortled, then read some more of the information from the document. “It says here that Artorian developed his own cultivation technique when he was in his fifties. Goodness. I can’t even imagine how corrupt his center was at that point. He was a philosopher and bedridden for three years until he suddenly decided to become a cultivator…”

“I like him,” Tyler stated as the others silently read.

Brianna shrugged, “At least he isn’t the High Elf. I say go for it.”

“We’ll give him a three month probationary period then,” Dale stated with relief. “We’re finally done. Thank goodness. I’m going to go do other things, no more full meetings for at least a week.” He left the room, searching for his team to prepare them for the upcoming raid on a new dungeon.

 Chapter Five

“Where are we? The dungeon has stopped moving forward and is sinking toward the waves. Is it going to drown us?” Hans was lying flat on the ground, looking over the edge of Mountaindale’s cliff at the ocean below and speaking in a conversational tone. “At least that would be a novel experience. It’s been nothing but blue for days. Blue sky, blue water, blue feelings…”

Rose was oiling her beast-sinew bowstring but glanced up when Hans spoke. “We must be above the dungeon that Dale wants us to fight in. Is it so surprising to you that a dungeon in the ocean is surrounded by water, Hans?”

“No, I’m more worried that this place doesn’t exist, and Dale is having a strange fantasy… oh, hey, look! There is a teeny-tiny island down there. Must be the entrance. Neat.” Hans smiled up at the party, trying to dazzle them with a brilliant smile.

“The ‘Dale is crazy’ routine is getting really old.” Dale had his arms crossed and was staring the Assassin down. “We have seen definitive proof that I am not making this stuff up.”

Hans ignored him and looked over the edge once more. “I’d say that we have about ten minutes before we get close enough to survive the fall. Not sure why we are going to jump off the cliff instead of going down the path to the flat area. Sure, we save time, but is it really time that we would rather use this way?”

Dale shrugged and gestured at a raft they were going to be sitting on. “I have a plan; I’ve done something similar to this before.”

“That’s wonderful, but I think I’ll just go ahead and drop under my own power. You know, since I can just float down on the wind. Your suicide raft over there would sure be fun to get on…” Hans started making motions like he was getting to his feet, but extra slowly.

“Dale, what are you doing?” Rose lunged at Dale as she saw him begin to equip a familiar item. “Why in the world would you put on those cursed gauntlets again?”

“No, these are different.” Dale attempted to soothe her. “New and improved version.”

“Not cursed gear? You sure? Those symbols look… pretty similar.” Adam leaned in for a closer inspection, squinting at the intricate runes.

“I see lots of corruption in the Cores, but nothing in the gloves themselves. Might be fine, might be cursed. You should get them looked at,” Hans nonchalantly added, flopping back down to the ground instead of standing as he had planned.

Dale looked at the gauntlets that he was just about to empower. “They better not be cursed.” Sending Essence through the Inscriptions, his heart fell as the gauntlets tightened and latched onto his wrists. “Oh, come on!”

“Really, Dale? Really?” Hans slipped to his feet in a whirl of flesh and loose clothes. “What did I just say?”

<Sorry, Dale, but you have a track record of failure, to the point where if I ever die, I want you to be the one to lower my body into the ground, just so that you can let me down one last time.> Dale’s face went red as he listened to the dungeon. <On the plus side, I built these so that they will slide up under your sleeves when you aren’t in combat. Yes, the hook on your armor designed to hold them was a distraction. It comes right off. Oh, also, try channeling each type of Essence through the gems in the gauntlet. All at the same time, if you don’t mind.>

Fuming, Dale did as instructed. His knuckles lit up in various colors, and he was hit by a wave of fatigue as a large amount of Essence was drained through him and into his armor. The gauntlets wove themselves into his ‘shirt’, and his shirt wove into his pants, shoes, and balaclava. The previously dull colors of his outfit changed, becoming vibrant and showing various Inscriptions placed throughout the entire material. After a moment, the color in the Runes faded, but the hue of the outfit remained. Dale punched the ground and shouted, “Seriously! This entire set is cursed gear?”

<Punching my mountain doesn’t hurt me. Also, to answer your question: yes it is, but now it cleans both itself and your body. You never need to take it off now! You’re welcome. It also helps to regulate heat. Not in, you know, lava or a blizzard, but in normal situations.> In Dale’s opinion, his origin was entirely too cheerful about this.

“Cal. What if I need to use the latrine?” Dale growled softly, already getting shifty looks from his team. He didn’t need to be shouting into the air for the dungeon to hear him.

<I did say they were self-cleaning, didn’t I?>

“No.”

<Fine. Just tell them ‘toilet mode’, and the necessary areas will become exposed. Also, that only works if you tell it; some random person can’t do it to you.>

“What about if you instruct it?” Dale’s eyes were narrowed so tightly that he may as well have his eyes closed.

<Well… oh look, time for you all to go after the dungeon down there!>

“Dale, stop being strange and let’s get going. Nice outfit by the way; bright reds and purples are great for maintaining stealth.” Hans’ eyes were rolling hard. When Dale didn’t budge, just continuing to stand in the same spot mumbling, Hans grabbed him and put him on the raft with the others. “Hope you’re ready!”

Hans shoved the raft off the edge, jumping after them only a moment later. As the wind rushed past him, he chuckled at the screams coming from the lower ranked cultivators. “I’m sure they’ll be fine.”

Dale was forced to snap out of his funk, and he reached into his bag and pulled out a Core. Focusing on sending out tendrils of Essence with air corruption in them, Dale waited for the right moment and shattered the Core in his fist. Bamph. He directed the explosive influx of Essence into the tendrils he had created, thickening them and doubling their length in an instant. The invisible tendrils caught at the air around them, slowing their fall from ‘deadly’ all the way to ‘uncomfortable’ just before the raft slapped into the water.

The group was drenched as the raft sank a few feet into the water before springing back upward. As the water ran off the now-damaged craft, Hans landed lightly and looked around at the sputtering group. “That looked fun!”

Rose formed her hand into a scoop and splashed water all over the Assassin. Hans looked shocked as she burst into laughter. “It actually was fun, and you deserve to be dunked for not joining us.”

Adam, meanwhile, was looking at Dale and making sure that he didn’t have any severe injuries or issues from using his new trick. “That was beyond foolish. You, more than anyone living, should understand that using Cores like that is wasteful and dangerous.”

“I know that, but I only had an issue when I used a Core filled with Mana. I can handle this,” Dale brushed off Adam’s concerns.

“Spoken like a true power addict,” Adam replied softly. “Let me guess, ‘you can stop whenever you want’. You don’t need the Cores.”

“Well, obviously.” Dale looked over at the small island, instantly seeing a path to get underground. “There’s our target, everyone. Let’s get in there and finish this place off quickly.”

After paddling through the waves, they arrived on an island that appeared to be perfectly circular. Only sand and two palm trees were present, and the trees were on either side of what seemed to be a ramp sloping down into the unknown. The Northern Barbarian, Tom, stared at the perfectly smooth ramp and spat to the side. “Hey. You think a human has ever gone in there before? I think this could be difficult for all sorts of reasons we aren’t considering. Perhaps we should allow another team, trained professionals, to scout the dungeon below?”

“Unfortunately… we don’t have that kind of time.” Dale adjusted his gauntlets and strode into the ground. “If there is something we can’t handle, we will just have to deal with turning around.”

They walked on the downward slope, interested to see that there was decent lighting in the area. It was shimmering and reflecting off the water, but they could see where they were walking. As they entered the first floor, it was clear that the walkways were mainly natural formations from the tide moving through the area. Tide pools filled a vast cavern, various life forms in the shallows.

“See any traps?” Rose nudged Hans, who was looking around with a smile on his face.

“None! This is the only dungeon I’ve ever seen that has traps and creatures only designed to prey on the environment. Look at this!” Hans pointed at a pool where a huge moray eel was zipping around. “If we fall in the water, we might be in trouble, but we are apparently totally safe on the sandbar!”

With this being said, they moved through the cavern and avoided fighting in all but one instance. They had to ford a small stream to get to the next downward sloping ramp, and an oversized piranha tried to go for their legs. Dale punched it several times, each strike breaking through scales and allowing him to tear Essence away from it and into himself. When the fish died, a small item drop appeared seven feet away. Hans rushed over and looked at it, rolling his eyes before tossing the item into the water behind them.

“Fish food.” Hans sighed and trudged toward the ramp. “Unsurprisingly, the rewards are things that are useless to us. Most attackers here are fish. So the rewards are tasty fish food. I hate it here already.”

Down the ramp they went, and after a few turns, the air began to get moist and musty. Walking onto the next floor, the walls opened up to reveal an expansive space filled with water. There was a path around the room that sloped slightly toward the water, apparently designed to direct any liquid to flow down into the pool. For them, it was a convenient path to avoid the vast shapes moving under the surface below them.

“This entire place is stuffed with water Essence,” Rose commented carelessly. “Dale, seriously, even though we are on a mission, you might as well take in some of this. It’s obvious that no one has ever cultivated here.”

“I will at the exit of this floor. Let’s make sure not to get caught off guard because we haven’t really needed to fight yet.” Dale was uneasy. “This is a dungeon, and it should certainly have something to defend itself with soon, something that could fight us on at least equal terms. The Essence in here is just too dense not to have some powerfully evolved creatures, so we can’t forget to stay vigilant.”

“True, very true.” Hans looked around the cavern, yawning and fiddling with his daggers. “How’s your aura going, by the way?”

“Ugh, it’s a gigantic frustration.” Dale pulled a face and continued walking. “I know to break into the C-ranks we need to force the excess Essence we collect into our bodies and aura, but for some reason, mine is expanding so slowly compared to anyone else I’ve ever heard of. It’s actually hard to maintain expanding it when I see such poor results.”

“Hmm.” Hans tapped the tip of his dagger against his teeth, producing a sound that made Rose wince. “Well… I’m no Craig, but I am in the C-ranks. Hey, Dale, you know what makes your aura expand really fast? Impure Essence. Yup. Instead of weaving a tapestry inside your body, you just add corruption and slap stones together to make a wall.”

There was confused silence for a moment, and right as Dale was about to ask what Hans meant, the man continued, “Guess what makes people bad at cultivation and actually attaining higher ranks? You may have guessed it: corruption. You see, your Essence is so pure that there is no wasted space, no ‘extra’ that isn’t being filled with Essence. That’s likely why it is going so slowly. On the positive side, when you do increase in rank, you can expect to be more powerful than others at that same level. Again, you should really talk to Craig about this. He’s the expert. I just… dabble.”

Dale contemplated this advice. “Thanks, Hans. Motivation is exactly what I needed. I think.”

“That’s nice, but you should really look out for that tentacle.” Hans stated this in such a bland tone that Dale didn’t register the threat right away. He was whipped across the back and tossed into the wall, needing to work hard not to slip off the slope and into the pool below.

“What was that?” Dale roared as he got to his feet, spinning around to see tentacles lifting out of the water.

“Some kind of octopus. I’ve got it.” Rose drew an arrow, collected a ball of chaotic Essence on the tip, and smoothly fired it into the cephalopod’s head as it breached the water. The tentacles spasmed and the water blackened from ink, but it then toppled over and began floating listlessly in the muddied pool. “Shall we?”

Chapter Six

The group reached the lowest level of the dungeon without much incident. This place, while likely an amazing predator in the ocean, was simply not built to defend against intelligent fighters. There was one last challenge ahead of them, and it was a doozy. A massive king crab was waiting for them, snapping its pincers in their general direction. Beyond having eight legs, it was mutated to have four pincers and have a glistening, diamond-hard shell.

“Would anyone be opposed to me attempting to handle this challenge on my own?” Tom loudly drawled to the others. He didn’t wait for an answer, and instead, pulled his oversized warhammer out of a bag that was far too small to contain it. The Barbarian started jogging toward the crustacean, picking up speed as he moved. Just as he got in range of the pincers, Essence that he had been gathering at his feet exploded into flames and sent him soaring at the monster with a speed he couldn’t naturally attain. The pincers missed closing around him, clacking together hard enough to create small shockwaves.

Tom spun and used his momentum to swing his hammer. Like the moons circling the earth, the warhammer turned with utter inevitability, landing against the shell with enough kinetic force to cause a localized earthquake. Unbelievably, the shell held firm. No cracks could be seen, and no blood came pouring out. The crab had stopped moving though and, after a few moments, toppled over as the others watched in awe.

“Good, you remembered my lessons.” Hans stepped forward and clapped Tom on the back. “If the exterior is overly armored, it is likely that they are compensating with weak internal defenses. You landed that blow right over its eyes, so you rattled its brain hard enough to kill it. Now, where did you go wrong?”

“Using that ability while surrounded by water and water Essence reduced the effectiveness by a great amount.” Tom furrowed his brow and thought harder. “Beyond that, I… did I do anything wrong?”

“You didn’t make sure it was dead.” Hans moved slightly, and a massive pincer was suddenly bearing down on Tom.

“Ahh!” Tom yelped, falling backward into a puddle in surprise.

“Ha! Gotcha!” Hans was holding the pincer in front of Tom, wiggling it around and pretending to clamp the Northman. “Rawr! I’m just joking. Really though, a lot of beasts like to play dead to lure in prey, so use caution. Gimme one second; I’m gonna see if this thing has a Core.”

“I think I’ve found the dungeon Core!” Adam called from behind the crab as Rose and Tom both fumed over Hans’ antics.

“Grab it and let’s get out of here,” Dale called over. Adam nodded and created a ring of glowing celestial Essence on the end of his staff. Poking the wood underwater, he fished around for a few moments and pulled up a brightly shining blue Core. After handing the large Core to Dale, Adam turned and led the way back up to the surface.

“What’s that sound?” Rose’s slightly pointed ears were twitching, and her warning was taken to heart instantly.

“I think the tide is coming in,” Hans calmly explained, continuing forward. A moment later, his steps faltered, and he looked back. “Oh. We are pretty far below sea level, and there is now a hostile dungeon Core in your pocket. Let’s run.”

“The Core shouldn’t be able to influence anything in the dungeon right now. My aura should prevent it from interacting with anything!” Dale bitterly complained as they ran up the ramp. Water was trickling down it, the speed and volume increasing by the second.

“It doesn’t need to! The tide coming in probably fills the entire dungeon twice a day!” Hans shouted over the sounds of rushing water. “It probably absorbs all of it and converts it to Essence! With nothing absorbing the liquid, this place will fill up and stay full.”

They re-entered the floor that held a miniature ocean, noting that water was pouring in from all sides. The walkways were waterfalls now, and the water was rising rapidly. Huge shapes were in the water, and the octopus they had slain earlier was bobbing up and down as huge chunks were torn off it to be eaten by the other monsters.

Hans saw what was eating their kill, and his eyebrows rose in surprise. “Whale, whale, whale, what do we have here?”

Gigantic fish that Dale had never heard of were breaching the water, blowing geysers from holes on their heads. Their walkway was cut off, but Dale had another, possibly foolish, idea. “Follow me!” He jumped off the ledge, landing lightly on the huge fish and running across it like a bridge.

“Dale, you are an abyssal crazy person!” Tom roared with laughter as he followed his leader in a headfirst dive off the ledge. “I love it! I get to use a fish as a bridge!!”

The fish didn’t even seem to realize that there were creatures walking on them, causing Dale to shiver. The sheer scale of these things was terrifying; their size on par with the largest Abominations he had ever seen. The thought of necromancers getting ahold of these and using their flesh and bones in an amalgamation was horrifying. Hopefully their foes remained on land.

“This is surprisingly e-fish-ent!” Hans called as they raced against time. If they didn’t get up the next ramp soon, either the water would rise too high or the whales would submerge themselves. In both cases, drowning would soon follow. Hans looked at the creatures they were on with a glint in his eyes, then pulled out his daggers and murmured, “You think these things have Cores?”

“Hans, now may not be the time to satisfy your curiosity,” Adam stated as they jumped to a new whale. This one reacted to their presence, almost immediately beginning to thrash around. It seemed to realize that it could just go underwater, and as it nose-dived the people ran up its tail and jumped… landing on the ledge next to the ramp. Water was pouring down from the upper level, but they were able to power through the current with their enhanced bodies.

As they returned to the first floor, Tom stopped them from moving forward and plunging into the waist-high water. “This level may not be as simple this time.”

There were no more walkways. The water had also reached a point where all the creatures were able to move about freely, and dangerous creatures were already striking out toward them to rescue the dungeon Core. Gigantic eels were the fastest, flashing toward them with needle-sharp teeth leading the way. Hans moved forward, his speed so high that he skipped across the water. His daggers plunged downward into the water, opening gaping wounds in their bodies.

Hans was singing as he slew the dungeon monsters. “When a big slimy eel a-bites you on the heel, that’s a moray!”

“Don’t bastardize love songs!” Rose shouted at him in the cavern, the word ‘songs’ reverberating and echoing a few times.

“We need to move faster, everyone.” Adam pointed at a wall that was beginning to spray water. “I think that the walls are mainly held in place by the dungeon’s will, so right now, they are in serious danger of failing.”

“This entire place is an abyssal deathtrap.” Dale glared at the Core in his satchel before quickly pulling the drawstring tight and diving into the now-chest-high water. He wasn’t a particularly good swimmer, having lived on the slopes of various mountains his entire life, but the threat of drowning turned his doggie-paddle into a breaststroke. Luckily, his clothes didn’t seem to hold water; therefore, he wasn’t dragged down very much. Adam was having significantly more trouble, his large robe soaking up water and dragging him toward the bottom. He had recently broken through to D-rank six, so luckily, his strength was more than enough to allow him to power through the rising water.

While Adam and Rose focused on moving through the currents, Dale and Tom needed to work to defend them from sharp teeth and various poisonous creatures like jellyfish. After a few instances of vicious bites only being stopped by the armor concealed in his clothing, Dale tried to move the water around him in a manner similar to the stone that he had been encased in during his last training session. As he had hoped, the water around him reacted similarly by creating a current that moved away from him. This made the creatures coming at him move much slower while also removing the strain of going against the flowing water. It did not help his team, though, so he tried to restructure the water into flowing in a single direction.

It worked to a small degree, but creating functions that work exactly as you want them to was an exhaustingly tricky, time-consuming, and potentially dangerous process. By the time the team worked their way to the ramp, the water level was only a few feet from the roof of the cavern. A wall had given out, creating a cross current that was draining their stamina quickly. If they weren’t able to escape as intended, there was the possibility of using the new breech to swim upward if they could avoid the pull of the ocean. They had to dive down to get into the tunnel and then swim upward while enduring constant assaults from normal-sized piranha with oversized fins. These variant fish moved faster through the water than a projectile from a harpoon launcher and were able to shrug off water-slowed punches from Dale.

Rose had a dagger out and was killing off fish every few seconds, but her speed through the water had significantly slowed. Adam was thrashing upward, evidently near the limit of holding his breath. Dale pushed them forward and upward, following the others after attracting the attention of most of the predatory fish. Their bites couldn’t get through his armor, but he was confident their mutated jaws were enough to leave behind severe bruises and blood blisters. After a few more strokes, Dale burst through a curtain of water, gasping for air even as he fought to stay above the water line.

A steady hand grabbed Dale and pulled him upward onto the raft. Hans slapped his back hard. “Breathe, breathe. You doing alright? Swallow any water?”

“I’m fine.” Dale coughed hard into his arm. “Is everyone out?”

“We’re all here,” Rose confirmed for him. “We’re caught in a whirlpool right now, so I’m uncertain how long we will be alright, but…”

Hans waved off her concerns. “We won’t be stuck for much longer. The last room was almost full as is. My concern is: how the heck are we getting back up there?” He gestured at the island that was floating a few hundred feet above them. Mountaindale and the surrounding land it had taken was hovering in the sky, blotting out the sun and giving off a truly dangerous feeling. Dale supposed that anyone would be nervous when a gigantic chunk of rock could fall out of the sky and crush them at any moment.

Dale simply shrugged. “Cal said he’d take care of it.”

“I think I know. I see our ride.” Tom pointed at something falling toward them. “Vines? Someone must have told Madame Chandra that we needed a lift.”

Chapter Seven

<Are you in there?> I prodded the captured dungeon Core with a tendril of Essence. It attacked the Essence savagely, doing all it could do to absorb the pure power. This wasn’t unusual, I had been given several Dungeon Cores as gifts from Minya. Apparently they were a hot item on the black market. <Hello? I’d hate to destroy you if you can think. No? Do you have a Wisp? Alright… let’s see. If you want to survive, if you can hear me or understand the impressions I’m sending you, don’t try to eat this.>

I extended a small thread of Acme mana, which the Core instantly tried to absorb. Instead, it cracked in half and exploded into a massive storm of Essence. I sighed sadly; so far, nothing I did had reached these Cores. At least I had learned to contain the blast of power after I had lost a dozen Goblins by trying to be nice out in the open. Now Essence only raged through a room designed to contain it, and the power was swiftly pulled through the dungeon, purified, and used to empower the various mechanisms of my traps and spawners. Any remainder came to me as a tasty treat, not even enough to be called a snack.

This Core had been C-ranked, but the mind had been from something like a shark. If it had ever had a Wisp, it had eaten it long ago. This Core had been decades away from achieving capabilities needed to actually think and would have required nurturing that no one - especially me - was willing to commit to. Ah well. I was glad that Dale had handed the Core over to me right away; I had been seriously concerned that he would do something foolish like attempt to absorb it himself. Maybe coming back and forming a complete soul had imparted some wisdom or extra intelligence to him? I didn’t know for sure, but I was interested in what was going to happen next.

According to all available texts and rumors, when a Core was torn out of a dungeon, one of three things would happen. The first option was usually the most likely, where the backlash of losing the controlling Core would kill all of the Mobs, turning the creature with the highest ranked Core into the new dungeon Core. This made the dungeon into a new, weaker version. This wouldn’t happen here, as far as I could tell from Dale’s story, there should only be one creature in there with a Core, and Hans had taken it.

The second option was that the accumulated Essence would be released into the environment slowly, mutating and empowering the nearby… everything. Even the water could gain some mystical properties. That was the least likely option normally because option number three was the apparent go-to.

In this scenario, the accumulated power was released all at once. Boom. Cataclysm. Mana storms, cats and dogs living together peacefully, rain turning into diamonds. Also, fire. Lots of fire, and in almost every circumstance. I was trying to avoid this because I was attempting to create a fourth option.

In what I was unbiasedly calling the best case ‘Cal option’, my ley lines would insert themselves and regulate the various Essences in the area. There was already a framework all around the dungeon’s location, and now that there wasn’t an active influence eating away at my Inscriptions, they should be working to connect and drain the excess Essence into my dungeon. Even though I was directly above the dead dungeon, the power wouldn’t reach me for several days. It would follow the ley lines back to my mountain’s original location, then the condensed Essence would pour through a small portal that connected me to my growing reservoir of Essence.

I say reservoir, but it was currently more like a funnel. There was hardly any Essence in there, as I was able to absorb it as fast as it appeared. Perhaps it would accumulate over time as my network of lines connected fully, but for now… well, for now it just waited. The skyland was starting to move again, but as always, it gained speed just as quickly as it slowed down. Eventually, I would be able to make the entire thing a part of my dungeon, but that was going more slowly than I liked. At least I had boundaries and a goal for myself. Eat. Entire. Mountain. Tearing it out of the earth and making it fly was one thing, but most of the Essence I would need to use to expand my influence went instead to keeping the place afloat.

I looked at the shattered remnants of the dead dungeon Core one last time before absorbing them. Now that this task was out of the way and Navigation Bob had charted a course to our next destination, it was time to try out some of my new… features. That sounded better than ‘killer golems and deadly traps’, right? Oh, and before that, there was another group going to challenge Manny the man-eating Manticore! This should be fun. The five Mages looked fresh, determined, and excited for the battle that they would be fighting. They must have come to this floor via a keygem and portal and seemed to think that they were going to get a sneak attack off on the floor Boss. This made me chuckle darkly. Manny knew they were coming. Manny was waiting. Manny… was hungry.

“This thing is in the B-ranks, right?” One of the men was polishing a weapon that gleamed in the sparse light of the room. I had no idea why he was doing so; even I couldn’t see any imperfections on the surface of the blade. Although the edge could have used a bit of sharpening.

“Yeah. B-one, if the new info is correct.” These people must be in the B-ranks at least, but I was thoroughly uncertain how they got the keygem. Either they bought it or stole it, and since I had never seen them before, I had no idea what form their mana would take. On the plus side, they were seemingly unaware that most of my creatures were far stronger than others of their same ranking. Any of my Mobs in the B-ranks had at least rudimentary intelligence, which translated into adaptive fighting styles. Cats could pounce, and Manny could skewer you by sliding his tail through a hole in the wall or floor and ambushing you. He had also learned a new trick where he waited on the mirrored ceiling and dropped rocks on people.

“Shouldn’t be an issue. Let’s get the bounty and check out the next floor. Not too many people have the Manticore keygem, so getting down to the next floor is costing an arm and a leg.” This came from a man who was the apparent leader of the group, although it seemed that there was some contention, as another spoke nearly instantly.

“Better than paying with an actual arm or leg.” This man sneered at the leader, making me happier with every passing second. Contention in the group! That should make this easier.

The leader rolled his eyes and jumped back as a projection of light appeared in the air before them. It wasn’t anything malicious - mainly because I couldn’t seem to weaponize the illusion - but it held some information that Manager Bob collected for me. “This Boss has a forty percent pass rate? What does that even… oh, the words changed. For every ten prepared parties that enter, only four groups survive. Then… what’s this, ‘challenge rating’?”

I growled to myself at that. I had made Bob update the list after Chandra came down here and killed Manny all by herself to gather ‘exotic meats’. The challenge rating meant that people who fought and won a hard-fought battle earned more and had a higher spot on the leaderboard than people who might come down with a group of A-ranked people and blow my Manticore to smithereens.

“Who cares? Let’s do this and get moving.” They pushed open the massive door and stepped through into the Boss battle arena. Manny was waiting for them patiently, sitting on the floor and staring at the approaching Mages. “Pff. It is so scared that it’s just waiting to die! Let’s oblige him, boys!” The sneering man ran forward, plainly attempting to steal command out from under his current leader. Two of the other men cursed and darted forward to join Mr. Speedy Man, but the leader and what must be their group’s healer didn’t move.

“Something’s wrong.” The healer was trembling as he stared at the Manticore. “I can sense no Mana from that beast. Boss, you need to call them back. …Boss?” The healer looked over, just as the man he was talking to slipped to the ground. Before the healer could shout a warning, a potently poisoned spike tore into his back. He slumped to the floor, joining his leader on the ground.

The charging men got in range of the Manticore, who seemed to be almost smirking at them. It didn’t even bother to move as a Mana-infused sword sliced through the air and stabbed into… a mirror. The reflection shattered, and to their credit, the men whirled around nearly instantly. They saw that two of their number were already dead, then their eyes traveled up a bit. The Manticore was sitting on a ledge that was placed above the doorway, mimicking the pose it had been using in the angled mirror. A deep chuckle resounded through the room, and the men began to sweat. “Get it!”

Manny crouched and sprang forward at them like a tiger, opening his wings with a snap and zipping toward the Mages. There were abrupt curses, and the men scattered out of the way before launching their own assault. Oh, now this was interesting! I was starting to classify Mages by the tier their law was residing on, which I had learned was a common practice. Now, I didn’t get a chance to interact with every node in the Tower of Ascension, but I had a pretty good feel for their general location. The more I interacted with various forms of Mana, and the more I grew to know my own, the better I could gauge Mages.

Two of them were ‘tier one’ Mages, basic Mages that had accepted a law from the first level. One was a fire Mage, the other a wind Mage. The final man was a tier three, and his abilities were more abstract and powerful. He was a ‘force’ Mage, someone who could transfer force from one position to another. After the first two sent a blast of elemental destruction toward Manny as a distraction, they all wound back and punched into the air with as much power as they possibly could. This force was redirected across the distance, and Manny took the entire synchronized kinetic load of three B-ranked Mages on his chest. The area it hit was the size of a pinhead, so it blew through his armor and splattered his innards against the back wall without hardly moving his body at large.

Manny collapsed with a shudder, coughing wetly and weakly. In a few moments, he stilled. I was stunned at the outcome of the battle. I would have never expected a couple of sneering jerks to survive against Manny. For some reason, I was certain that he would rally at the last minute and have a fantastic comeback. I guess the only comeback he’d get was when I brought him back. Wow. Oh, right, they won. I formed a keygem and let it clatter to the ground at the top of the stairs leading downward. Put in the work, get the reward… even if you are a sucky person.

Chapter Eight

The Mages walked down to the next level and halted. They stood there for a few moments, gawking at the various paths they could take. Obviously, they were frustrated by the concealment Runes I had made, but even the simple paths that were visible seemed to entice them almost to the point of self-destruction. Not being able to see the way clearly was surely frustrating, and in fact, they nearly stepped on the trail and started walking in order to see and understand more of them. That would have undeniably spelled doom for them, but sadly, they realized their current weakness in time to make an inglorious escape.

Too bad. The portal closed behind them with a fizzle, and my lowest levels were once again mercifully empty. Mostly empty. I still pretended not to see the Dark Elf guards that ‘protected’ the Silverwood tree that grew over my position. They tried so hard to be stealthy; I just couldn’t bear to break their hearts. Heh, that made me think of bears and bear jokes. Maybe someday I would make an entire area devoted to that. Then if they did something wrong I could make a punishment! It might be funny. No, it would be funny! I just couldn’t let Dani know about it ‘til it was too late, or she would try to stop me.

I briefly glanced upward, looking over the first few levels and smiling at the massive amount of fighters that were moving around the area. I usually left those floors to be managed by the Bobs, but it was fun to see all these students struggling against Bashers. Seriously, how do you have a hard time fighting rabbits when they didn’t come in overwhelming numbers? Just then I saw a Hopsecutioner decapitate an instructor with a sneak attack. I winced; Dale was going to be sad that they needed to find another instructor for… lutes?

What in the world was her class doing here? You know, besides getting beat into the ground? The students lasted longer than the teacher, but not by much. There was only one survivor, a Dwarven earth cultivator. He coated himself in stone and was ignored by the Mobs. He escaped after they left the area, I tracked his progress directly to the tavern. Now, a serious question, why were the Hopsecutioners this far up in the dungeon? Hadn’t I assigned them to hang out with Raile or something? …Yes. I had, but… they were rank C-zero mobs and only came out when they were bored, or a too-powerful group attacked Raile. Technically, these things were stronger than Snowball, at least in cultivation, but… they were rabbits. If they were this bored, I thought it would be fine leaving them as wandering monsters… so I looked for something else to work on.

At that point, I was waiting on the results of the self-writing quills I had designed based off my vision. It had been fun to access creativity mana because I was suddenly able to envision Runes that I had never seen nor heard of. Not to brag but I had a copy of every Rune known by the Spotters, and their lists were extensive. So suddenly being able to take an idea and write out an unknown Rune… pretty amazing. The combinations I had made had produced these new quills after only a few failures, and I didn’t even accidentally summon a creature when I powered the new Runes! Sure, I had blasted a hole out of the mountain, but that just made it easier to fill that space with my influence. Sure, I had been testing in a reinforced experimentation room, but this was Mana so powerful that it was located at the highest, well, second highest tier in the Tower of Ascension. Even a drop of it was more potent than a river of tier one mana.

To be fair, I shouldn’t have powered the Inscription with that type of Mana, but I was so excited! I probably should have used Essence and did on the next trial, but still! Now I had a self-writing quill in each of the workrooms that I had set up for non-Mages. They recorded everything anyone in the area said or did, and it was kind of funny to see the annotation ‘Spotter attempted to grab quill and screamed in frustration when defensive Runes took hold’. That was all over the place on the papers. The Spotters that could see the pens moving were salivating over the thought of new Runes. Heh. I’d make sure to give these out as a reward on the lowest levels, but I would put the Inscriptions on the interior of the quill and make it from some kind of material that would take weeks to peel away. That should keep ‘em busy for a while.

“What are you doing, Cal?” Dani interrupted my chuckling and diabolical plans, and I went silent instantly.

<Just, uh, going over the results of the Runes and such that I’ve been working on!> I must have sounded a little too innocent because she didn’t seem to believe me.

“Is that what you should be doing? Or should you be working on what we decided you should be doing?” Her voice had a dangerous inflection, and I sighed at the reminder.

<Dani, you see, sometimes, I just need a break. Expanding influence is so slow and boring and time-consuming! I just-> I was cut off quickly; she knew that I could find any number of things to say about this.

“It isn’t a break when you are doing it all the time. Take a break from your ‘break’ every once in a while and do actual work. There’s an idea! You doing work is actually a break from what you normally do.” Dani’s voice was a whiplash.

<Demanding little thing, aren’t you?> I muttered quietly. Not quietly enough. Apparently.

Dani flashed red. “Excuse me? You are the one that asked me to keep you on task for the deadline you set! I-”

<You are excused, thanks for the apology! Listen, I have a lot of work to do, so I’m going to grab all this Essence and sink down into the stone, ‘kay? Love, love! Bye!> A hurricane of Essence followed my mind as I dove into the ground beneath my Core and began converting Essence into influence. I heard a growl from above, and the floor vibrated. Dani was in the Mage ranks with the same access to Acme that I had. Scary. To work and quickly!

I had almost enough space converted to make a new floor, but I was holding off until I could think of a good theme for it. I could continue with the Tower of Ascension theme, but what I had between the sixth and seventh floor currently listed out options all the way to the ninth tier. I initially had all of them on one, but that had been too crowded for me to really enjoy watching the battles. Now, the platforms were more extensive, and I was able to fit a changing roster of options onto each floor.

I had only seen two beings besides myself that were in the upper tiers, hinting at the fact that most people couldn’t get to that point. It made a certain kind of sense. As I had climbed the tower, the concepts became more abstract and powerful. At a certain point, a fleshy brain wouldn’t be able to turn away from the deepest desires of their mind and would suddenly wake up bound to a law.

I would bet money - if it had any value to me - that most people who got to those tiers blocked out the memories of the other things they had seen. Heck, I wanted to block out a few of them. Madness had been so… alluring. It had an innocence, a compelling sweet sound… but it had been full of rot and corruption. The dichotomy threatened to damage my mind if I thought on it too hard. No wonder the Madness cultivator, Xenocide, had been so strange. If he hadn’t started that way, going to places overflowing with madness just to study it and draw it into himself would undoubtedly do it.

Maybe I would make this into a rest room. Not a toilet area, but a pleasant and comfortable space. That sounded kind of ideal, and since I hadn’t made any areas for Mages, maybe I would do something like that here. Blocking the Mages from the workshops and training areas still made sense, but perhaps I could create some extravagant manors, giant personal workshops, and a pool! That would be nice, a small communal area so the Mages didn’t get all cagey and introverted. I snorted at that. Like I had room to think about others being introverted.

Also… I think that the keygems I make for this floor will be tied to the people that use them the first time. I want this to be the Mage’s Refuge from other people, especially the students at the academy. Oh, this will be fun. If I had hands, I would be rubbing them together in delight. There was going to be an undeniable surge of Mages trying to get to this floor as soon as it was found. With all the people that had been running here from the necromancers, all of the uppity Nobles and all the students… space on the surface was being rented at a premium. Manors deep in the dungeon? I can’t even imagine how they would react.

After dutifully expanding my influence over the course of six hours, I turned to my new project with gusto. With a thought, I made a precise cut in the stone by absorbing the minerals. Taking away was much easier than creating, so the structures I was picturing began to form quickly. It looked like giant slabs of rock were falling and vanishing, revealing stone frameworks for buildings that had been there all along. Oh, this was going to be fun!

Chapter Nine

Dale was back to training, which is all he seemed to do these days. Practice, meetings, and just a hint of harrowing danger from charging into an unknown dungeon with the intent to kill it. His Moon Elf instructor had nearly killed him outright when he learned that Dale had gone into the oceanic dungeon, and after doling out a severe beating, he had been forcing Dale to fight against monsters constantly.

This was monster number fifteen, and Dale was already coughing blood from the repeated body blows he had taken during earlier fights. The beast charged him, and thanks to having two swollen eyelids, Dale didn’t see this fast enough to dodge. He wasn’t sure what this creature was, but it had reasonably simple characteristics. It was all teeth and claws, had six legs, and was surprisingly light. The being hopped on his chest and started tearing into him, or at least, it was trying to.

Dale's clothes had no tears, abrasions, or even loose threads. He could feel nasty bruises forming under the paths of the claws and teeth but was able to grab the thing and squeeze. Crying in a cross between piteous and furious, the animal struggled even harder for a long moment before a snap resounded through the area. The creature fell limp, and Dale slid to the ground as well, completely exhausted.

“Let’s see here… ‘the dungeon wanted me to do it’. ‘I needed to get the dungeon Core and give it to the dungeon’. ‘It was something I was supposed to do myself’.” The Moon Elf was ticking things off on his fingers as he recited parts of earlier conversations. “We are going to try again, and if the answer doesn’t satisfy me, I am going to let something nastier in. Now, tell me again why you went into an unknown dungeon, with a team in the C or D ranks, with no backup, and without explaining it to the people relying on you.”

“I just…” Dale sighed and dragged himself to his feet, “I have no excuse. It was a bad idea, and it won’t happen again.”

The Moon Elf stared at him, nodding after a few long seconds. “That was the correct answer, finally! I thought we were going to be here all night.” He pulled a lever, and a small gate opened. Out of the gate came a yowling Flesh Cat from the lower levels of the dungeon. It pounced at Dale, its Essence ability tearing open his skin and ignoring his armor entirely as it slashed hooked claws at him.

“Ow!” Dale twisted away from the Cat, returning the assault with one of his own. His fist hit the Cat, and the studded knuckles broke its skin. The Cat had a strange expression on its face as the blood in its body lurched and churned away from the normal paths it would be taking. A huge bruise formed on the hairless Beast before it collapsed, but when it did, Dale angrily tore it open and pulled out a Core. Glaring up at the Elf, he asked a simple question, “Why?”

“I told you that if your answer didn’t satisfy me, I would let a monster in. Just because your answer was correct…” he trailed off, pulling another lever and making Dale blanch. Thank goodness, this time it revealed an exit from the training arena the academy had built. “This is a handy invention. Great for letting people test their limits. How do you feel, Dale? Do you feel that your limits have been… tested?”

Dale frowned, feeling at his Core. It was almost completely drained, leaving only a depressingly small trickle of Essence running through his body. “I certainly feel like I am completely exhausted if that’s what you are getting at. I have almost no Essence remaining, and I haven’t slept in thirty-nine hours. My limits feel tested, yes.”

The Moon Elf sneered at him. “Good. Dale, if you are so weak currently, how did you not only break the Scrivener’s spine but also beat a Flesh Cat to death with repeated blows? Before you try some half-baked answer, I’ll just tell you. Your aura. It’s weak as of yet, but your body is becoming more directly powerful. All of this was without using Essence directly, which means you are becoming formidable. Not to mention the hand-to-hand combat style you have been learning is the most effective style for killing without a weapon that currently exists. Now, there is another aspect to the aura that you have been building throughout your body and in your immediate surroundings.”

He paused a moment, considering his next words. “Two aspects, actually. First, the Essence that you are inserting into your body is the path that your Mana will take once you actually gain access to it. This has a different meaning to many people, but the gist of it is that Mana will only empower the areas where you have stored Essence. I've seen people do a poor job of maintaining their aura, and they are torn apart when they try to move into the Mage ranks. I heard that you needed motivation; I hope that covers it. Consider yourself motivated."

"I'm feeling it." Dale's face was green, extra queasy at the thought that he had been ignoring his Essence collection recently.

“Good.” The Elf looked away, gathering his thoughts. "Second, there is a reason it is called 'aura' and not 'body preparation'. You've already been using what I am talking about, or your body would be significantly more singed than it currently is. By holding your Essence in multiple patterns around you and infusing them with various corruption, you are able to generate elemental ‘shielding’. This is more useful than you seem to think if your lax attitude in practicing your shields is any indication. What I want you to do is prepare the shield you've been using to block my fire traps."

Dale was relatively confident that this was another lesson that he wasn't going to like. "One small issue, teacher. I am almost fully out of Essence right now."

The Elf waved at him and growled. "Then sit down and cultivate, you infernally frustrating man-child! Not that it will matter much. Until you have a full aura and step into the C-ranks, whatever you manage to create will be a wispy shadow of what it will become."

Glad for the respite, Dale sat and began greedily sucking in all of the Essence around him, heedless of its natural affinity. The strange energies swirled around him, getting pulled to his body and covering him with colored lights if you could see them. Typically, this would make for a corrupted Center and would hamper the future growth of anyone foolish enough to cultivate in such a manner. There were a few exceptions. In the dungeon below them, the Essence was cleaned and had little to no corruption in it. Dale could take it a step further, as the tiny corruption Cores that surrounded his central Core would funnel all of the corruption away and use it to power the various cursed equipment that Dale was using.

Within five minutes, Dale was moderately sure that he could hold his shielding in place for a handful of minutes, so he stood, got into position, created the shield, and nodded at the Elf. His instructor hadn't bothered to wait for the nod of confirmation, throwing a massive fireball at the now-nervous Dale. The fire washed over him, splitting around and rebounding off of his shielding.

"I have three important lessons to teach you right now. Lesson one: like reflects like." The Elf held a fireball in each hand and bounced them off each other. Creating a strange watery spike, he tossed it at Dale. "Lesson two: opposites cancel."

Indeed, as the water hit Dale's shield, there was a small gout of steam that rose away from the impact site, and Dale felt a bit weaker. The Elf continued to speak the entire time Dale was pondering. "It is easier and less Essence intensive to reflect than to cancel. When canceling out another affinity, you are betting that you have put at least as much Essence into your shield as your opponent is throwing at you. Lesson three."

His instructor now had a whirling tornado in his palm. He threw it at Dale, and as the wind Essence brushed against the fire Essence, a roaring flame scorched Dale's exposed hands. As Dale cursed and shook his hand, the Moon Elf snickered. "Hee… I love this lesson. Adjacents interact. When in combat, knowing the protections that a person has in place is the key to not only winning, but surviving. Since I knew that you had only placed fire in your defense, it was easy for me to know what would happen."

"There are only so many things that I can make!" Dale had waited until it appeared that the Moon Elf was finished speaking. He had learned long ago that interrupting the Elf was a recipe for a tooth-loosening slap. "I have access to each of the elements, but how can I possibly know what is about to assault me?"

"Two things." Luckily his instructor seemed to be in a talking mood instead of a 'beat Dale ‘til he gets it' mood. "Practice. You know how to look at a person and see what Essence is swirling around them. You simply need to get better at interacting and understanding what that means. Now, some people will intentionally misdirect you, using an element in their shields that they don't plan to use for attacking. Be wary, for all combat is a life-or-death situation. Honor is a joke in battle, and if I have taught you anything, I hope it is that you must do anything, anything, to survive. Winning is secondary in all cases. Next, think for a moment; if you have access to all forms of Essence, what do you need to do to protect against a larger portion of them?"

Dale didn't respond right away, instead cursing himself for not seeing the obvious answer right away. "I would guess that I need to combine them?"

"Correct. You have an advantage that others can't get without reaching the B-ranks at a minimum." The Elf lifted his hands and twined together fire and wind Essence over his hands. "Aura can be used for defense and attack. There are many, many people who focus entirely on using aura to its fullest potential. Typically, these are people without access to techniques or other forms of more efficient fighting abilities. Using aura allows you to empower your body as well as offer other simple short-to-medium range means of assault without the need for extensive training. Observe."

Dale watched as the Elf increased the swirl of wind. Pointing his hand away from himself with his palm aiming at a training dummy, the Assassin forcibly ejected a river of fire that acted like a twister, creating a blazing cone that engulfed the mannequin and quickly burned away all the flammable portions. Liquid metal began to drip, and the fire suddenly stopped sprouting from the delicate-seeming hand. "Now, the trick is to learn how to combine elements in your shield without doing that to your body. I'm sure you understand the inherent risk involved here, so please practice near a healer or at least away from highly-populated areas if you plan to do something extra foolish."

Staring at the ruined dummy, the thought that he could have easily started a conflagration on his skin of the same intensity caused Dale’s eye to twitch nervously. This had been an excellent lesson: no practicing until he was well-rested and thinking clearly.

Chapter Ten

After getting a very rejuvenating three hours of sleep, Dale decided to find one of the few people he knew of that could help him with exact requirements for his shielding. "Good morning, Craig. Do you mind if I take a few minutes of your time?"

The Monk looked up from his breakfast of tea and broccoli, seeming a bit surprised by Dale's words. "Oh? I believe that our next session was supposed to be tomorrow, but if there is something I can help with, I am always glad to do so."

"Thank you. I am attempting to create aura shielding, but I am concerned that I may damage myself. I was hoping that you could give me some information to make this a bit easier." Dale was trying to keep his voice down; several people were already looking over at them, exchanging coins, and chuckling. There was a simple explanation for this. Dale no longer ate in this area but he still technically had a standing order from the cook to bring him herbs, meats, and rare ingredients that may be found in the dungeon. Dale was attempting to keep a low profile because the man would always charge at him and demand service if he knew that Dale was here. It had become something of a game for the cook, but the threats he made were genuine.

"Oh, we were going to start going over that tomorrow night anyway. I suppose you were given a more… practical lesson from your… combat instructor?" Craig had initially been excited for Dale, as the Moon Elf hand-to-hand combat forms were considered to be the most thorough and deadly martial arts in the world. After seeing Dale's patchwork of new scars and the constant damage he sustained, Craig had grown more concerned. Not to mention he was starting to dislike the Moon Elf that would inflict such punishment on his former team member and current student.

"I did, and I am very excited not to turn myself into a wreck of a person. I've died too many… I mean, I've come close to dying too many times to want to put myself into that sort of situation again. I'm also fairly certain that he is standing over in that corner watching me, and if I were to try it alone he may very well cut off an arm or something as punishment." Dale had gestured at a corner of the large tent they were eating in, and moments after he did so, the tent flap opened and closed 'by itself'. Sure. Invisible freaks.

"I think that we can do some work on that this morning." Craig swallowed his tea, standing and walking outside with Dale by his side. He had Dale explain what he knew about shielding, nodding begrudgingly at the straightforward explanation that Dale had been given. They walked to the academy and took an entire stone room for themselves. Craig explained that learning aura control was the purpose of this room, and so it had been specially reinforced. Dale winced. As helpful as this shielding sounded… no turning back now, though; he was committed to improving himself every day.

"Let's begin." Craig had Dale sit down in the lotus position, then place his hands out in front of him with his palms facing upward. "The most common mistake when learning to combine elements is to use your entire body to practice. In a safe location like this, it is fine to retract your aura or focus it into your palms. Do so now."

It took a few minutes because Dale had never needed to control the aura around him in this manner. Typically, it was a consistent coating of energy that was the same thickness throughout. Once he got the hang of it, it was simple to retract the aura, though it made him feel vulnerable in a way that he hadn't been expecting. He had been building his aura for weeks at this point, and it had grown to be a familiar friend that protected him from dangerous things. Craig was watching closely and nodded when he saw that there was no aura leaking from Dale's body. "Very good. I am surprised at your instinctive level of control; many people have a much harder time learning to do even this much."

"I do have to say that the daily life-or-death training has helped me to know myself better." Dale had a rough time most days, but it was all in an effort to become stronger and protect himself, the people around him, his land, and the dungeon. Which was also kind of like defending himself, but unfortunately, the memories that he had initially gained from combining with Cal had been fading day by day. He had written down a small portion of information that he had deemed essential to remembering, but in general, he was back to being just Dale. He hadn't told anyone about the memories he had gained at the time and was now glad that he hadn't done so. If they wanted information, secrets, leverage… he had lost all of that by this point and would have been seen as a disreputable source.

Knowing himself as only himself wasn't terrible, and what little he did remember about Cal’s ability to use Essence with a master's ability compelled him forward and heightened his own understanding of his skills. In everything he did, it was just a little easier to get better. Craig was now speaking, so Dale returned his attention to where it belonged. "Exact proportions are needed, every time, in order to create a powerful shield that does not damage your body either through its own creation or during another's assault. Also, not every combination is useful as protection."

"What do you mean by that?" If he got a combination wrong, he could be leaving himself entirely vulnerable?

"It's very simple, and I can give you an example right now." Craig smiled, waved, and vanished entirely. Dale looked around uncomprehendingly when suddenly, Craig's face was floating in the air in front of him. "Boo!"

Dale flinched backward with a stifled yelp as Craig became fully visible again. Craig smiled at him. "I've been wanting to try that ever since Hans told me how much fun it was. Allow me to explain. That type of shielding is a simple interaction of fire, celestial, and water Essence. The fire and water interact to make a film of steam around the body, and the celestial works to enhance this while bending light. This type of auric invisibility is fairly weak in terms of actually hiding, as it creates a 'shimmer' in the air whenever the person using it moves. And guess what? Breathing counts as moving. The Moon elves have a different 'recipe' that they use for their invisibility, and it is - as you have learned - far more difficult to see through. I was actually quite impressed when you were able to point one out earlier. So, as you can see, though it offers little defense you gain excellent utility."

"That's… that's amazing!" A whole new world of possibilities was opening up for Dale, and he was excited to see where this would take him. "How do I know which combinations are going to be useful for helping to survive battles?"

Craig tapped his chin, then steepled his fingers. "It is possible that I was not being as clear as I should have been. Even the invisibility that I was just using is beneficial in some combat but realistically only against those who need to see you to attack or those that weaponize light in one way or another. As this particular technique bends light around you, so long as you are able to output enough power, you would be able to survive a lance of light that can melt a hole in a mountain.”

“Each situation calls for a different type of shielding, but the fact is that most people are unable to generate shields with such a plethora of affinities. You may have access to all of them, and learning to use as many as possible will make you more versatile but will also weaken your ability to practice them to perfection. What you should do for now is practice the most common types of shielding you will need. Utility and specialized shields will simply have to come later."

"I see. Thank you for this. Can we work on a few of those shields?" Dale needed to get started; he had other responsibilities creeping up on him, and while theory was important, practicality needed to come first.

"Yes. Let's work on bio, magma, ice, mud, and regenerative shielding. Normally, I would exclude that last one for a long time, but… looking at you makes me think that you will be needing it." Craig ignored Dale's wry look, explaining what was needed from the young Noble. "Bio shielding is similar to plant shielding but is more difficult to hold correctly. When you make this aura type correctly, you will be able to grasp the others much more easily. This requires earth, water, celestial, and wind corruption to be added in a ratio of three, four, half, and two.”

“I would suggest that once you get a good feeling for the power you expend, you decide upon a metric for determining what a 'single unit' of Essence is. This is different for each person, but the ratios remain the same. Some people simply create stronger shields when they add 'one unit', but I would suggest making a single unit into a tiny portion of your Essence. You can always increase the units that you add, but that is harder to do when just one takes a full third of your Essence. Please try it now."

Dale began sending Essence to his hands and noticed the color of the energy changing swiftly. It had started as green but then transformed into brown… then grey. As soon as it began turning grey, Craig sliced his hand forward, somehow removing the Essence and throwing it against the far wall. A thick bramble bush was suddenly sprouting from the point of impact, and the wall cracked as roots dug into it. The bramble vanished after a moment, but the damage remained. Dale looked at the wall in horror. "What was that?"

"That, Dale, was an Essence construct. It is a representation of the Essence that created it and has no real substance. As you can see, as soon as the Essence sustaining it runs out, the construct fades." Craig sighed and looked back at the wall. "At least that wasn't your hands. Looks like you are going to have to work just as hard as anyone else at this. Let's get started. Try again."

"I have some other meetings that I-"

Craig cut him off with a slicing motion of his hands. "Reschedule. You have work to do here."

Chapter Eleven

It was hours before Dale was allowed to leave the training room. When he did, he seemed revitalized, calm, and focused. He was actually mightily struggling to maintain the regenerative aura that he was projecting, but it was very beneficial to him to continue using it. Not only did it very slowly and passively heal his body, but it also did the same for anyone that came near him. This was felt by the receiving person as a soothing presence and tended to help reduce stress and fatigue in them. This type of aura was almost exclusively able to be used by clerics, as it required significant control over celestial Essence. Even then, it was a rarity because of the requirement of being able to generate 'blood' Essence.

The ratio needed in this particular recipe was six parts celestial, three parts water and earth, and one part fire. Maintaining the balance of Essences was mentally taxing, but after it was in place, the aura would help to relieve that burden. It was a positive feedback loop that would lead to swift mastery of this type of aura, and Craig had thought he needed a rapid win to avoid depression - which in fact this aura also helped fight against. Once it was mastered, Craig asked if he would be so kind as to sit in the academy where students congregated during finals. The boost to their bodies and mental states might be precisely what they needed to survive in the high-pressure environment. For now, Dale was going to use this in any meetings, gatherings, or interpersonal event of any kind. War looming on the horizon was a significant stressor, and recently people had been snapping at each other more than usual.

"Excuse me, young man. I was hoping that you would be so kind as to help me find my way around the academy?" Dale looked over to see an older man with a massive series of bags on his back. Dale was so shocked by the size and amount that he was speechless. Why in the world didn’t he just use a spatial bag? "Young man? This burden is not getting any lighter, and I would like to be set up for classes by morning if at all possible. Oh, a regenerative aura? It’s rather weak, but… a young cleric, perhaps? Or have you found a more interesting path to take? Yes… I think it is the second option." A small smile appeared on the old man's face coupled with just a hint of impatience.

"I'd be happy to assist you, elder." Dale grinned softly as the man rolled his eyes and muttered something too softly to be heard.

"Yes, well, perhaps we go with 'Headmaster' for now. Elder seems very… almost condescending with the number of Mages in the area. I'm only in my eighties after all! I'm a spry young bird compared to those old fogies!" He hopped in place, coming down and landing with almost no noise, though the bags on his back shook and rattled.

"Ah, you must be Headmaster Artorian!" Dale smiled as the other man looked at him quizzically, as if his mind had just snapped back to reality after being absorbed in thought. "I am actually the Baron of Mountaindale, owner of this mountain and the dungeon that it contains. I was the one who hired you, and it is a pleasure to be one of the first to be able to greet you."

The man’s wizened gaze sharpened as understanding appeared on his expression. His hand rose to shake Dale’s as warmth and good cheer slowly filled Artorian’s face. "How fortuitous! As they say, it is better to be lucky than to be good! Personally, I find that being good and lucky is my preference. Would you happen to know where my personal quarters are located? I brought everything I owned with me and would like to set it down." A cursory glance was taken of his surroundings filled with the scrutiny of someone that had suddenly realized they were lost. 

Artorian didn't seem to be having any issues holding his gear, but Dale understood what he was getting at. They walked through the gates of the academy, hearing chuckles every once in a while by students who didn't have as much intelligence as they should. When the Baron of the mountain and the Headmaster of the academy were walking together, respect should have been a given. Luckily, the two were deep in conversation and didn't particularly care about the derision of students.

"It simply doesn't explain the hostility and overall tendencies of these necromancers! Even if they were downtrodden, why would they not take the opportunity they had to sue for peace and perhaps start their own civilization? Is it so unlikely that they would have been left alone if they didn't initiate an assault?" Dale's voice was frustrated, and his aura wavered for a moment before he caught himself and devoted himself to holding the flowing Essence correctly.

"Young man, that is a rigid perspective. They did not want peace, and I will tell you why. It is generally believed that there are three potential goals in the philosophy of war: the cataclysmic, the eschatological, and the political goals. Now, that is not to say that there cannot be another, only that they are only three of the most common. Allow me to make this into a metaphor for you. In political philosophy, war is compared to… let's call it a game of strategy.” Artorian’s hands were flying about as he attempted to explain with his hands as much as his words.

“Political players look at war, and all they see are numbers. Numbers of troops, numbers of possible resources that they will be able to take upon winning the game. This… I think this is not what our foes are after, or their actions would have followed a different path."

"In terms of the eschatological, war is used as a means to an end. This could mean a war for freedom, for recognition, for rights. In other words, there is a clearly stated goal. If I understand you correctly, this is what you are thinking the necromancers would be pushing for. You are saying that they should take the rights and freedoms that they have now won, that they should now band together and raise themselves out of the positions that they had been in for so long. If they had only done this, the war would be over, and uneasy trade may have even started. Unfortunately, they seem to be after the third option."

Artorian took a moment to gather his thoughts, and even though they had stopped in front of the headmaster's new house, they didn't want to end their conversation. "Now, the cataclysmic theory of war tells us that war serves little purpose. That is, outside of causing destruction and suffering. The main outcome of this type of war is drastic change to society at large. This mentality arises from the idea that 'there is no other option', that the only thing that can possibly be beneficial is killing and destroying the previous order. From the ashes rises a new, 'better' society."

Dale shook his head. "It is impossible. Any society is going to have the same issues that plagued its precursor. Why… why wouldn't they try to affect change from within? Why not try to change society slowly instead of going back to square one and dealing with every other issue that society had already eradicated? King Henry, Queen Marie, they had plans for change that would have bettered the lives of hundreds of thousands over the years. Why not try?"

Artorian gesticulated as if he were about to fall into a long dissertation, and his entire pack moved, clanking and clattering. The Headmaster caught himself, remembering the time and seeing the exhaustion on Dale’s face, and decided to shorten his answer. "Sometimes the hardest thing to cultivate is not Essence but patience. Perhaps even harder than bringing yourself to the Mage ranks! In all my years, patience is either the saving grace or the folly that leads to downfall.”

“In short, change from within society also requires that they have a place within society. Most infernal Essence cultivators lack this, due to how they are viewed socially. I believe your settlement is the only one in the current age where their acceptance is something that has been planned for.”

The old-looking man’s face seemed to darken. “Even then, I did notice where their particular building is positioned. Rogue comments of the clergy have also not escaped my notice as I passed earlier. I hear there’s a Father present with a keen interest in keeping an eye on them. This merely adds to what I mean about how closed off they must feel. Even here, no infernal student will be without scrutiny, and I expect strong words with at least a few of the professors to keep their biases in check. Now, Dale, this has been a pleasure, but I really need to go. I have a meeting to get to with the instructors. I'd love to do this again sometime."

"You can count on it. I am fairly certain that this is the most in-depth conversation I have ever had. I’ve been studying texts and reliving memories of others with no one around to help me understand them." Dale shook hands with the headmaster and turned away to head off, feeling much happier about the hard decisions he had needed to make recently.

He looked back to see Artorian undo a latch on his bag, releasing what appeared to be hundreds of pillows. They flowed from the bag like a river, somehow all making it through the doorway. Artorian looked over his shoulder, seeing that Dale was once again giving him an odd look. The older man shrugged. "I like pillows. I like them everywhere. All I have left to unpack now is a few dishes and clothes, so I'm going to get to it. Have a good day!"

Chapter Twelve

<And… done!> I shouted triumphantly as the last droplet of salt water splashed into the body-temperature pool. Fifty manors cut as pagodas, similar to a city I had seen a while back when fixing a ley line issue. I had thought the city was beautiful, and so I tried to replicate the grandest elements of it into my current design. Each building had a built-in bathroom, several spacious bedrooms, and a large common area for hosting parties. There were also workrooms and comparatively small training rooms attached, but the devices in them would be enough to make most early B-rank Mages drool with greed. There were even small exchange areas set up that would allow the Mages who entered here to give up a certain amount of tokens for specific rewards instead of random ones. A booklet attached to the kiosk detailed all the options available, and they were not cheap. Powerful, rare, but not cheap.

I felt good about my actions over the last… oops, three days? I hope Dani had been managing to run everything smoothly in my absence. I felt good as I lifted myself back to my Core. I felt strong, clear-headed, and… oddly powerful. What the… I ranked up! I was rank B-three now! When did that happen? How? What did I do to become more powerful? All I had been doing was creating a new level… and making it as close to perfect for my specific goal as possible. That… alright, would that work again? I almost dove right back down, but Dani somehow knew I was poking my mind up here; she jumped on the opportunity.

"Hey! You! Cal, you… you can't just run off for days at a time! I thought we were past this!" Dani was whizzing around frantically, and I knew right away that something else was bothering her.

<What's going on, Dani?> She was doing strange things, zipping back and forth to various monsters and grumbling.

"It's Grace! She's playing hide and seek, even though I told her that it was time for lessons on dungeon management!" Dani flew over to a Cat and stared at it, but it merely stared back unblinkingly. I figured that Dani didn't know how much Cats liked staring contests.

A quick scan of myself revealed the location of the tiny Wisp, and I almost laughed out loud. <She's in the door over there, Dani.>

"She is? Grace, get out from behind that door this instant!" Dani flew over, but the door slammed shut with a tremendous bang. The thing weighed over five tons, so the sound was quite impressive. Dani flew backward with a startled squeak, and I laughed out loud.

<I did say she was in the door, didn't I?> I laughed at the uncomprehending look I got. I pulled with a thin strand of Essence, and Grace popped out of the stone. <Here you go, delivery of one baby Wisp!>

Grace had turned a light yellow, which I took to be her sulking. <Hey now! You know I hate ruining games, but I'm more afraid of her than you, so…>

"As well you should be." Dani collected Grace and went flying off. "Minya is looking for you!"

<Thanks!> It didn't take long to find Minya; she was sitting on Manny and petting him at the base of his wings. That was pretty impressive, but… I wasn't entirely sure why she wasn't under attack right now. <Minya? Can I do anything for you? What’s going on?>

She glanced up with glazed eyes and a vapid smile. "Oh, he is so cute! Why is it that I never get to see them get made?"

<Because, from your perspective, all you would be able to see is a full-grown creature popping into existence. It looks like someone who was invisible coming out of hiding. Why are you hypnotizing Manny?> I was really concerned. I hadn't thought the Manticore could be enthralled like this.

"I'm not doing anything to him. He's just such a good boy!" She pet the scales under her hand hard as she said this, causing Manny to purr loudly. Maybe I had left too much feline in him. Minya looked up again, her eyes sharpening. "I'm here for my reward. I did a lot of work for you, and I think it's time that I get something more out of it."

<Oh really? What is it that you are after?> What was it with my dungeon born getting full of themselves? They didn't get it from me, did they?

"I started a… following. People that want to work for you, for the dungeon, in return for becoming powerful servants." Minya was beating around the bush too much for my liking. "Unfortunately, there are people on the surface that are seeing us as heretics, betrayers, and the like. They don't seem to think that the leaders working with you is as bad as working as a part of you. Basically, they need somewhere safe to live and work."

<You started a cult and now need a safe haven?> I cut through the fluff and watched her reaction. She didn't quite nod, but I got the idea. <That's fine. Really, I'm flattered. They will need to make binding oaths, of course. If that will be an issue, let them know not to come, or I'll feed them to the Cats.>

Minya smiled and thanked me, unhooking a keygem from Manny's claws before exiting the room. The Manticore jolted and hopped to his feet, looking around and growling menacingly. <Oh, so big and scary now, huh? I'm pretty sure that I heard you purring not two minutes ago you big faker.>

A raspy, growling voice came from the massive Beast, "Petting. Tricked out of treasure by petting."

<Eh. I've seen worse. Bye!> I had a… I don't know, a temple to make? Where do cultists sleep? Some kind of barracks? Hold on… oh, this would be funny. I went back down to the new level, the Mage's Recluse, and made comfortable apartments along one entire wall. They were beautiful homes, designed for small families, and they overlooked the beautiful tiny town I had made. They were far more straightforward than the other buildings I had constructed, and so the fifty apartments only took me around ten hours to design. Minya had decent timing; Mages were used to a certain level of… service when they lived somewhere. Mwa-ha-ha. The cultists probably thought they were going to become monsters or something. Maybe when they had proven their work ethic, but it would be fun to see their faces when they were assigned as servants to other humans for a good long time.

Although, until Mages started arriving, there would be nothing for them to do except for getting settled in and learn their new jobs. I worked on moving my Core and the Silverwood tree next, but I decided to have some fun with the Elves that were assigned guard duty. First, I had an Essence-rich steam pour out of the ground around my Core, obfuscating what I was doing. Then I quickly dropped the entire section and replaced it with a duplicate so that the Runescript around the room would remain fully active. As I sensed the Elves trying to get closer through the fog, I ignited the gas that had laced the mist. There was a blast and billowing flame for a few long moments, and when the smoke cleared, there was only a small mound and ashes remaining where my Core and the Silverwood tree had been.

They lost it. The Elves began freaking out, shouting at each other in their language and dropping their invisibility. One was crying, and I started to feel a little bad about my joke. Hmm… oh. Right. Without the tree, their race was going to become extinct. So… this joke made them think that they were all dead. Lovely. Well, to be fair, they shouldn't have burned all their bridges. Really, this tree wasn't even mature yet. Wasn't there a saying about eggs in a basket? I did hate to see grown Elves crying like this, though. It… was getting uncomfortable. Elves were not pretty criers. We're talking big sobs, blotchy faces, and bags under their eyes. That was just the males! Woof.

Before they went and told on me, I let the door I had created slowly and loudly grind open. The Elves looked at the new opening, tears drying quickly and facial expressions shifting to total embarrassment. I knew that if anyone saw how they had been acting, they would be mortified… I think I had some new statues to make and display. They walked down the stairs, apparently hopeful that they would find a new level with the Silverwood tree intact. Well… that was what they were going to get. Unfortunately for them, the new floor wasn't open for business right now. They walked along the houses, carefully searching for the threats of this level. Finding none, they eventually gathered around the tree, talked to each other a short while, shrugged, and returned to 'invisibility'. Too easy.

Chapter Thirteen

I was on my way to chat with Navigation Bob when I felt something tingle. Glancing around with a hint of confusion, I felt an expanding field of Essence pour over my newest floor. Oh! Oh, yeah! The convergence of ley lines over what had been the ocean dungeon was finally giving me Essence! It was enough that I couldn't use it all at once, and the corruption Cores that I used as filters were working overtime to clean the enormous amount of water taint that was coming through. I was worried I might need to offload some corruption collectors into the reservoir. Frankly, I was surprised that I hadn't been required to do so until now since the net of ley lines was continually expanding and growing. I had needed to fly for days to reach this disturbance in my network.

I'd get one of the Bobs to figure out their placement. No, actually… the amount of tainted liquid Essence flowing through the reservoir would likely pop someone who tried that with a fleshy body. I'd have to take care of it myself. I really needed to find a way to delegate this stuff. Maybe I could make a few golems that could handle the situation? That would work… if they were able to draw out the necessary Runescript. That was unlikely. I needed to talk to Bob first.

<Hey there, Navigation Bob! I was wondering where we're off to next?> I smiled to myself as Bob glanced around the room looking a bit put out.

"Pardon me, Great Spirit, but… are you giving me a name based off the work I do here?" Uh-oh. Right, I hadn't shared with them how I was remembering their individual functions.

Deciding it was better to be honest, I took a deep 'breath' and spoke, <Yes, I did. You do all of the plotting of our courses, so it just kind of stuck with me. If it is an issue, I'll come up with something else.>

Bob had tilted his head to the side. "No, no. I wasn't upset. Actually there are so many of me right now that we are having a difficult time speaking to the Goblin who is doing the work we need. We've been wearing numbers, but that has been feeling a bit degrading. Perhaps titles are what we need in order to function. Someone had suggested that we take different names, but who wants to be the one to give up a name given to them by the Great Spirit?"

<Titles, huh? I can see how those could be beneficial. I'm glad I was able to sort that out for you. Now about our destination…> I trailed off leadingly.

"Ah. Right. This one is going to be a bit harder of a sell. There is a known dungeon in this area, and there was a town in this location because of it. It isn't a Mage rank dungeon just yet, but from what I understand and from the rumors of power fluctuations coming off of it… the dungeon is not far from attaining the Mage ranks. I think that we have a couple of options. We could take the Core as it begins to ascend or nab it before it can. Grabbing a Mage-ranked Core would be much harder than taking a C-ranked one." Navigation Bob pointed at the map as he explained, and I agreed with his assessment.

<Great work, Navigation Bob,> I teased playfully. <It looks like we are a few days away, so I am going to go make preparations and get Dale to put together a team. If his beating went as his master wanted, Dale isn't going to go himself, so I need another option. Oh, maybe I can get Minya to go?>

"I'm… I'm not sure what's happening here, Great Spirit." Navigation Bob hadn't had me bouncing ideas off of him like this before. Oops. I tried to keep my manic side to those that were already 'in the know'.

<Don't worry about it! I'm off.> I probably should have just been quiet and vanished, but I was a tad embarrassed and flustered because of it. It's hard living up to the expectations of the ones relying on you and even harder to have fun with them when they are expecting that you either can't or won't.

Before I forgot to do it, I connected to the portal leading to my reservoir. Working through portals was tricky for me, but this place was technically still part of my dungeon. That made it manageable, even though I needed to expend a slightly higher degree of Essence and attention in order to make things happen on the other side. I needed to carve Runes along nearly the entire thing, from top to bottom, so it was a pretty draining experience. Luckily, the whole thing was mostly empty because the liquid Essence could have otherwise easily activated the Runes before they were ready. Being extra cautious, I even waited to add the activation sequences until after everything else was completed. I had to say, this place was pretty… freaky. It was neat, don't get me wrong, but someone who didn't know what it did could easily mistake it for something sinister.

The container was four hundred feet below where the base of my mountain had initially stood, and the interior was a sphere with a twenty yard diameter. This thing could contain over four million liters of liquid Essence at max capacity. This sucker was huge. The exterior was corruption-enhanced granite, followed by a layer of tungsten, lead, a very thin layer of Mithril, and then ceramic on the interior. To anyone scanning it with Mana or Essence, this should look like a giant ball of fecal matter. If that doesn't convince them to leave it alone, perhaps the actual night soil that I deposit around it would be enough if they started to dig. An entire city above me dumping their… stuff leaves a lot of cleanup. I could just absorb it for the Essence, but I like to think that this was more fun. I had even added some Runes to the area that would keep it 'fresh' for a few decades.

I inserted the corruption Cores throughout the ceramic layer and watched for a few minutes to make sure that everything was working correctly. The corruption in the air and liquid began rapidly decreasing, and I felt the strain of it around my own Core lessen significantly. Perfect. I was worried that there would be a buildup of corruption on my lower floors that would get out of hand and drive away my new potential tenants, not that there were many Mages strong enough to get to the lowest level. The Moon Elves were the elite of the Dark Elf race, and even they only had four guards that could take up position on this floor.

Well, I suppose that wasn't strictly accurate. Mainly, the difference was that other Mages were taking their time mapping out floors six and seven so they could be aided in cultivation or so their protégés could. I was also learning something interesting from the A-ranked High Mageous 'Madame Chandra'. She had come down here and begun mapping the floor all by herself. Back and forth she went, gathering all the possible ways I had learned to make plant Essence. She even seemed surprised by a few of them. Who would have guessed that earth, air, water, and fire were a way to make plant Essence? All four basic elements to form a single second tier type of power? It was because plants made breathable air by taking carbon from the air and ground. They did this from some interaction with light and water, and fire was a lower fragment of light. Fascinating stuff.

Well, after finding that out, she had gotten pretty excited and a teeny bit mad. From there, she had mapped all of the possible ways to achieve nature Essence, and after exhausting all possible avenues, she plopped down right there and began to cultivate. That hurt a bit because she drew in Essence like a whirlpool pulls in ships. Then… the most bizarre thing happened. She got… weaker? No… her cultivation rank dropped. She was pale and shaking, but when her eyes opened again and she smiled, I was in awe of her. She… she had upgraded her law! I hadn't even known that was possible! Was it because plant was a subset of nature? Could anyone enhance their powers with the knowledge I was offering? I needed to make the traps here deadlier. This… now it made sense why people kept freaking out about the paths I had made. I was going to need to put some kind of Boss monster between the tiers, or this place would be flooded with extra powerful Mages in no time flat.

Madame Chandra went from rank A-nine down to A-three, but as her power began to ripple out from her, it struck me as more condensed, more dangerous, more whole. She was now a tier-three nature High Mageous instead of a plant High Mageous. As she sat there, she seemed to be concentrating. She…! She just went up a rank! Two! She jumped to rank A-five over the course of a few hours! How? Her knowledge of and affinity for nature must be incredible!

She seemed to have progressed enough and got to her feet wearily. I could hear her speaking to herself, and I listened in closely. "All those years… and that was the key. Fire! I still can't believe it, but now it makes perfect sense! He even told me that fire had a place in the forest, and I laughed at him! I could have been here for a hundred years! I'm a stubborn old fool, needing to see it drawn out for me like a child. So many things that eluded me are clicking into place! My goodness, I bet fire could even be used in the growth cycle of- oof. Goodness me, that confirms it."

I created and dropped a jawbone on the ground just so I could visually represent the astonishment I was feeling at this moment. She had just increased in rank again! How deep was her understanding of the natural world, and how many revelations must she have had to reach rank A-six? I was figuratively drooling at the thought of gaining access to the memories, ideas, and concepts that must be floating around her brain. She took stock of her surroundings one more time, then began making her way into the next tier, this time frowning as she traced out the possibilities for upgrading into a higher law. I breathed a sigh of relief when I saw that the patterns became confusing for her. At the very least, she wasn't going to be moving to a higher understanding right now.

Still, her progress and increase in power was sickening. Where before she had been powerful, now she didn't even need to call upon her Mana to dominate my golems. She would walk up to them and give them a friendly pat on the chest, and they would crumble into dust. By attacking in this manner, she even shattered their Cores. The resulting blasts of Mana seemed to thrill her, and she stood in the reverberating power like someone enjoying the wind from a thunderstorm. Then she vanished.

<What in the…?> My various golems in the paths leading to the stairs exploded at that moment, the barrage of explosions shaking the entire floor and setting me back six hours. I would need to recreate every one of them individually. Let me guess: she was testing her speed. At least she was heading toward the newest floor. Maybe I would have some new residents that I could study closely. Perhaps a few memory Cores would be gently pressed against their heads as they slept… it was time to train my new servants.

Chapter Fourteen

“Hold, good folk of Basketville! Trust in your training, prepare the war hounds, and stand ready to fight!” The Mayor of Basketville stood on the ramparts of his town, doing all he could to bolster the spirits of his people. He knew, he knew, that this would be a battle they couldn’t win. But he had to try; he had to inspire and give hope to the people counting on him. The Mayor looked behind him, gulping and trying to hold back the tears threatening to pour down his cheeks.

The undead were here. There were ranks and formations of skeletons and zombies, but from his vantage, he could see that there were Abominations coming up from the rear. They were marching, getting closer and closer… then all at once, the undead stopped and a Demon, an abyss-blasted Demon stepped out of the mass of bodies and waved at them.

“Human filth.” The demon called lazily, obviously having used this same speech multiple times. “I am here as an ambassador of The Master. I have been instructed to give you all a choice. You are to join us, or you will die. These are your only options, and not choosing or delaying will ensure your demise. You have one minute to answer.”

The Mayor listened to his people shouting, and noted the silence of his town’s defenders. They were prepared to die, as long as they died fighting. No one had expected an option where they would survive the day, and this offer was breaking the resolve of more than one person. The Mayor needed to take matters into his own hands. “How do we know that we can trust this offer?”

“The Master demanded that I give this choice to all before we fought with them, and to accept whatever answer they gave us. I am bound to follow his laws.” The Demon shrugged, then decided that enough time had passed. “Your choice?”

The Mayor looked at his people, who had just gotten a spark of hope for the first time in weeks. “We… we surrender. We will join you.”

“Excellent. Open the gates so that we don’t need to smash them. I am so glad you made the right choice.” The Demon took a step forward, and the ranks of the dead moved as he did. The stone walls surrounding the town were ignored as the gate opened and the dead poured inside. When everyone was under control and accounted for, there was a slaughter that lasted mere seconds.

The Demon, coated in rapidly drying blood and viscera, gave a happy sigh as he cracked open a rib bone and sucked out the marrow. He looked around at all the slain townsfolk that were being reanimated and laughed. “I love it when they don’t see it coming. Thank the abyss that the order from The Master was so vaguely worded. After all, they did choose to join us…”

CAL

Two dozen of Minya’s cultists were approaching, and I was having fun watching the people move past gigantic Cats that had been ordered not to hurt them. The Cats seemed to be enjoying themselves as well, flexing their claws and releasing deep rumbling growls. Every single time they did so, all of the humans would flinch. They were all only humans, as it turned out. I listened in on them, laughing at what they were speaking about.

"You think that she's just bringing us here as a sacrifice to the dungeon?"

"Does it matter? If that is how I can serve the dungeon best, then so be it!" This lady had some serious advancement opportunities coming her way.

"Finally free from all that menial labor! Ugh, those guild members are insufferable! I only hope that I get the chance to ram an enchanted weapon into their guts someday when they trespass!" Taking note of that guy for sure; he may not like what his job was going to be down here if he couldn't stand adventurers. "If I ever had to bring them their dainty meals or tea again, I would have added as much poison as possible and made a run for it!"

Yeah, I didn't think he would last long in his new position. Maybe I should let them see their new quarters before asking them to make the oath to my service. In fact, I would give them a day in the hot spring pool that I had created, plenty of tasty food, and let them sleep in their new beds. If that didn't make them ready to say yes to anything, I didn't know what would. …Then again, they knew what they would be getting into. In terms of the oath, that is. Minya was leading the group down the service tunnels, which were usually reserved for Goblins or relaxation areas for my Mobs. Before they could enter the eighth level, I figured it was time to get this show on the road.

<Stop them here, Minya.> She held up her hand, and the others stopped next to her. <It's time for them to swear the oath. Otherwise, they will be too excited to say anything.> The humans with her were standing in a deep gloom, their weak eyesight failing to penetrate the darkness that surrounded them on all sides. Actually, it wasn't just darkness that was all around them, this was also the recreation room for all varieties of Cats in my dungeon. Even Snowball was in the room right now, being cuddled up to by three or four lesser Cats. He shouldered them aside as he got closer to the group, wanting to be the one to get the first kill if someone refused to swear the oath. If they had come this far, at this point, I would need to consider them traitors or spies.

One by one, Minya had them swear their oaths. I felt a connection spring up on each of them and smiled as I scanned them. Standard humans. Mostly non-cultivators looking for a cheat, a way around working for power. One or two of them, the real fanatics, actually had some serious health issues. One had all of his affinity channels blocked, and the other seemed to be on the verge of organ failure.

Ah. Opening a meridian would have killed her, so there was no way to cultivate past the lower levels without expensive and extensive healing. Most groups wouldn't want to devote those kinds of resources to someone who may not be able to repay them. I marked these two as leaders and looked at the last human without an oath… and grinned. Thank goodness, I had thought that my Cats would be going hungry!

The man in question was one of the worst complainers. He was fiddling with something and seemed to be getting frustrated that it wasn't working. It was either a beacon of some kind or an object that would facilitate his escape in most other situations. In this scenario, he was surrounded on all sides by corrupted stone, and I was in total control of all Essence in the area. This far down in my depths, my Mana was coating everything, and his low-ranked Essence couldn't break through even with the help of the Inscribed item he was carrying. Now he was beginning to panic. Interesting, it must have been some sort of escape device in that case. I was appreciative of the gift, but it was really too bad that- oh, there goes Snowball.

The other humans began to panic when one of their own was snatched away with a startled shriek. A snack for me and my Cats! <Sorry, Minya. Traitor. He had an interesting item on him, though. Any idea what this is?> I showed her an image of the object, and she swore loudly. Whoa. She hadn't even needed to look at the Runes or anything! That didn't bode well.

"I'll tell you in a minute. We need to get these people somewhere safe first." Minya looked around with some expression on her face that I hadn't seen before. I'm guessing it was something like 'not in front of the new people'. That was fine. I opened the doors slowly, adding an air of majesty and wonder. The first set of doors opened by splitting in half, one part going upward, one down. The next doors opened by going to the left and right, and the final set split diagonally.

All of these were now my people and so could hear me when I spoke to them. For the very first time, they listened to the voice of the dungeon! <Welcome, my new minions. Welcome… to the Mage's Recluse! If you will follow Minya, we will get you all to your new homes.> Soft silver light from the Silverwood tree was the first thing they were able to see, followed shortly by the glowing lights along the walkways and in the beautiful manors. They stepped onto the floor, jaws dropping and eyes widening at the splendor. Small birds flew around, chirping happily although the floor was locked in what appeared to be a perpetual twilight. The cultists walked as though they were in a dream, watching everything around them in awe.

Their first step was getting close to their homes, but before they went inside, I had Minya bring them to a small hot spring that was reminiscent of - if much more modest than - the one on the Goblin's floor. They were all instructed to bathe and get into their new uniforms. All of them had matching robes that shimmered with iridescent silver. This would identify my employees, and any Mage who harmed them would quickly find themselves locked out of this floor and having a tough time in the dungeon. The next step was feeding them, and it was amusing to see them almost fight over a practically endless resource.

It wasn't overly surprising to me. After all, there were only three types of people who would make a deal with something generally considered to be a ruthless, mindless, soulless killer of people. There were your desperate people, like King Henry, who had need of great power to help others. Fanatics, who really thought that I was a higher power of some kind. Wrong, but cute in its own way. Then there were the selfish people, the people who wanted to be powerful without the hard work, without putting in the time.

While this group had a few fantastic fanatics, it was stuffed with the supremely selfish. If these people thought there was a way to get a benefit, they would happily kill each other for it. As they finished eating, I decided that it was time to set the rules. <Welcome, my new residents. You have now taken my hospitality, eaten my food, and pledged yourselves to me in a very binding manner. It is now time for you to learn what you are going to be doing for… well, not forever, but a good long time.>

At my words, the majority of people seemed to become wary. I guess they didn’t really understand what it meant to come in here and swear oaths to me. Well, they were about to find out. I laid out their duties and roles, putting the fanatics in positions of power over the others. There was deep complaining, but when the first one to loudly shout 'I refuse to work as a servant' simply fell over, the others got real quiet. He was checked by one of the others, and when the fallen man was pronounced dead, the others looked around in abject fear. <Hey, I didn't force you all to swear binding oaths that would kill you if you broke them. You came down here after being told that was the case, correct, Minya?>

"That's correct." She seemed disgusted by their behavior, shocked that they had been acting like spoiled children. "Though I would have never guessed that they didn't understand that. Next time, I will ensure that my fellow parishioners truly believe!"

<I'm still not a deity, Minya. I have no need for that, and hubris is something I'd rather avoid.> She rolled her eyes and ignored me. I sent the cultists off to bed, letting them know that a Bob would be here in the morning to teach them their jobs. Etiquette Bob had been given memory stones from the human courts, so it was going to be his job to command and train all of these whiners. Mage's Recluse was going to be a success, or I would let the Cats in here and try again with a fresh set of… employees.

Looking around the area, I noticed that Madame Chandra had already set up shop in the manor closest to the Silverwood tree and furthest from the others. She was taking a nap, which, at her rank, was entirely optional. I was amazed once more by her massive increase in power and decided right then that I needed to make her a true ally. It was time to start doing things the human way. It was time to begin sending bribes.

Wait! I had nearly forgotten to learn what Minya knew about the item I had taken off the traitor! I turned my attention to her, and she grinned at nothing as she walked. "Hello there, Cal. I'm so sorry about that whole situation. If I had known they would be like that… I really thought that they were like me, wanting to see you succeed for no other reason than to have you become powerful."

<It's fine, Minya. If they shape up, they are going to live very happy lives and become more powerful than they ever could have elsewhere. I really want to know more about this… is it a bell?>

Minya stopped walking and grimaced. "It's called a ‘return bell’. It is one part of a two-part item. By infusing Essence or Mana into the Runes, the activator can ring the bell and will be 'returned' to the other part of the item. It doesn't have that great of a range, though, and it has… other issues."

<Such as?>

"Well, the first thing that comes to mind is that there are no teleport protections in place for it. If you ring that and something had been placed over the return pad, you get torn into pieces and will probably fall to chunks. Also, infusing it with Essence is slow, and the further you are from the return pad the more power you need to add to it. Oh, and you leave behind an explosion of the Essence or Mana used to power it. That guy was trying to escape and kill all the humans he was around." Minya waved that information off, taking a deep breath before continuing.

"The most important point: that particular item is exclusive to the Adventurers’ Guild. Only high-ranked people can get access to it, and even then, it is almost only used by guild spies or informants. If the Guild is acting like this… we are going to start having serious issues with them soon, at a time where we cannot afford to do so.”

<So you are saying that the Guild is trying to spy on us? Literally the most powerful organization on the planet, the group that has members from all races, that has its hands in every political venture… is spying on me?> My voice was incredulous, and for good reason. The Guild had members that could tear this place apart, so having them spying on me was something I had never bothered to consider.

“Well… they are at least trying to.”

<But… why?>

Chapter Fifteen

"I don't understand what I'm doing wrong here." Dale's entire body language screamed frustration. "This is a simple application of aura, isn't it?"

"Is anything really so simple, Dale? Has there been a time when you have made real progress without also suffering setbacks and consequences?" Craig was trying to help him through learning various aura signatures, but Dale kept meeting with frustration. “Aura is very difficult to master at the beginning, though progress increases rapidly as you use it properly.”

"I just don't understand why such a minor difference should make such a drastic change in the outcome." Dale's voice was full of defeat, making Craig want to roll his eyes in annoyance. He held himself back thanks to his long years of training as a Monk, but it was a close call.

"Dale. The difference between blood and water is a few extra minerals and tiny meaty chunks, yes?" Craig paused only a moment before launching back into speech, "Do you think that replacing your blood with water would let you be as comfortable as you are currently?"

"Oh, come on, that's-"

"Different?" Craig reached forward and poked Dale in the head. "Of course it is! That's what I'm trying to say! Now, I understand that this is a rare application, but it will give you versatility in the lower levels of aura that are hard to match. It would be an amazing defense against nearly all forms of attack that are not purely physical. Also, you can thank your friend the dungeon that we have this information in the first place."

"Oh, what a generous donation," Dale deadpanned. "The dungeon is amazing, after all. Is there any more information or help you can offer?"

"Hmm. Well, I'm sorry to say that this is simply one of those auras that I am unable to create or control. Luckily, you show extraordinary control for your rank, so the real issue for you is maintaining and empowering your aura. I’d say you have a leg up on a few C-ranked folks." Craig patted Dale on his back and smiled kindly. "Try again."

"I'm still trying to figure out why I am trying to learn to create a disenchanting water aura," Dale grumbled as he deftly began to move strands of his aura around. He needed to ensure that he got everything correct, but he also couldn't let the water touch him. Craig had him practicing over a small chunk of cursed earth that they had excavated from the dungeon. Dale's attention had slipped during his reverie, and he was jolted back to reality as Craig tore a chunk of his Essence out of his hands once again.

"That was a nasty contact poison you just created, Dale. Perhaps my comment about your control was preemptive?" Craig was shaking his head at his student. "Are my lessons so boring that you would rather have your arms cut off than keep learning?"

"No, it's just that-" Dale was cut off as a door slammed open and a guild representative rushed in.

"Baron Dale!" The man was gasping, an impressive feat for a cultivator that had done something as simple as running. "There is a man here from Guild headquarters… he is demanding to see you and all of your councilors."

"Um. Thank you, but why is this so urgent?" Dale walked over to a nearby table to get a glass of water for the distraught man.

"He… he said that if you are not meeting with him in thirty minutes, he would tear this mountain out of the sky and drop it in the ocean." The man shuddered. "M'lord, that was twenty minutes ago. We couldn't find you!"

<I'm sorry, what now?>

Dale ignored the voice in his head and left the room at a sprint, the already exhausted Guild member running alongside him to bring him as close as possible to his destination. One final door barred the way, so Dale threw it open, smashing the wood to splinters as it impacted the wall.

A thick man in armor with deep Runescripting turned and glared at the new arrival. "Baron Dale?"

"Yes, I'm here." Dale shook himself out of his panic, clearing his throat and trying to appear presentable. There was a suffocating feeling given off by the man, just by him existing and being in the same area.

"Good, we are finally all here. Dale, by the authority vested in me as liaison to the guild, I hereby order you to stand aside in matters pertaining to the dungeon. You are also to hand over control of the city of 'Mountaindale'," the large man sneered at this obviously narcissistic naming scheme, "to someone more qualified to lead it. The Guild will also be assuming control of this academy and taking a direct hand in the running and maintaining of the building and curriculum. All students will be given higher quality resources as well as entry to the Guild upon completion of their academic studies and be excused from service until they reach at least the C-ranks. Until we go to the war or the war comes to us, that is. Then everyone will need to fight if they want to survive."

"What?" Dale retorted with a combination of rage and confusion lacing his voice. "You can't just-"

"I can and already did. These orders are already in place. Also, welcome to the war." The unknown man had a smirk appear on his face at that comment. "All Guild members are ordered to submit themselves to the war effort. We had politely asked for reinforcements against the necromantic horde, but we are past that now."

The other members of the council had also gathered in the room, and High Mageous Amber stepped forward and glared at the man. "Even so, you cannot remove him from his position. Baron Dale was confirmed in his position by two separate Kingdoms, and you-"

"Silence," the man cut her off with a single whiplash word. "I know exactly how he got this position, and I also know most of what has been going on here. Unfortunately, both of those Kingdoms have fallen already. I understand that surviving members of the Royal families are living here, but they have no power. As it stands, they could not order a single person to respect their authority. They have none. They are currently fairly strong civilians. That. Is. All."

The man waited a few moments so that his words would sink in. "You will comply with my orders, or you will be tried for dereliction of duty. By me. The penalty during a wartime situation is death. Oh, also, all titles of Nobility given to the members of fallen Kingdoms, Queendoms, fiefdoms, or political groups are now null and void. There is no more 'Baron Dale'. There is only Dale, a man who earns a five percent stipend based off of the export or sale of goods from this dungeon. You no longer are the ruler, leader, or owner of this land. It belongs to the Guild. Also, the lavish suite you were granted has been repurposed. We will hold your items for one day to give you time to find a new place to live, and your goods will be delivered if you do so.”

“What?” Dale couldn’t believe what was happening. “What about my projects, the commitments the city made? The alliances we have secured?”

“All deals that have been made will be honored by the Guild. Heck, we’ll even give bonuses to the people who set them all up.” The man seemed to be getting upset by having all these low-powered fools staring at him. “In fact, the Dark Elves are going to be getting special deals and requests from us. It’s already been discussed, agreed upon, and sealed with their leadership.”

“I did nothing of the sort.” Brianna stepped forward threateningly. “Do not overstep your bounds-” She was cut off as the man unfurled a document that had the stamp of the Dark Elf Queen embossed on it. No one would be foolish enough to falsify that seal, as it would mean their death, the death of their families, and possibly being raised by a necromancer just so you could be killed again. 

“I’m done now. Get out of my sight, all of you." As the others slowly started moving away, shocked by the brutal change, the man softly growled a few more lines that were almost hard to hear. "Been here living it up, relaxing, and playing with the dungeon… the rest of us have been working to save the world. Things are going to change around here. Things are going to change."

Brianna appeared next to Dale for an instant and murmured into his ear, “He can’t take away your Elven authority. Remember that, Duke Dale. Only my mother could, and that was not included on that document.” Then she was gone like smoke in the wind, leaving Dale to wonder how this information would help him.

A state of shock had set in as what had previously been the council walked away from the meeting room. Tyler reached out and gripped Dale's wrist. "Dale, are… are you okay?"

"You know what, I just don't know. Maybe this is for the best. I don’t think that I have what it takes to be a Noble anyway. Take a look at my city: I either care too much about issues, or I don't seem to care at all. I could never seem to find a nice middle ground for moderate care distribution. Beyond that, when was the last time I went dungeon diving in this dungeon? I’ve been in meetings and training, but I haven’t progressed much further because I am not actively cultivating.” Dale chuckled darkly, and all the others could do to help was pat him on the back and disperse.

After all, without land, a title in the human areas, protections from multiple Kingdoms, or enormous piles of money… Dale was just a D-rank four cultivator. Everyone else was someone with actual power or at least responsibilities. In moments, Dale stood alone in the hallway.

Chapter Sixteen

<Well, hey there, Dale. At least you’ve always got me. As in, feel free to come on down and visit. Snowball, in particular, is eager to see you.> My voice seemed to startle the man out of his stupor, and he walked off with an angry spring in his step. <What’s the rush, Dale? Got a hot date?>

“Nope. I just lost almost everything, and my only hope now is to become powerful enough that people can’t take away the rest of it. I’ve pissed off a bunch of Nobles that no longer need to worry about retribution from the crown or governments.” Dale started walking faster, his inherent paranoia ratcheting up another notch. “I’m already in the Guild, so my only hope is the Guild, even though they just screwed me over. It is highly unlikely that such a large organization holds personal animosity toward me, but I need to take precautions.”

<I mean, the Dark Elves have a deal with you directly, don’t they?> These guys were pretty powerful, and it was unlikely others would pick on Dale.

“I can’t rely on them. As I have no political clout anymore, someone killing me off gets them out of any obligations they have to me. No, I need to do something outrageous.” Dale was jogging now, which to mere non-cultivators would be an unattainable sprint. He ran into a building, right to someone sitting at a desk. Dale’s abrupt appearance seemed to freak out the bureaucrat, and his next demand even more so. “Enroll me at the academy as a direct disciple to Headmaster Artorian.”

“B-baron Dale?” The man sank back into his role as soon as he realized that this was a work-related visit. “Ah… while he does get the option to have a direct disciple, the Headmaster has indicated that he doesn’t want one.”

“This is an order. Register me as a student right now, and put me directly in the care of Artorian. I do own the academy.” Dale stared the man down, but even though he started shivering, the man shook his head.

“I can make you a student right now, but this needs to be approved by the Headmaster. He has a level of autonomy that I, as a simple administrator, can’t touch. They wouldn’t want me making decisions for the high and mighty, right?” Handing over a form, the man continued, “You need to have him sign this, and your new position will take effect right away. Welcome to the Academy, cadet. Er… Baron.”

“Thank you. He just needs to sign this?” Dale grabbed the paper, and when the man nodded, Dale ran out of the room. He charged over to the Headmaster’s residence, pounding on the door as soon as he arrived.

“What is going on down there?” Artorian’s head peeked over the edge of his roof, his expression clearing up as he saw Dale at the door. “Oh, if it isn’t the young Noble who started the academy. Please, come on up.”

Dale had no idea how he was supposed to do that when the door was locked, but he decided that he didn’t care much about property damage right now. He turned away, coming back with a running start. His momentum let him get a few feet up the wall before slamming his Mithril-clad boots into the wall creating footholds. Pushing off, Dale only needed to jump twice more before he was standing in front of the Headmaster.

“Didn’t you build this place? There is a stairwell in the back.” Artorian was fully surrounded by pillows; in fact, the entire rooftop could be called a hedonistic hotspot. Exotic foods and drink were on display, a hookah was releasing a small amount of smoke, and not a single inch of the rooftop was visible. Pillows of various thickness and color covered it entirely. “Oh, um. Shoes off, please, if you are going to be staying.”

“What are you doing up here?” Dale was shocked at the tendencies of the Headmaster, and this was his first day on the job!

“Cultivating and preparing for my meetings with the other faculty.” Artorian took in Dale’s disheveled appearance, noting the paper in his hand. “What are you doing here?”

“Oh. Right, I need you to sign this.” Dale handed over the form, but after reading it, Artorian recoiled as if he had been handed a snake.

“Are you out of your mind? I can’t devote the required time a direct disciple would need from me. No, thank you for the offer, but I am not interested.” He tried to hand the paper back to Dale, but the young man shook his head.

“I don’t need your tutelage; I need the protection and resources that would come with being your disciple. You don’t even need to provide them, the academy will do that.” Dale looked the Headmaster in the eye. “I know the exact requirements you need to fulfill in order to become the Headmaster permanently. I also need to join the Academy, and I need you to sign this right now.”

“You are bribing me? Or is this blackmail of some kind?” Artorian shook his head… then grinned. “I like it. A cultivator needs to know when brute force will not work and when they will need to turn to other methods.”

Artorian took the form and signed it with his essence signature, eschewing the standard use of a quill. After handing the document back to Dale, he seemed to come to his senses and hesitantly voiced the thoughts in his head. “Now that I think about it, why do you need to be a disciple? You own this place and all the resources…”

“Not anymore.” Dale shook his head and sighed. “The Guild has removed all power from anyone from the ‘Fallen Kingdoms’, as they are calling them. All titles of Nobility are gone, all land ownership contracts are now voided because the Kingdoms are no longer in power. For example: Artorian, get off my mountain.”

The Headmaster stared at him, remaining seated on his overstuffed pillows. He leaned over and took a long draw from the hookah before speaking again. “What was that supposed to accomplish?”

Dale let his head roll back and around to loosen his neck. “Before, you would have been forced to leave my mountain by any means possible, as fast as possible. Now, all I am is a D-rank cultivator with more gold than is typical for my status. I needed to join the academy, else I would have likely been sent to the frontlines by the Guild. I’m fairly certain they want me gone.”

“Son, if the Guild wants you gone, I don’t think this is going to stop them.” Artorian closed his eyes and breathed in deeply. “Ah, that’s the stuff.”

“What are you doing?” Dale looked at the man lying on his pillows and smoking cultivator-specific tobacco.

“Cultivating.”

“Like that?” Dale was scandalized; how was he going to achieve balance when he was draped over a space like that?

“Mmm. Should I be in a rigid lotus position, then?” Artorian blew out a ring of smoke, smiling as it made a perfect circle around the sun. “That’s not my methodology. I’m a starlight cultivator; I need as much of my body open to the sun as possible.”

“Are… are you naked under those pillows?” Dale felt slightly sick about that thought; wasn’t he going to be meeting teachers soon? “Also, starlight? Why aren’t you cultivating at night? What does the sun have to do with it?”

“Is this knowledge that you truly seek to learn? No, no, not that information, I'm clothed. This weave of tunic is loose enough that there is very little impediment to the sunlight. My cultivation is simply different than what you seem to think of as ‘normal’.” Artorian took a deep breath and smiled. “My method is much different than any other, as it was entirely designed and created by me. I was an old man, steeped in corruption and philosophy when I made my first breakthrough. From there, this has always been enough for me.”

“Sunlight? I thought you said you were a starlight cultivator?” Dale was confused enough that he hadn’t even run to return the form. “How is your cultivation method different?”

“A common misconception. The sun is a star. I can cultivate day or night, but I have much better results during the day, as the Essence is more abundant. Of course, this dungeon and my proximity to the dungeon are excellent supplements to my method. My cultivation is focused on the outward instead of the inward. If you look at me with Essence empowering your eyes, you should be able to see that there are no spirals in my cycle, only circles. My entire cultivation base is circling outward and blazing with starlight. I am a beacon to those looking at me, and the light purifies my Core and body daily. This leads to faster breakthroughs, weaker bottlenecks, and longevity that cannot be measured. The downside is that I need to cultivate every day without fail to replace the Essence that is being used. For this reason, I am still in the C-ranks and likely will remain here for years. At least… I would have if I were not here.”

“Purifying light… I don’t suppose you would be willing to share the secrets to the path of sunlight?” Dale hopefully questioned.

“I see no reason not to.” Dale’s eyes widened at the thought of using sunlight as an aura to begin purifying himself. “Twelve parts water, one part air, three parts fire, and eight parts celestial Essence.”

“No way.” Dale shook his head. “Are you telling me that you had four naturally occurring affinities? You would have never made it to your fifties.”

“Heh. Dale, Dale. Why do you think that I am still using my Essence to purify myself?” Artorian made a ‘go away’ motion at Dale. “Thirty years is not enough time to remove fifty years of taint. Now, shoo. My instructors should be arriving anytime now.”

Dale nodded and did a backflip, landing on the ground dozen feet below. Artorian’s’ voice floated down after him. “Showoff!”

Dale took off, returning to the administration building. He was apparently expected because the bureaucrat that had helped him previously was now glaring at him. “Ah. Hello there, Baron Dale. I’ve been informed that there have been some changes to your status recently. You should have never been admitted to the school; you have no backing, no extraordinary talent, no-”

“Indeed, there have been some changes,” Dale cut the man’s rant short. “I am now the direct disciple of the Headmaster. Here is the form.” After handing over the paper, Dale waited until the man grudgingly gave him his room assignment and the tasks that he would need to complete in order to remain enrolled in the academy.

“As the Headmaster’s disciple, you have extra quotas and deadlines for advancement. You can attend any classes you want, but the only tests are advancement. Miss the deadlines on what you need to give to the school, and you are gone.” Now that Dale was no one of importance, the attitude toward him had already shifted dramatically. “Good luck.”

Chapter Seventeen

<You think so, do ya?> I was gently scoffing at the man who was walking by himself in the dungeon, shouting orders at me.

“Dungeon, if you don’t start flying toward the coordinates I’ve given you, I will knock this mountain out of the sky and drag it to where I want it to go.” This was the third time he had shouted this order, and I was starting to think he was a bit too full of himself. Sure, he was an S-ranked individual, and I had no idea what he was actually capable of, but I highly doubted he would kill everyone here just because I was ignoring him. “I’m told that you have some slight intelligence, so I’ll give you a small demonstration.”

He was now on the floor my Goblins called home - level three - and I instantly gave the order for them to evacuate. I was too late. He huffed - just a light exhalation of air - and a miasma of green light appeared in front of him. He blew on it, and from there, the light expanded to cover the entire floor. His body went rigid, his eyes glassy, and his jaw slack. Odd. I watched everything that was going on, and it was easy to see that a few students saw the strange energy cover them. They looked down and around in confusion, but a sharp word issued from the S-ranker - somehow not from his body but from the miasma directly - and they no longer worried about anything.

I was confused. I had just lost all connection to everything on that level. There was an enormous hole in my influence that perfectly fit the bounds of that floor. I quickly shunted my influence through a makeshift portal between floors to recapture my control and worked to re-establish a tiny bit of connection on that floor. When I could see into the room, I still couldn’t quite understand what I was seeing. The entire floor was empty. No fortifications, no Goblins, no people at all. The strange part was: I didn’t get any Essence from the loss, which was even more confusing and disturbing.

Did he not kill everything? Just then, the green light finished returning to the man, condensing in front of him. When it was all there, it shrank down to a small ball of energy. He opened his mouth again, and the energy flew in, vanishing as he swallowed. Did he just eat my floor? He ate other humans too! Cannibal! Wait a moment… that was an illusion! Not in a good way, the eating of my floor and such, I meant his ears! This was a High Elf, not a human! Not a cannibal, technically. Still, I… I didn’t know what to do. I have nothing that could even scratch this guy, nothing I… all I could think of was to get the word out, perhaps sully his reputation?

I concentrated on what was above me, way up to the surface, and created a statue in a public area. Technically, I made it underground and pushed it upward on a slab of stone, but the idea is the same. The figures were a detailed representation of what had just happened, showing the panic on the student’s faces, the Goblins, the empty area around this Elf. I even placed his ears as they really were, showing that he was a High Elf. Then I returned my attention to his threats. He was sitting down and absorbing the energy he had just consumed, but after a moment, he stood and belched. Gross.

“As you should be able to tell by now, I have no qualms destroying every single person here if it means that I get access to a mobile flying fortress like this. Being able to launch our initiatives from the air would grant us battle superiority in most situations. One of the great weaknesses of the undead is that until they reach incredible heights of power, they are cursed to remain upon the ground. You will comply, or I will pluck your Core out of its position and seal it in a weapon. If the Guild cannot use this as a base, no one will. Ever.” The dark undertone of his words was freaking me out. He whirled around and left the dungeon with a sonic boom trailing after him.

I made my decision. <Bob. What does our timetable look like for arrival at the next place blocking my ley lines?>

“We should be there tomorrow, Great Spirit,” Navigation Bob confirmed for me quickly.

<This is the only one that we know of that is using Mana to block us, correct?> I looked over the map. With the additional power given to me through the ley lines, I had been able to empower their creation. It was a happy feedback loop that let me grow my network faster and faster.

“As far as we know,” Bob confirmed once again.

<Good. After we get there and destroy that place, we will be following… a new course.> My words were heavy, and it was challenging to say this aloud.

“Great Spirit?”

<We will be… following the orders of the… Adventurers’ Guild. They have threatened to destroy this entire place and tear out my Core if we don’t comply.> I was really beating myself up about this. I should have expected something like this to happen the second I started to let others know that I had a mind. Dani had warned me, told me that other people knowing I could understand them would be dangerous. I just hadn’t expected it to be like this. This was… I was being pressed into slavery, and I knew it. As soon as I had the chance, as soon as this S-ranker was gone… I was out of here. I would be eating that portal that connected me to other locations and running for it.

“…What?” Oh right, I was still next to Navigation Bob.

My resolve set, I spoke grimly, <Navigation Bob, I need you to gather the others. Bob Prime especially. We are going to be working on a new project together.>

“What should I tell the others this is about?”

<We are going to be looking for a weakness. We won’t be shackled for long, Navigation Bob. We’re going to be hunting an S-ranker.>

“That’s… ambitious.”

<It’s also necessary. We’ll be free one way or another.>

“I prefer the version of freedom where we remain alive.”

<Yeah, well, we’ll take what we can get.> I paused a moment and directed my thoughts at this S-ranked jerk, even though I knew he wouldn’t hear me. <I hope you live each day like it’s your last. You know why? Because I am going to kill you, but I’m also awful with dates and schedules.>

DALE

“Baron Dale!” A messenger was running up to the new cadet, but Dale held up a hand to forestall any information.

“I’m sorry to tell you this, but I am no longer a Baron. Is this message still applicable?” Dale questioned the heaving courier.

Hesitating, the man eventually made a ‘no idea’ gesture and relayed the information. “A statue came out of the ground in the main courtyard. It shows Guild Elder Sorbere… it depicts him killing a dozen students along with nearly a hundred Goblins and… and…”

“Spit it out!” Dale barked at him, already disgusted by the details. It was nice to finally learn the man’s name, though.

That had been a poor choice of words, even if Dale didn’t know what had happened yet. The messenger paled further and looked a bit sick. “It shows him eating them, sir.”

“You’re joking,” Dale flatly responded, not quite able to comprehend the joke the man was telling him.

“I’m not.”

“Alright. Um. Hmm.” Dale went silent for a moment. “Please go find Hans, Tom, Adam, and Rose. Do you know who they are?”

“I do. Your party is well-renowned. That is, many people talk about you. Ah…” Now blushing after saying a little too much, the messenger almost ran off right away but was stopped once again.

“Thank you for letting me know you think of us, hopefully in a good light. Can you ask them to meet me at the entrance to the dungeon as soon as possible? After that, find one of the council members, not Tyler, and ask them to retrieve that statue. I am going to go down and take a look at what happened.” Dale waited until he got a nod, then tossed the man a silver coin and went to get prepared. “Why are we fighting this guy? Why is he randomly killing people? It doesn’t even make sense for the Guild to be acting like this.”

Dale waited patiently for everyone to arrive and explained the situation to all of them. Hans, as usual, was the first to speak up. “How about we get the heck out of here before we piss him off? Do you know who he is? His name is Sorbere, but he is known as Barry the Devourer. He is able to infuse his entire cultivation and soul into an attack, converting everything affected into Essence or Mana. Do you know why he can just kill anyone or anything he wants? Because that was part of his contract to get into the Guild. He was so strong that they were forced to recruit him instead of sending an army of fellow S-rankers after him. For this guy to be here… something must have gone really wrong. The war must be going worse than we expected or were told.”

“Are you telling me that sending proof that he killed a dozen people out of hand to the Guild will be ignored?” Dale froze up at Hans’ nod, entirely uncertain how to deal with this situation.

“So, if we do nothing, we go to war. If we do something, he might eat us?” Rose almost gagged at the sickening thought.

“At least we know why he isn’t going up against the necromancers directly.” Adam shook his head, then flicked his eyes back and forth at the people giving him strange looks. “What, seriously? You just said that he invests his soul in his attacks. Don't you think a necromancer would be able to take advantage of that? Especially one as powerful as this ‘Master’ fellow?”

“Well… that was just a rumor. But… it does make sense.” Hans rubbed at the stubble growing on his chin. “So now what?”

“I don’t know about you, but I joined the Academy so that I wouldn’t be sent off to war at my current ranking.” Dale tossed his gauntlet-clad hands into the air in frustration. “Apparently, it’s just as dangerous to stay here, though!”

“Dale, I hope you will not let this fear control you, even if the Guild controls us all right now.” Tom stepped forward so that all eyes were looking up at him. “Listen, what have we done every single time something horrible and unexpected is happening? We persevere. When that Distortion Cat attacked us, when a horde of infected attacked the city, when you personally bet your life on rescuing a Wisp… why would we now let a single known threat stop us? We will get past this, through this, as a team.”

Rose nodded at Tom’s inspiring speech. “I agree. It is like my Grandma likes to say: everything you’ve ever wanted, everything that will make you happy, is on the other side of fear. If we don’t take risks, if we don’t power through this, we will never find what we need.”

A new voice interrupted them, making the blood freeze in their bodies, “What pretty sentiments.”

Barry was shaking his head at them as he strolled forward. “Do you have nothing else to do? A war to prepare for, perhaps? Move.” He continued forward, not bothering to stop while talking to them. The party scrambled out of his way, which was for the best. If they hadn’t, the S-ranked man would have walked through them. In a far more literal fashion than they would have liked.

Chapter Eighteen

“So. Now what?” Hans grinned nervously as Barry sauntered away. The others gave helpless shrugs and made as if to leave.

“Hold on.” Dale had a bit of fire coming back into his voice. “The only way out of this sort of situation is to become stronger. When we finally get to a point where we can feel safe from that sort of person, then we can go relax in a corner or hide from the world.”

“You do realize that he has likely been cultivating for several hundred years to get to the point he is at now?” Adam queried with resignation in his voice.

“So we do it faster,” Dale affirmed gravely. “He never had the resources we do. A dungeon with no affinity? Seriously, why don’t we stay down there for a few days or weeks at a time?”

“Some of us have a social life?” Hans chuckled when Dale rolled his eyes and head so hard that he almost fell over. “Hey, it isn’t my fault you always ran off and had meetings to get to. Also, I haven’t found a single decent ale or mead down in the dungeon.”

“…You know what?” Adam tapped his stave while deeply considering the situation. “Neither have I. Because… who drinks in a dungeon, right?”

“Right?” Tom played right into Adam’s trap with this single word.

“So do you think that the dungeon has recipes for alcohol down there? If not, we may be able to get a reward for items it has never taken before.” Adam smiled, as did the other people around him.

“Finally! A reason to go to the tavern!” Hans cheered and turned to face the bar like a compass needle pointed to the north.

“You never needed one before, did you?” Rose acidly sniped at him.

Hans ignored her, a situation that was becoming more and more commonplace. They went to the tavern and - through a heroic haggling effort - managed to get a small cask of every type of booze and drink they made. If they had told the bartender the eventual destination of the drinks, he would have assuredly stopped them. So far, the dungeon hadn’t been making anything like these, so it was assumed that it didn’t have the recipes. The staff at the bar would certainly want to keep it that way.

As they rolled the small barrels into the dungeon proper, Dale heard a sigh in his mind as the dungeon took notice of them. The mental voice was the most lackluster Dale had ever heard. <Alright, what’s this now?>

“Booze for the dungeon!” Hans called out loudly. “Come get your booze, bo~o~oze here!”

“What are you doing?” Adam asked the overly loud Assassin.

“Enticing the dungeon.”

<No he isn’t.>

“No you aren’t.” Dale shook his head, though he smiled while doing so. Hans had a way of breaking tension, and it was actually really nice of him to do so since they were all pretty tense currently.

<I have a totally empty floor right now, Dale.> Dale went still; he wasn’t used to this kind of serious tone. <That S-ranker tore the entire level, everything, and everyone on it out of my depths. It was completely desolated; there wasn’t even Essence left in the area, and I’m needing to reclaim that space with influence! Unless I shut the dungeon down for a few days, it may be weeks before that level is back to its previous functionality. He also threatened to kill everyone here and knock me out of the sky if I don’t meet his demands. I messed up, Dale. I messed up bad. Even the hot springs bath is gone!>

Dale was now placed in the uncomfortable position of needing to comfort a dungeon, which was also somehow himself, while others looked on curiously. “Um. There, there, big guy.”

<Did I give you all my idiocy when I put your soul back in your body or something?> Dale flushed even further. <‘There, there’? Really?>

“Soul…? Right!” Dale shouted as the others jumped away from the suddenly loud man. “Cal. I have information - really, it is only a rumor so don’t get too excited - that Barry puts his entire soul into his attack when he does something like that. Does that sound realistic or at all familiar? We think that is why he isn’t on the front lines fighting necromancers.”

<It… yeah, it kind of does, now that I think about it.> Dale waited for a few moments, and just as he gave up and was going to do something else, the conversation continued, <Interesting. I may actually have something that I can do about it. Not for a while and not for certain, but… maybe. What do you want for this information? The booze too, I suppose.>

Dale looked around, and sure enough, the small barrels were gone. “Sneaky. We want safe areas on each level. We want to stay down here cultivating for days on end without needing to worry about being attacked all the time.”

<Safe areas? That might have been a better idea than making an entire town down there…>

“I’m sorry, what?” Dale wasn’t sure that he had heard Cal correctly.

“Don't worry your mutated little head about it. So you just want areas where you can cultivate. Who wants to sit in a room doing nothing but breathing all day? That sounds dreadfully boring.>

“If you’d rather just offer us Essence directly…” Dale trailed off, getting a more verbose response than he expected.

<Go fight a Cat. Do your own work, or fight and steal Essence like you were designed to do. Seriously! So needy. I hope you took all that personality trait with you when we split last time. Also, yes, I altered your meridians a bit, making them larger and more durable; drain Essence to your heart’s content. You can get that stupid look off your face now.>

Dale tried to get his facial expressions under control, but the negative surprises of the day had made it hard for him to ignore even this small positive one. “Thanks for the information. I’ll look for those safe areas.” All he got in return was a disgruntled noise.

“I take it from your half of the conversation that things went well?” Rose smiled at Dale, bringing him back to the present.

“They did. We have a lot of work to do.” Dale had fire in his eyes and a wide smile on his face. His regained confidence and his enthusiasm inspired the others, so they gripped their weapons and descended deep into the dungeon. “We are going to stop on each level and cultivate until we feel that we have gained all we can from that floor. We are going to hunt any creature with a Core, and eventually, we are going to become powerful.”

“More than we already are!” Tom raised a fist into the air, punctuating his misplaced enthusiasm.

After roughly twenty minutes of exploring, Rose chuckled as she punched a wall and revealed a small silver chest. “I’ve missed these. Do you guys remember when fighting standard Bashers was a challenging endeavor?”

“Wasn’t that about two months ago for you, Rose?” Hans laughed as she flushed. “Nothing to be ashamed about, it just shows how far you’ve come.”

“Oh.” Obviously she had been prepared for an insult. “Thank you, Hans, that’s true.”

“No Cores or really anything of value for us on this floor.” Adam was leaning on his staff, looking bored. Unless someone was injured or he was directly under attack, his main job was staying out of the way.

“If you all don’t mind, I now have ‘quotas’ of materials, components, and Mob kills that I need to turn in if I want to remain at the Academy.” Dale was stuffing the Bashers into his dimensional bag, but no one had said anything about that oddity yet. “If any of you want to join the Academy, I’d recommend making a stockpile as well.”

“My Grandma just had to push for me to join the Guild,” Rose grumbled softly. “Now I might need to join some two-copper school to stay out of a war.”

“Hey!” Dale’s eyes went wide. “I built that school!”

Hans shook his head. “Really, really, people. I know you don’t see it, but the Guild is awesome to be in. This particular situation isn’t super wonderful, but usually, the members start out just like us and work their way into recognition based on good stuff. This guy… Barry… I mentioned it before, but things must be even worse than we thought for him to be out and about. Knowing he is a High Elf - nice statue by the way - makes it even more concerning. They must think that the entire world is at serious risk if the upper echelons are starting to show up, or they just wouldn’t care.”

Tom considered his words. “So you are saying that we should try to work with him and just hope for the best?”

Hans shrugged and nodded. “I’m saying that there is likely a lot we aren’t aware of, and we can’t afford to be short-sighted or to actively work against Barry. If we do, there is a good chance that we will die. All of us. Worldwide.”

Chapter Nineteen

<Hey there, humans!> I cheerfully greeted my cultists-turned-servants. A few looked around with excitement, but the reactions were far more mixed than I preferred. <Tiny update: I have decided to stop calling you ‘cultists’ and have determined that you will be called my ‘Attendants’ from now on.>

Oops, I guess I had only been calling them ‘cultists’ in my head. There was an awkward silence as I waited for their reaction, and I sighed when only the two known fanatics reacted positively. Ah, well. If this group had been the cream of the crop, they wouldn’t be here doing what they were doing. It was never the strong and confident people who gave up everything for more personal power, right? I needed to get their training started if I wanted to see any changes, and I had really wanted to leave everything to Etiquette Bob, but his creation was on hold while I slowly regrew the Goblin’s floor.

It took a vast amount of Essence to bring the floor back from its current state of nothing, the kind I had been able to throw around before. Unfortunately, the ongoing maintenance of flying, ley line growth, and automated respawning on other floors was impeding my progress. <Okay, well, first off, we are going to work on fixing any issues that your bodies have. For most of you, that is going to need to wait until we get some of that corruption out of you.>

I could have made it really easy on them and directly placed Cores around their Center, but that was an exacting, time-consuming, and expensive way to fix something as simple as an overabundant taint. I decided to give them an option and made a pendant similar to the ones I had given Dale’s group so long ago. Of course, I had never explained what the pendants did, and since I had never seen them again, they had likely sold them off as unidentified Inscribed items. <Alright, Attendants. You have two options.>

A clatter came from the stone table they were all gathered around, and all eyes were drawn to the two objects that had appeared there. <You can either wear a pendant and slowly purify your Centers - forgoing agonizing pain and a medium risk of death - or you can swallow a Core and get purified now.>

Several of the people reached for the pendant right away, but my resounding mental voice halted them. <There is a catch. At this level of the dungeon, the ambient Essence is very thick, as is the ambient Mana coming from my Core. Those of you who take the easy way out will be stuck on this level for a very long time as you are thoroughly purified over the course of… a year maybe? Those of you who take the risk will be able to begin cultivating right away - today even - during your free time and will likely advance very quickly. This will be in your favor, as influential people will have more options in my service.>

A line was drawn on the table, and I told everyone to choose a side to stand on. One half held the pendant, the other, a Core. Unsurprisingly, the fanatics went over to stand by the Core right away. The others slowly situated themselves, the vast majority waiting sheepishly by the pendant. There were only five willing to take the risk, and I silently snarled at Minya yet again. If you are going to create devoted minions, at least make sure they are high quality devoted minions! Each of those with weak willpower got a new necklace and were sent off to relax until I could get back to them. You would think that people that had left their lives behind them would be willing to take a few risks! Then I turned my attention to the people that would be the actual powers among my new Attendants.

<Excellent. Even by making just this step, you have raised yourselves in my estimation.> They seemed to perk up at that, and even more so at the next bit of information I fed them. <This is actually a standard recruitment task for the Adventurers’ Guild. Most of their members need to go through something similar, so don’t be too afraid. A couple of you are going to need to wait on this, although I’ll give you all a cultivation technique right now. Don’t use it until I tell you to, but study all the details. Even though it will be added directly to your mind, work at actively understanding it.>

I had two of the humans step into a side room, the ones with severe issues that had prevented them from advancing themselves. They laid down, and I put pressure on their minds through my Mana until they passed out. They wouldn’t want to be awake for this part, and I didn’t want to wait until they had taken medicine and fell asleep in a semi-natural manner. The first was easy; she merely had multi-organ failure. Hardly a problem for me to fix but likely nearly unbearable for her. Easy-peasy. Done.

The next guy was a little more interesting to work with, but my experience messing with Dale’s innards had prepared me well for this moment. This man’s affinity channels were stuffed with impurities and entirely blocked. I had no idea how he had survived this long. With no way to absorb Essence, he would be burning through his life force at an extra fast rate. At least this explained why a man who appeared to be in his early sixties was actually in his early twenties. Others might have chalked it up to a life of hard living, but his body had advanced far past that natural explanation. I went through the myriad channels in his body, scooping out the impurities and collecting them into a sealable jar. My Goblins really liked to use this black goo to poison weapons and such; it made for nasty wounds that disrupted Essence and became easily infected.

The rest of this man’s body was in shambles due to having such a weak constitution his whole life. Fixing him up was far more intensive than, say, fixing a few failing organs; I almost didn’t bother, but… if he was going to be wrangling the others, perhaps going from an ‘old man’ to a young one would create an incentive to do well in my service. I worked on him, then took all the impurities off both of their bodies, leaving them sparkling clean. That sparkling may be the glitter I dusted them with, but my point stands. I left clean robes next to them, and let them wake up.

They both examined their bodies with glee, feeling better than they could ever remember feeling. They stood without hunching, without pain. Then they both dropped to their knees and started singing my praises. No… they were actually praising me as if I were… <Enough of that, please; I’m not god. I have no wish to have actual angels dispatched against me or to have the Church attack, so stop it. Treat me like a really generous boss that is going to help you live forever.>

They both were beaming about that and seemed to get even more excited, so I decided to distract them. <Oh, look over here! A memory stone with a decent cultivation technique! Hey, you… the, um, male? What do I call you?>

“Call me Anders, Great Spirit,” he responded as he pulled on the robe he had been given.

How in the…? <Oh, not you, too! Is that a side effect of fixing people?>

“Our spiritual leader, Minya, informed us that this was the preferred method of addressing you,” Anders respectfully informed me.

<What a surprise. Just… fine. Listen, you have almost zero health issues right now. Your body is fixed, your meridians are clean, and your center is basically empty of Essence and corruption. Mainly because nothing could ever get through your clogged meridians, but that’s beside the point. I want you to begin using that cultivation technique as soon as possible. Even now, your body is burning through your life force, since it isn’t using Essence as a substitute. You are visibly aging. Go! Hurry up!> Anders seemed to fall into panic, because he grabbed the stone and nearly clobbered his head with it in his rush to begin. I chuckled at that and turned to the other.

<As for you, your center is not clear, but your body is finally at a place where it should survive the next steps. Go join the others; we are about to have a water drinking competition. Oh, wait, name please!> I caught her just as she was moving toward the exit.

She curtsied, which seemed a little out of place without a dress, but it was nice all the same. “I am known as Jules, Great Spirit.”

<Lovely. Just so you are aware, you two are going to be in charge of the others. Make sure to survive!> She bobbed again, and I smiled. This might actually be fun!

I glanced around my caverns and tried to think of how to deal with the myriad issues popping up. There was already one manor occupied. Madame Chandra had found the open doorway leading downward before I had remembered to close it and was now living here without the amenities that I had planned for. She didn’t seem to mind and was even unintentionally helping me out by growing plants all over the place as she tried to get a feel for her newfound prowess. This proved another point for me: Mages were wasteful with their Mana. I had suspected it for a while but had never found a proper way to test for long periods of time so I could know for sure. Even so, my theory had been one of the main reasons that I had made this floor.

When I say ‘wasteful’ I don’t mean they litter all over the place, I just mean that they don’t actually use their Mana efficiently. When they cast a spell or use their Mana for any reason, there is some that is just… wasted. No longer! Now, instead of floating free and eventually collecting into storms or mutating things randomly, I can gather the Mana and either use it directly or absorb it into my own power to help my reserves grow.

It’s evident that Mana is more potent than Essence, but by testing it out, I was able to draw accurate conclusions about exactly how much more potent. The ‘runoff’ Mana that Madame Chandra had unknowingly leaked for me over an hour offered almost as much energy as the accumulated Essence I was able to gather on my first floor for a full day. There were now at least a hundred weak cultivators wandering my first floor at any given time, and they were no longer shy about diving in at night.

These Academy students seemed extra motivated to kill and collect my Mobs, and I had increased the amount available because of this. No longer did Bashers move alone, ever. The smallest group was now ten - as the humans had proven that, one-on-one, they could now defeat my Bashers every time. My first floors had gotten more dangerous as a result, but the people on them seemed pleased by this instead of upset and even sneered and laughed when they heard about people failing to survive. What a strange attitude to have! What was I talking about…? Right! Chandra!

This A-rank Mage was all the proof I needed to deem my new floor a success. From here, I would accelerate the training of my Attendants and hope that word got out to the Mages above. They should really hurry up because the benefits of being here would be beneficial to both parties but especially to me. I needed to advance, and it was time to get serious about it.

Chapter Twenty

“Dale, I’m not sure this is the best idea,” Hans spoke in a whiny tone as they settled in on the mostly empty third floor.

Dale glared over at Hans with a sour expression. This was the third time they had gone over this. “Hans, I’m serious about advancing my cultivation. The only reason I’m going to leave is to get new missions from the Academy, to drop off Mobs or requested goods, or attend my instruction with the Moon Elves. Or, you know, if we get hurt pretty bad and need help. Hurt by Mobs,” he clarified hurriedly as a knife appeared in Hans’ hand.

“How do you know that this ‘safe area’ will be honored by the dungeon?” Hans quietly inquired, twirling the knife over his knuckles and through his fingers in a beautiful display of dexterity.

“I don’t, and that’s why we are setting a rotating guard when we sleep.” Dale shrugged and fluffed his small travel pillow. It wouldn’t help much, but it was better than sleeping directly on the rocky ground. “But needing to defeat the Boss of the floor to get a token, finding the safe area kiosk, and the fact that it only lasts a few hours maximum all point to this being a serious effort on the dungeon’s part.”

“I’ve also noticed an interesting effect in the air after we inserted the token.” Adam was watching apparently nothing with his strange golden irises. “There isn’t any more Essence coming within the circle created when we put the token in. In other words, this isn’t somewhere that we can sit and cultivate. If it is a ‘safe area’, it is only that; this is certainly not a valid cultivating area.”

Dale seemed crestfallen, his expression exaggerated to the point that the others laughed at him. Tom lightly punched the ex-Noble, sending him staggering a few steps. The giant redhead was grinning. “Do you really want to cultivate in a safe area? You will end up like a greenhouse cultivator, unable to withstand the slightest breeze of adversity! No, we will grow against all odds, we will persevere where others would fail… like the weeds near the summit of Mountaindale!”

Dale burst out laughing and slapped the other man on his back. Tom gained a look of panic on his face - which twisted to one of pain - and he staggered away rubbing a hand-shaped bruise that was forming. Dale winced and sheepishly grinned. “Ah, right. Sorry about that, buddy. My strength is… I’m just not used to it yet. Great speech though!”

Tom nodded and tried to rub the spot on his back. “I understand perfectly, though I may ask Adam to look at this. Get some sleep; I’ll take the first watch.”

“Sorry…!” Dale called after Tom, who simply waved it off. Rose was laughing at him, as was Hans, so Dale decided to do as Tom directed and get some sleep. He lay down and drifted off, and a few hours later, he was shaken awake by Hans. “What? What’s going on?”

“Just wanted to let you know that the ‘safe area’ is working as it is supposed to.” Hans pointed at the edge of the circle that had appeared, where some frightening Bashers were staring at them menacingly. Dale hadn’t seen these types before and recoiled in shock when he activated his Essence sight and was able to see that they were C-ranked.

“What are those things?” His voice made them shift anxiously, but the huge, blade-horned rabbits didn’t come any closer.

“I’m thinking that they are the ‘Hopsecutioners’ that I’ve heard about. They supposedly give support to Raile when large parties try to work together against him. Now, I’m not sure what they are doing here, but if they stay here, they are going to be dead in half a minute.” Hans stated the last part loudly, and the knives spinning in his hands took on a dull edge of heat. The Hopsecutioners’ ears twitched, and after snorting softly a few times, they turned and bounced away.

“Did the dungeon give them new orders, or could they understand you?” Rose wondered aloud as the fluffy tails whisked around the corner.

“The dungeon didn’t focus on this area, so I’m going to assume that they could understand, if not his words, then at least the threat that he offers.” Adam had come over to stand by them and put forth his own interpretation, “I’m betting they are down here because this floor is almost empty otherwise. Even the Boss Goblin we had to fight to get this token was alone.”

“Bugbears!” Tom sat upright, blinking owlishly in the light from their campfire as he looked around. “Wazzat?”

“Go back to sleep, Tom. We’re all set,” Dale gently ordered. Tom nodded once and laid back down. Dale looked at the others and talked a little softer, “Tomorrow, we are going into the labyrinth. Do you think everyone is ready?”

“Is there any rush?” Rose poked at him. “Let’s cultivate for a few days on this floor.”

Dale shook his head. “The density of Essence increases as we go further down. We can increase our cultivation in a shorter time if we dance on the edge of oblivion.”

“How poetic. I assume you mean if we get especially close to that monstrosity of a Boss monster that has its own floor?” Hans shuddered in disgust. “I don’t think it would be happy to have us wearing clothes made out of its skin…”

“Maybe it will think we are smaller versions and just let us pass through?” Rose countered optimistically.

“If we could survive on deeper floors, I would have just had us pop down to them through a portal. The fifth… sixth floor? The one after the Manticore… does his level count as a full floor? Anyway, they are too dangerous for us to cultivate on. We are only taking the scenic route because we need to load up on Mobs and plants. The labyrinth is going to be different; that is where we will end up staying for our extended cultivation training.” Dale was confident in his plans.

“Works for me.” Hans stretched and cracked his vertebrae. “Can’t get ordered to do things if you can’t be found, know what I mean? As for the floors, as far as I know, there are the two rabbit levels, this empty floor that used to hold the Goblins in their fortresses, the labyrinth, the Boss room, followed by two golem-filled floors of ‘paths’ from the Tower of Ascension.”

“I thought there was only one floor of those at the end?” Adam voiced the question before Dale could.

“I hear things,” Hans shrugged, feigning nonchalance, “so if you count all of those as floors, there are currently seven.

Dale was raring to go but feeling ever more powerless. “All I hear is that there are unexplored treasures under my feet that I can’t access. I was taught my limits in here. A while back, I was in the room with the Manticore as a few Mages fought it, and its Mana was so overwhelming that I could not move no matter how I tried. I hated that feeling, and I want to be able to fight that thing on equal terms!”

“Give it a few decades, Dale.” Hans smiled at the glare that was shot his direction. “You’ll get there!”

“A few decades is too long.” Dale’s mouth set in a firm line. “That’s where this training comes in. We, together, are going to become strong enough to protect ourselves, our interests, and each other.”

“Ugh, so serious all the time.” Hans pushed Dale on the chest, causing him to stumble. “You have the option for a near-unlimited lifespan; have fun every once in a while!”

“Where?” Dale blandly asked Hans instead of rising to his bait.

“I’ll take you into the city and we can… hmm.” Hans’ brow furrowed, then a devious grin jumped into place. “We can go to the Golden Sands Broth… nope. Huh. To the Abyss with it! Necromancers should be renamed ‘Joy Assassins’. They literally killed all the fun in the world. Fine, I’m in. Let’s go get strong.”

“They might have killed the fun, but couldn’t they revive the area?” Rose tried to banter with him. “I heard that the tourist areas of the city were dying, maybe that is what got them all hot and bothered?”

“Dale already proved his point, Rose! Why must you taunt me with your beauty and honeyed words? Are you just trying to get close to me?” Hans fluttered his lashes at her.

“With our history, you are still trying that?” Rose’s hands inched toward her bow.

Hans stepped toward her, shaking his head. “Rose, feel my arm. Just do it.”

“Why?”

“It’s part of me, so it is obviously made out of boyfriend material.” Hans dodged gracefully, catching two arrows in his hands before the anger left her face. “Careful with that! You might actually hurt me someday!”

“Oh, I will. Dale, I’m fully on board with this training.” The last sentence was said in an almost sickly-sweet tone.

“Well, let’s not waste time.” Dale woke the others, and they walked to the entrance of the labyrinth. They headed down the winding stairs, entering into the welcome room of the enormous maze. Dale felt a sudden pain and flipped backward as a Flesh Cat missed a swipe at him. He was bleeding, so perhaps ‘missed’ was the wrong word. Failing in its attack, the Cat ran off before a retaliatory strike could be made.

“A few weeks of this, and we will be sufficiently battle-hardened!” Tom was entirely too cheerful in Dale’s opinion. After a bandage was pressed to his fresh wound, they moved deeper into the maze.

Chapter Twenty-one

I was hovering over the location of the almost-Mana-using dungeon that was on our map. Everything was ready for this dungeon to be destroyed; I just needed to make it happen. <Dale, come on. Just go convince some people to hop down there and grab the Core. You’ve been a constant annoyance, just help me out a little.>

Dale was fighting Snowball right now and wasn’t taking my interruptions very well. “Quiet, you over-talkative rock!”

An arrow whistled through the air, and I nudged Snowball’s mind to have him duck. Dale got slapped by a dinner-plate sized paw and tumbled away as Tom stepped in to block the Cat from pressing his advantage. <Why won’t you just->

“Cal, I have no political power!” Dale wheezed, blood trickling from his lips. Snowball hit with the force of a high C-ranker. “All I am now is a low-ranked fighter.”

<Well that’s just perfect timing, isn’t it?> I growled as Tom kicked Snowball in the ribs. That was uncalled for. Snowball hissed a gout of steam at the Barbarian, who had to dive out of the way to avoid being parboiled.

“Why not go bother Minya with this?” Dale bellowed as he dove back into the fight. He rolled onto Snowball’s back, straddling him and punching the Cat in the head repeatedly.

<Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t realize your opinion was in this recipe, Dale.> I watched as Snowball tried to shake him off, failed, and then ran toward a steam vent. <You’re probably gonna want to let go.>

“Not until- Ahh!” Dale shrieked as steam blasted onto him. His enhanced body took the heat without killing him instantly, but nasty blisters now coated his skin. Now, I know it is strange to be happy about seeing him in pain, as he is me, but it was oddly satisfying to watch him writhing around on the ground as Snowball turned on him. Good thing that steam was natural and not Essence-created, or Dale’s armor would have just absorbed it.

A paw reared back, then dropped again as I warned Snowball about an incoming dagger. The blade stuck into the wall, and Hans laughed. “I guess it’s learning our tricks!”

“That’s great; help me!” Dale shouted in reply as he rolled to avoid a pounce. He should have gotten some rigid armor; he wouldn’t have needed to prevent every little thing from striking him. Too bad someone doesn’t listen to my advice!

Snowball tried to spring forward but yowled as he was pulled back to the ground. A golden chain - which looked too thin to hold my Cat in place - had kept Snowball connected to the ground. Adam was smiling with too-white teeth as his eyes shone bright gold. He blinked as Rose slammed the bladed end of her bow into the colossal Cat’s head, killing my poor kitty. The chain vanished, and Adam’s facial features returned to a fairly neutral expression.

Dale stood up, reached into the new wound, and split Snowball’s skull open. He dug around for a moment before popping the Core out of the skull and into his hand. Just before he crushed it, I coughed into his mind to get his attention. “What, you annoying puddle-loving rock?”

<Wow. That was totally uncalled for, Dale. Here I am, about to offer you a better way of doing things, and you throw details you shouldn’t know in my face.>

“You don’t have a face.”

<See, there you go, being all hurtful for no good reason. Fine, I won’t tell you how to absorb that Core more efficiently. Just go ahead and squeeze.> I’ll admit, I was getting huffy, but he was being unaccountably rude. I didn’t invite him to come here and kill all of my Mobs. That was on him. He was stressed? I had a soul-sucking S-ranker threatening to abyssal eat me. It was my job to eat people, not the other way around!

Dale rolled his eyes and ran a hand through his hair. He winced as he carelessly pressed against a blister. “Fine, fine. You’re right, puddles are great, and bubbles are fun.”

<Good choice. Just hold that Core in the Rune on your palm, then cultivate. If nothing happens, oh well, but if it works as intended, the Rune should let you pull the Essence out of the Core so long as you don’t leave it alone long enough for it to gain intelligence.> I paused as he stared at the Core. <I think I actually will ask Minya for help. Thanks for the tip. I tend to forget that you are one of my weaker people, even if I have the most interaction with you.>

Dale ignored most of what I had to say, staring at the Core in his hand with trepidation. “This could become intelligent?”

I snorted at him. <That? Give it a couple hundred years, and sure. Just like a tree can become self-aware.> I didn’t bother to stick around for what would assuredly be a scintillating rebuttal but, instead, went in search of Minya. It didn’t take me long to find her; she was the only person that was surrounded by guards and proselytizing about the wonders of the Dungeon, or me. I guess I held wonders. That was nice to hear.

“Come deep into the dungeon and learn great secrets, be healed of your wounds, and have your cultivation bottlenecks shattered!” Minya was shouting above the guards’ orders.

“You are under arrest for the suspected massacre of over a dozen people!” One of the men surrounding her was shouting back at her. “Be silent, wench!”

Minya backhanded him, snapping his jaw and sending his unconscious body to the ground. No one tried to catch the fallen human as Minya continued shouting, “The Guild sends a new police force, removes those in power, and sends our lives into turmoil! For stability, for honest work, and a boost in your abilities, join me in serving the dungeon!”

<You seem busy, I’ll come back later.>

I started to return my attention down below, but Minya’s eyes widened and she began yelling, “Even now, the dungeon speaks to me! What service is it that I can perform for the Great Spirit?”

<You’re really having too much fun with this, aren’t you? Listen, I need the dungeon Core from the dungeon we are hovering above. I’m pretty sure it's a Mage ranked dungeon, but I don’t have details. Can I get you to do this for me?> I winced as she started shrieking her answer aloud.

“The dungeon calls for a crusade! Who will join me in destroying the impertinent dungeon we are above? I call upon my fellow Mages!” Minya looked around, beaming at the growing crowd.

“What would we get out of it?” A B-ranked man stepped forward, greed warring with incredulity on his face.

I threw out the first thing I could think of, <Eh. I found a way that Mages can reach a higher tier of laws. You think they’d be interested?>

Minya’s eyes widened even further. Somehow. I was surprised they hadn’t popped out. “The dungeon offers a path advancement for any Mage willing to do this task!”

“You’re lying or insane.” The Mage who had stepped forward stated flatly, turning away and vanishing into the crowd.

“Mages! What risk are you taking?” Minya called over the laughter the Mage leaving had generated. “Either you do nothing and laugh at a perceived falsehood, or you are offered a path advancement! If the rewards are not as promised, it will be easy for you to tell the others that I do not speak true, will it not?”

The laughter faded to muttering, and soon enough, a few people had stepped forward. <Hey, Minya, I’m not sure that->

“Welcome friends!” she brightly greeted her temporary companions. “Shall we begin immediately, or do you need time to prepare? Can I get your names?”

“I’m Shanara. Call me Shan.” A green-eyed Elf was standing next to her and staring unblinkingly at Minya. “I’d normally charge you for my services directly, and I warn you that if the dungeon does not follow through on the promise you made, I will charge you the normal fee plus danger pay.”

“A mercenary? Ooh. A Wild Elf, then?” Minya grinned as other people quickly stepped away from the group with looks of fear or disgust, depending on their race. “What are you bringing to the group?”

“Poison and ice. Take it or leave it,” Shan hissed with narrowing eyes. She did not particularly care to have her exile brought up in casual conversation. “I’ve destroyed dungeons before if that helps.”

Minya’s smile never wavered. “Oh, it does. I’ll learn the rest of your names as we go, but let’s do this!”

<I need the Core unbroken, Minya!> I called to her as the Mages began running toward the edge of the mountain.

“Don’t worry about it, Cal.” I saw the smirk on her face just as she jumped off the cliff. “I haven’t failed you yet.”

She and her team were outside of my perception, so I could only groan and try to avoid a headache that shouldn’t exist. Since, yeah, no head. Alright. Well… if they couldn’t succeed, I was going to be in real trouble. Already I could see that ‘Barry’ was getting impatient if his tapping foot was any indication. Each ‘tap’ demolished some of the ground around him, so it was an obvious threat to me. I listened in on his muttering for only a moment and shuddered.

“If we aren’t there in time, I don’t care what they told me to do. I bet the Dungeon Core in here is delicious. The taste of its Mana… so exquisite… so pure.” Barry was literally drooling, likely the most disgusting thing I had ever seen. At least to me. I saw worse things practically daily, but for some reason, this hit me on a more visceral level than seeing someone get beheaded.

I had to put my faith in Minya and hope she pulled through. I couldn’t wait here any longer. I had an appointment with the Guild, and it appeared that arriving fashionably late was not an option.

Chapter Twenty-two

Adam toppled to the floor as the room they were in lurched. He looked at the small Rune next to his head and winced. “That could have been bad. I found another trap here, everyone.”

The others had been able to steady themselves during the sudden movement, and Tom had actually been assisted in his attack against a Cat. The Cloud Cat had been dropping at them, and the sudden shift brought it into Tom’s attack range just as he swung. Gore rained down on them as the remains of the pulverized Beast succumbed to gravity.

“Thank you, Adam.” Hans helped the man to his feet, then rounded on Tom. “As for you, how many times have I told you that using that hammer is overkill and wasteful?”

Tom hedged around the issue while storing his hammer back in his bag. “I, um. I just didn’t want our team to be taken advantage of when we were off balance like that.”

“Bull!” Hans was trying to be serious but failing to hide a snort. “You just like seeing your opponent pop like a Mage punched them at full strength.”

“It… it is so fun,” Tom admitted, looking at Hans out of the corner of his eye. “I try to use it rarely, but…”

“You’re fine, but relying on that weapon will fail in an extended battle.” Hans smacked Tom lightly on the bicep to get him to relax. “You’ll be drained long before fighting anyone of actual strength. Wasting your ability to fight on such weak creatures… don’t make it a habit.”

“…they aren’t weak to me.” Tom’s mutter went uncommented upon.

Dale had already sat down and was cultivating. Unlike when he focused on pulling in Essence from the air around him, there was currently little disturbance in the ambient power. He was staring at the Core in his hand as if it held all the secrets he had ever wanted and was doing his best to pull power directly from it. The light in the Core flickered, and Dale smiled maliciously as he ‘caught’ the Essence it contained and began to sap it.

“That is disturbing to watch for some reason.” Rose shuddered as she sat next to him and joined him in cultivating. “It’s almost as if you were eating raw meat from a creature you killed.”

Dale slowly shook his head, trying not to lose focus. “There is so much more Essence in these than I had been getting! I was taking a fifth at best… now I’m sure I’m still losing some, but perfect conversion is probably outside my capabilities. Still… Snowball had more Essence stored in just his Core than I do in my entire body currently.”

Dale focused on his cultivation technique, rotating his current overabundance of Essence through his body to grind away at the barriers to advancement. Until he was able to pour enough power into his aura to step into the C-ranks, he needed to continue weaving Essence through and around himself. It was not… quite as easy as it sounded. First, he needed to bring external Essence into himself and refine it in his Core. He couldn’t just use ambient Essence directly, unfortunately. Then he needed to reach out and infuse his body with that power, down to the smallest particle. The only real difference in this step was the order you progressed.

There were three potential paths here that led to the same outcome, though each had positives and negatives. You could start the process by wrapping your externalities in Essence, which would allow you to make more powerful barriers from the outset. The downside was fairly obvious here: your body would be less well protected against injuries if your shields were breached. The second option was to start at the outermost portion of your body, the skin. This would help you gain resistance to piercing and slashing attacks but would leave you poorly defended against jarring blows or elemental assaults.

Option number three was to start on the interior of the body and work your way outward. This would help protect your inner organs and increase your recovery rate. Of course, by the time your aura was complete, all of the combined benefits would be in place. Dale had every Essence type available and so had chosen to work on his external shielding first. There was just too much benefit to be gained to ignore this path.

Since his armor protected him from most slashing attacks - intentionally ignoring the Flesh Cat - and he would eventually get the benefits of protected internals, shielding simply made sense for him. Creating the external aura was a trial in patience and eerily similar to the actions needed for crocheting, if on a much smaller scale. Weaving a tight aura was essential to creating shields that would hold up to various attacks. After each ‘knot’ was created and connected, Dale realized that the pattern was similar to the drawings he had seen from the memories of a flesh Mage that specialized in brain injuries. Each ‘knot’ was similar to what the Mage had called a ‘neuron’ and connected to the others similar to the ‘dendrites’.

How very… odd. Did this explain why using an aura pattern was more natural as you used it more often? Were you able to get your aura to learn as you used it? Would it become intelligent, at least a little? Did it matter? Dale shook his head and continued to work. He would save his more esoteric questions for the next time he saw Artorian. If he wanted to discuss or ponder philosophy, he needed to do it in a safe location. Continuing to generate more ‘knots’, Dale soon hit a stumbling block and opened his eyes. The Core in his hand was inert, empty, useless.

He wasn’t upset, just a bit tired. Dale had made a couple hundred new connections to his external aura. He needed a few hundred thousand before he was ready to step into the B-ranks, but he was happy to see that he had made progress. With good cheer, he informed the others. “I just made it into D-rank five!”

“That seems slow.” Hans offhandedly crushed his good cheer. “I’ve seen the amount of Essence you are taking in; you should be at least at D-eight by now. Strange.”

Dale was a little put out by this comment. “Hans, it isn’t just about Essence, come on. You know I need to build my aura.”

“You’re building your aura in the D-ranks?” Hans’ jaw dropped. “I thought you just had been storing power, maybe been taught a few techniques! Are you actually infusing? Let me look at you.”

Dale was pulled close and heat blazed in Hans’ eyes as he looked Dale over. “Would you look at that? You are actually building your aura! I’ve never seen a D-ranker with such a dense external aura before; you must be working on that, then? Interesting choice. I’m shocked that you have such fine Essence control.”

“Hans, I was told that this was the path to getting into the C-ranks…” Dale trailed off as the Assassin had a grin play around his lips. “Are you messing with me?”

“Actually, no, I’m not.” Hans gestured around the room. “Adam, Tom, how do you get into the C-ranks?”

Tom answered first, speaking as though he was reading from a textbook, “You store Essence in your body and aura. Once you reach a critical mass of stored power, once you have expanded your aura to its maximum, you will step into the C-ranks. From there you will need further instruction.”

“Any disagreements, Adam?” Hans looked at the Cleric, who shook his head. Hans turned back to Dale. “This must be the Moon Elf. Craig wouldn’t have steered you wrong without reason. Well, not wrong. Steered you different. I’m sure there is a reason for the way they are making you do this, but it is not the standard way of making things happen. The D-ranks are all about the raw power necessary to achieve them.”

Dale decided right there that he needed to have a talk with his instructors when he left this place. Until then… he barely stopped himself from doing something he would regret. Fine. Dale decided - extra reluctantly - that he would bear with this for now, he would trust that the people shaping him had the best results in mind for his advancement. No need to break something or come out with a substandard result because of his haste. He had an advantage currently, and even Hans had commented positively on his shielding. Time to get back to killing.

Chapter Twenty-three

Tom looked around the corner, whipping his head back as a whirlwind of gold-tinged flame filled the hallway and melted the stone to slag. “I truly dislike Assimilators. They seem to be disproportionately powerful to the other creatures in here.”

A detail sprang to Dale’s mind from the fading memories of his time recombined with Cal. “The dungeon powers them directly with ambient Essence. They will get stronger and stronger until the Essence in the area is reduced; then they will weaken quickly. That will make it useless to cultivate in this area though, so we should kill them quickly…”

“Thanks, Dale, that’s extra helpful.” Rose stood and drew an arrow. “So your advice is to kill the thing trying to kill us? If only we had thought of that sooner!”

She leaned out into the hallway, sighting, firing, and whirling back to safety all in the span of a half second. A bolt of electricity hit the wall where she had briefly appeared, scattering sparks and discharging against the stone. Tom coughed from the smoke rising off the molten rock and looked at her, “Did you get it?”

“No.” She rolled her wrists and got two arrows ready. “This time for sure.” She moved down the corridor to get a running start, then jumped across the cooling floor and fired while in the air. She planted her feet on the opposite wall, smoke rising from her leather shoes as she pushed off and jumped back to the group, firing as she did so. Dale watched her with a touch of hero-worship; he had never thought to attack like that. Perhaps he needed to start using more… how to describe it… aerial encompassing attacks? Include movement along all three dimensions instead of only remaining on the flat ground? Bounce off the walls to attack from odd angles?

Rose nodded to indicate that she had landed an attack on the creature and settled down to wait. Unless they wanted to backtrack and find a new way through the maze, they needed to let the stone cool enough to pass through. Assimilators only seemed to appear when they were near the center of the labyrinth, so it was a good bet that getting through here was their best option. They had been making a considerable amount of potential profit by going through the fourth floor again and again. Not only were Cores in abundance on this level, but they had pouches stuffed with tokens, creatures, and herbs.

Dale had stuck to his promise to only leave the dungeon for training and returning items to the academy, but each of the others cycled out for relaxation, baths, or their own personal reasons. It had been a week since they came in here, and the constant stresses and cultivation had been good for all of them physically, even if their mental state may have been in question. Hours of cultivating each day and night in an Essence-rich environment had propelled each person forward, even if it weren’t enough for them to advance in rankings. Yet.

“I’m almost at C-rank six. Then she’ll love me,” Hans muttered to himself, moving his head slightly without looking so that the arrow coming his way landed in the wall instead of his head.

“Knock it off, Mr. Dangerlicious.” Rose broke into a grin. “Even if I wanted to be with you, would my Grandmother approve of someone so… worldly?” The others chuckled at that, and Hans muttered about how much he hated that wayward Bard that had immortalized a story from his past.

They all relaxed for a few minutes, crossing the hallway after it cooled and harvesting the Assimilator. The ends of its tentacles had been determined to be a useful component for creating weapons that let you spray elemental assaults at enemies without messing with your aura. Tyler, the innovative weapon merchant and council member, had found an excellent way to attach these to a multitude of various weaponry. As the weapons were cheaper and even sometimes more effective than enchanted or Inscribed weapons of the same type, they were purchased en masse by F and D rank cultivators. Continuing to carefully explore, the party eventually made it back to the center of the maze.

The swirling steam and mist were a good indication that Snowball the Cat was awaiting them and that an ambush was likely. Dale glanced over at Hans. “Are you going to help on this one?”

“Nope. You’re the one who wants to fight all the Cats and use them to get stronger. You four should have no problem working out how to take down the Boss. I’ll try to step in before any of you die, but…” Hans shrugged and shook his head sadly. “Sometimes, things happen for a reason. Perhaps that reason is that you are weak.”

“Very comforting.” Adam rolled the golden orbs he called eyes, which did more to highlight their oddities than to show his displeasure.

“No warhammer.” Hans pointedly stared at Tom until he reluctantly grumbled his assent. “Have fun, you crazy kids!”

Hans faded from view as the others stepped into the steam, giving Dale a flash of inspiration. He pulled on his aura, shifting it from earthen shielding and into a misty camouflage. To the others, Dale’s feet faded, then the remainder of him, and finally, he disintegrated before their eyes. Before anyone could panic, he whispered to them quietly, “Don’t worry; it’s an aura trick. I might actually be able to get a sneak attack off on Snowball because the dungeon seems to be busy doing something else today.”

“Just make sure that you don’t get between us and the Beast,” Tom announced in a too-loud voice. “Else an errant attack could unintentionally fell you, and I feel that I would not be able to bear the shame of slaying yet another team member.”

A loud growl rippled through the area, a sign that Snowball knew they were there… and that he was coming for them. Dale was getting excited and had to calm himself forcibly. Breathing hard or even a rapid heartbeat might give him away to the Cat. Dale softly padded away from the group, finding himself crouching near a steam vent. Snowball usually went around them when he wasn’t relaxing or attacking, so Dale hunkered down and waited patiently. In a few moments, he heard a soft shushing sound that he had come to associate with Snowball’s fur lightly brushing against the ground. Dale smiled, his teeth showing through the fog momentarily. White fur coats were the current fashion in Mountaindale, and intact pelts were going for a high price as winter progressed.

As the soft sound passed him by, Dale felt a disturbance in the mists of his aura. He launched forward, putting everything he could into a single attack. His fist slammed into Snowball’s haunch, sending the Cat flailing and hissing with pain and surprise. Dale’s smile faded as Snowball did something unexpected, using some form of ability that he had never seen before. The Cat inhaled and roared at the steam. It seemed that he took direct control of the vapor in the air because it shuddered at the tremendous volume and dropped to knee-height throughout the room… all of it but a human-outline of mist hanging in the air a few feet from the Cat.

Snowball sprang at the exposed cloud, but Dale hadn’t stayed where he was. As soon as he realized that he was exposed, he had dropped to the floor and rolled toward the Cat. A roiling mist dispersed as Snowball tackled it, but Dale had managed not to get hit. His teammates had also reacted, and now, a full-scale fight had erupted. Snowball had already been weakened by Dale’s attack, and his injury made it hard for him to deal with the multitude of attacks coming his way. He dodged away from a single arrow, but another took him in the flank and disabled his rear-left leg. Dale rejoined the battle then, springing out of his position on the floor and punching the Cat in the nose.

The move was… surprisingly effective. Given that Dale hit as hard as a bear with his current cultivation rank and that noses are notoriously fragile, Snowball’s inability to respond to the blow was quickly capitalized upon. The fight ended a few exchanges later, as Tom’s ingot hammers rapped out a staccato beat on the feline’s skull. Dale was soon looking at yet another Core in his hand, excited about using it almost to the point of ignoring his team.

Hans slow clapped and sarcastically cheered for their group takedown of a Beast that was - by all accounts - much too strong for the group. Tom cleared his throat and countered the Assassin’s condescending attitude. “My apologies, Hans, but I think that your sarcasm right now may be neglecting the fact that this Beast - by all rights - should be far too much for us to handle. Especially without powerful weapons like my warhammer. If you will pardon my saying so, you need to… tone it down? Is that the correct expression? With your current attitude toward our success, we can only make the assumption that you really and truly despise us. Perhaps this is the attitude that drives away the Lady Rose? That is, if you are actually interested in pursuing a relationship. None of us are currently certain of your sincerity.”

“Or interest in any woman, for that matter,” Rose agreed, flicking her sweat-soaked hair out of her face. “No one wants to hear negative comments all the time. It makes us despise being around you.”

Hans had a genuinely grotesque look on his face by the end of this tirade, and his hands were frozen mid-clap. As the others got to work harvesting the now-red-furred Cat, Rose could hear him muttering, “Is that… really why I’ve been…?”

Chapter Twenty-four

Dale walked out of the portal and into town, looking around with haunted, tired eyes. The week so far had consisted of sneak attacks from every angle, and his battle readiness was getting near its peak. He moved more fluidly, staying balanced and on the lookout for any danger, no matter the form it might take. He breathed out, fashioning his aura to shroud him in swirling white, and nearly vanished in the snowstorm as he walked. Right then, Dale decided that he might be in love with the myriad applications of aura.

He walked over to the area that had been designated to meet with the Elf and looked around with pure paranoia. The small field he had been ordered to in their last session was utterly filled with snowmen. Full-on, child fantasy, snowmen. Carrot noses, black rocks for smiles and eyes, and thin twig arms.

Dale flinched as his instructor’s voice rang through the swirling snow. “Nice try with the aura, Dale. With that level of detail, you will only be able to fool humans up to the D-ranks if you are lucky. Most others won’t bother to see who is trying to sneak around; they will just blast the area.”

Dale felt a chill that had nothing to do with the bitter air. He hadn’t even thought about what would happen if someone did see him. Anyone that would care would probably do exactly what the Elf had said and blast the oddity to kill a presumed thief. He grumbled a bit but dropped his camouflage aura completely.

“Excellent!” Dale was anxious about how cheerful the Elf seemed to be. “Today, we are going to be working on your perception. I love perception training; it gives me free rein to say ‘you should have seen that coming’. Your test tonight, Dale, is a game I like to call ‘monster or snowman’. If you get too close to a monster without attacking it, the creature will attack you. Hmm. Let me clarify. It’ll actually attack you either way, but you’ll get the first blow in. If you smash just a regular snowman… well, why ruin the surprise? You have until dawn. Then all the monsters that might be in there go free.”

Dale stared at the field stuffed full of snowmen. How close did the Elf say he could get? …He didn’t say, did he? Dale moved forward a few more steps, then activated his Essence sight. The field lit up in swirling colors, but… it all looked like snow. Just snow. There were no distinguishing auras, nor were there any differences in the snowmen that he could see. He was just going to need to get closer and see what happened. Stepping next to one of the Snowmen, Dale stared at it, waiting for any sign of movement, any change in the immobile effigy.

When nothing jumped at him, Dale slowly got closer to a second Snowman. He kept an eye on the first, just in case there was a creature in there waiting to ambush him. Dale got to the third… fourth… soon he was surrounded on all sides by smiling snowmen. Were there no monsters? Was it all a trick to get him to attack something when he shouldn’t? The Elf hadn’t been overly fond of moral lessons so far - did that snowman just move? Dale stared at it, waiting for any sign at all that it had actually moved. There! It had moved… or the falling snow was messing with his eyes. Either was possible.

Dale decided that it was time to take a chance. He was pretty sure this one had moved, and he was going to run out of time if he did nothing. Nonchalantly acting as if he were approaching a different snowman, Dale whipped to the side and smashed his target with as much force as he could muster. The middle section of the snowman scattered into snow, and the top chunk fell to the ground. A blue light momentarily appeared over the site of his demolition, and he heard the Elf chuckle.

“That was a bad idea. I’m surprised and pleased that you waited until you were near the center. Bad for you, though; this is going to be entertaining.” Dale still couldn’t see the Elf, but he had a sick feeling in his stomach about this training. He staggered forward as a chunk of ice slammed into his back, then whirled around to see who had thrown it. Nothing appeared in his vision. No enemies, no monsters. Another chunk of snow-covered ice flew into his face like an obese homing pigeon.

Still, he couldn’t see where it had come from. The only things visible were the snowmen. Who… had all turned to face him. Their smiles had also turned into frowns, which freaked him out more than he had a valid reason for. He heard a slight sound and dodged to the side. A chunk of ice sailed past him, slamming into another snowman and destroying its head. Another Elven chuckle, “Oh-ho! This is going to be fun.”

Dale had to hold back a biting comment toward his ‘teacher’. If he yelled at the Elf to teach him directly, the Elf would. Specifically, he would teach Dale ‘respect’ and beat him severely. It had already happened twice, and Dale was very interested in keeping that number as low as possible. Also, he had other things on his mind now. He was hearing the sound of something cutting through the air again, so he lashed out and shattered an ice ball with his right fist. As he felt the ice give way, another missile struck him, catching him right in the ear and making him yelp like a kicked dog.

As he recovered, he expanded his aura away from him in a diffuse cloud, one of the first things he had ever been taught to do. As two more ice balls flew at him, they entered his aura with the same feeling as someone pulling on his hair. Dale was able to get out of the way of the ice but winced as they once again impacted snowmen. He was fairly sure he knew what was going on: as more snowmen were broken and shouldn’t have been, the remaining ones would conjure balls of ice equivalent to the amount destroyed.

Of the two snowmen that had taken a blow, one puffed into powder and released a blue glow while the other exploded with a sibilant hiss, expelling a dozen snakes that began slithering through the snow to him. Huh. It looked like there were monsters in some of them, after all. Dale was having a hard time keeping up with the current threats, as the snakes had spread out and were gliding toward him while he was forced to defend against three balls of ice every second. He slipped to the side as a snake lunged at him, punching out and smashing its head.

<What in the…? What did you just do? What was that? What’s a snake?> Dale almost got bitten while wincing as he realized that he had just given the dungeon a new type of monster, one that was particularly scary to a majority of humans. <Why is there snow again? I thought I ate all the snow. What in the abyss is going on?>

“Busy… Cal!” Dale managed to get out as he slew the remainder of the snakes, taking the impact of an ice-ball without bothering to dodge.

<What is this, a human-made dungeon?> There was silence in Dale’s head for a moment. <It’s pretty sloppy; you can see where the monsters are hiding. If this was supposed to be an ambush, it was poorly done.>

“How do you find the ones with monsters in them? Dale quickly demanded, thinking that the dungeon seemed to be in a good mood tonight.

<Well, I mean, I can’t see them, but it is easy to tell there is something there when I can’t see it, you know?>

“I really don’t.” Dale finished off the last snake; luckily the cold had been affecting it pretty heavily, and it was moving rather slowly. Two more snowmen had been hit, so five ice balls were flying at him from various angles every second or so.

<It’s pretty logical, Dale. Even you can feel with your aura to sense something’s rank, right? Well, if you can’t see anything, then someone or something is blocking you. Sweep your aura at something, if it rebounds - ya know, you can’t scan it - then it is alive.> Cal’s words resonated deeply with Dale, and he shifted his mindset on the spot. Sometimes what you thought you needed to look for was what led you in the wrong direction!

His aura was already extended, so he hurried through the field, testing each snowman. If it felt blank and not like snow, he blasted it. He was running out of time and not from dwindling night. Dale had already been shivering at the start of this exercise, but every fifth snowman that was broken without a monster inside added a ball of water that coated him in freezing cold liquid if it hit him. He wanted nothing more than to shift his aura to a fiery shield and bring it close to his skin, but that would make it impossible for him to determine if there were monsters nearby.

“You missed one!” the Elf called with delight. This threw Dale off, as the Elf had been silent for over a half hour. A set of snowmen fell over as a creature pulled itself out of the ground, bellowing a guttural honk at the lone fighter. Dale froze in place, shocked at the sight of a giant grey and white goose charging at him while flapping its wings. It didn’t sound like a bird; it sounded like pure evil.

<He buried the Murder Honker under the snowmen. Clever.> Hearing the dungeon giving out compliments about trap-making made Dale nervous; it was going to be getting ideas from this. Dale ran at the goose, needing to stop it. The creature was larger than he was, and it kept smashing aside snowmen. The air around Dale was now so thick with chunks of ice that he was sprinting and zig-zagging just to avoid being pelted to death. In fact… Dale dove at the goose as it tried to peck him. Beak him? No, peck was the right word. The cobra chicken honked in pain as it was clobbered by an ice storm, and Dale grabbed its legs and clamped down to make sure it couldn’t escape or expose him.

He only felt a little bad as the ice beat it to death for him, especially with the noises it was making, but as soon as it went limp, the ice attacks abated. Pushing the goose off of him, Dale stood up and came face-to-face with his instructor. “Excellent progress tonight, Dale. You are truly one of those students that can’t be taught in a classroom environment; you need to feel and understand why we ask you to do the things we do. You should go rest up, and as for those nasty bruises… maybe put some ice on them?”

The Elf turned away while chortling and vanished amongst the wreckage of a great snow war. Dale stared after him with hollow eyes. “…I’d like to try a classroom. How do you know this is the best method?”

<Hey, Dale?> The dungeon paused as Dale surveyed the field once again. <Are… are you gonna eat that?> When there was no response, the snowmen vanished, as did the snakes and goose. Dale shook his head, remembering how when he had been walking over here he had thought he was ready for anything. Who was prepared for snake-stuffed snowmen? Is anyone ever really ready for an angry goose?

Chapter Twenty-five

After eating all the new creatures and snow, I looked around Mountaindale and saw that the precipitation was not just in the training area. We had been in an almost tropical location recently, so I had forgotten to continuously absorb what was landing on me. I fixed that and looked around for Dani. She had been mysteriously absent for a few days, ‘training’ Grace. Every time I’d try to see what was going on, she would tell me that it was none of my business or that I didn’t need to know.

Today was no different. I poked my mind into the room they were in and looked around in shock. The stone boundaries of the room - the walls, floor, and ceiling - were twisted, malformed, and charred in places. I looked over to see Dani bobbing in place, praising Grace. “Good job, sweetheart! Try once more; see if you can get that stone to shape into a spike this time.”

<What is happening in here?> As soon as my voice was heard, Grace turned a happy pink and started flying around in circles.

Dani though… she turned red. “Get out! This is important training for Dungeon Wisps! Are you a Dungeon Wisp? Do you want us to send Grace off unprepared when she finds a good dungeon to bond to?” I recoiled from those words.

<That shouldn’t ever be a problem! She doesn’t need to find anyone else for a few hundred years. Right, sweety?> Grace zipped around, not quite understanding what was going on. I whispered the next part, <I’ll shatter any dungeon who tries talking to you.>

“You will not, and you will get out!” She did… something, and my vision of the room disappeared.

<Hey! That’s my Mana!> I shouted down the hallway.

A muffled reply drifted back to me, “Our Mana! What’s yours is mine!”

<Razzem-frazzem.> I grumbled nonsensical words and looked around for something to break. My eyes landed on Artillery Bob. <Bob! How are those weapons looking?>

Artillery Bob looked up from the huge chunk of opal a few other Bobs were chiseling. He wiped his brow and nodded. “They are looking good, Great Spirit. My only concern is the Mana that you are planning to power them with. I’m not certain she can take the stress!”

<Don’t personify a system, Bob.> I understood his concerns, but he needed to do this. <It’s our only hope, Bob. I’ll look it over before we use it and make sure there are no flaws. It has to be perfect, and the Bobs are the only people I trust with this.>

Artillery Bob stood straighter, eyes shining as he saluted. “I will make it so, Great Spirit!”

<Many thanks.> I drifted away slowly. I was making a series of infernal cannons to try and hurt the S-ranker if he ever tried to absorb more of my dungeon, but there was no guarantee that they would work against the powerful being. I only had hope and, soon, cannons. For now though, our interests were beginning to align. I wanted to attack the necromancers that had taken Dani hostage, but the fact of the matter was that I was too weak to do so. This ‘Barry’ seemed to think I would be an essential factor in the war, but I didn’t see how.

Oh. I think I do understand; it is because I can fly. They can use me as a mobile teleportation pad. They could be fighting on the eastern front, then five minutes later, have their entire force anywhere that they wanted. I was a huge, miraculous… wagon. They were going to use me as a troop transport, but at the same time, I had trouble believing that. I thoroughly doubted that they would be hanging around on me; I would either be their grand entrance… or their desperate escape plan. Uh-oh. I didn’t like that thought at all. Would they run away and leave me as a treasure to be collected? Was I going to be the spoils of war?

The reason these thoughts were on my mind? That one was pretty simple: we were approaching the main Guild encampment. I couldn’t see it directly, but I had Navigation Bob for that. I needed to adjust my far-sight Runes and make a projection for myself. From this point forward, we were going to be having an active role in the second ‘great necromantic’ war. According to Bob, even now there were several people flying toward us, leaving vapor trails in the sky as they broke the sound barrier. Please be Guild members, please be Guild members…

They touched down on me, remarking with good cheer on the density of Essence on my surface. Whew! I wanted to thank them and brag a bit, but my good cheer at their appearance vanished as Barry stepped out of a building and began moving toward them imperiously. As I glared at him, he looked around and grinned. “Oh, dear. I seem to have gained the dungeon’s animosity. Whatever shall I do?”

Let’s see… two A-ranked Mages and an S-ranker. Hopefully, this one isn’t a cesspit of a person like Barry is. He seemed to be the person who was going to do the talking, and as soon as the first oily words were out of his mouth, I cringed away. “Ah, Barry! So good to see you. Truly a pleasure, as always.”

Huh. Was this guy bound to the law of butt kissing? He continued speaking, and I tried not to judge him by his opening lines. At least he seemed to be getting serious. “Our outpost is set up, and we are waiting on Shield Wardens and the Church to get their troops here. Until that point, I am temporarily in charge of our forces.”

“Oh? You are in charge? ‘Opportunistic Lord’ Hendric?” Barry sneered at the opposing S-ranker, who paled at hearing his hated nickname. “I have the highest standing in the guild, I have the highest cultivation, and I-”

“You want to be in charge? You?” Hendric sneered right back at Barry. “You think they would trust you more, ‘Battalion Devouring Bartholomew’? At least the troops know that I am trying to help them, and I won’t eat the people pledged to me for a slight boost in my own power.”

“You dare repeat that name to my face?” Barry clenched his fists, the ground around him shuddering and cracking as his emotions ran wild. “They were already dead; they just didn’t know it! The corrupting mist had lain over them all night! They would have dissolved painfully and horrifically as the sun rose; I made it quick! There are hardly any who know the truth of this matter and spreading these falsehoods is grounds for me to destroy you!”

“You made it quick?” Hendric scoffed. “What of their souls?”

“They were delicious.” Barry’s smile and shift in attitude were obviously not the reactions Hendric had been expecting, and the bloodlust washing over the area caused the A-ranked Mages to fall back. “You will cede control of this outpost to me, or I will take it.”

Hendric struggled for a few moments, then rolled his eyes. “Fine! Take it, you abyssal psychopath! The regional Guildlord will be here tomorrow anyway, so enjoy your power over others while you can.”

“I will. Let’s start with you.” Barry pointed at an area off to the right of the camp. “I need a place for this mountain. Check for anyone alive down there, since you obviously care so much about the fate of fishies and the like. Anything down there will be crushed, and it is unlikely that we will be mobilizing for any length of time. I don’t want this thing spotted until it is too late for the corpse lovers to do anything about it.”

Interesting. Landing may actually be of benefit to me, though I was loathe to do it without good reason. Without the need to stay afloat, I could rebuild my Essence reserves and finish tasks in days that had been projected to be completed in weeks. I informed Navigation Bob of our destination, and he altered our path slightly so that we would land gently on the specified area.

“See how well-trained I already have this dungeon?” I was taken aback as I heard Barry bragging. “I merely tell you where it will go, and it does the rest. Just wait until you see the improvements I made for our troops.”

For that comment alone, I would make sure this man was a casualty in the war.

Chapter Twenty-six

I was as nervous as a new father as my mountain was set down on the plain. <Carefully! You can move slower than that!>

Navigation Bob was sweating heavily as he tried to follow my orders. I felt a little bad, but at the same time, it would take a tremendous amount of effort to reattach a part of Mountaindale that was not directly a part of the dungeon, such as the lake at the base. If that cracked or the water sloshed out, it was gone until I finally extended the dungeon proper to that point. “I am doing my best, Great Spirit. This is our first attempt at setting the dungeon down and not just getting close, so please bear with me.”

<I am well aware, Bob. Just…>

“I have it well-handled, I think,” Bob cautiously interrupted me. “Why don’t you go check on other things and leave this to the people who can see where they are going?”

<That’s cold, Bob. Fair, but cold.> I actually laughed, though; most of the Bobs were too ‘respectful’ to give me backtalk. <Fine, I’ll get ready to divert the Essence into other projects. Any word on Minya? Has anyone seen her, heard from her?>

“Perhaps another Bob would be willing to help you, Great Spirit,” Navigation Bob spoke through a clenched jaw as he used his whole body to shift a section of the Runescripting that was keeping us afloat.

I didn’t reply, instead going to another Bob and asking. His response made me groan. “Why not try and contact her directly, Great Spirit?”

Because I forgot to do it, that’s why. It hadn’t really been a ‘thing’ I was used to doing because the last times I had attempted to do so, Minya had been in an area that was designed to interrupt our communication. I reached for our bond and sent my thoughts along it. <Minya! How are things? Did you get it yet?>

I waited a few moments, but there was no answer. Was she still in the dungeon? Was it blocking her attempts to communicate? I knew that I could do that and had in the past, but if it was something all dungeons could do, I needed to find a new method of communication. Actually, no, this should be the last dungeon we need to destroy for a long time. I glanced at the map of ley lines and found that the expanding lines had almost finished circling the entire globe. It had taken some convincing for me to believe that the world was a sphere, but the Bobs assured me that they could look out and see the world curving. I was still confused about how things stayed on the surface on the other side of the planet, but I saw strange things all the time.

I felt a shudder, then a thump, and then the entire mountain vibrated as it came to a stop. People and creatures stumbled as our momentum abruptly shifted, but I was pretty pleased with the final result. We had decided that hovering and gently lowering was a bad idea, as the mountain’s momentum would need to go somewhere and might rebound on us even if we were moving very slowly. We had come down at a slight angle and let the ground get scraped up instead. As far as I could tell, it had been a success.

Navigation Bob did good work. I created a cookie for him and shifted all the power I had been using for flight back into myself. I was lifted out of my puddle - which splattered everywhere - as the Essence accumulated so rapidly that it overflowed onto the floor as liquid Essence. Luckily, I was just heavy enough to remain in my area; it would have been embarrassing to need to find a way back in. I hadn’t moved my Core directly for a long time!

Converting the accumulating Essence into what I needed was easier than ever with such an overabundance. I returned the liquid power to its gaseous form and sent it through a pipeline that connected directly to the third floor. It was time to get my Goblins back! Luckily, there were very few people in the dungeon; most had gone to watch Mountaindale settle onto the ground. If a cultivator had been on the third floor right now, it would have been a dream come true in terms of easy cultivation. At least until I sent Snowball and the Hopsecutioners after them. Heh. If I ever start a band, that would be the name of it.

I twisted the Essence and, similar to the first time I had created this floor, the ground began to sprout stone. I remade the fortifications, the pathways, the plants, and even the Goblin hot spring baths. I then went to each spawning area and poured enough Essence into them to make a dozen Goblins at every fortification. Still, I wasn’t even using enough Essence to keep up with the flow of power coming into my area.

I now had a moat of liquid Essence around the small hill that contained my Core, and the only reason it wasn’t going further was the Runescripts. The liquid would get to the edge and stop, flowing higher as more flooded the area. If I didn’t find a use for this Essence, I would soon have a pillar of liquid that reached the ceiling. Actually, that might be fun to see. I considered letting the Essence build up, but I decided that I may as well use it while I could.

After informing Mind Bob about all the bodies awaiting memories, he hurried to the floor with a happy smile. I guess being around only yourself all day could be a little annoying for other people. Being around myself was a delight for anyone who had the chance. Essence began to build higher, and I started to get nervous. Should I just work on absorbing it all? Convert it to influence and expand my control of the area? Feed it into the gigantic ritual that I was using to create the ley lines, thereby forming a feedback loop that would net me even more Essence?

That one. Yeah, I liked that last one. I opened a channel for the liquid and controlled its movement. I liberally poured power into the Cores powering the ritual, filling them to capacity. Then I empowered the Runescript directly and connected the channel of Essence to them. The liquid Essence could be used directly, and the Cores would add power again after I removed the alternate power source.

That should do it! My attention returned to my Core, and I frowned. That hardly dented the Essence accumulation. Celestial feces it took a ton of Essence to fly. I knew it was a lot, but… this was… wow. I made a pillar from ground level to almost be even with the hole I resided in under the Silverwood tree. Where else could I store this? I checked my reservoir through the small emergency portal that I kept, but even that was now full. Maybe I should make big tanks or barrels of Essence or something. Put it in flasks and see how many people drink it and explode? …That could be fun.

<Hey Dale, want a training aide?> I winced as he looked up from his lotus position. His face was bruised so badly that I wouldn’t have recognized him if I were an inferior being who relied on something as unreliable as eyesight. <Is that all from when you were being pelted by ice and goose?>

“Yeth,” he lisped, nodding very gently.

<Wait, is that ‘yes, I want the aide’ or ‘yes, the ice’?>

“Yeth ta aide, yeth th’ gooth.” He closed his eyes again; although, through the swelling, you could barely see that they were open in the first place.

<So, why haven’t you been to a healer to get fixed up?> I kept my tone conversational as I created a large flask in front of him, directing pure vapor Essence into it and converting it back to liquid form. The vial, more like a jug, filled quickly. Dale’s eyes were what I assumed was his approximation of ‘wide-open’ at the ‘generosity’ I was showing.

“Againth ta ruleth.” Instead of drinking the now-full vial as I had expected, Dale covered the opening with his palm and began pulling it in through his meridians. Dang, he was smarter than I thought he was. I guess he did keep some of my characteristics. “Thith helpth. Thankth.”

I wanted to say something, but he looked so abused right now that I figured I would be better served working with the overflowing Essence again. I placed a few small vials in chests on the first and second levels with just enough Essence in them to pop anyone below the C-ranks. I wanted to see who had more ambition than brains. This should be funny!

Next… hmm… I guess expanding influence? I went back to my Core, morbidly curious about how high the liquid had expanded. To my confusion, relief, and confusion again, the liquid had not gone past the base of the Silverwood tree. I could see the Essence pouring in and welling up, but it seemed to be vanishing after that. I had a stable amount of Essence and no more. Could it be that the… yup! The tree was taking it all in. I was impressed, awed, and a little jealous over its apparently endless capacity. There were no outward signs, and there was no overpowering aura coming from it; the tree was just… thirsty.

Not my problem, I guess. I connected to the veritable pool of Essence and began converting it into influence. I packed the influence into the ground and began expanding my body. If I hurried, I might be able to claim the entire Skyland as dungeon. If I really pushed, I might be able to take some of the surrounding countryside with me as well.

Chapter Twenty-seven

Dale sighed in relief as he sat in closed cultivation. This wasn’t an extra-special process; it merely meant that he was in a locked room that held high Essence concentrations. The point of this setup was intended to be used to avoid interruptions while seeking enlightenment, but it was frequently used as a way to avoid people and decompress from stress. In Dale’s case, he was using it for both reasons.

His team had requested a day off, which he agreed to as he was a member, not a dictator. Beyond that, he really didn’t want anyone to see him right now. He was beat beyond recognition, had lost his Nobility, and had somehow gone from a champion of the people to a laughing stock overnight. Tom had even attacked him initially when he came back, which was why he was so happy to agree to a break. Tom had thought the bloated and malformed infected had returned to the dungeon, and only Adam’s hasty intervention had saved him from a full-power warhammer smash.

Forcing himself not to roll his eyes at the memory - moving at all hurt - Dale looked around the small stone room he was in and gulped. Some water would be nice, but this was a ‘breakthrough’ room, designed as a sensory deprivation chamber for those that were close to ranking up and simply needed to clear their minds and let ideas come to them. Dale was using it as an escape as well as a hiding place. Who bothered those who were getting close to a breakthrough? He glanced at the mostly full jug of pure Essence in front of him. “Bethides the dungeon, I gueth.”

His eyes closed once more, and he began directing the new Essence into his body while making new connections for his external aura. Without needing to constantly stop and restart after cultivating, he was building his aura at record-breaking speed. It was still tedious and time-intensive, but this liquid Essence jug held more Essence than he could gain from two dozen Snowball Cores. He closed his eyes and returned his mind to his aura. Loop. Twist. Loop…

At some point, Dale ran out of available Essence. He knew that he had, but he was in a trance of working. Building his aura had become rote, automatic and necessary for his mind. Darkness began to close in on him, and as his thoughts fell into tunnel-vision, a light appeared and began to peel away at the fringes of the encroaching void.

“Tut, tut, boy.” The voice was familiar… Artorian? “Even if you are only my disciple in name, I can’t have you dying from self-inflicted Essence withdrawal. Let’s stop that working on the aura and get you to bed. How does that sound?”

“Thoudth good…” Dale muttered around his swollen lips.

“Those are some impressive bruises. Not healed, hmm? I bet your combat teacher is trying to teach you to ‘fight through the pain’ or some nonsense.” Artorian swept Dale up and put him over his shoulder. “Bah. As if you wouldn’t seek healing in some form or another during a battle.”

A gentle warmth filled Dale as Artorian started to glow. “Sunlight helps everything, a least a little. Except for the undead. Melts them like butter.” He chuckled once more, and that was all Dale remembered.

He awoke with a start, looking around in confusion. He was laying on a bed made of pillows, and when he tossed off his blanket, it turned out that he was covered in pillows as well. The ‘blanket’ he had tried to remove went sailing into the wall and exploded in a puff of feathers. Moving more carefully, Dale managed to crawl out of the pillow pit and get onto firm ground. “So much floof! I’m surprised he isn’t a pillow Mage or something. Actually, that title seems a little… indecent.”

He felt at the bruises on his face, but they had fully healed or were at least no longer painful and swollen. Dale wanted to find Artorian and thank him, but the man had apparently gone to do other things and was nowhere to be seen. Next… Dale felt entirely drained. His Essence was flickering, having barely restored itself from ambient Essence while he slept.

He sat down and began to pull in Essence, feeling relief wash through him as his starved body greedily ate the power. As his Essence started to increase rapidly, he felt his aura and was shocked. There were tens of thousands of miniscule connections that surrounded his body, over a hundred times what he had in place the day before. He continued to pull in Essence, pausing when a thought struck him. His cultivation was so slow, and there was someone he could blame for that.

“Cal,” Dale firmly announced to the room. When there was no response, he glared and added a touch of Essence to his voice. “Cal.”

There was a tiny fluctuation in the ambient Essence, and Dale instantly looked toward it. <Whoa, that was creepy. Taking after your friend Adam now?>

“What are you talking about?” Dale’s tired voice echoed in the room.

<How you looked at my point of view. It’s not… a normal thing. Even S-rankers can usually only feel my presence, not the exact location.> The dungeon spoke with uncertainty, making Dale wonder what else was going on. The normal sarcasm and bad jokes were missing. <Anyway. What do you want?>

Dale took a deep breath. “Look, Cal. I need something from you.”

<What a shock!>

“I’m serious, Cal. My growth is being impacted because of this.” Dale’s mouth set in a firm line, and he stared unblinkingly at the wall. “A while back, I had gotten a cultivation technique from the Dark Elves, and you ate it. I need it. All I have is the standard Guild technique, and it isn’t really designed for someone like me. I’ve been overpowering it with all my affinities, but it isn’t enough anymore.”

Dale waited for a long minute, not speaking, moving, and barely even breathing. He wouldn’t be the first to talk. If he did, he was sure the dungeon would turn this into a joke and run off. When the next words entered his mind, Dale’s heart leapt into his throat.

<I… suppose I can do that.> There was a long, long pause. <This is it though, Dale. The armor, the special treatment, safe zones, and now a really, really good cultivation technique. Do you agree that we are equal in services if you get this? You did a good thing when you got Dani back for me… but this is it, right?>

Dale actually hesitated. Did he really want this to be the final favor he would ask for? Should he… no. He needed this. “I agree, Cal.”

<Then here ya go!> The air in front of Dale thickened, and Essence began to swirl in front of him. There was a throb of power, and a solid item appeared in midair. Dale caught the gem in his hands before it could hit the ground.

He flinched as the voice inside his head suddenly shouted, <A new hand touches the beacon!>

“What the abyss, Cal! I nearly pissed myself!” Dale yelped, an instant headache forming from the mental strain.

<Heh. Just thought it’d be fun to see you flinch.>

Rolling his eyes and remembering the last time he had held a memory stone with this information, Dale pressed it against his forehead immediately. Information flowed into him, settling in place and becoming his own memories, his personal experience. He saw the Elf who had spent over a decade to form the initial stages of this technique and was startled to find that Cal had added in his own changes. Those changes increased the technique’s ability to absorb essence by almost twenty percent, and Dale looked up with shining eyes.

“Thank you, Cal.” Dale’s voice was thick with emotion.

<Please, don’t mention it. Ever.> There was a pause. <Really, withholding from you is kind of like damaging myself over time, isn’t it? I have an excess… of good will right now, but it won’t last for long. Go fix yourself.>

Dale waited to see if anything else would be added, but the fluctuation vanished and he knew he was alone once more. Remembering the details of the cultivation technique, he gulped nervously. Altering a cultivation technique was dangerous under normal conditions, and his had been put in place and sealed by Father Richard. Using this one would undo that seal, changing not only his fractal chi patterns but also the very essence of how he drew in the energy. A wry smile appeared on his face; that had almost been a pun.

Looking around the empty room, he decided that this was as good a place to practice as any other. He knew he could put the technique in place; he ‘remembered’ doing it properly and what was needed to make it happen. He also knew how painful this was going to be. He took a deep breath, reminding himself that at the end of this process, he would feel great. Dale turned his mind to his Center, his Core. With a thought… his chi spiral began unwinding. The fractal patterns reverted to unbound Essence, and the loose Essence threatened to swell out of control and explode outward if he didn’t find a way to control himself. Dale gagged as his body screamed that it was dying since he could no longer draw in the energy of the heavens and the earth. He growled under his breath, “I’m fine!”

The body could survive for years without external Essence. It was just… unpleasant. Dale began weaving his Essence into threads, holding each string in place through force of will alone. For some reason, the experience transformed into a feeling like he was in a smithy heating metal. As each ‘ingot’ of Essence became ‘hot’ and malleable, he had to grasp it with his fingers and pull the near-liquid substance into a thin wire. It was a confusing sensation, as he had never spent time in a forge. Nonetheless, he continued to pull the cord and shape it into a complex configuration, a beautiful piece of elaborate jewelry that formed in his Core.

When he finished an unknown amount of time later, Dale smiled in satisfaction at his Masterwork. He was just handing the intricate jewelry to the King of… as the strange vision faded, Dale blinked, finding himself back in the Headmaster’s quarters. It was night, but as he stood, a voice called out to him, “So, m’boy, it seems that you felt that you couldn’t leave without saying goodbye, hmm?”

Dale turned and smiled at the hedonistic posture Artorian had taken. He was lying on a mound of pillows with a plate of fruit and a glass of wine, smoking from his hookah. A robe, possibly silk, was wrapped around him. Dale rolled his eyes at the excess, thinking that perhaps they had initially agreed to a salary which was far too high. “No, Headmaster, I was having a… breakthrough of sorts.”

“Hmm. When I first came in, I honestly thought you had died sitting on my favorite pillows, and I would have hated to throw those out. No chi spiral usually means dead or crippled cultivator. Now though, well! You seem to be getting healthier by the second.” It was true. Even the passive absorption of Essence with this technique outstripped Dale’s previous by leaps and bounds. He could barely wait to see what the active cultivation looked like.

Dale wasn’t sure how much to tell this man. Then again, he had saved his life and brought him into his home to recover. “The… dungeon and I have a special relationship. I did something for it recently, and it repaid me with a technique that I desperately needed.”

“I… see.” Artorian nodded, eyes half closed. “Well, I trust that you are well enough to head off? I do have some other things to take care of.” Dale nodded and said his farewells, while Artorian thought long and hard about his next actions.

“I see no other real choice here. Excuse me, dungeon? I… would like to make a deal,” Artorian spoke, and a small fluctuation in the ambient Essence assured him that the dungeon was listening.

Chapter Twenty-eight

“Great Spirit, I have news!” Bob Prime was shouting into the third floor, his Mana-enhanced voice rattling Goblins and adventurers alike. A few started running to the exit, making me sigh as they avoided walking into traps or going for ‘raspberries’ from my sneaky monsters.

<Hello, Bobius Primius.> Bob didn’t react to my teasing at all, so I just told him to report.

“Cartographer Bob has spotted Minya and two others flying toward us with all haste. There seems to be some form of… atmospheric disturbance behind them.” Bob finished the last sentence hesitantly.

<Oh. They must have succeeded then.> I pondered what to do next. <Bob, you have heard that a dungeon can become a ‘disaster zone’ when it loses its Core, correct?>

“I have, but I do not understand exactly what that means,” Bob confessed apologetically, even as he opened a secret panel and left the floor.

<Hmm. I’ll use myself as an example.> I looked around and lit up a section of the wall. <Let’s use this wall to explain. This section is made of a combination of cursed earth, dungeon grown stone, Runes, and is just stuffed with Essence. That’s the wall. As we get lower in the dungeon, the items are formed with my Mana in some cases. As pure as my Essence is, I still store all of the corruption that I should have floating around in me. Now, my influence is also a factor here. Soon, this entire mountain, and then some, is going to be part of me. If my Core were to be taken out of here improperly, all of the Essence, corruption, and Runes that I keep in check would be… loosed.>

“So anything not in your Core… would start to leak into the surroundings?” Bob paled, and he swallowed as he looked around at the purple cursed earth.

<Over time. Then, as more gets loose, the remainder will get loose faster. Eventually, it will all go boom unless something takes control, absorbs the excess, or if it is exceptionally stable. I think the ‘disturbance’ behind them is the remains of the dungeon going ‘boom’. I need to direct more power into the ley lines leading there. Let’s see if I can’t absorb the excess before things get weird.> I always liked a challenge.

These ley lines were fun toys, and extending the range from which I could absorb energies was very beneficial. I looked at the map and frowned as I found blank spots in areas around the world. One of the downsides of using basic Essence to power them was that a higher concentration of Essence or Mana could block the ley lines from expanding. Over time, I could slowly make them stretch into the area, but that wasn’t good enough right now. I needed to make a statement here, to flex my power and take control.

Minya touched down on Mountaindale and ran toward the entrance to my dungeon. She started speaking on the first floor, her speed increasing as she flashed past bosses. “Cal, I’m holding a dungeon Core that is very unhappy to be held. It keeps trying to eat me, and if I put it in anything or let Essence touch it, it takes it all in, and I lose control.”

Ah. That explained why she hadn’t just taken the portal down to me. “Can you please take over this thing or give me access to something that’ll get me closer to you!”

<Take a left, Minya.> She heard and obeyed, running toward a wall that slid out of her way. <Get ready, there is a bit of a drop.>

“A drop…?” She had gone past the wall and found that the ground simply ended. This was the most direct route down to me without a portal, a simple shaft that I used for air, Essence, and now Minya. “Ahhh!”

<Oh, knock it off, Minya. You can fly, can’t you?> I saw the humor in her eyes as her descent slowed a tiny amount.

“Ah. I thought you were expecting a little drama.” Minya patiently waited until the ground began to approach, then slowed and landed gently. She walked toward the Silverwood tree, cocking her head as she saw the liquid Essence sloshing around. “Is that…?”

<Yup. Liquid Essence. Can you put that Core on the pedestal there?> She did as I asked, and I stared at the Core. It had a tier-three Mana signature, which was… decently impressive. Earth and fire Essences… <Was this in a volcano?>

“Yes, also, it erupted just after we took the Core. The entire region is going to be having a hard few years.” Minya looked so grim that I had to tune her out.

<Let’s see here… hey. Core. Do you have a mind?> I projected my thoughts at the Core, and its colors began to swirl and shift. <I’m thinking ‘yes’. Oh?>

<Eruption,> said a slightly feminine voice I had never heard before.

The previously almost inert Core launched a huge ball of liquid stone at me, more precisely, at the tree above me. <Oh, that just won’t do. Acme.>

With a small puff of smoke, the attack was fully absorbed, converted into base Essence and Mana that I easily swallowed. The great thing about my Mana was if I was stronger than the attack coming directly at me, I could absorb it every time. Especially if I didn’t need to deal with a being’s aura weakening my own. <How to retaliate…? How about…>

I was speaking aloud intentionally to cow the Core into submission. My Mana expanded away from me, wrapping the Core in a suffocating cloud of dense power. When I say ‘suffocating’, I mean it. If the Core didn’t give up soon, I was going to shatter it either by accident or design. That was when another new voice interrupted me.

“Please! Leave her alone!” A green Wisp came flying down the airshaft Minya had taken, and with a thought, I closed the wall. Whoops. That could have been bad. “She is just in pain, and terrified!”

I eased the pressure on the opposing Core, noting that a few imperfections flaked off of… her. <Can she speak?>

“Normally, yes, but I think she is in shock. She was just ripped out of her body; she isn’t thinking rationally!” The Wisp seemed agitated. Heh. “My name is Xan; I’m her bonded Dungeon Wisp.”

<You sound pretty proud of that, Xan.> I twitched, and my Mana retracted.

“I am. She is smart and had made over one hundred levels through an active volcano. That’s… I mean, it’s gone now, but she did it.” Xan’s voice dropped to a whisper.

<Is that what took you so long, Minya?> I looked over at the Mage, who was staring at the sloshing liquid Essence still.

“Huh?” She seemed to wake up. “Oh. Yeah. It was hard to get down, even harder to get back up through all the rising lava.”

<Magma,> I heard a voice call out weakly. <It’s only lava when it is out of the ground.>

<Ah, the guest of honor speaks!> I cheered with zero sarcasm. <I’m Cal, and I’d like to offer you a job.>

<What? I’m dying, Cal.>

<That’s nice,> I responded brightly. <I need someone to take over a few of my floors so that I can do other things. I’m in the process of taking over and regulating the world’s Essence right now. You have a name?>

<It… I’m Dregs,> the Magma Core responded. <Are you the one who kept tearing away at my Essence regeneration?>

<Yup, that was me. Kind of. Now I’m going to clean up your dungeon. One moment, please.> Bob had already been so kind as to isolate the ley line that led directly to the dead dungeon, and I had the map projecting on the wall right now. I touched the web of ley lines, pulling a breath of Acme from my Core. As the Mana passed through the air from my Core to the line, the air crackled and sparked, marks appearing in the air that took a long moment to heal. I touched the Mana to the line and sent it to empower and enhance the lines.

I watched on the map as the line I had just touched blazed. A pure white line was traced over the golden strings, and in moments, it had reached the blank spot of the chart. A sheet of white covered the empty spot, then slowly resolved into a series of individual lines. From there, white traced along a few connecting paths, but it all slowly returned to a bright gold, perhaps slightly more pale than the remaining lines. <And here… we… go!>

Mana and Essence were being sucked through the line, coming toward me. <Get ready, Dregs, we are going to see what you can do.> I directed the Mana into her Core as it reached us, and all the energy of an erupting volcano slammed into her. I heard her scream as she did her best to absorb all of her own Mana, but I was also watching her for when she couldn’t take any more. Just before that point, I switched the flow to myself and swallowed all of the Mana at once.

<Yum.> I didn’t allow anyone to see how much effort that had taken. <So, about that job.>

Chapter Twenty-nine

I installed Dregs as the controller of floors one through four. I still had everything in place; it was just her job to keep the traps and Mobs running smoothly so that I didn’t need to bother with them. In return, she was able to draw in the pure Essence on these floors. Obviously, she didn’t get it all and it was quite the demotion for her, but the other option for her was to become an intelligent weapon that I gave out as a special reward to someone. It would have been a whip that assisted the user, boosted control over fire and earth Essence, and… ah well. Maybe she would be terrible at her new job.

Then again, if she failed at such a simple thing, it would look bad for me. It would seem like I had failed. Maybe I should just… no, no. I needed to trust myself. The pursuit of perfection could not be a lonely road. I looked wistfully at the room Dani and Grace were in. I missed them. From the explosions, laughter, and bursts of energy, I could tell they were having fun. Le sigh.

The volcano that had been inhabited by Dregs had turned out to be a natural Essence accumulation point, a shaft from deeper in the earth where fire and earth Essences constantly spewed forth. My ley lines were now acting to regulate the energy, but it made me wonder if naturally formed dungeons served a purpose for the world. Did they fix what would otherwise be an imbalance in the Essence of the planet? At this point, so close to finishing the first layer of ley lines… did I care? Nope!

On another side note, I was advancing. I knew I was; although, for some reason, this advancement was oddly slow. Typically, there was a significant moment and boom! I advance! This one, though… it felt like my soul was stretching. Not in the ‘oh, I just woke up and feel good’ way. More like ‘put him in the rack and start pulling’! My cultivation settled into a plateau, and if I had lungs, I would have been gasping in pain.

<Dani, we need to talk.> She started to refute me, and I knew she was getting ready to kick me out again. I silenced her objections with a harsh repeat of my words. <Dani. We need to talk.>

Concern replaced her current haughty mood, and she floated out and toward my Core. “What’s going on, Cal?”

I filled her in on what had been happening in the dungeon, the new Core and Wisp, and the pain of my recent advancement. She listened intently, not interrupting, which I was thankful for. When I was finished, she flew in circles around the glistening Silverwood tree for a bit, thinking. Grace splashed around in the liquid Essence, obviously enjoying the increased power and seeing what happened to things that the Essence landed on. She giggled as a flower mutated wildly out of control and burst into flames without consuming the plant. That’s my girl!

Dani came to a stop, hovering above me. “So… the only thing I can think of is the next stage of Mana cultivation, which is applying your law within your soul. What this does is create a space, an actual physical location in your soul that is accessible. For most people, this is basically only enough room to store a single item, but… I’m not sure what you would be making. I could also be wrong, since this isn’t normally started until the A-ranks.”

I considered that. <Well… could it be that since I have such a high-tier law, I’d need to start that process early?>

“That’s what I was thinking.” She nodded along at my words, hesitating before speaking again, “Whatever you start making… you need to finish eventually. It needs to encompass your law, and if you make something too weak, you will severely limit your future growth. Weak Mages make something the size of a large box, strong ones make an entire palace, but the larger the creation, the more power will be needed to complete it.”

<Does it all happen at once?>

“Hah! Not even close. Only the concept has to be made all at once.” Dani chuckled as my dreams collapsed. “I think we are onto something here. Try thinking about what you will be making in your soul space, and when you are ready, try adding to the space that already exists. If something happens, you were ready for this. Otherwise, we will need to find some other way to help you.”

Her instructions were helpful, but I was faced with the same issues I had when trying to cultivate perfection. What embodied perfection? What could I make that would be a sufficient stand-in for Acme? I pondered this question, but reflecting on perfection was as useful as staring into the void. There were no ready answers, and they wouldn’t grant their secrets easily. I had real work to do now.

<Bob Prime, I have a job for you.> Bob perked up as I spoke into his mind.

“What can I help with today?”

<We are going to be working to change the Runescripting we have set up currently for the creation of the ley lines. I need to find an outlet for my power, and I’ve decided that I want to be moving the lines into stage two.> My words made him go still.

“Great Spirit, it might be years before stage one is complete. The blank spots on the map-”

<Are going to be overpowered by me,> I announced grimly. <I’ve found a bit of a bottleneck in my growth, Bob, and I think the way to break through it is to devote myself to a few important tasks and learn more. When the preparations are complete, I will be connecting my Core directly to the diagram and powering it with my Mana. Anything trying to block us… I’m done trying to play nice. I am going to destroy them directly.>

“Is this… is this wise, Cal?” Oh? He called me by name?

<I can’t say that it is, Bob, but I’m running out of time.> My mind looked upward, leaving Bob behind to follow my orders.

I watched as Barry ordered some Guild members around. “No, I’m glad the regional Guildlord was delayed. This camp is in shambles, and I only have a few days to fix a few weeks’ worth of issues. We need our lower members to get going through the dungeon; it’s a good training ground and gives out Inscribed weapons like a drug dealer gives out free samples.”

I can’t say that I cared for the comparison, but his point was valid. He continued speaking softly, though the people around him were stiff and silent, so his words were clear and audible, “The dead have been moving toward us; obviously, they plan to move to defeat our armies before continuing on to attack the High Elves in Citime-o Ka, the city of light. The Elves will be joining us, and our Dwarven and Northman allies will flank the army of the dead. This will be our only real chance to crush this foe. If we fall… if we fail… there will be no one left that can resist them.”

“What was the purpose for bringing the dungeon here, Paragon?” an A-ranked High Mageous dared to ask. Paragon? Was that the title for an S-ranker then? Or just his title?

“We are going to use the dungeon to swoop around the dead and deposit our elite troops at the rear of the army, where the leadership will most likely be cowering and commanding their troops. If everything goes well, we will be able to cripple their chain of command in one. Fell. Swoop.” Barry squeezed the table, which exploded into sawdust.

“When will we move out, Paragon?” another A-ranker spoke from the middle of the group.

“One week,” Barry growled throatily. “In one week, this dungeon will take off, carrying the hope of the entire world with it.”

Well, no pressure on me then, thank goodness. I snorted and moved away. I now had a deadline, and I needed to get to work on my pet projects. I moved over to where a few Bobs were working on an opal and asked them to step back while I inspected it. I went through the massive gem, whistling at the end. This thing had enough carats to feed a floor full of Bashers for a decade. There was a slight flaw, a crack near one end. I filled the microscopic crack, then congratulated the Bobs on their hard work. This is precisely what I had needed.

I washed my influence over the massive opal, dissolving it into my being. Using the new pattern, I exerted myself, and twelve identical opals appeared next to the nonplussed Bobs. <Now that we have our focus, it is time to start assembling the weapons.>

They nodded sleepily, which made me wonder if the crack I had found had been due to a sleep-related accident. <First, go get some rest. The energies we are going to be using are not something to play around with, and I don’t want to have to clean your bodies up again.> Most of them nodded cheerfully and scattered away. A few went over to the corner of the room and fell asleep on mats that had seemingly been placed there for that exact reason.

I didn’t envy their need for sleep. I looked over at the Runescript that Bob was layering on the original and went to offer my assistance. I was ready to taste the fruits of my labor, and the harvest was coming soon.

Chapter Thirty

Dale’s thoughts were whirling as he strained his cultivation technique to the maximum he possibly could. He was having an issue similar to when he had first advanced to the D-ranks, where his chi threads were slightly fractured. All he needed to do was gather enough Essence to fill the gaps, but the issue was that he could only repair one section at a time. Once he got going, the usable portion would expand, rushing the remaining Essence toward healing. A snowball effect, if you will. His thoughts stuttered, and he shook off the memories of snowballs. If he never saw a snowman again…

He was sitting alone on the second floor, feeling that he would be best served doing this by himself. Dale tried actively cultivating again, and the air shuddered as Essence was pulled into him. He gagged as the pain of his chi threads reforming struck him, his technique faltering. Catching his breath, he grit his teeth and did it again and again. Each time he did so, he was able to devote more Essence to the threads and last a little longer. He was close; he knew it…

Pushing himself, needing Essence to reach his Core again, Dale pushed one last time. The air trembled, then roared as his chi spiral stabilized and began drawing in Essence. Dale was panting as the intricate workings of his new technique pulled power through every single affinity channel at the same time; his meridians began working overtime to bring Essence to his starving body. It took a few minutes before Essence actually began trickling into his Core, but once it did… the trickle became a flood.

The vibrations he was generating were causing the floor to shake, the air to thrum, and his body to rejoice. The last remnants of his injuries and bruises faded as his body took energy to heal and to enhance. In a few minutes, the power flowing into him returned to a trickle as the loose Essence in the air was depleted. It would replenish soon, but for now, this area was going to be useless to cultivate in. A few Bashers appeared nearby, drawn by the noise and shaking, but they seemed to get sick as they came closer. Dale watched them as they closed in, but a few hops later, they turned and ran away.

“What was that all about?” he muttered aloud, not expecting to get an answer.

“Well, Dale, they survive on Essence.” Minya was seated off to the side, and he shrieked too shrilly when her voice reached his ears. “Wow. That was extra manly. Dungeon born flora and fauna in this world need a certain Essence density to survive. Just like when normal humans climb mountains and have a hard time breathing, Essence-enriched beings don’t do well in depleted areas. In a dungeon, this is an effective tactic for keeping creatures away from you, which is in part what these new ‘safe areas’ in here do.”

“Why are you here, Minya?” Dale questioned the Mage with a sigh. “Cal and I are on somewhat friendly terms now, and I have no need to be ‘converted’.”

Minya looked around, seemingly avoiding the question. “I’m just here… exploring how well the first few floors are being managed.”

“What does that even mean?” Dale stood and brushed his pants off. He started edging toward the exit portal, his hand going toward his pocket where he kept a keygem. “Listen, it’s good to see you, as always, but…”

“I really wouldn’t do that if I were you.” Minya smiled sadly at Dale. “I don’t think you want to go up there right now.”

“Might be better than hanging out with…” Dale took a deep breath and stopped himself. “I’m sorry, that isn’t fair. If I am getting on friendly terms with the dungeon, I can’t fault you for doing the same, if a bit more… energetically than me.”

Minya nodded happily. “I’m glad you are finally coming around. The benefits of working with Cal… they’re unbelievable. As I’m sure you’ve learned.” Her smile was now mysterious and sly.

“Right. Well.” Dale looked at the portal. “Why shouldn’t I go up there right now?”

Minya’s smile shifted to an annoyed frown. “The academy clerk that you’ve been giving your ‘required items’ to? You never got a receipt or a token of some sort to prove that you were making your quotas. If you go up there without fifty percent more than two weeks’ worth of items, you will be dropped from the academy as soon as you appear.”

Dale’s jaw slackened, and he sighed deeply. “You know, I’m not a big fan of murder…”

“This is your own fault, Dale. You keep thinking that everyone else is going to be operating in good faith.” Minya shoved him playfully, and he slammed into the wall. Dust rained down on him, and he slid to the floor groaning. “Oh, shoot, I’m so sorry. I forget that you are just in the D-ranks sometimes.”

Dale muttered an inaudible reply, speaking louder after he was able to clear his head. “I turned in everything yesterday. I’m cleaned out. What didn’t go to the academy went to Tyler’s weapon shop. I cleaned out my bags to make room for the next trips.”

“I’m sure they knew that, which is why a Guild member is waiting near each exit to ambush you and press you into service. I’m on my way out; would you like me to send anyone down here for you?” Minya smiled gently as Dale growled.

Thinking about the third floor and the Goblins it contained, Dale’s eyes hardened. “No… I think I know what I want to do for now, and bringing others into this to save me from my own mistake wouldn’t be fair. Thank you for the thought and the kindness you are showing me.”

“I’m sure they wouldn’t mind. You have a nice group of people on your team.” Minya was no longer smiling and evidently thought Dale was being overly stubborn.

“I have a few kinks I need to work out of my fighting style, and right now, I really think this is what I need to do. Thank you for your concern though, Minya.” Dale started walking toward the stairs, glancing back only once. Minya was already gone. Good.

He pulled his gauntlets over his hands and covered his face with his headgear, leaving only a tiny slit to see out of. Dale slipped into the breathing pattern he had been taught by the Moon Elves, maximizing the air he took in while minimizing movement. His walking pattern changed, and his aura began to shift to match the scenery. If Hans had seen this transformation, he would have recognized and complimented the deadly Assassin training Dale must have been going through.

Dale was excited for this opportunity, no matter what Minya had seemed to think. While he filled the role of a Fighter or Monk for his team, Dale’s training had taken him down a different path. A path he didn’t really want other people to see from him; one focused on lethal, instant, brutal attacks. An Assassin’s path. He wanted to see how well he could do fighting against creatures at his own cultivation ranking. As long as he could avoid the powerful necromantic Goblin that appeared intermittently, he was confident that he could do well on this floor, alone. If nothing else, his armor, speed, and aura abilities would ensure that he could escape if he needed to, but he doubted it would come to that.

Padding along with silent footsteps, the only signs of his passage were the bending grass that he needed to step on while avoiding the paths. He spotted a raspberry bush, grinning as he got closer. Half the time, these things were mobs, and he wanted to see how close he could get before it noticed something amiss. Dale found where the creature had burrowed itself. The creature’s head was barely peeking out, its eyes slowly scanning the scenery for prey. Dale stood directly in front of it, and it only blinked a few times to try and clear away its ‘blurry vision’. Dale reached back… and slammed his fist into the creature’s head.

One of the studs on his fist destroyed its eye socket, and the beast thrashed in pain. He punched again, and its skull fractured. The animal went still, though it still twitched every few seconds. Another blow and even that halted. Dale pulled a few spines off of it, planning to use the powerful sedative the thorns contained to control the amount of enemies he faced at any given time. Next, he harvested a few items that the Academy had on the list of goods accepted for contribution and started toward the hexagonal fortifications the Goblins could be found in.

There were guards on the fortress wall, but since they usually had a clear line of sight on any approaching adventurers, they were… lax in their patrols. This fort was in the center of the floor, not against the wall, so Dale couldn’t recreate Hans’ method of pressing against the wall to climb over. He pulled out a small throwing blade and used it to dig into the branches filled with sleeping poison, coating the small blade liberally. Calculating the force and angle needed to reach the Goblin on top of the wall, Dale took aim and threw the small blade.

Ting. The metal item bounced off the stone and fell back down, landing in the dirt a few feet away from him. Dale closed his eyes, hoping the Goblins wouldn’t get alerted from this. He kept very still as the Goblin looked over the edge, attempting to identify the sound. Dale cursed silently; he thought that he was getting better at throwing the small daggers, but… that should have been an easy throw, and now his confidence was shaken. Glancing up, he saw the Goblin still leaning over the edge and narrowed his eyes. Plan ‘B’ then.

He reached out with his Essence and moved a line of power through the stone, shattering the wall right where the Goblin was leaning. The Mob fell with a yelp, landing awkwardly on the ground near Dale. That fall wouldn’t typically be enough to kill a creature at this rank, but Dale was behind it as it started to stand. With a quick motion, he snapped its neck and crushed its windpipe just to feel satisfied. Then, before anything else came to investigate, he rushed around the wall to the opposite side and began to climb. A touch of power on his fingertips let him dig into the stone, and he peeked over the edge to check where he would cross over.

As he had expected, the majority of the Goblins had rushed over to the broken wall to see what was happening. Dale smiled even as he shifted his aura to match the stone more accurately and stealthily drew closer to the Goblins. It took a few minutes to circle the walls, but he heard some interesting conversations when he did.

“Shoddy walls maybe? The Lesser Spirit may not be as interested in making the walls solid for us.”

“Don’t lean on the walls, anymore, got it. Maybe it thinks that we are not allowed to rest? Should we ask the Great Spirit?”

“Don’t be a fool.”

Several variations of this conversation were being discussed as the gate opened and a few Goblins went to retrieve their fallen member. Dale retreated around the corner and pulled out the thorny branches once more, quickly stripping the thorns off with his gloved hands and moving around the bend to scatter them like caltrops near the clustered, barefoot Mobs. He waited a few minutes as the Goblins chattered, then seemed to remember that they had a duty to perform. They started walking away, a few of them snarling as they stepped on something sharp. Dale smiled. The poison took a few moments to have an effect if the thorns weren’t still connected to the branch, but he could afford to be patient.

By the time they were back to their regular patrol sections, many of them were woozy and stumbling. Dale first targeted the few that were moving normally, taking out the first with two devastating kidney shots, making the Goblin stand rigid and unable to make a sound through the pain. Dale snapped his neck, shoving the fresh corpse into his spatial bag before moving to the next one.

The Goblin he came up on next was woozy, so Dale simply grabbed him by the back of his neck and slammed his head into the stone wall. This process was near silent, and another Goblin went into the bag. He continued around the wall in this manner, quickly finishing off the ranged Goblins. The melee Goblins might be harder to defeat with such attacks, but so long as he didn’t need to dodge arrows at the same time, Dale was once again confident in his eventual success.

Chapter Thirty-one

Dale climbed down a ladder set into the wall, getting close to the fighters that were clustered around small tables. They were working on various hobbies, sharpening weapons, or playing cards. Dale was shocked to see how similar the Goblins acted to members of the Guild when they weren’t fighting. It was… Dale shook his head. No, he couldn’t get sentimental about this; they were going down.

“Where are the archers?” Dale winced as one of the Goblins at the table looked up and scanned the wall.

“Maybe they fell off?” Another chuckled, stopping as the first held up a hand.

“No. Something is off; I think we are under attack.” He stood, reaching for a massive sword that was always close to hand. His fingers grasped air, and he looked down at the imprint of his sword that had been right there. “Who took my sword?”

Dale grinned widely. The sword was safely stored in his bag. He had crawled around and collected any weapons not being held or not on a Goblin. He had to suppress his laughter as a small fight broke out. This was an excellent opportunity for him. While the others watched the match with amusement, Dale took out Goblins on the fringes of the area. He was burning through Essence, but a single strike to unarmored kidneys with his left hand would force a full quarter of the blood in their bodies to shift, and they would generally expire from the first strike.

If they did, they went into the bag. If they survived, a second blow to the base of the skull would finish the job, and they still went into the bag. Dale needed to replenish his Essence at this point. Without cultivating, draining their Essence with his other gauntlet, or opening the Goblins to take the Cores inside of them, he was starting to run low on available power. This wouldn’t have been a problem if he hadn’t recently drained himself and started a new cultivation technique, but right now…

“Stop! Stop!” The Goblins that had been fighting were now part of the only four that remained. “Where is everyone? What’s happening?”

“They just went to check on the archers!” The one he had been fighting got in one more sucker punch, but the serious growl stopped him from throwing another.

“Fool, we are under attack! Group up!” The Goblins clustered, and Dale sighed softly. He didn’t have confidence in his current ability to fight such a large group, and now that they were on the alert, he needed to leave. As the Goblins began searching, he moved in the opposite direction and opened the gate. There was only a simple and easy-to-remove bar holding it in place, making him smile. After quietly opening the gate, Dale walked away and found a small hill to sit on.

That could have gone better, but he was happy with the current progress. Taking a deep breath, he released his hold on his camouflage, setting a simple shield in place for now. With so many interconnected sections on his aura, the shield was able to be held with barely a thought and a hint of Essence, so it only made sense to keep them in place at all times. With a small happy sound, he opened himself up to his surroundings and pulled. The grass in the area bent toward him as the wind picked up, and the low rumbling of displaced air alerted anything nearby that something was happening.

Expecting that his cultivation would draw in Mobs, Dale kept his eyes open and tried to remain aware at all times. He smiled as he surpassed the amount of Essence he had been able to draw in on the previous floor. Since this floor was large and open, the ambient Essence quickly rushed to fix the imbalance created by his extraordinarily powerful draw. It took a half hour, but Dale - now panting and feeling bloated - finally needed to stop taking in more. His eyes were shining as he stood, flexing his empowered body. Applying more Essence than usual to his muscles, he took off running for the fort he had vacated.

As he sprinted, he smacked his lips. The Essence had held a more substantial hint of fire and earth than was usual, and he wondered if something had happened to a powerful lava cultivator here recently. The door he had used was still unlocked, and as Dale approached it, he shifted his aura and vanished from view. He slipped through the egress and looked around for the Goblins. They were calmly sitting with their backs to a wall, apparently expecting that their brethren would soon reappear and that the threat was past. They were very wrong. Only two of them held weapons still, so he decided to start with them.

He got close to the first, and its eyes jerked up as Dale stepped on some small scraps of metal. The group tried to get to their feet, but Dale abandoned stealth and punched the Goblin in the face, crushing its head against the wall. It slumped to the ground, and Dale ran at the others before they could get into a formation. He landed a few powerful blows against the Goblin with a weapon, but they were less effective since it could see the attacks coming and defend against them.

The Moon Elf hand-to-hand combat was designed to be used against single opponents but was easily able to be utilized against multiple foes. Dale would have taken a few scratches if he had not been wearing his armor, but even at his level of mastery, the martial art forms were more than sufficient to disable and destroy these Goblins. Dale straddled the last one, punching it in the face over and over while he screamed.

“How dare they take it all away from me? How could they just do that to me!” His bloodlust sated, Dale stared down at the unrecognizable lump of flesh on the ground, wincing as he realized the outlet his pent-up emotions had taken.

<That seemed cathartic, but can you not do that? They do retain some of their memories, and I’m pretty sure that if I don’t take that memory away, this guy’s future iterations are going to claim you as the focus of a blood feud.> Dale nodded, apologized for his loss of control, and stood up. He looked around, deciding to claim this area for the time being. Goblins wouldn’t respawn if he was in here, and the density of the Essence was sufficient that he would feel safe working on his aura for an extended period of time.

He locked the doors of the fortress, double checked that he was alone again, and started cultivating. In terms of pure power, he had stepped into rank D-six. Dale shook his head, disgusted by the people who had been lying to him but also at his own insatiable need to meet their expectations. As his focus converged to a point, the connections in his external aura began to increase yet again. Dale wouldn’t fall into a trance this time; he knew that for a fact. It slowed him down to keep a watchful eye, but relaxing here would likely be the last thing he ever did. He grinned wryly, thinking a dark thought: ‘At least with this body’.

Dale worked through the night, cultivating when his Essence got low and increasing his aura when his power was full. With his new cultivation technique, he was never out of power for more than three-quarters of an hour. With all of his meridians open, he needed very little food or water to sustain himself. When he couldn’t handle the tedium any longer, he would clear out a new fortification, always making sure not to take on too much. At one point, he realized that he was about to miss a training session with his Moon Elf instructor and had the dungeon send Minya with an explanation.

The Elf didn’t seem to mind at first; in fact, he joined Dale in the dungeon and taught him there. As he was leaving, his ire became clear. He broke Dale’s arm for making him go out of his way and then threw him over the wall of an intact Goblin fortress. Dale was pretty sure he left at that point because even though he took a nearly fatal beating from the Goblins, no help arrived. Dale’s eyes blazed with silvery Essence. Good. He didn’t want any help right now.

He could guarantee that the Goblins would. He also knew they wouldn’t get any… at least not in time. He set the bones in his arm with a scream, then showed his teeth as the first arrow came his way. He arrogantly strolled forward, his smile growing wider by the second. Time to work.

Chapter Thirty-two

Filthy. That was the only word Dale could use to describe himself. The blood ran off of his clothes, the flecks of skin and bone would wash away, but he stunk. How long had he been down here? A day ago, he had felt the dungeon shudder as it lifted off the ground, but he didn’t particularly care about those details. What he did care about was that his bag was nearly full of Goblins, Goblin weapons, and various items from this floor. No Cores, though. No, he wouldn’t be giving any of those away. Those were his.

He felt a sense of exaltation, though. He had done it. He knew he had. His external aura was thick, dense, nearly choking him with power. It was complete, at least as much as he could make it at his current cultivation ranking. Now, when he made his shielding, it wasn’t a pale shadow of a real shield. His was at least as powerful as other people he had been studying. When he made a sunlight aura like Artorian had taught him, it didn’t glow. It blazed with light and life. When he made a regenerative aura, his wounds shrank at a visible rate; no longer was it a simple easing of pain.

Dale was at D-rank nine after his extended stay in the high-Essence environment with his new cultivation technique. He would have been in the C-ranks days ago if he hadn’t bothered to devote his power to his aura. But… he had, and he would go to the abyss before he let any of his instructors tell him that he hadn’t done as they asked.

The next step… next, Dale would work internally, trusting his armor to stop slashes and stabs. He knew from trial and error how easy it was to become concussed when struck, how easy it was to lose consciousness from a simple blow. Enhancing his brain was at the top of his priorities, but for now… Dale looked at his bag, which was now dripping with blood that even it couldn’t contain any longer. It was time to return to the surface.

Sneaking around the Boss of this floor, Dale stepped through the portal it protected. As the shimmering field of Essence vanished, an official approached Dale with a smug expression. “Disciple Dale, you are hereby informed that your tenure at-”

His words faltered as Dale’s fingers came within an inch of his neck, stretched out in a claw shape and glistening with infernal-laced flames. Dale’s eyes blazed with silvery light as the Essence imbuing them shone through. Dale’s posture relaxed, his hands dropping to his sides. “Sorry about that. Extended training alone in the dungeon, really gets in your head. I’m sure you understand the risk of something getting into your head, or neck, I suppose. You have ten seconds to finish speaking before I leave. Nine.”

“Uh. You…” the man coughed, regaining his posture, “you are to report for your failure to produce your required resources to the academy. If you do not appear to the headmaster and a quartermaster within thirty minutes of getting this message, you will be dropped from the academy and sent to the frontlines of the ongoing war.”

Dale snorted. “I lose my protection from the war at the start of the C-ranks anyway, but yeah, sure, I’ll play along. I assume they’ve already been alerted and will meet me somewhere?”

“You are to… um… yeah, they’re going to meet you at the punishment hall.” The man nervously scratched at the spot on his neck Dale had touched with his fist.

Dale turned and trotted away without a word. He was done being polite; he had done everything he could to be helpful, courteous, and charming in the past, and look where that had got him! Perhaps it was time to be ruthless. His foot hovered in the air, and he set it down slowly. Was this a realization that all cultivators eventually had? Was this why they all seemed to care so little for others, why they only respected power? He wanted to be different, but… his eyes hardened… but being different wasn’t working out. Maybe he had merely stumbled upon the truth.

Walking into the punishment hall, he noted with a smirk that a large group had apparently been gathered to watch his ‘disgrace’. Headmaster Artorian was the only one in the room that seemed anxious, but the others in the area seemed pleased when they noticed him. Some people were only happy when another person was suffering, was that what this was? He planned to wipe the smirks off their faces soon. Very soon.

“Dale, you are called here today to answer for your failure to produce results. Your contributions to the academy are nil, and unless you are able to produce a month’s worth of such goods, you will lose your discipleship immediately,” the quartermaster stated all this information dryly, neither happy nor sad about carrying out his duty.

“I’m sorry, Dale, there’s-” Artorian was cut off as Dale reached for his bags.

“Sure, here you go.” He upended the bag, fed it some Essence, and allowed weapons to pour out in a stream of clattering metal. As that faltered, he turned the bag, and preserved Goblin bodies began slapping wetly against the floor. A pool of blood rapidly expanded from the area the bodies were appearing, making the onlookers step away hastily. Dale turned the bag one more time, and various herbs and ores began falling onto higher ground. He wouldn’t want to get the rare herbs bloody now, would he? When the last ingot bounced off the floor, Dale put the bag back on and glared at the quartermaster. “I assume this will suffice?”

“Plus an additional three weeks.” The quartermaster nodded, ignoring Dale’s attitude entirely. “Please ensure to get a receipt for all future deposits.”

“This is absurd!” A student stepped forward, pointing at Dale. “He didn’t make his contributions on time! Why does he get special treatment?”

The voice was familiar to Dale, but he couldn’t place it. Artorian’s sudden smile began to fade as the young man continued speaking. “He doesn’t deserve a place here; he has cheated his way through everything! I challenge this peasant for his position as the Headmaster’s disciple!”

Ah, that did it. Dale snapped his fingers. “Thomas Adams.”

“I see you remember me, you scum. Thanks to you, my family was humiliated in front of the Prince!” Thomas roared theatrically, spittle flying as his eyes bulged.

Dale spoke over him, “If I remember correctly, it is this same attitude that got you in trouble last time. Are you sure you want to continue speaking this way to a Duke… peasant?”

“You are no Duke!” Thomas screeched shrilly, hand grasping for a weapon.

“I only lost my titles in the Human lands. Unlike you, I was assured of continued political allegiance by another people.” Dale drolly and intentionally got the man worked up. “If you challenge me, it will not go well for you.”

“My challenge stands!” Thomas spat while drawing his sword from its sheath. He was obviously confident in his ability to win, being at rank C-five.

Artorian coughed lightly. “A challenge has been issued… Dale, you do not need to accept it.”

“Yes, show them that you are a coward!” Thomas taunted with a manic grin. “Run away; go back to herding sheep. If that is all you do with-”

“I accept the challenge,” Dale stated calmly, vanishing from view.

“Huh?” Thomas blinked, staring at the spot Dale had stood. He took a step forward, not trusting his eyes. A shimmer in the air caught his attention, and Dale’s fist caught him in the jaw, breaking it on the first strike. Thomas staggered backward, but Dale pressed his advantage and made a deposit at the bank of schnozz, breaking the sensitive olfactory organ with a sickening crack. The ex-Noble dropped to his knees, and Dale punched him twice more, once in the face and once on the chest, to send him awkwardly splaying onto the ground.

Dale looked around at the shocked faces, trying to make eye contact with anyone who dared. “I trust this matter is settled?”

“Did you kill him, Dale?” Artorian softly questioned the young man standing over the fallen, bloody ex-Noble.

“No,” Dale responded grudgingly, getting a sigh of relief from the rest of the room. Why had they bothered to ask instead of just checking him with their Essence sight? “No matter my personal dislike of this man, that is, what others generously say is a man, every single one of us is another cultivator that can stand against the necromantic horde. He will be fine and just as unpleasant as ever after a cleric takes a look at him.”

Satisfied with this outcome, Dale turned and walked out the door. He had a clerk to find. Why was he continually having trouble with people that were supposed to be doing their job correctly and with integrity, especially the ones that collected upon other people’s hard work? Did the insignificant amount of power they had over others just naturally lend itself to enhancing their greed? Dale glanced into the collection point; happily, the person he was looking for was on duty. He waited a few minutes for the room to empty out, then stalked forward. To his surprise and fury, the clerk smirked at him.

“I’m so sorry; this area is only for current students. Get out.” The last bit was apparently an order and also one that the man thought would be enforced magically. When Dale simply kept walking toward him, he paled and tried to run.

Before he could take two steps, Dale was in front of the man and gripping his neck powerfully, choking the man as he lifted him off the ground. “I will make this easy for you. You owe me all of the supplies I gave you, the extra that was taken from me as a penalty, plus another week’s worth for making me go out of my way like this. You have until this weekend to make it happen, and if I find that you did it by stealing from someone else, I will make sure you never have the option to do so again.” Dale put his hand over the man’s center, made a small cut with the sharpened Mithril knuckle, and pressed his palm against the fresh wound. With a yank, Dale forcibly pulled a strand of the man’s Essence into his hand and absorbed it.

“D-demon cultivator!” the man hoarsely choked out. Dale backhanded him, bloodying his nose.

“Not even close, you worm.” Dale dropped him and walked away, not bothering to look back. “I’ll see you in a few days. Better get busy… unless you want to go back to being a fishy.”

Chapter Thirty-three

“What did you do to yourself?” Craig stared at Dale, eyes narrow and searching.

Dale remained seated casually but cocked his head to the side at the question. “I’m not certain what you are talking about.”

“Don’t take me for a fool, Dale.” Craig swallowed hard. “Are you… crushing Cores again? Do you not remember what happened last time? As far as anyone knows… it killed you. You haven’t refuted these claims, so…”

“I’m not crushing Cores, Craig.” Dale sat up and looked into the Monk’s eyes to show his sincerity. “I have a new, intensely better cultivation technique.”

“I’m not sure I can believe you, Dale. How do you explain your shift in attitude?” Craig’s gaze sharpened further. “You nearly killed a young man today, I’m told. That isn’t like you, Dale, but it does sound like someone who is doing things they shouldn’t be doing. Heightened aggression, anger, sudden surges in power…”

Dale held up a hand. “I’m happy to prove it.” He shifted in his seated position and closed his eyes. For a long moment, nothing changed. Before Craig could say anything else, the Essence in the room trembled and began moving toward Dale. All of it started moving. Craig’s jaw dropped, and Dale opened his eyes in time to see the shift in his expression. The Essence stopped shifting as Dale laughed, almost falling over due to the Monk’s shock.

“So much Essence absorption,” Craig whispered reverently. “It’s almost like… ah-ha! I see now.”

Now it was Dale’s turn to be concerned. “What? What did you just think of?”

“Hmm. No, he has also been in the dungeon consistently fighting… but if he hasn’t been working his body hard enough… I bet he was nearly undamaged the entire time.” Craig’s mumbling was getting on Dale’s nerves, but soon enough, the Monk looked up and explained himself. “Do you remember, a long time ago, we discussed how hard Nobles had to work themselves? How they would only cultivate a few hours a day, then work themselves physically for the remainder of the day?”

“I remember it vaguely.” Dale swiped his hand through the air, motioning for the Monk to continue… and be quick about it.

“There are multiple reasons for this, ranging from stabilizing the Chi… to tempering the mind. Large and sudden increases in power are known to lead to a mental shift. Arrogance stands above the other risks, but wrath and a loss of concern for life also appear. If you do not keep yourself in balance, Dale, you may become something that you once despised.” Craig waited to see if his words would reach the young man, but it seemed that Dale was already disregarding the words he was hearing. “I see. Well, let’s get to training then.”

Craig moved faster than Dale had ever seen, lightly touching Dale in the chest. The move was deceptive, as Dale went flying across the room before slamming into the wall. The Monk cracked his neck, walking toward the fallen man. “It seems that your Elven teacher knew you were already beginning to tread this path. If this is how it needs to be, so be it. I cannot, in good conscience-”

Dale jumped to his feet. He was surprised by the sudden attack, but for some reason, he was completely fine with it. He charged at the Monk, shifting into his combat forms and attacking as hard as he could. He knew he was out of his depth and only full power would give him a chance. Each of his thrown fists were deflected with almost contemptuous ease, and a wide kick was easily avoided. Craig slapped him in the chest again, sending Dale flying once more.

The young man got to his feet, spitting out blood and glaring at Craig. “To the Abyss with this! I’m leaving!”

“No. You aren’t.” Craig was now in front of the door, so Dale shifted into camouflage and tried to go around him. Slap! Once more, Dale was airborne. He screamed in frustration, grasping at the stone around him and trying to hurl it at the Monk. The rock lurched, but then stayed in place. Right. Craig was a more powerful and experienced earth cultivator than Dale was. A gold-tinged fire appeared in his hands and he pointed his palms at Craig, only to have his hands smacked and shifted away before he could launch an attack.

“A riddle for you, Dale.” Craig took a step back and pulled some wraps off his hands. “If you have three, you have three. Two, and you have two. If you have only one, you have none. What is it?”

Dale ignored him, lunging for the wall, desperately trying to blast a hole through it. He failed, yet again.

“It’s options, Dale. You leave me with only one choice, which is no choice at all. Essentially,” Craig spoke calmly as he walked forward and proceeded to beat Dale methodically, “we need to give your body and mind something to focus on, other than your cultivation, that is. Pain. Pain is a good teacher, a decent motivator, and a great limiter. Ah, using your aura to heal yourself? Good, I can be a bit more… thorough.”

By the time Craig left off with his brutal assault and let him lay on the ground whimpering, Dale was feeling thoroughly tenderized. He had deep muscle bruises over the entirety of his body, and Craig hadn’t even spared the more sensitive areas. Something about needing to think with his main brain. Craig looked down at the quivering pile of purple meat named Dale and shook his head, “This should take some time and effort to fix, especially on your own, and as you do so… improve yourself. Start adding Essence to your body; don’t just let it build up in your Center and allow your ‘power’ to go to your head.”

“With your cultivation technique, you could be in the C-ranks today, if you wanted to ignore our advice. I wonder, though, how much more powerful would you be if you had the body of a C-ranker before ever even entering the new rank? How much more powerful could you become if you devoted your time in the C-ranks to only empowering your body and aura instead of needing to build it like everyone else in that rank?” Craig stood from his crouched position and walked toward the exit of the room, leaving Dale gasping in pain on the floor.

He paused for a moment at the door to deliver a parting line, “I admit, a part of me is simply curious… but another part, the part that has spent decades studying Essence… that part is telling me that this path would bring you to heights no person has ever been able to touch. I’ll see you in two days for our normal session. Think on today’s lesson so that we won’t need to repeat it.”

Once he was alone, Dale’s rapid breathing slowly evened out. His eyes shot open. He tried to will fury at the situation, but he was far too hurt and exhausted to do more than grumble internally. Lying on the floor, he attempted to summon the energy to move, but while he was full of Essence… his body was simply too ravaged. His muscles were strained, his tendons expertly and gently damaged. He snorted impotently, almost impressed by the damage Craig had inflicted on his body. The Monk had left him no choice but to empower his body if he ever again wanted to move normally.

There would be no help coming; Dale was sure Craig would make this a fact. He could heal himself over time, perhaps, but… Craig’s warning and alluring words actually did give him pause. It was evident that this lesson would be repeated if Dale only healed himself, so he needed to find a better way. His eyes closed, and he took a deep, shuddering breath. Fine. He had already been taught how to use his Essence in such a way as to permanently enhance his tissue, but doing so required connecting his flesh to his Center, much like building his external aura had.

It meant that he would be sacrificing his cultivation base. He was on the cusp of the C-ranks, and doing this now… it would lower his ranking again. Dale wanted to be furious about this, but he saw the vast improvement his aura had given him already. Enhancing his body was sure to lend to even greater strength. Creating his external aura had also stunted his advancement because it was essentially devoting a chunk of his Essence to surround him at all times… but it was almost an ‘invisible’ cost. He had simply been devoting power as he got it and hadn’t needed to lose his cultivation ranking to make it happen. Now… now it would be a very visible cost.

Dale grit his teeth and began the process. This was not something he could undo, which was the only reason he had been hesitating. Essence boiled out of his Core; Chi threads connected to each cell in his body. Those threads connected each of those cells to their surrounding cells, and slowly, the infusion of power began to enhance his body. Dale felt it like a blow when his cultivation dropped to D-eight, especially since only his heart had been fully improved by this point. Then he felt the benefit of his actions. His heart, which had been racing and straining to pump blood and repair his body, calmed and managed the same task for a fraction of the energy.

He smiled a real - if bloody - smile for the first time that day and allowed his outpouring Essence more leeway. More than anything else, he wanted to enhance and protect his brain, but he needed to do this in order. If he wanted to get at his brain, he needed to connect everything in a line from his center and upward. The connections reached the base of his skull, and he frowned. D-seven. He continued upward, and slowly, carefully, he enhanced everything until he finally reached grey matter. As the first connection took hold, his cultivation base lurched, and Dale passed out entirely.

Someone shook him. “Dale. Wake up. The process has completed, it seems.” Craig was smiling at Dale, who looked up at him with bleary eyes.

“What… happened?” Dale managed, then his newly-enhanced brain kicked in, and his eyes dilated. “I see. The brain is an amazing organ, and it is so heavily interconnected that by inducing a single change to the system… the entire organ needed to be enhanced at once. It likely drew upon my Essence until it had finished, at which point consciousness once more became possible.”

Dale blinked, felt at his cultivation, and paled. “Rank D-one…? I… I’m even lower than I started at…”

“You are likely the most potent and powerful D-ranked person on the planet.” Craig shook his head in… admiration? “Dale, you have a full external aura and one-third of your interior enhanced, including the portion that is the most difficult and Essence-intensive. The only reason you are not ranked as C-two is the lack of available Essence in your Center. With your cultivation technique and access to the lower floors of the dungeon, you could finish your full aura and still enter the C-ranks in… I can’t even estimate. Days? Weeks?”

“That’s…” Dale shook his head, which felt clear and aware. “My thoughts are so much… crisper.”

“Your brain has been enhanced past what is possible for non-cultivators. You are likely going to find that things that were difficult to understand before now are… undemanding.” Craig smiled as he saw that the Dale he knew was back in control. “How do you feel, by the way?”

“I would have to say… embarrassed?” Dale admitted shamefacedly. “Did I really attack you? It feels like a dream or like the memories are from a memory stone.”

Craig nodded sagely. “You were out of balance. Your spirit was full of power, and your body was strained to the breaking point attempting to keep up. This caused your mind to begin fracturing, and you looked to increase your fighting spirit above all else. While it is not common these days, it used to be. Back before we knew what these issues were caused by, people would begin to lose themselves to the draw of ever-increasing power, doing anything for even a small gain. It was an addiction. Now… well, like I said, it is at least less common.”

“Thank you for making me understand.” Dale stood up slowly, his body still in severe pain. “Why did you come back? I was certain you were going to just leave me here until I had finished my aura.”

“Well, I did tell you that I would see you for our next scheduled training session, yes?” Craig smirked at Dale’s expression.

“I’ve been lying on the floor there for two days?”

Chapter Thirty-four

I’m flying again. This gives me a strange sense of freedom, even though I know that I am currently anything but free. Maybe I should roll the mountain like a barrel, just to see how many people fall off? …but then I would lose all my lake water. Not worth it. Besides, the people I really want gone aren’t going anywhere except to war, it seems.

Barry had come into my dungeon again and made the usual caustic threats. What was the main difference between now and the last time he had done so? Easy! I knew for sure that he was crazy enough to follow through with the threats he was spouting. I was honestly surprised that Xenocide had never abducted this guy and used him as a cultivation resource. There was probably a whole mess of madness wrapped up in Barry’s nasty little mind. Once I had started moving, he wore a satisfied smirk and left the dungeon. He ordered me to a new position, simplistically telling me to ‘head West until ordered otherwise’. This overpowered cultivator obviously thinks of me having intelligence similar to an animal: only able to understand the carrot and stick mentality.

My main issue is that it is all stick. There has been no benefit to me for working with this fiend beyond… staying alive. That still falls under the ‘stick’ category, though! It’s a threat, a promise of slavery and a life of following the orders of the Guild. He thinks I’m a broken stallion, a creature of the wild that has learned to wear a harness. Soon enough, he’ll learn that I’m a mimic. A creature that can hide its true self until striking at an opportune moment, slaying the unaware. I was looking forward to that moment.

“Copper for your thoughts?” Dani nudged my mind, breaking me out of the fantasy I was living in.

<Oh, not too much on my mind.> I hummed a short tune, turning the question back on her. <How are, um, things going with you?>

“You’re sure nothing is going on? You were… cackling.” Dani chuckled as I sputtered and tried to find an excuse for what I wished was a more abnormal activity. “You’ve been sounding very menacing the last few days. If you remember, right now we are supposed to be spending time together, watching the changing horizon as we fly along!”

<Right, right. Sorry about that. It is nice, isn’t it?> I was silent for a few moments, watching on a projection as the vast plain slowly rolled under us like a verdant ocean. I had finally worked the kinks out. <It’s just…>

“Here we go.” Dani brightly laughed. “New superweapon? Awesome Mob? Hmm… a path to the A-ranks?”

<No, no, just planning our inevitable victory over the Guild. You know, nothing extraordinary. Just what I would be doing on a typical day.> My words caused her to fall out of the air and just lie on the ground for a moment. Wow. I was just being facetious; I hadn’t thought I was being that aggravating.

“Oh, Cal.” Dani flew up and started following lazy patterns around the Silverwood tree. “If anyone else were to say that, I would ignore them as I would any insane person. The Guild isn’t just standard fighters and cultivators, you know. It includes all sorts of subsets like the Mages’ Guild, an Assassin Guild, and even a branch of the Church. To most people, saying you are going to fight the Guild is the same as saying that you are going to fight civilization as a whole.”

<Oh.> I hadn’t thought they were that extreme. Did that change things? …Maybe a little. I decided that I agreed with her assessment. <Let me try again. No, no, just planning our inevitable victory over a certain member of the Guild.>

“Better. So what comes next, Cal? We are being used as a flying fortress, a mobile troop transport. How do we get out of this mess?”

<I hate to say it, Dani, but… if we need to, we will run away.> I stopped her before she could ask the obvious question. <I’m not talking about the dungeon, Dani. I mean you, Grace, and me. I have already shifted the ley line creation section to be out of the floating portion of the dungeon, so it will continue even if this place gets obliterated. I also have a small band of Essence I created that is holding me suspended over this portal; if something terrible happens and I am somehow no longer able to properly function, the Essence will dissipate, and I’ll fall through this hole in space.>

“How would we get to you? What about everyone else, the Goblins, the memories of all these humans that…?” Dani’s voice was soft as we discussed the worst possible outcomes.

<If I can no longer function, I am hoping that you two have already gone ahead. If we need to evacuate, you two are going first.> I paused, trying to keep the heated passion from my voice. I had been thinking about this a lot recently. <If we run, obviously, we will lose all the Cores and Stones we’ve been collecting, which will be a huge blow to me, but…>

I made sure Dani was looking at me. <The two of you are more important to me than anything else. If the entire world is going to burn, we will watch it happen from a distance, and we will be sad for a short while. Then, eventually, we will rebuild.>

Dani was silent for a full minute. “Wow, Cal, you would willingly give up everything else to keep us safe?”

<Yes, but at least we will have unlimited Essence!> I laughed as I ruined the serious moment. <That’s all worst case. We are talking total last option, necromancers closing in, everything else gone up in flames, Mountaindale overturning the earth as it falls from the sky…>

Dani cut me off before I could extrapolate further, “I get it. So we just fly through the portal under you?”

<Simple, right? That’s one heck of an easy escape plan.> I was inordinately proud of such a simple action. After all, sometimes simple was best, right? <Now if you had meant ‘what is next’ in the really short term… I think preparing for war is the only real option. I am making an army of Goblins to protect this floor and equipping them with all sorts of Inscribed silver weapons and armor so they are extra effective against undead and demons. I was thinking of calling them ‘The Silver Legion’. What do you think?>

“Sounds… good, I guess? I don’t think that silver is actually any more useful against them than other materials though. Why do you think that is?” Dani raised a good, fair, somewhat upsetting point.

<Are you serious? I was listening to a merchant on the surface telling all these students how much more effective silver was for killing infernal creatures because it is a ‘purified’ metal!> Did I really waste two whole days making silver equipment? <I got scammed. I got scammed so bad! No~o~o!>

Dani was laughing at me, and not with her usual chuckle. Mana was infusing her laughter accidentally, and the entire area was shaking and bouncing because of it. “Cal! Seriously? You got taken in by a swindler? This is just the best!”

<Why in the world would a merchant lie like that? It could get people killed!> I called indignantly.

“They are trying to make sales, Cal!” Dani groaned and rolled around in the air, trailing colored streams of light. “If the weapon is made correctly, it should kill the undead just as effectively as any other, but just maybe the knowledge that it is ‘extra effective’ might make them attack a little harder, go in for the killing blow, have a little more hope. That is what these merchants are really selling: hope. Or that’s what they would tell you, anyway; they are really just selling anything they can to make an extra copper.”

<It just seems wrong, somehow. People that come here know there is danger, but no one is expecting a trusted merchant to be a danger, even if it is just to their wallet.> I decided to move on; I couldn’t really talk about ‘ethical’ things without some severe bias. <Well, my Silver Legion is still pretty awesome, and at a minimum, they look really cool. Extra shiny.>

“Plus anyone who sees them will think they are all wearing Mithril, since that is something you’ve used in the past,” Dani chimed in. I froze, the gears in my head turning viciously.

<Make them expect one thing… and spring something different at them…> My tone returned to gleeful. <Oh, Dani, I think we have found an answer to a couple of our troubles. At the very least, I think I know how to take down Barry when the time is right.>

“Care to share your plans?” Dani hopefully questioned. I tended to be mysterious and circumvent explanations for fun, but…

<Sure.> I smiled when she went very still. <I’m going to use a decoy, like I did when necromancers came for me. Barry has been walking in, right? Not using the portals? Well, when he is coming to fight me directly, I’ll have him walk into a false floor. He never bothered to go further than the third floor before, so…if I do this right, I won’t need to sacrifice an actual level again. Oh, Dani. This is good. If this works… alright, here is the plan. Wait! Let me get Bob Prime first.>

Chapter Thirty-five

<At that point, if he walks to this position before attacking, we can use my spirit cannons to take him down!> I enthusiastically finished outlining my plans to my two most trusted compatriots.

“Hmm,” Bob Prime made this sound deep in his throat, and Dani bobbed in agreement with his non-verbal disagreement.

<What is that all about? Why aren’t you thrilled to hear that I’ve come up with such an excellent plan?> I was seriously stumped about this one.

“Well, it's…” Bob hesitated, then pressed forward, “Great Spirit, this plan relies on many, many assumptions and variables. What you just told me was: ‘if he is here, in the right place, at the right time, and everything is ready, then maybe my prototype weapons will work against him if the rumors about his abilities are accurate’.”

<Well, that’s a pessimistic way of looking at things, Bob.> I looked pleadingly at my loving Wisp. <You think it’s a valid idea… right, Dani?>

“It is a totally viable plan!” Dani trailed off with a nervous chuckle. “Maybe it isn’t our ‘go to’ plan, though? Maybe we come up with something a little more, um, likely to work correctly?”

Dani looked over to see Bob rolling his eyes. She decided to amend her answer. “… Fine, It’s a terrible plan, Cal.”

<Oh, you guys are no fun. Next, you are going to want me to shove him through a portal to somewhere random and hope that he can’t find us ever again.> I rolled my eyes at their lack of flair.

“Wait, can you do that?” Bob Prime latched onto my last statement with excitement. “That may be more likely than the hope that Barry will bother to fight your Goblin Warlord in a duel. I’m also not sure how we distract him for ten minutes with rabbits while you power up your weapons.”

<With Bashers, Bob. Come on; you’ve been here how long?>

Dani cut me off before I could explain better, “I’m also not sure that he will fall into a pool of excreta, Cal. Most regular people will be able to recognize it, and S-rankers can likely do a lot more than that.” She might as well be slapping me with these cold, mean facts. “That portal idea, though, that sounds interesting. What do you need for that?”

<Come on! That was literally the most boring thing I could think of to fight him! We aren’t seriously considering->

“I vote for the portal plan;” Dani called out for a vote.

“Seconded!” Bob Prime replied with a smile. Evil! Pure evil! Humans were right about Goblins! I should have listened!

<Guys!> I whined, only to have Dani tell me to suck it up and figure out the details. Bah. What a boring way to fight someone. I’d do it their way, since… I mean, it did sound more realistic. I would work on ‘plan S’ behind their backs, though. If I had time. I don’t think I would have time. I might put together some of it though. This is why I don’t lay out my plans to other people. Why did I do it this time? Misplaced excitement?

“Great Spirit!” Navigation Bob was shouting into the air to get my attention, so I popped over to his area and saw what he was pointing at. “We are approaching the edges of a necromantic horde!”

<Thanks, Bob.> I was looking at the projection he was using, and if I had blood I would have blanched. What even were some of those things? A vast, grotesque, most likely smelly army was marching in perfect step. The human-sized creatures were taking three paces for each one of the larger variants who were taking two steps for each one made by the massive abominations. There were three Tomb Lords that I could see, moving slower than others in their army so they didn’t crush their own troops. They had to be Tomb Lords; nothing else I had ever heard of wore that much armor around a lump of decaying flesh. Those things were each A-ranked, and by themselves represented more military force than I could really comprehend.

To think we were coming up behind this force made me wonder what their front-line shock troops would bring to bear. I didn’t usually feel bad for Humans, but this… this was… I shook off my awe, taking a moment longer to shake off my jealousy. I think that was the correct emotion to have, right? I wasn’t a huge fan of the undead, but by the abyss, I wanted a cadre of A-ranked creatures to do my bidding! I enhanced the projection, zooming in closer to inspect some of the things walking around. It still surprised me how few living creatures were down there. It was almost as though a necromancer was a mobile dungeon because they were very similar to me. For instance: if the controlling necromancer fell, the creatures he controlled would either die instantly… or go wild and then die. Hmm. I didn’t care for the fact that my abilities were parroted by such a noxious group.

I pulled myself away from the projection. At this distance, I had no way of knowing what the creatures were. I could see their form, but I wouldn’t know what they were for sure until I heard them named by someone else. I’d have to wait until we got closer and the others could sense them or see them with their weak, fleshy eyes. It wasn’t like I could invite anyone into the control room of the… but then, I didn’t need them to come here, did I? I shifted the projection and controlled the light it emitted. It took a moment or three of finagling the details, but there was now a projection of what we were flying toward that appeared on the side of one of the academy buildings.

I zoomed in on one of the creatures that I wanted to learn the name of and waited for someone in the area to say something. What I wasn’t expecting were the screams. Terror and horror filled the space, and the wall hosting the undead creature went boom as a Mage charged at the ‘creature’ and punched it. The structure detonated, injuring dozens of weaker humans as it collapsed.

“I got it, I think!” the Mage cheerfully called out.

“You moron, it’s an illusion!” I think this guy was one of the remaining Spotters? Made sense that he was the first to recognize the projection for what it basically was.

A few minutes later, the wall was repaired, and over a hundred people were watching as the undead marched. Speculation ran rampant as people tried to figure out what was going on, and I was getting frustrated by the lack of correct guesses or information that I was hearing. I almost shouted for joy when someone noticed that the area we were flying over looked suspiciously similar to what had been projected recently. From there, the veil came down quickly. There was a collective ‘celestial feces’ moment, and someone must have run off to alert the Guild members because they appeared shortly after. When they confirmed what they could clearly see, people began moving around quickly.

Messengers ran to and through the portal, and merchants were suddenly swarmed with customers who had ‘just remembered’ that they needed an important or life-saving item. Barry tried to yell at me and give me orders to stop getting closer, but I continued with my facade of not being able to ‘hear’ him until he came down to at least the third level of the dungeon. After getting my new orders, I ever so slowly changed directions and continued following, albeit at a glacial rate along a zig-zag path. I still needed to gain Essence to fly freely because I was devoting most of the Essence now collected into other projects.

Barry was now back at the projection, speaking with the other members of the Guild that had been riding along. “As soon as we hear that the Guild is attacking, we will increase our pace. When we have word that our allies have flanked this mass, we will wait six hours and proceed at full speed into the undead. The heavy hitters amongst our groups - A ranked or above - will destroy the Tomb Lords and Abominations as well as any necromancers that we can find. Anyone B-ranked or lesser will fight against the standard undead and lesser necromancers at ground level. Are your orders clear? Does anyone have any question as to which group they will be in?”

Barry waited for anyone to ask a question, and sighed with relief when no one did so. “Thank goodness; I was sure someone would have forgotten their rank by now.” People chuckled at his words. Wait a moment… was this guy popular? Was he liked and respected by the majority of his Guild? He continued to chat, and I looked at the people around him. It was true! They liked him! This cannibalistic monster clothed in the flesh of a man had people fawning over him! I was a little sick to my fifth floor over this! Great, now I can’t not picture my fifth floor as a stomach. I blame Barry for this, too.

Let me see… escape plan in place, a growing group of Silver Legion Goblins setting up positions on the fourth floor, at maximum capacity for Mage-rank Bob production… all done. I can’t really think of anything else to do right now. I suppose I could link myself to the Runescript set up for ley lines, but I figured that I would do that while the war was going on and I was in position not doing much else. Navigation Bob will make the call if we need to run for it, and I should be able to retaliate against anyone attacking me directly.

I was churning out anti-demon weapons, and all of my Mobs that could use these weapons were given them. Even my Bashers had tiny, little shoes with Inscribed silver claws on them. My troops were deadly and adorable!

Chapter Thirty-six

A voice boomed from the balcony of what used to be Dale’s bedroom. The power-infused voice reached everyone on Mountaindale, even those within the dungeon. It took a second to register, but the voice resolved itself as Barry. “People of… Mountaindale. War approaches. The time you have spent here has likely been an excellent respite, a time safe from the constant struggle the rest of the civilized world has been embroiled in. Unfortunately, I must inform you all that your relaxation must now come to an end.”

As the echoes faded, people began talking to each other. Barry interrupted once more; he had apparently been pausing for dramatic effect. Dale shook his head; he had waited too long to continue. In his opinion, everything now sounded stilted and poorly rehearsed. “War approaches. I hope that all of you survive. Though, I know many of you will not. This mountain is flying directly at the rear of the necromantic army, and in a few hours, the strongest members of the Guild will be arriving to assault the leadership of these monsters. We ask all cultivators to prepare themselves and all non-cultivators to remove themselves and either leave through the portal or seek shelter in the dungeon’s… workroom? There’s a workroom down there?”

Now it was obvious that the man was reading from a script. Not that there was anything wrong with that, but he didn’t even bother to read through it beforehand. Just laziness. “Ahem. As I was saying, any cultivator attempting to avoid service to the Guild will be placed on the front lines of the battle when they are caught. If they survive, they will be slain after the battle has been won. Time is running out. Get moving.”

Was ‘get moving’ his catchphrase or something? Dale shook his head to clear his thoughts; where had this constant mockery of other people’s speech patterns come from? He hadn’t done this in the past, had he? Dale felt at his aura, pleased with the progress he had made in the last few days. With the help of his team, he had been able to cultivate uninterrupted deep within the dungeon. His rank had increased back to D-three, but there was no comparison in terms of power from the first time he had been at this point. The only reason he was still in the D-ranks was because he had been devoting every spare drop of Essence to enhancing his body.

His cultivation technique had never been meant for humans or, really, anything that was able to move. Dale was using a B-ranked dungeon’s personal cultivation technique, and the incredible results were obvious. All he had left to finish his aura entirely was his skin. From there, the way to increase in rank was to increase the flow of Essence to these areas. There were two more steps involved with reaching the Mage ranks from this point. Yes, the Mage ranks. Firstly, his body and external aura needed to be fully enhanced and empowered. Secondly, he needed to break through the barriers that limited his race. This was done by reaching the peak of the C-ranks and attempting to climb the Tower of Ascension.

Climbing the tower was… difficult to learn any real information about. Mages seemed to have different theories on why they were able to attain differing laws, but two facts were widely known. The more knowledge of a particular subject you had, the more likely you were to be able to grasp and bind to it. The second was you needed to have an affinity for it. The C-ranks were where people would usually open affinity channels, like Craig had done in the past in order to have three affinities. Of course, the one that had been trained to this point was going to be the most potent affinity, and the others could only be lesser or just about the same. There were… mishaps sometimes when opening affinity channels, but the process itself was known to be reasonably safe.

All of his channels were open, his aura was already almost built, and he should be able to gather the required Essence in weeks instead of years. Dale would be able to skip all the steps except for learning about the laws. If he attempted to jump into the Tower without the knowledge he needed, he would likely be stuck at the first tier… or he would die. It had happened in the past. Every single cultivator had heard the stories. People who skipped steps, who thought they could cheat, who cut corners… they died. Almost always in some spectacular fashion. That was the real reason that the world wasn’t stuffed with Mages. Either the C-rankers were too lazy to push forward and learn all they could about their possible Mana paths, or they worked very hard and pushed for higher tier knowledge.

There was almost no in-between. There were very few people that would get to the peak of the C-ranks and be happy only reaching the first tier. The very few who were simply glad to be Mages… well, they tended to regret their decisions later on. Dale closed his eyes and smiled. He had a plan, a plan that would make others hate him if they knew about it; he was going to cheat. Dale burst into laughter, startling his team from their own cultivation or guard duty. They were already on edge from Barry’s announcement to Mountaindale, and his random outbursts were not smiled upon. Dale simply kept his eyes closed to avoid the glares and thought through his plan.

Path advancement. That is what it all came down to. Dale would power through the C-ranks, and when he had the chance, he would throw himself into the Tower and climb as high as he could. He would be fine even if he took a first tier power because he knew from Rose that Madame Chandra had recently been able to upgrade her law. If she could do it just from the knowledge she had accrued plus a little nudge from the dungeon, Dale could as well.

He planned to take the several hundred extra years of life that reaching the Mage ranks granted and progress smoothly and continuously. As far as he knew… he was the first person ever to attempt something like this. There had been path advancements in the past, but they were always mysterious. They were not planned events and certainly not to the extent Dale was thinking of. Most dreamed that they may be able to advance once before the S-ranks… not him, though. He was going to climb until he was happy with his choices.

“I still can’t believe what I’m seeing.” Hans shook his head and sighed as he watched the Essence flow through Dale and connect each cell in his body to his Core. The weave was done with pure Essence, and the weave was so tight that Dale’s body must have increased in durability and strength by a factor of ten. “You look like a Royal with that technique. If you ever find or make a spare of that… I have a hidden pit filled with platinum and gold coins I’d hand over.”

Dale chuckled as he infused the skin on his palms, dust falling as his epidermis tightened and thickened. “Ouch! Wasn’t supposed to do that. I’ll see what I can do, Hans.”

Chapter Thirty-seven

Dale’s team walked out of the dungeon and looked around, utterly dumbfounded by the sheer chaos in the surrounding area. People were running toward the portal, Guild shock troops were coming out of it, the projection on the wall had increased in size and the undead were clearly visible, and merchants were basically under attack from cultivators trying to buy things. Over all of this was the shouting. Everyone was yelling about something, whether it was ordering another out of their way, screaming for some reason, or attempting to attract the merchant’s attention. A few impromptu bar areas had been set up as well, and these were making money hand over fist.

“Over here, pharmacist!” a man shouted at Stefan. Dale only recognized him because of his unique name. “I was here first!”

Bedraggled and overworked, Stefan nodded painfully and slowly. "One potion of cure disease of sexual origin? Give me fifteen minutes…"

"Hey, hurry it up! If I don’t have that potion ready by the time we are sent to fight, I’m going to cut you!" Stefan didn’t react to this shout, moving at a continuous pace no matter the verbal assault thrown at him.

“I guess we’re getting closer to the undead than I expected.” Dale frowned as he looked at his team. They were all pretty worn down from the last few weeks of intense training and cultivation. “We should all split up and get some rest. Thank you all for helping me get to this point; I won’t forget it. Sorry if I haven’t been as invested in the team as I should have been recently.”

Rose rolled her eyes. “Dale, you aren’t the only person in the world. What do you think we do when we aren’t working together, sit around drinking and longing for your company?”

“I mean, I do that.” Hans batted his eyelashes at Dale.

“Oh, stop it. No! We train, hone our skills, and live our own lives. Also, when we party up like this, you aren’t the only one who benefits. We’ve all been cultivating. We’ve all gotten stronger. You’re fine; we work with you because it is mutually beneficial, and we all like each other.” Rose glanced at Hans. “That is, we all like most of the group. Don’t go all melodramatic on us again.”

Dale froze, slowly losing his severe expression and laughing. “You mean to tell me that I shouldn’t sacrifice myself to the necromancers in an attempt to appease them and halt this war? Well… there goes that plan.” This got a few pity laughs, but the message was clear. They were all friends who would stick together without the need to promise rewards in the future.

“I will gladly take you up on the offer of rest, friend Dale.” Tom clapped Dale on the back, frowning as his hand stung and Dale didn’t budge an inch. “Huh. That is new. You seem to have become denser.”

“That explains why we need to keep explaining things to him!” Rose called as she walked away.

The others chuckled and scattered to pursue their own interests, leaving Dale to plan his next move. He opened his bag and counted the gold and silver he had stored away. His bank account held more, but the large pile of gold he carried with him should do for now. He walked into one of the only places in the academy courtyard not stuffed with people and started shouting, adding to the noise. “Buying Cores in bulk! Sell your Cores for gold here!”

There were a few people giving him strange looks, but soon enough, students began drifting over to sell him their Cores. When word spread that he was paying good coin, the crowd around him increased quickly. Usually, Cores were graded and judged by the person buying them, but Dale gave a gold coin for any that held the density of an upper C-rank and half that for anything mid or low. No one offered him a B-rank Core, or he would have certainly bought that as well. When interest in his services waned, he went around to any merchant that was offering cultivation supplies and purchased any Cores they had. Finally, he went to the Guild store and purchased Cores until his coin ran out.

Looking through his bags, Dale could only smile as he saw the vast amount of gem-like objects gathered there. If the dungeon had been truthful, his meridians were more easily able to handle the large amount of Essence that shattering a Core would inject into his body. He needed to be careful, but if this worked, he would be able to get so much more Essence for his trouble. Cultivating while holding a Core worked far better, but it was too slow for his needs. He wasted less doing it properly, but it would take hours to drain a single Core. In a pinch, this would also let him empower abilities and supercharge his Essence attacks.

Dale needed to finish working with his skin. He was honestly surprised how long it took to work on this organ; you couldn’t just infuse a patch of skin to completion, each layer of skin across the entire body needed to be slowly connected at the same time so that it wouldn’t crack and separate from the other layers or the flesh around it. Dale was close to being done but still needed to devote time to making it happen. He rented one of the best empty rooms and took it for himself, barring the door and preparing himself mentally. He was nearly drained from the work he had done so far and so wasted no time in getting a Core out and forcefully crushing it.

Bamph! The Core exploded, and Dale grasped at all of the Essence that was now around him and on his body. He tried to pull it all in through his gauntlet but realized that he was being foolish. If there was Essence escaping, why not draw it in with his normal technique? Dale popped another Core and maintained his cultivation. This time, he was able to gain a large amount of Essence before the remaining power diffused into the area. Dale grinned, pleased he had been able to get one of the personal cultivation rooms at the academy. Being the headmaster’s pupil did have some side benefits. There was a reason he had taken this particular room; it had weak but useful Essence gathering Runes throughout the area. Even though he was losing some of the energy from the Core, he would eventually get it back. There was no real escape for this Essence; he would have it all.

An hour passed, and Dale’s bag full of Cores had been reduced by a quarter. He was absolutely sick of the feeling of Essence crashing into him like this; it felt like an instant drunken high followed by an immediate hangover. At the start, it had only felt good, but this was no longer fun. It was work, and that was all Dale needed to remind himself of in order to get the motivation to withdraw and crush yet another Core. His skin had finished infusing within the first ten minutes of this training, and his cultivation rank had skyrocketed. He broke one more Core and shoved the Essence against the barriers in his Center.

A common misconception was that if you had enough power, you would easily break the bottlenecks that held you in place. Unfortunately, the barriers to advancement were… elastic. ‘Pushing’ on them weakened them over time, but they were fine with expanding to a small degree. Cultivation usually stretched the barriers over and over until they finally gave out, but Dale was attempting to break the barriers as if they were rigid structures. If someone else was using sandpaper to scrape away, he was wildly swinging a hammer and hoping that it would hit a weak spot just right.

This method was painful, as the blockages were not in your physical body; but in your soul and your psyche. Dale crushed another Core and coughed, wiping away fresh blood that had begun dripping from his nose. He absorbed the Essence, and his barriers stopped expanding for a moment before deflating slightly. Dale felt this, and before his Center could use the Essence or remove it… he crushed another Core. The power rushed into him, and his barriers to the C-ranks began to crack. As he pulled in more and more of the Essence in the room, the barriers gave way with a groan like wood splitting. Dale felt the energy that had been used by his mind and body to maintain the barriers flowed back into him, condensing in his Core and wrapping his Chi spiral in a pearly substance.

Dale was gasping as he felt this process; he smiled through the pain as his Chi spiral became rigid and immutable. The benefits of the C-ranks were hard to ignore, but they were usually only a larger well of Essence and the start of aura control and creation. There was another thing that happened, but there was a massive argument about if it were a positive or not. The cultivation technique being used when someone broke into the C-ranks became an almost solid thing, almost like a pearl in a clam. This meant that if you wanted to change your technique after this point, you either needed to destroy your entire cultivation and start over in the F-ranks or make painstakingly slow changes to an almost solid Chi spiral.

Some people liked this fact since it meant they were genuinely committed to improving if they had to start over. Other people wanted the crystallization because it allowed Essence to move much, much faster through the body. Dale tested this rumor by willing Essence to his hand, it- “Whoa! It’s already…”

He shook off his wonder; his Essence was incredibly responsive. Even getting it to his hands before had taken a few moments of thought and direction. Now, it was simply there, ready to be used. He looked at his hands a moment longer before clenching them and standing. Dale took a deep breath, let it out, and took another. Then he screamed.

“I did it! I did it! I’m in the C-ranks! I’m C-rank zero!” Dale jumped up and down, his energy needing an outlet. He flipped in the air, punched the walls, and possibly even let a manly tear of joy slip out. After thirty seconds of this, he put his back to the wall and slid to the floor. His breath was coming hard, and he whispered once more.

“I did it.”

Chapter Thirty-eight

“You disgust me.” Hans glared at Dale as the young man walked toward them with a wide smile on his face. “It took me twenty-two years to get to the C-ranks. Twenty-two years, Dale!”

“Why does he disgust you?” Tom looked between them, his eyes slightly glazed from the Essence-wine he was sipping. “Those two statements seem entirely unrelated.”

“Drink your wine, adults are speaking.” Hans brushed Tom off, but the man didn’t seem to mind, simply drinking more wine with a cheerful smile. “C-rank zero. Do you know that you are basically glowing to my sight? If I didn’t know you were new to the C-ranks, I would assume you were at or near the end of the C-ranks and about to break into the B-ranks. You and ol’ cloth-fist Craig have the same style of body aura.”

“I feel amazing, Hans.” Dale sat on the seat next to him at the Dwarf-run tavern, ordering the same Essence-wine that Tom was drinking. “My body feels like it was designed to have Essence moving through it. I literally feel ten times stronger than I was a single rank ago.”

“Well, that is how progression is supposed to work. Remember? Each step in the rankings means that a similarly trained individual needs to have ten people a single step lower fight him at the same time in order to be reasonably assured of victory. Also, remember that this only holds true in the non-Mage ranks. From there on, the tiers from the Tower come into play, and everything gets super messy.” Hans watched Dale throw back his drink with a wide smile. “At least I taught you something! Good lad, I was worried you would get all fastidious with what you eat like Craig did. He always says ‘I’ll eat what I want to in the Mage ranks’. Waste of good coin, though; it’s hard for Mages to get good and drunk on anything affordable.”

“I’m not going to get drunk, Hans! That was a celebratory glass and nothing more; we’re going to war here soon.” Dale twisted and caught Hans’ fist as it was sailing at his arm.

“Oh? Interesting, you think you are up to the task of keeping up with ol’ Hansel-bread, eh?” Hans’ eyes were glittering with excitement as he imagined sparring against someone using Moon Elf fighting styles.

“Nah, but I think I could give Mr. Dangerlicious a run for his money.” Dale laughed as the fight fell out of Hans, who was now pouting instead.

“I hate Bards,” the Assassin muttered grumpily. He looked over Dale again with a critical eye, “So what is next for you? What law are you going to go for in the Tower? Some noble pursuit, I assume? You look like a Flesh Mage in the making to me.”

“Ew, no. I want to be able to fight, not fix some lady’s nose when she is sick of looking at it.” Dale snorted at Hans’ twitching face. “You were hoping to convince me and then get a discount on future work, huh?”

“Why do you know me so well?”

“If you aren’t trying to get drunk, c-can I get that?” A tipsy dwarf reached for Dale’s cup, taking it right out of his hand. “Thanks. Been a rough week to be a student. Name’s Feljer Lynn, I was in a music class that got wiped out in the dungeon. You… Y-y-you should be nicer to bards. We… they… try so hard.”

Hans looked at the drunk wreck of a Dwarf, looked at Dale, and worked to ignore the intruder. The young Dwarf drank down the contents of his ill-gotten mug and grimaced, light coming into his eyes. He was… sobering up?

The bartender behind the counter, a well-liked Dwarf named Steve, suddenly shouted into the room. “Alright, who in here is a cleric? Someone is regenerating people, and they are losing their buzz! Knock it off, or you are going to be buying everyone drinks to make up for it when we find you!”

“Agreed, I was having an enjoyable drinking session. Now, I am fully sober,” Tom sadly told his companions.

“Hans, it might be time to go.” Dale looked around at the patrons who were getting agitated. “I tend to hold a regeneration aura these days… I think it might be stronger than it used to be.”

“It’s him! It-” Hans’ shout was cut off as Dale slapped a hand over his mouth and started pulling him to the exit. Tom joined them, not wanting to buy any more wine now that he was sober.

Dale let go of Hans and wiped his hand on his pants. “Did you have to lick my hand?”

“Yes,” Hans replied seriously. “There are consequences for your actions.”

“Why am I not surprised to see you three stumbling out of a bar right before we go into the most dangerous conflict of our lives?” Rose’s voice was raised to be heard over the general hubbub in the area. Adam was strolling along beside her, his hair floating in the air like the man was underwater. His incredibly thick celestial corruption was still having an altering effect on his body, changing it in strange ways.

“Because you know me so well, my Rose!” Hans put both of his hands over his heart, pretending deep infatuation. “We are so comfortable together already, why don’t we just make it official and-”

Rose whipped out an arrow and fired at him. Hans didn’t move, and the arrow thunked into the armor covering his knee. He looked down at the arrow, back at her, and back at the arrow. “Are you invoking the Northman’s courting ritual?”

“Ha!” Tom bellowed a single, deep laugh. “He’s right; we call getting married ‘taking an arrow to the knee’! You just got engag-” he sputtered to a stop as he looked at an arrowhead that was pointing at his eye.

“Will you three please stop flirting and get serious? Do we need anything else for when we fight against the undead?” Dale smirked as Rose obviously considered shooting Hans again, then Dale for his comment, but reluctantly put away her arrow.

“I am currently all set for the upcoming conflict. I have four days’ worth of supplies and three times the amount of restorative potion that I would generally bring into an extended stay in the dungeon,” Tom listed for the others.

“I have a similar amount. I also have anti-infection and infernal dismantling potions from the Church,” Adam chimed in softly. He pulled the hood of his robe up, covering his hair since random people were stopping to stare.

“Everyone else?” Dale looked around and smiled. “Excellent. I also have extra Cores to empower some of my abilities if necessary. I made sure none of them were above C-ranked this time. Oh, and on that note, I advanced into the C-ranks this morning.”

“What! Congratulations!” Rose gave him a quick hug while the others gave him appraising looks with Essence-empowered eyes. “Have you talked to your instructors yet? I’m sure they are going to want to see your progress!”

“Not yet, and if that image is correct, I think we are out of time. Good luck, everyone.” Dale gestured at the enormous projection of the undead that they were approaching, drawing attention to the fact that some of the undead had turned around and were staring directly at them. “If they can see us, that means we are getting close enough that we are almost in combat range.”

The projection flared, and black-tinged light surged from one of the Tomb Lords. A dense beam suddenly sprang from its eyes, growing larger at an alarming rate. Something flashed over their heads, the shockwave it produced knocking them off their feet. On the projection, a person appeared and absorbed the attack. They didn’t take a hit; they absorbed the energy, and a moment later, the energy returned toward the undead below as an arc. The projection fuzzed from the amount of power discharged, and when the dust cleared after two minutes… Dale’s mind had trouble understanding the amount of devastation wrought upon the forces gathered below. The landscape had shifted, and a new canyon had been created. Already, groundwater had begun pouring into the canyon, and a river had shifted its flow to pour into the chasm.

Of the forces that had been in the area, there was no sign. Dale was sick to his stomach over the thought of what would have happened to them if the Tomb Lord’s eye-beam had impacted Mountaindale. At best, they would have needed to hold onto a chunk of superheated stone as it fell from the sky. At worst… well, he wouldn’t have needed to worry about it. Rose made a choking sound before squeaking out, “We are going down to fight that?”

“No, no!” Hans cheerfully denied. “We are going down to fight on the ground around those things while the big ones fight our big ones. We fight the ones that, you know, got obliterated from the runoff of the first exchange. It’ll be fun to try dodging friendly fire while re-killing the undead.”

“Have you done something like this before?” Tom swallowed hard as the Tomb Lord picked up a chunk of stone the size of a village and hurled it with unerring accuracy at the floating Mountain. It seemed to be struck with something, falling out of the sky and slamming into the ground. A crater formed around the area, adding plumes of dust to the debris already in the air.

“Eh. It wasn’t the undead, but the Guild was called to war once before. The entire conflict lasted an hour. When our heavy hitters walked onto the field, the other side surrendered in ten seconds. Half of their forces had already been wiped out by then; the Guild does not mess around. I had been fighting for twenty minutes at that point and had just got orders to go assassinate some of the leaders. If I had been faster, I would have been in the blast zone. I’m really sorry to have to tell you this, friends, but our survival right now depends on how lucky we are and how well we can dodge. Adam… do you know your job in all of this?”

“Heal and protect,” Adam rattled off instantly.

“You wish,” Hans stated without malice, only resignation. “You heal us if it is absolutely required, but your job is actually to keep an eye on the big fights and warn us if it looks like something is coming our way. You don’t focus on our fight; you focus on theirs.” He pointed at the projection, which showed one of the men Dale recognized as an A-ranker from the Guild. The man made an ‘up’ gesture, and a freaking volcano erupted under the Tomb Lord he was locked in conflict with. Balls of molten rock and pressurized gas ravaged the battlefield around the epicenter of the event, but the Tomb Lord only lost a bit of mass and stepped calmly out of the inferno.

“Also, Adam? You need to really pay attention,” Hans grimly told him as the High Mageous simply ignored the volcano he had made and created more hazards. “Did you see how fast that happened? If you think something is coming, by the abyss, you scream it. We then make like sheep and get the flock out of there.”

Chapter Thirty-nine

I was deep in meditation. My entire focus was at such a depth in my soul that I was having trouble extricating my thoughts from my being. I was finding what I needed, the concept I would model my soul around which would encompass all that my law had to offer. I had rejected everything that came to mind for what felt like weeks on end to my time-ignoring psyche. Now though… I think I had found it. The idea had come from exploring my cultivation technique, of all things. As I stared at the swirling galaxies that surrounded me, I realized that they may as well have been representations of what I already saw when I looked up at the night sky.

Where was I? I was in a place that already embodied Acme, a place that already had everything I needed. My inner soul space, therefore, would need to be a place where every other law could be represented in full. Only then could my inner self hope to reach Acme, the culmination of all other laws. Whew. That was wordy. In simple terms, my inner world had to be precisely that: a world. As I accepted this fact, a vast influx of Mana poured through my connection with Acme, and Essence emptied in from the area surrounding my physical Core. I took this as a good sign, as an acknowledgement of choosing correctly. As I watched, an entire planet was sketched out. My study of the maps in reality obviously impacted my thoughts, as my inner world reflected the outer one.

There were differences, though. Not all of the laws were equal, and different sections of the planet seemed to be wavering strangely. It was… it was time that was moving differently! I really hope that my irreverent attitude toward time wouldn’t make this go poorly. I felt tiny pops in my consciousness as the Cores throughout my dungeon that I had been collecting corruption in burst and flooded into me. At first, I was shocked and nearly sick when the corruption hit me, certain that I was about to have a very bad time. My body had rejected every hint of this stuff in the past, after all, but, instead of tainting my cultivation, the corruption flooded into my ethereal world and began infusing the stones, water, light… everything. As more corruption entered me, my world became more robust - more real.

I didn’t know what to do, and I didn’t know what was happening. I had lost control. My collected corruption stopped pouring into me, what I had thought of as abundant Cores were already exhausted. A tiny fraction - about a half-acre - of the planet seemed solid now. I had just burned through all of the corruption I had stored in Cores since the inception of my current collection system. I gulped. This was going to be a long, long term project. On the plus side… I could tell that I had fixed the issue I had been having. I could feel that my cultivation path had finally opened up, and the suffocating feeling of ‘nowhere to go’ was now gone.

I ‘blinked’ and was once more aware of my surroundings. A feeling of vast emptiness yawning inside of myself caused me to groan with actual pain. I hadn’t been this hungry since I was an F-ranked Core staring longingly at moss. The Essence that had been lapping around the base of the Silverwood tree was all used up, and a massive portion of my reservoir was once again empty. My goodness, that had taken a lot of power. <Oh, man… Dani, how are things going? What did I miss?>

“Hi, Cal!” Dani’s voice perked me right up. She was so great. “Not too much going on in here, just playing with Grace.”

I looked at the room they were in, taken aback by the twisted walls, demolished adventurers, and remnants of powerful Mana usage. <What… um… what sort of games are you playing?>

“We’re playing ‘protect the Core’, and a few adventurers got lost, so… we decided to ‘invite’ them to the game,” Dani cheerfully informed me of the circumstances surrounding the massacre. “One of them got too close to Grace, so I needed to convert him.”

<Convert him? Did he join Minya’s cult?>

“No, I converted him to corrupted ash.” Dani giggled as Grace flew back to me and zipped around the Silverwood tree. She landed on one of the branches, and all the silver leaves around her took on a tinge of purple.

<Right. Don’t let other people near Grace; message received.> I chuckled nervously. Unlike myself, Dani had full access to directly creating and using spells with my Mana. She had recently begun practicing and using it, which both amazed me and made me a little afraid of offending her. When I asked her about it, she had told me that in any relationship a healthy respect of your partner was needed. Also, that anyone who tried stealing from us or kidnapping one of us was going to have to figure out a way not to be turned into a torch during their attempt.

“Outside of here, I think that we have reached the necromancer’s army. Bob said something about some creatures attacking the dungeon at range. Nothing hit us, though, so… I’m not sure what’s going on. I should probably pay more attention, but I’ve been honing my skills here.” Dani didn’t seem too worried, which relieved me.

<Well, I certainly can’t say anything about paying attention. I don’t even know how long I was in meditation. Time is hard for me; I should really install an hourglass or something in here.> I looked at the projection of the battle we were facing, going silent as I saw charred and smoking landscape. I was pretty sure that had been grasslands until recently. What exactly had I been missing out on seeing? <Hey, Dani, I… I think I need to work on this battle. Are you two okay without me here for a while?>

“No problem, Cal. We literally have forever together, a few hours apart here and there won’t impact us at all.” Dani flew over to Grace, snuggling in next to her on the branch. “It’s nap time for her anyway.”

<In that case… I’m going to monitor the situation. All the love!> I called as I moved my attention over to where Navigation Bob was allowing the other Bobs to watch the ensuing battle. So far, not too much had happened, at least not in the grand scale of the battle that was going to be playing out. There were tens of thousands of lesser undead, but in reality, they were not the overwhelming portion of the fighting force. The greater undead, the demons, and the necromancers were the real core of the troops. The lesser undead were good for tying up fighters and lesser cultivators as well as being used as occupational forces. That is, after an area was conquered, they acted as an army or policing force. Anyone who broke the law… well, they soon joined the police force.

The real threats were the higher undead and demonic controllers of the armies. The undead had no real will of their own; they were mainly hungry husks that were pushed in a general direction or controlled carefully to ensure they didn’t turn on their masters. Thanks to the height of the dungeon coupled with our telescopic abilities, we could see the far fringes of the army as well as the closer ranks. We were on the only front that did not have a really active war being waged. This conflict spanned nearly thirty miles, and the entire perimeter was filled with flying Essence, Mana, debris, and especially blood. Blood was everywhere. Some of it was rotting, but there was undoubtedly fresh red blood splashed liberally across the landscape. At this rate, there would be a moat of the sanguine fluid around the necromantic horde.

Here I was, powerless to do a single thing to help or absorb any of that power. I was too weak to help people survive this conflict, and I could only hope that the generous rewards and anti-demon weapons I had given out were going to be put to good use. I felt like… a group buffer, someone who could make the party stronger but was basically useless during actual combat. Oh, celestial, was I a cleric? Please no…. but all the signs pointed to yes. Anti-infernal weaponry, giving extra abilities and power to people, sitting back and not being useful… oh no! I shook off my melancholy, resolving to change this fact right now.

<Bob Prime, we have some work to do.> The Goblin I had called to perked up and walked out of the area to have a private conversation with me.

“What can I do for you, Cal?” Bob had dropped the ‘Great Spirit’ honorific, and I couldn’t tell if I was happy about that or not. I had disliked it at the time, but… now I missed it a little. It reminded me of their arrival in my dungeon. I shuddered in revulsion at the memory. I decided that maybe it was better this way; natural Goblins were nasty.

<Bob, how close are we to finishing the changes to the Runescripting?> I fired a question without preamble. <The ley line stuff.>

He thought for a moment, leaning back and forth on his staff. “That’s hard to say, Cal. We’ve used Mana in the past to power the Runes, but I haven’t been able to find a good method of rejecting the corruption that would be pulled into you. In all other cases, when the Cores we are using input their Mana, they swiftly turn into corruption Cores. Their link to the Runes is nearly impossible to break, and even if they are removed from the Runes, there is a permanent sympathetic link and power flows through them and into them until they are destroyed either manually or by the energetic density. I am just… I’m not sure if this is a good idea. Ever. No matter what changes we make to the Runes.”

How very interesting. <So what you are saying is that I would get a huge amount of Essence and corruption regularly from that point onward?>

“Exactly, Cal! I am relieved to hear that you see just how terrible of an idea this is.” Bob Prime smiled and turned to go watch the screens again.

<This is exactly what I needed to hear. Let’s do this!> My words halted Bob in his tracks, and when he finally stopped twitching, he looked up at me with a smile and asked a dangerous question.

“Have you talked to Dani about your plans for all of this?”

Chapter Forty

“Everyone! Prepare yourselves!” a High Mageous was shouting at the cultivators that were already present on Mountaindale as well as the troops pouring through the portal to augment their combat power. The portal had been locked as ‘one-way’ until the end of the conflict. At this point, there was no escape; survival was the only option for leaving this place. “If you do not yet have access to flight or a flight-like ability, you will be deposited on the ground. Depending on the Mage setting you down, the ride might be rough. As soon as you land, get into a formation. You will only have a few moments to set up a defensive perimeter before getting swarmed by the creatures waiting below! If you die, please at least try to take a few with you.”

“This guy should be a motivational speaker, hey, Dale?” Hans poked Dale in the side, trying to tickle a reaction out of the pale-faced youth.

“So what should we do after all of this?” Tom spoke with a wide smile. “I am thinking of visiting an exotic location, perhaps finding a secluded island and being revered as a god by the local women.”

“Sounds like fun.” Adam smiled and looked over at Rose, who was not paying attention to the conversation. “Any plans, Rose?”

“Hum? Oh, aim for the head, I guess,” she responded somewhat distractedly.

“I… I meant after the fight?” Adam stammered as she turned her attention to him.

“Oh.” She was silent for a bit. “Get some dinner I guess? One way or the other, I don’t see this war lasting too long. There is a Mana haze here that screams ‘the most powerful people in the world are present’ to me. So… I’d say dinner time is an accurate guess-timate.”

“A what, now?” Tom interjected. “I am unfamiliar with this word.”

“Guess-timate.” Rose cocked her head to the side. “A guess, an estimate. A guess-timate.”

“Why do people have to keep changing the language with weird mash-ups?” Tom grumbled. “I have a hard enough time with it as it is normally; there are just too many consonants. Sounds like a bunch of snakes hissing at each other.”

The Mage that had been speaking earlier began shouting again. “First groups! Lifting off in three… two… go!” Dale’s party sucked in a deep breath as they were suddenly accelerated forward. To Dale, it felt like he was a ninety kilogram projectile being launched from a trebuchet to a point over three hundred meters away. In reality, their landing point was nearly a half kilometer away if the descent were included. The only reason the sudden velocity didn’t damage anyone was that they were accelerated as a single piece, a unit, not grabbed and tossed. It was hard to describe the difference, but there was a notable one.

Dale watched as the ground approached at a rapid pace. The unspeakable abominations that were the undead - including actual Abominations - began turning toward the living flesh that was falling from the sky like a treat thrown to a hungry dog. Dale’s section was not the first to touch down; that dubious honor went to a contingent of earth Mages who prepared their landing point and threw up some rudimentary defenses to slow the advancing nightmare fuel. From his current vantage, it looked like a group landed like a meteor and formed a crater when, in reality, they fell with prepared spells and walls sprang up around them. Either way, it was amazing to watch what he hoped to be able to soon accomplish under his own power. They landed not-exactly-gently within the sudden protections and hurried to the chest-level barricades to help hold back the flood of rotting flesh.

Moments later, Dale was fighting against zombies. He lashed out with his fist, and the skull of the first creature broke with a squishy thud. Dale was taken aback by the ease his first foe was dispatched, but another slightly alarming component was the infernal Essence that was absorbed by his gauntlet and absorbed into his Core. He was momentarily distracted, concerned that a necromancer would somehow gain a hold on him through his usage of his gauntlets, but he was forced to recover quickly. The dead were not waiting for him to resolve his internal crisis. Besides, after a moment, he could feel the corruption Core in his chest separate out the taint and suck it into itself. He should have nothing to fear from fighting as usual.

Right, left, right, left. Dale’s punches were nearly as regular as a drum beat playing a marching cadence as he beat down the undead rushing at him. There were already bodies and skeletons piling up around the basic fortifications. Their opponents were starting to use the rotting corpses as a platform to jump at them or to gain the high ground and swing at them from above. Fire and celestial cultivators were working overtime in an attempt to destroy or consecrate the bodies so that the approaching Abominations couldn’t pull them into themselves and become stronger.

Dale could only continue to punch, kick, and dodge. Sometimes he wished he had a longer range weapon, but his body was more durable at this point than many of the items he could buy, and his gauntlets were Inscribed and effective. Dale took a deep breath as he eyed the mounds of flesh that were shambling to their location. They didn’t bother to avoid the other undead as they traveled, simply crushing them with each step and slurping up their broken forms to add to their own mass. The first of them reached the line of consecrated bodies, absorbing them and continuing forward. Having expected a different outcome, Dale debated reaching for a Core to throw an enhanced attack at the creature. It was too close and was standing eight feet taller than him at this point. It hesitated for the first time, quivering as the consecrated bodies deposited their payload of celestial Essence directly into the greater undead.

Blisters began forming on it, turning into weeping sores in seconds as the Abomination worked to expel the consecrated flesh and bone. It did, finally, needing to sacrifice a more substantial chunk of its body in order to package and regurgitate the damaging ‘food’ it had swallowed. A large sack of meat and bones fell out of the humanoid, looking for all the world like it was defecating on the battlefield. The smell of the creature didn’t help either, as the rotting meat already smelled worse than - boom. A pillar of holy light seemed to fall from the heavens, and the squatting Abomination disintegrated, the ashes flowing upward and vanishing.

“Looks like the Mages finally woke up.” Hans panted as he lashed out with his daggers yet again. Dale didn’t know what he was attacking at first, then saw a few zombies drop a half dozen feet from them. He must be using his wind affinity to increase the range of his attacks. Probably because… Dale looked at Hans. Yup. Perfectly clean still.

“Your reluctance to get filthy in combat is song worthy, Hans!” Dale called over, breaking the tension and putting smiles back on the faces of his friends.

“Don’t you dare! Oh, and I’m sorry that I don’t want rotten meat and blood on me. I’m no Mage; I can still get sick from this nasty stuff.” Hans slashed the air, cutting deep into a pair of sprinting ghouls. “Ew, I hate the running ones. They splash when you cut them down.”

Everyone else in earshot was surreptitiously trying to clean particles off their hands or faces as Hans’ words registered. Most people here hadn’t lived through the last necromantic war, but the tales of disease and pestilence from that time were nearly as legendary as the war itself. Everyone winced as screams tore through the air behind them; an Abomination had broken through the defenses and was able to smash a hole through the defenders, swelling in size as fresh meat and blood empowered and emboldened it. A Mage sent it flying away from the area to impact a swarm of skeletons that were using the breach as a gateway.

“Someone close that hole! Where is the Mage that was supposed to be watching this area? Stop sitting on your thumbs and get fighting! Now is not the time to be conserving Mana!” Dale looked at the unknown person shouting orders, trying to figure out the chain of command here.

“We need to move,” Adam calmly stated to the group. “Not just us five, all of us. I am seeing a ripple in the area, the kind that washes through time when a cataclysmic event occurs. I’d say we have less than two minutes to get away from this area.”

Hans’ eyes widened, then narrowed. “Guild members! I am invoking martial clause twenty-five bravo! We need to shift our position a hundred-”

“Two hundred, at the minimum,” Adam interrupted quietly.

“Two hundred and fifty meters south, now!” Hans easily incorporated the new information and disseminated it.

There were wide eyes all around as people were forced to move. A Mage stepped forward and parted the bodies, making a corridor of death that the formation charged through. The Mage then caught up and sprinted alongside Hans with furious eyes as they moved, speaking quietly, “If you flippantly made us leave a fortified position in the middle of a war, I will ensure that you pay for every life we lose. I don’t know how you have the authority to declare a state of emergency in the middle of a battlefield-”

“That’s fine, but in that case, you’d better make sure my team gets the accolades for saving every single person in the company that survives when we are done here,” Hans returned darkly, his serious tone making the Mage raise a brow and go silent. They both had good reason for their concerns, as the undead collapsed upon them from all sides now. Shambling zombies, sprinting ghouls, clacking skeletons, and moaning Abominations did their very best to grow the numbers of the dead. In too many cases, they succeeded. Anyone below the C-ranks had a difficult time against anything but the zombies or skeletons, and fighting the Abominations was reserved almost exclusively for Mages.

When they reached their new position, the fighters all needed to work together to push the dead far enough for the earth affinity cultivators to raise solid barricades again. The seconds ticked by, and tempers started to rise against Hans as nothing happened to their old position. The entire fighting force of the Guild that had deployed in the area were well-spaced out so that a single blow couldn’t eradicate them, but now, they were cut off from any chance of reinforcements. Before their anger could boil over, a Tomb Lord fell out of the sky and impacted their old position so hard that the flesh within its armor turned to paste.

Barry stood solidly in the air above it, exhaling a green mist that washed over everything in the area. A word from the midst of the cloud in front of him shattered the very air, and thunder was heard as all the mass in that section was converted into a hand-sized sphere of energy. The thunder was generated from air rushing to refill the empty space as the green cloud returned to Barry’s body. The sphere of power started moving toward him as well, but as he caught it, the S-ranker snorted and tossed the silver orb deep into the ranks of the dead. There was a detonation nearly a half mile away as the energies contained in the globe were released, and the shockwave knocked over roughly half of the undead. Then Barry vanished, returning to do battle in the air at speeds that lower ranks simply couldn’t even see.

The Mage next to Hans glanced over, taking a deep breath. Hans spoke first, “I got it, and we are all set here. Same team, right? Also, we’ll take the bonus in gold, please. So you know, this is the man that was doing the scrying for us.” He jerked his head at Adam and continued to fight.

Adam nodded at the Mage. “Don’t worry too much; I’ll keep an eye out.”

“Please do. I am granting you the same authority he used to get us here; if you see something, make sure we all hear it.” With that, the Mage hopped into the air and went to take his position. The war was nowhere close to being over, and there was no time to waste.

Chapter Forty-one

An hour later, Dale was brimming with energy. He cheerfully smashed yet another skull in the endless tide, absorbing the small amount of Essence that was keeping the corpse moving. The people around him, fighting just as hard as he was, were forced to switch out as they ran low on stamina and Essence. Dale was certain that he should be sore or weary, but his powerful aura, as well as his new ranking, kept him from falling out of the line like the others. Hans eventually came over and gripped his arm, pulling him into the center.

“I know you feel fine, but you need to take a break or the mental stress might break you. Battle trances can be really hard to break out of, and if the rumors are true, you have a bad history with overdoing it in trances.” Hans forced him to sit and drink some water, and the ice-cold thrill as the liquid hit his stomach made him remember that he was starving. Then he nearly fell asleep in seconds as the adrenaline wore off. Having enhanced his entire body meant that the chemicals keeping him going also had a more powerful effect. Dale’s hands shook, and then he actually fell asleep in the middle of a battle.

He was shaken awake fifteen minutes later to the unpleasant sight of Tom urinating a few feet from his head. He was upright in a second as the others laughed. Rose shrugged at him while chuckling. “Well, we couldn’t use the outer edge as the latrine. A zombie would have bit that off of him.”

The others winced at the visual, and she rolled her eyes. “Seriously? We are in the middle of a war where… you know what, forget it. Dale, we could use you on the line with us again; we need to cycle back in.”

“That’s fine. I’m feeling refreshed even if my masculinity is feeling a little threatened right now.” Dale’s eyes flicked to Tom as he sighed in loud relief.

“Ahh, that’s the good stuff. I try to stay hydrated, and this is the price. Fear not, Dale. Most men would be having insecurities right now.” Tom grinned as Rose’s cheeks went pink and Hans rolled his eyes.

“Just wait until the C-ranks, Tom,” Hans told him. “You can get up to an inch extra each rank. Just ask Dale.”

Dale nodded with a straight face. “If anything, Tom, I was feeling a little bad for you.”

Tom’s hands twitched, as though he were hoping to take their necks and squeeze. “The two of you are not funny. If these were true facts, there would not be a man alive who didn’t do his utmost to enter the C-ranks.”

“Well, you got me there.” Dale smiled as they tapped a few people, signaling that they should switch. The punching began anew, and Dale was soon absorbing infernal Essence once again. His Core did separate it, but he was starting to feel a little ill after collecting the mess of filthy energy. Remembering what Artorian had taught him, Dale shifted the output of his auric Essence and carefully shifted to an aura of starlight. There was still a regenerative property to this version, though it was far less pronounced than what he had been using. The real difference became apparent as he landed a punch and the skeleton’s skull not only broke as usual but melted for a few seconds after landing on the ground.

“Well, that’s new. I like it,” Hans commented as the bone bubbled and popped. Dale would have responded, but the downside to his aura had just become apparent. The dead were staring at him, and his aura was painting a beacon of hate for them to target. Dale had been dealing with waves of zombies and skeletons, but now there were ghouls sprinting at him as well. The long-clawed undead were faster, smarter, and overall more deadly than their lesser counterparts, even though they were lesser undead themselves. If a comparison had to be made, ghouls fought in a manner similar to rogue-types. They could deal a tremendous amount of damage in a short amount of time with their teeth and claws, using their enhanced strength to tear off chunks of meat.

Dale wasn’t overly concerned about these fiends - as his armor would prevent their main weapons from cutting into him - but the mass of dead now focused on him was still unnerving. Thud, thud, thud. Dale’s fists beat out a metronome, and bodies began to pile up in front of him. Unbidden, his armor unrolled itself, ensuring that only the smallest sliver was left open for his vision. An arrow took a jumping ghoul in the eye socket as it dove at Dale, too late to arrest the undead’s momentum as it tackled the man from the side and brought him to the ground. It began sizzling and melted onto him as his aura interacted with it, but by then, more ghouls and zombies were coming through the slight opening in the lines.

The people that had been resting were forced to join in the battle and beat back the encroaching horde. As the last were cleaned up and tossed out of the ring of warriors, Dale had to grip the arm of someone who assumed he was dead and was trying to throw him as well. This had the unfortunate side effect of having the man scream like he was being murdered, and Dale very nearly was slain as his friends came to ‘rescue’ the man. Dale waved his arms and shouted that he was alive, but the man still fell back mumbling, “You were dead!”

“I was never dead; I was just covered in bodies!”

He shook his head violently while whimpering, “Dead things should stay dead!”

“I wasn’t dead!” Dale yelled as the man stumbled away.

Hans pulled Dale back into his position before it could be overrun again, pausing as the blood splatter that had managed to land on him boiled and vanished into vapor from Dale’s aura. “Oh, I like that a lot. I think it’d be worth opening some affinity channels if I can get an instant bloodstain remover. Listen, Dale, some people handle the stresses of combat easier than others. Look at Adam, he’s barely freaking out. Tom is laughing and coating himself with as much gore as he can; he’s going to need a healer after this. Rose is more of a ‘fire and forget’ sort of person, so she seems fine. That guy was in shock, pretty obviously. You get that sometimes.”

“Tom! Get closer to me here, would you?” Dale called to the overly large Barbarian. “You are going to get a nasty infection if you keep doing what you are doing!”

Tom kept laughing and swinging his hammers, crushing undead as he stepped a few feet closer to Dale. Black blood began to boil off the redhead, revealing bright red bulging arms. Tom’s arms were hot from constant use, and if he were not in a battle frenzy, he would have been in serious pain from his strained and damaged muscles. Dale’s aura began to sink into the man’s skin, and the tight muscles relaxed and began to heal at a faster-than-natural rate. It wasn’t what he truly needed - a cleric - but it kept the man from suffering possibly permanent damage to his limbs. It also allowed Tom to last longer before he would need another rest.

Tom’s commitment to the battle, even at the expense of what must be severe pain, helped Dale stay grounded and focused even though the dead began surging against their lines harder. Heavily armored Death Knights started joining in against the Guild, their hard-to-damage forms keeping the attention of the cultivators while standard units used them as a distraction to pile onto the living and bring them down. The Death Knights weren’t hindered by the stone barricades, simply smashing through them when they charged with ground-shaking steps. Defensive Mages reinforced the walls quickly, and the next few Death Knights bounced off or flipped over the chest-high walls, becoming easy prey if the humans were able to take advantage of their position.

The death toll began to build as more and more Guild members fell and joined the opposing forces. A cleric-Mage in the center of their group flew into the air, hands clasped before him in supplication. He shouted to the sky and released an immense wave of golden Mana that rolled over their formation and into the undead surrounding them. The Mage’s eyes rolled back into his head, and he fell out of the sky, luckily caught by his team waiting below. The undead who were caught in the light dropped like puppets with their strings cut, instantly consecrated and banished from the world.

“What is going on? Why have they gotten so much more aggressive?” Rose shouted, her ears ringing from the blast of power.

“I don’t know!” Dale shouted back, his ears equally impacted by the thunderous noise. There had been a strange dichotomy of pain and pleasure as the healing energy washed over them, but the noise had followed the light and so was the most recent thing to affect them. As the sounds of the battlefield started to resurface, they quickly learned why everything was starting to go downhill. Walking across the small gap were three smiling demons. Before the dead closed around their path, Dale also saw a few men in purple and black robes. Not only demons then; the necromancers themselves had arrived to wipe them out.

Chapter Forty-two

“Why hello there, filthy mortals.” The demon’s voice was difficult to listen to. The intonation was pleasant enough, but worms of infernal Essence seemed to crawl across the skin and ears of everyone present. “Our Master has authorized us to give you a chance to flee. Take it, and be gone from this area. Quit the field, leave the war, run away like a scared little Forest Elf! Pretty please, run in terror. Flee before us, and show to the world that the so-called ‘Adventurers’ Guild’ will always leave them to their fate in order to save themselves!”

It was evident that the creature was intentionally taunting them. It had no interest in letting them leave, but it had to follow its orders even if it only technically did so. While everyone else stood frozen, including the Mages, Rose took the initiative and answered for the Guild. She whipped out an arrow from a side quiver, sending it speeding at the demon as a flashing streak of silver. The demon casually held up a hand and let it thunk into its palm.

“Oh, look, she used silver. How cute.” The demon’s casual tone vanished as the banishing Rune on the tip of the arrow took effect. “What? You filthy-” He vanished with a flare of infernal and fire Essence. The Guild members cheered wildly as the other demons stared toward them with fury - and maybe just a tinge of fear - outlined on their faces. Then, in sync, they squinted and ordered the dead to attack instead. Creatures that had been slow and unfocused in their attacks before were now being directly controlled; they had become fast and coordinated. The necromancers empowered them with bolts of infernal Essence, and the demons directed dozens of attacks at once.

Before this point, only their overwhelming numbers were a serious concern. Now, even the lowest powered minion was a strong and deadly threat by itself. If a bolt of dark power connected to a skeleton, they would be wreathed in dark flames and subtly change. Their boney fingers would sharpen, and a hint of the deepest darkness would appear in their joints and along their bones. Dale punched one in the face, and instead of the skull shattering, it only cracked. Putting a bit more effort into it, he lashed out again, and the entire skull was blown into fragments that knocked over a few beings that had been behind his target. A more substantial portion of infernal Essence was sucked into him, and he took a sharp breath as it reached his Core.

“I’d say somewhere between the strength of those two strikes, Dale,” Hans quipped easily while never failing to dispatch zombies and ghouls that were coming at him. For some reason, his ranged attacks tended to glance off the skulls of the skeletons now. That was fine because Tom was happily smashing skulls left and right with his ingot hammers and powerful arms but was having trouble with the more meaty heads of the zombies. Rose ran out of regular arrows and had to leave her position to stand in line to get a fresh crate of them transferred to her bag from a Guild supplier.

Dale rolled his eyes, not that Hans could see it. “I figured that out, thanks, Hans.”

“Always happy to teach the newest generation how to do things properly!” Hans flipped the dagger in his hand, using the hardened pommel to smash a skull that was clattering at him. “I don’t mind the skellies getting close, I suppose. They aren’t very leaky.”

As they were bantering, a Mage lifted out of their group in preparation of using a large-scale spell. As her hands began forming symbols, a demon sprinted across the combat area and leaped, snatching her out of the air like a dog catching a ball. She screamed once, a sharp cry that made everyone wince as she vanished among the dead. Someone else shouted an order, “No more flying!”

“What? Why?” Dale muttered sarcastically as he began increasing the pace of his attacks. After he had given himself a bit of breathing room, he pulled two small items out of his bag. They were the ends of the tendrils of Assimilators, specifically the Runes for fire and celestial projection. Holding a Core in each palm, Dale began directing Essence through his corruption Cores and gauntlets into the organic Runes. With a grunt, he crossed the Runes and a wash of celestial-enhanced fire sprayed from him in a cone. This naturally drew attention, and as the flame began to sputter out, Dale saw a black-eyed demon sprinting at him with a malicious grin. As it closed in, sure of its kill, Dale smiled in return. The demon saw his expression shift and tried to react, but for once, Dale was faster.

The Cores in his palms shattered, and Dale grasped the entirety of the expanding Essence and directed it through the Runes. This time the fire was almost a solid as it projected outward, obliterating the dead it touched and coating the demon in holy fire. It screamed an unearthly buzzing scream as the flame stuck to it and seemed to draw ever more flame to itself. Almost as a mercy but more in terms of practicality, Hans whipped a spike at the being. This was a spike pulled from Manny the Manticore and was an effective banishing device. With a pop and a blast of Essence, the entity vanished, taking the flames and spike with it.

The organic Runes in Dale’s hands crumbled to ash, scattering in the wind before they ever touched the ground. He took a moment to slap Hans’ outstretched hand, grinning as he did so. “Two down, one to go?”

“They can summon more, so what we really need to do is take down the necros,” Adam interjected quietly, scanning the horizon for hints of danger. There were massive exchanges of power in the distance as the powerful members of the armies clashed, but since they were alive and still here, it appeared that there wasn’t a decisive victor yet. This made Dale wonder exactly how powerful The Master was. He knew there were powerful people in his army, but if the might of the entire world was being fought to a standstill right now…

“Son of a… an S-ranker is making a move in the area!” one of their remaining cleric-Mages shouted. “The dead are moving!”

“No kidding, moron!” someone jeered to a round of chuckles. “We’ve been fighting them all afternoon!”

“Not the ones still standing, fool! The ones we’ve been destroying!” the Cleric bellowed with a high-pitched tone. Indeed, the dead that they had dismantled were being pulled away by an invisible force, shattered bones and rotting flesh that had been ignored to this point were yanked deep into the enemy forces. A towering being began to take shape, the decaying materials flowing up and connecting together. Bones collected over each other. Skin, muscle, and sinew lashed the gargantuan bones into single chunks, and a towering form took shape.

“Someone is making a Legion Dreadnought Bone Lord!” Dale heard this shout and almost laughed despite the seriousness of the tone.

“Seriously, pick a name. Am I right, Hans?” He looked over with humor in his eyes, but Hans was staring at the towering creature that was forming and gasping deep breaths. “Hans? Hans!”

Hans started moving again, jerkily slashing and stabbing. He didn’t answer Dale, instead looking over at Adam. “Anything? What do you think?”

“Too nebulous of a threat,” Adam responded darkly. “Everywhere is threatened right now. I can’t get a read on where it will go, and nowhere within leagues will actually be safe.”

“Talk to me, please! How worried should we be? Please explain what that is!” Dale barked at the two, who simply changed the scope of their conversation to include him.

Hans explained the nomenclature as quickly as he could, “Bone Lord, fairly obvious. Bigass undead Golem made mostly of bone. Dreadnought, heavily armored and really hard to stop, does a lot of damage. Not as hard to stop as a Juggernaut-classed one, but it is reinforced with Spiritual energy so that point is basically moot. Legion type: this means that there is a demon bound to each limb that can control it independently and one more powerful demon controlling and coordinating the entire body as a whole. If that thing comes at us without us having S-ranked support, we die. I’d just go ahead and be very nervous, Dale.”

“What can we do about it?” Dale was hoping for anything but the answer he got in reply.

“Hope it doesn’t come after us and try to run away if it does?” Hans’ speech was slowing, so Dale nodded and got back to his own fight.

“In that case, all we can do is continue, right? Let’s trust that our people will recognize the threat and take care of it before it becomes an issue for us.” Dale’s words flowed evenly and powerfully, raising the spirits of the others around him. Their morale, that is. Not some kind of phantasm. He wasn’t a necromancer.

“It’s forming a weapon,” Adam stated almost blandly as his eyes stared unblinkingly at the monstrosity.

“Let me guess, a scythe, right?” Tom laughed as eyes turned toward him. “These sorts of things always have a scythe in the stories!”

Adam shook his head, looking like he was going to be sick. “No, it looks like it will be using something similar to a cat o’ nine tails with ends similar to a morningstar. This is bad. This is really bad.”

“What’s the matter, Adam? How does this get worse?” Rose shouted over the growing sounds of terror in their group of Guild members.

Clearing his throat, Adam had to swallow before speaking in a squeaky voice, “Four legs, three arms, three weapons. Those weapons also have an entity bound to them. There are eleven powerful demons in that thing. This thing has to be at least SS-rank. It has to be a personal summon of The Master.”

Chapter Forty-three

<Kind of a nice updraft coming from the battlefield down there. Plenty of Essence and Mana drifting up too, barely even have to keep Mountaindale flying around.> Navigation Bob didn’t respond with more than a grunt, keeping his eyes and limbs in constant motion as he made subtle changes to our flight trajectory. <Yes sir-ry! Beautiful day for a war.>

“Cal, now is not the time for you to be messing around and distracting Bob!” Dani chided me sharply. I didn’t hold it against her; she was really nervous about the changes that I was making against everyone else’s recommendation. “You should be triple checking every last Rune, making sure that you have done plenty of research on the possible side effects, and-”

<It’s all been done, Dani,> I gently interrupted the ranting Wisp. <At this point, there is nothing to do but to make it happen. You know me; I wouldn’t do this if I had even an inkling that I would be making the wrong choice, Dani. I really think that, at this point, there is no other option for my advancement, Dani. If we want to grow, if we want to live without fear, we need to fight against our instincts of self-preservation and change what would otherwise be our destiny. Dani, I don’t want us to be mediocre, Dani. You don’t want that for us either.>

“If you say my name in a soothing tone one more time, I’m going to throw something at you.” She growled deeply, making me and the Bobs in the area laugh.

<Fair enough, my bad!> I chortled while checking the Runes one more time just to appease her. Looky there! No changes, still perfect. <Everything looks good on my end. Is everyone ready? Nav Bob, you have control of the flight? Bob Prime you have the dungeon respawners all good to go? Loot generators?>

“We are all set… Great Spirit.” Bob Prime spoke morosely, which may have set me off a little.

<Hey, I’m going to be right here! I’ll be fine. This is going to be beneficial to all of us! Stop acting like I’m going to break; that isn’t even a valid concern.> There were half-hearted smiles and a smattering of false cheer around the room. Ugh. Bunch of whiners. <Alright, here we go! I’ll do the honors myself if that is fine with everyone.>

The stone around me swiftly vanished into my influence, removing the hill and exposing my Core and thousands of roots from the Silverwood tree. I watched with just a twinge of regret as my puddle of Essence splashed to the now-flat ground, leaving me totally dry for one of the very few times in my life. I was still held up by a small pillar of stone, looking for all the world like a stereotypical Mage’s staff. Pfft. They wish they had something as awesome as me on their weapons; though I’d make sure to be the most cursed item ever. The pillar shrank away, leaving me only with a thin band of metal supporting me in the air. It wasn’t actually a metal ring; it was two different metals set to spring apart and drop me through the tiny portal below me in case of emergency. Sometimes simple means are still the best means.

The Runescripted stone flowed across my floor, which would have been an impressive feat if there were anyone carrying it. No need for that here; in here it was just another chunk of area under my control. I lowered the stone that was already around me, the Runescript that collected Essence, and set the new section in its place. The original still functioned correctly and would even disperse the power to me just as easily, so there was no issue with using this new setup. I shifted everything around so that I was comfortable and took one last look at my surroundings.

My army of silver-clad Goblins stood in formation, Dani was flying around nervously while Grace followed, roots were everywhere… this is why I needed to become better, stronger, more powerful, so that I could protect all of them. Sure, a not-so-small part of me wanted to grab power just to have power, but what I was seeing right now was my drive, my motivating factor. I re-formed the hill around me, which I’m sure was a relief to the Silverwood tree. This was the first time the Goblins had ever seen my actual Core, and they were acting entirely too reverent. <Someone tell them to keep an eye out like they are supposed to be doing, please?>

The Goblins in the ranks snapped to attention, glaring around like someone had tricked them into sneaking a peek. I chuckled and let the metal holding me sink downward. Now, I was still suspended in the air but was also in the center of the Runescripting. I was about to become the power source as well as the receiver of all the power and corruption that would move through here. With a deep sound of inhalation - since I didn’t actually breathe - I connected my Mana directly with the activation sequence of the incredibly dense Runescripting.

Power began to flow out of me, moving along the lines of precious metals, corruption-transference minerals, logic gates, gemstones… if you could see it, the activation was a beautiful sight to behold. I tried not to get bored, but I had expected something like what had happened in the past. Boom! Power flows like crazy, instant results! I was getting spoiled. As the last portion of the new Runescript was activated using my Acme Mana, my literal worldview began to expand and not in an existential way. As my Mana began to filter through the myriad of powerfully scripted Runes that formed the ley lines, I could see the area that the ley lines moved through in a way similar to the influence of my dungeon.

I could also get a hazy view of the areas the ley lines weren’t directly impacting. All of this information was just too much for my mind to process, so I needed to follow a single point at a time to really understand what I was seeing. I could describe everything about it, the earth, minerals, underwater rivers, and the ocean… but what I was able to understand and comprehend in a moment was simply too much to voice. It was also… hard to hold all of that information at once, and so I funneled it into my soul space. The concepts, the design of things, the very fabric of the world’s surface… all of that was grabbed by the model inside of my soul which subtly altered everything.

The flaws, the deep mysteries hidden from view, the fantastic sights, it was all replicated. At least, it was reproduced in the same way an artist might replicate their sight with a pencil. Everything was mutable and could be changed for now. I had a feeling that this may not hold true if I ‘solidified’ these sketches with corruption. My thoughts were jerked out of myself as I felt a sudden strain. The final few ley lines already in place were now fully empowered with a thin layer of my Mana. I was drained beyond belief, but the connection to the world was worth it. There were a few… let’s call them holes, in the lines that we hadn’t noticed on the map, but once I had restored my Mana, I should be able to simply shatter whatever was blocking me in those spaces.

Now came the easy part, depending on how I looked at it. With a single thought, I turned the lines from ‘outgoing power’ to ‘drawing in power’. What do you think happens when a universal receiver and a perfect conductor for all forms of power opens itself to overabundant ambient energy? That instant gratification I had been missing before decided to grace me with its presence. I was forcibly returned to my standard dungeon view as the unbound Essence and Mana in the world started to pour into the ley lines and through them into me.

<Hey, Dani?>

“Cal! You are alright! Did everything go okay? Are you hurt?” Dani zoomed around frantically.

<Dani!>

“What, Cal!” she practically shouted at me.

<You remember a long time ago when I talked about making a giant Rune to draw in all the Essence of my dungeon?>

“...Yes?”

<I did one better. What would you say about getting to the A-ranks before the end of the week?> I smiled at her excellent reaction.

“If it were anyone else, Cal, I would tell them it was a nice dream and to go back to bed.” Dani glowed brightly and happily. “Coming from you, I say… let’s do this!”

Chapter Forty-four

<Great! I mean, I can’t guarantee that we are going to get that rank, but, you know, I’m glad you approve.> I chuckled as she quivered with barely suppressed rage.

“Cal! I’m gonna… argh!” she shouted into the air, making a few of the Goblins in the area shake with laughter that they worked very hard to hide.

<‘Argh’? What are you, a pirate?>

“Why do you need to take every serious situation and turn it into a giant joke?” Dani groaned as she settled back onto the Silverwood tree. “Would you like to explain yourself to me? To us, I guess?”

Fair enough. It looked like there were plenty of people trying to listen in. I expanded my speech to include them. <Sure. Listen up, friends. I just connected to the surface of the entire world. Any minute now, Essence and Mana from around the globe are going to start arriving. I am out of Mana right now, but after I regain some, the ley lines we have created will begin to engrain themselves deeper into the world. This will form a feedback loop that will bring in a nearly endless amount of power. So far, we have been fine with the Essence in the area, a bare trickle through the ley lines. I believe this will now be a flood of power.>

I could keep speaking endlessly - as I didn’t breathe - but I thought it would be best to let them imagine a few grand scenarios on their own. <It can only increase from there. I am hoping to absorb everything, but that isn’t realistic. It is highly likely that there will be spillover, which means evolutions for the creatures in here, more open space, and more powerful forms for everyone!>

The Goblins cheered softly, needing to remain on task, but the Attendants went wild. Clapping their hands, dancing in place, hugging… they really wanted to leave their humanity behind. I could help with that. After all, to err is human. If I didn’t need to have that beaten out of them, all the better. I hadn’t even thought to offer to mutate them; most species tended to have an inherent superiority complex, and the thought of leaving it behind should be abhorrent. Maybe I really did get lucky with the people that Minya had gifted me? At least the ambition for power was something I could respect. Perhaps the majority of them simply had no way to get started?

<All of this will take time, but what do we have if not time?> There were a few polite chuckles at this, as all of them were now functionally immortal unless something happened to me. <Right, well, anyone not on duty, make sure to get plenty of rest. We are at war, so… yeah.>

I cut off my words to everyone but Dani, feeling almost shy. I didn’t often speak to large crowds. <Was that okay? I didn’t go overboard, right?>

“You did fine, Cal. Wow. Who would have guessed that you were a shy public speaker?” Dani teased me lightly. “By the way, holy roots! No wonder the Elves have never figured out a way to safely move one of those things; they must be tied to the earth so tightly that it's near impossible to budge, even with earth magic!”

<Oh? Yeah, I guess. We’ve seen Dwarves chop off the top of a mountain peak before though, so I’m not so sure it only has to do with the ground. I bet that it needs a highly-concentrated place of power to live. I’ve been watching it ever since it was a seed, ya know. I always see growth spurts after we increase in power or add a new floor. Also, I’m pretty sure it is intelligent.> I had projected the last few sentences, and it was gratifying to see the shining silver leaves above me react slightly. Not enough that a being that relied on eyes could see it happen, but still. I had befuddled a tree. I feel that this was a real accomplishment.

<I saw that!> I jokingly taunted the tree. It was doing a better job acting now, and it didn’t react to my teasing.

“You saw what, Cal?” Dani seemed worried that I was going insane. She must have been listening to the old rumors.

<Eh. Don’t worry about it.> I ‘winked’ at the tree, or at least I sent the conceptual idea of winking at it. There was another tiny reaction as a single leaf tilted slightly to the left. Real communication between us might prove to be difficult. <Hey, do you hear that?>

“What?” Dani didn’t get a chance for a follow-up question as a torrential flood of Essence sprayed into the reservoir below me. The flow of power was so extreme and so filthy, that I almost cut off the portal reflexively. I stopped myself and took a deep, calming moment to myself. Four million liters of liquid Essence filled the reservoir to capacity in under a minute. I may have made a mistake; I may have overestimated my abilities while underestimating the amount of power that would be coming.

I had only ever used standard Essence or Mana to power the Runes in the ley lines, and filling it with a perfect superconductor in the form of the ultimate type of Mana was giving me… different than standard results. Oops. <Dani, you should back away - Glub glub.>

Liquid Essence merging with mixed Mana types was squirting in a high-pressure stream through my portal, and in a few seconds, the mass of power had almost reached the ceiling. There was now a column of liquefied energy encasing my tree in a perfect pillar of swirling, crackling candescence. Fortunately, I was held in place, or I would have been floating around the room screaming by now. I had made the drowning noises as a joke, but Dani seemed to be freaking out about it. <I’m fine, sorry, was just having fun! It! Is! Time! To! Eat!>

No lungs? No need for air? All that means is that there is no need to slow down when eating! I opened myself entirely to the energies around me, bypassing the need to cultivate properly and simply swallowing the power. The hole in my soul expanded by a tiny degree, and the pillar that had surrounded me and my shiny tree became a whirlpool. Oops, looks like a few Goblins died. Lightning had formed as friction caused the air to charge, and it seemed that the silver armor my legion were wearing had been a great path for the lightning to play. Well, we had to learn somehow. The screaming humans were getting on my nerves though.

<Hey! Tree! Help yourself to this power; take what you can get while you can. If you don’t eat it, I will!> I watched as the Silverwood tree pretended it couldn’t think for another long moment, then it gave in and the leaves shone with a soft silver-and-purple glow. Its trunk became more porous, and I paid careful attention to what forms of Essence and Mana it ate. I couldn’t be too sure that this is what it would always want, but if I took care to feed it treats it enjoyed, maybe it would open up to me more.

After making my offer, I ignored everything else and focused on draining the power into myself. It was an uphill battle, as more power continuously flowed into the area, but I was making progress. When the glorious food - that is, the mysterious power of the world - was back to a manageable amount and flowing into me and not the room, I took a look at where it was actually going. Diving into my soul space, I took a look at the forming world. I was still absorbing a hundred thousand liters of Essence and Mana every few seconds and adding it in directly, so I found the results to be disappointing. Only a single cubic foot of the world was solidifying per five seconds.

What if I tried to direct the power to turn into air instead of earth for a while? I did so and found that I was fortunate to be incorporeal. A cubic foot of air formed from the convergence of Essence and corruption that was so dense it created solid air; solid like a rock. What happened next shocked me. Not actually, I didn’t form lightning, but it was somewhat startling. There was a massive, explosive, decompression of air. The ground that it had formed over was blasted apart, and for a half-dozen feet, the earth was churned and tossed around. Well. Oops. Glad I did this now instead of later. Changing the point of air creation, I started in on making an atmosphere for my burgeoning planet. The various corruptions went to their respective areas to sketch out molecules and such - of course - but the Essence to create and solidify them was being fully devoted to making an atmosphere.

I watched as a solid cube of air decompressed and filtered out to fill about a hundred and thirty feet of space. The density wasn’t anywhere near high enough to be breathable, but a few weeks at this rate… who knows? I left my soul space and returned to reality, happily telling Dani all of the details. She was impressed and nodded along as I explained everything, or at least, she acted that way.

“Good work, Cal!” Her bright words made me as bubbly as my puddle had been. Oh. Now I’m sad again. “This is really interesting! You have somehow reached ‘foundational’ cultivation without getting to the A-ranks, though I have to say I don’t doubt that will be reached soon.”

<Wait, I thought foundational was a type of energy?>

“No, you are thinking ‘fundamental’ energy. In a sense, though, yes, your foundation is a conceptual source used in the A and S-ranks. You use the concepts and things stored there as images that you can then impose on your Mana, allowing you to reach greater heights. It is rare to find anyone in the A-ranks that is willing to discuss this information, so a lot of this will be trial and error for us. What you are doing now is called ‘building a foundation’ and has different connotations for different cultivators. It is as varied as the types of Mana themselves.”

My goodness, Dani is smart. I should just take a few years and get all the knowledge she has in her head moved into mine.

Chapter Forty-five

I almost feel like I’m cheating. This type of power delivery system is slowly but surely increasing my power, and I’m not having to do much for it. Actually… you know what? No! I deserve this. Did anyone else set up a world-spanning power collection array? This is the result of hard work, and I should just reap the benefits of all the effort I had to put in to get to this point without concerning myself with minor details.

I had been playing with my inner world, trying to see if there was anything I should or could be doing better. The forming world mirrored the real one, at least superficially, but did I want it to be an exact replica? Maybe… maybe not. For instance, the fact that almost all of the landmass was concentrated into a single massive area, followed by the rest of the world being underwater was kind of dull. Once you were past land, it was just blue as far as you can see. Sure, there are volcanic islands, but… I wanted my world to be more interesting.

I spent a few days fiddling with the mechanics of my soul world but didn’t really come up with an answer to my restlessness. Dani got my attention with a ping of Essence, and I returned to reality once again. She was impatiently waiting on something, and when I had no idea what to say she made a frustrated noise and jumped into it, “Ugh, I gave you three hours to play with yourself, but you can’t just sneak into a dark corner forever. Now, what should we do to help in the war down there?”

<What do you mean?>

“The war, Cal. Come on; I know that you didn’t forget about-”

<No, not that! I was working on my foundation for days, Dani. Three hours? Are you sure?> I was getting excited; I must have a temporal distortion in my world! Did time run faster than in reality?

“Pretty sure, Cal.” Dani paused a moment and seemed to squint at me. “Are you telling me that you thought you left Grace and me alone during a war for three days? You were fine with that?”

<No idea what you are talking about, my sweet firefly. So, the war, huh? What do you think we should do?> My too-casual tone didn’t convince her, and I’d have been sweating if it were physically possible.

“Well…” Dani let the word draw out ominously, and I felt physical relief when she allowed the subject to be changed, “we need to figure out a way to do something, but you should really look at the battle before we make a final decision.”

I watched as a monstrosity formed, finishing its growth at a hundred feet tall and half as wide. The power radiating from the creature was palpable even through the projection I was using, and I gasped as it began to move. Son. Of. A. Biscuit. Then it started doing that infuriating ‘I’m way more powerful than you and thus too fast to be seen’ thing. It had left the ground, shattering a quarter kilometer of earth with the force needed to counteract gravity. It appeared on the other side of the battlefield, a half dozen brilliantly shining High Elves forming a barrier in front of its descending weapon.

That must be the Elven leadership, the S-rankers that form their top level of government. I winced as the shockwave of the blow reached Mountaindale, causing the entire mountain to tilt dangerously. <I need to either get higher or lower if we are going to survive this!>

“Go down! Their blocking is deflecting the force upward; look at the clouds!” Dani directed my attention to the clouds that had been gathering due to the massive releases of Mana and Essence in the area. A half second after I switched my point of view, the cloud imploded like a pillow punched through a hole in a wall. The gathered power scattered, clearing the sky and allowing the bright light of the sun to wash over the area once again. Yikes. Down it was. We dropped for a moment, just enough to get below the current shockwaves being produced. Really, there was no need for all the screaming coming from the humans on my surface; they landed with hardly any broken bones!

The battle between the S-ranked Elves and SS-ranked demon thing would have been over in short order if the Elves were doing anything except defending. To have a minute chance at victory, they would need at least ten S-rankers fighting against this thing in perfect synchronization. I wanted it to continuously focus on the Elves and others rushing toward it and ignore me completely. Sadly, Dani didn’t seem to agree with my assessment. “How can we help destroy that thing?”

<Dani, I could drop this entire mountain on that, and it would probably brush me off like an annoying fly, turning us to dust as an afterthought! You want me to get involved in that?> I turned her attention to the airborne bone demon as infernal fire wreathed its head. The Spiritual energy version of Malice Mana - shaped as a flaming skull - flew at the Elves. A few more S-rankers had joined the Elven defenders, and a reinforced barrier took the blow. There was a detonation that hurt my soul to look at, and the shielding power reshaped and deflected the blow. The malicious energy flew away into the sky like a reversed meteor strike, and I was sure it would eventually destroy something up there.

“Well…” Say nothing, say no, say anything but- “yes, I think we should do something.”

<Quite frankly, Dani, and I mean this with all the love possible… no.> She scoffed at me, and I kept talking to head off her complaint. <I don’t have anything that could damage it, even if I was able to figure out where it would be by the time an attack got to it. Drawing its attention can only mean death for us!>

She was quiet, which was always nerve-mangling, and her eventual words didn’t fill me with the confidence that she understood my limitations. Apparently, I needed to be less awesome. “If you do think of something, just promise that you will join the fight.”

<This is unlike you, and I will not make that promise.> My decisive and icy answer seemed to startle her. <You are essentially asking me to throw my life away as a distraction to help people I have no affiliation or loyalty to. No. Our safety and people come first. If this world is overrun with the dead, then we will go to the sea. If the sea is conquered, we will fly into the sky. If the air is taken, we will strike out and leave this planet behind! But no matter what else happens, I won’t put you in danger again.> With that thought in mind, I took a glance at the portal on my surface that connected me to other cities.

The unguarded portal that is not currently in use or protected. Nom nom nom. I slid a section of stone away, and the portal dropped into my depths. The stone slid back over its previous location, making it look like the portal was ripped away by something clawed. That should throw them off the trail when they were looking for the culprit if I was not fast enough. When the portal finally stopped moving downward, I studied it with my Mana and dissolved the artifact after removing its active connections. No need to tear a spatial rift through myself. I snorted at the horribly inefficient and shoddy workmanship, disgusted that this was the culmination of centuries of gathered human knowledge.

I replicated the portal with a thought, making the exterior appear the same but replacing the internals with Essence instead of Mana. I restored the connections it previously had, and as the portal came to life, it no longer had the infernal whooshing-buzzing sound that had been its trademark in the past. Actually... that might give away my changes. I made a screaming rock, adjusting the Rune on it over and over until it matched the buzzing sound nearly perfectly. I put that in the base of the new portal and pushed it upward, placing the portal back in its old location.

From now on, the portal Mages would think they had control and would still be able to change the location it connected to, but I could cut the power off whenever I wanted. I would also be able to change the location it linked to. When I made my escape, I wanted it to be a clean escape. I didn’t need adventurers anymore, but I’d continue building up my dungeon for the simple fact that I still needed to protect myself. Not a lot would change, at least not soon, but at least I was getting ready for it!

Chapter Forty-six

“Ah, if it isn’t my star pupil! Get it? Star pupil?” Dale flinched at the voice that sounded near his ear. He glanced back to see Artorian studying him. “Yes, good, good. How impressive that you were able to create a derivative of my sunlight aura from a simple conversation on the Essence ratios! Your comprehension must be off the charts! C-ranked as well, now? Astounding.”

“Headmaster, what brings a nice guy like you to a dead-end place like this?” Dale wryly questioned as a lance of light extended from his palm and began melting a Ghoul’s head. Artorian nodded approvingly at Dale’s formed Essence.

“Hmm, a decent application of light. Good for conserving energy if you can retrieve it, but not great application for this large of a crowd. Allow a demonstration.” Artorian nudged a very tired Dale out of the way, extending his hand. His palm faced the ground, and his fingers were pressed together to form a wedge. “Now, while energy conservation is good for a long fight like this, what we need right now is fewer enemies around us. So, as the average height of the undead is based on the average height of our fallen people, we position our attack thusly and allow the light to move in a line, actually a wave if you pay attention closely.”

His extended arm glowed strangely with much less light than Dale expected. He had only thought about increasing the brightness or concentrating the light, so watching Artorian do… something was a little confusing. Artorian stepped back and nodded. “That should do it, did you catch all that?”

Dale looked at the unchanged view, frowning skeptically. “I’m sorry to say that I don’t see any difference.”

“Hmm? Oh, give it a second. They are all propped up due to the high enemy density. Now, this isn’t something that works well for extended fights,” Dale’s jaw dropped as a long, long line of undead simply slumped to the ground with partially melted skulls as the others around them moved onward, “but it can grant a reprieve, as you can see, even if the Essence cost is astoundingly high.”

“H-how?” Dale sputtered even as he punched another zombie that tried to fill the gap.

“It’s a simple usage of light.” Artorian cocked his head to the side. “Ah, I see. You are only using the visible spectrum. Well, I guess experience will always win out. I used a combination of focused, high-spectrum light along with the inherent properties of celestial Essence; in other words, I consecrated the portion of the skull that necromancers connect to in order to direct movement. Light naturally travels through certain materials easily, but, as I said, high Essence cost. Also, this works to damage regular people as well, so you can’t just fire it off willy-nilly.”

“I… I don’t understand. Spectrum? What do you mean light goes through things? That’s just false!” Dale was so agitated that he missed an incoming attack and had a boney fist slam into his face. Luckily for him, it was a skeleton that did the attacking, and its hand broke as it contacted Dale’s cheek.

“We will have plenty to talk about, it seems.” Artorian smiled gently as he joined in the fight more directly. “There is always more to learn, Dale. Again, this is simply a matter of experience. You will be able to do something similar in the near future, I am certain. In the meantime, I notice that you are having some trouble taking down Ghouls before they land an attack on you. Extend your senses and attempt to learn.”

Artorian’s palm began to glow fiercely, though it also contained the same glowing not-light as the long-range attack he had used previously. “This is the basic form my attacks take, a simple palm strike. Now, I’ll walk through all of the instructions you will need to follow my ability. It should synergize well with your current hand-to-hand fighting abilities.”

“The user’s celestial Essence is condensed, massively, into the legs, spine, arm, and hand. This will prevent you from hurting yourself. Usually. The speed at which you move when completed perfectly should cause a ‘boom’ to occur shortly after the first few steps have been taken. When I arrive at the destination and target, my foot is planted in front of them, forcing all of the velocity and momentum to push forwards and spiral up along my body and into my arm. I then deliver all of that force and energy into the target with a palm strike in a single go. This makes me appear to have arrived at an abrupt standstill while the target proceeds to cease existing as it takes on all of the force and energy I generated.” Artorian then followed his words up with action.

Boom. The ground indented where Artorian had been standing, and he appeared a few feet away.

Boom. Shattered shards of bone went flying in all directions.

Boom. Artorian began panting as three Ghouls corkscrewed through the air before dropping to the ground, the remains of their heads following soon after. “As you can—pant—see, the perfected form is a bit hard on your body and would normally be used only on enemies much stronger than these. The—gasp—Ghouls will be good training targets until you are able to have perfect understanding of this technique.”

He then performed a less-potent version, still destroying anything he touched with a simple slap but no longer using the maximum force possible. “Get back in there, Dale; we’re wasting daylight. For me, that’s a terrible thing to waste.”

Dale was having trouble reconciling the hookah-smoking, grape-eating, hedonistic headmaster with this undead-obliterating starlight warrior. He got back into the fight, punching vigorously - if somewhat mechanically - as the potent aura coming off Artorian refreshed the muscles and reduced the fatigue of everyone near him. Dale grumbled good-naturedly; he had really thought he had the starlight aura perfected, yet Artorian was able to produce better results without blinding the people around him. Trying out a palm strike, Dale winced as the blow did hardly any damage. There was so much he had yet to learn! This fact made him smile and attack with renewed vigor. He had things to do, and this war was getting in the way!

Hans jumped in the way as a demon reached out of the pressing dead and grasped at Rose. The demon laughed as Hans seized him, switching targets and slowly dragging the Assassin forward. Not knowing what to do, Rose froze in place. Hans shouted loud enough to be heard over the other sounds of combat, “You’re gonna have to make it up to me later, Rose, if you know what I mean!”

On instinct, she whipped out an arrow and shot it at Hans’ head. Gasping as she realized what she had done, Rose took a half step forward as Hans effortlessly predicted the incoming arrow and shifted his head to the side. The projectile slid through Hans’ ear and the demon’s cheek. Cackling laughter cut off as black fire washed up and started traveling over the wooden shaft between them. The demon’s eyes were hungry as he was pulled through the rift of banishment, doing his best to take the rogue with him. Hans twisted, tearing a chunk of flesh out of his ear as the arrow and demon vanished entirely.

“I knew you’d scratch me with one of those eventually.” Hans grinned at Rose, and a watery smile formed on her lips.

Screams rang out behind the team, and Dale glanced back just in time to see an entire section of their defensive ring collapse. Adam whipped his head around and glared at the demons that were gleefully pummeling fallen warriors, blood spurting as their punches went through chests and struck the earth below. Striding toward them, Adam swung his topaz-tipped staff and struck the lead demon in the chest. Contrary to expectations, the previously gleeful demon was blasted away with a smoking crater in his chest. Anyone watching felt sick to their stomach; the collision of the opposing Essences had created a small dodecahedron of chaos.

“Seeds!” Madame Chandra’s voice rang out, and a nearly undetectable ripple of Mana followed along with the Incantation. The churned earth of the battlefield suddenly sprouted greenery, drinking spilled blood and feasting upon rotten flesh to grow into bizarre corruption-mutated plants. “There is a wave of Abominations approaching led by a Tomb Lord! This should slow their growth as they near your group, but don’t touch the plants! They will eat living flesh as happily as undead tissue!”

Dale watched the spot where she had been floating, as she had vanished abruptly as soon as her speech had finished. This entire battle was confusing to him. There was a literal tier system in place here, where B-rank and below stayed on or near the ground, A-rankers fought in the air above them, and the S-rankers and above were keeping their combat even higher in the sky. He was uncertain why they were even fighting, as soon as one side’s S-rankers won, they would crush everyone else. Were they literally there as a distraction for the top-ranked fighters?

“Someone get rid of that blasted demon!” The hole in their lines had closed, but the final demon from the last wave was now among their forces causing havoc. It was darting back and forth, stabbing, burning, and cackling. Dale turned to help, but Tom was there first.

With a smile on his face, Tom swung the massive hammer in an uppercut at full strength, right as the infernal being turned toward him. Now, lesser demons were considered to be equivalent to B-ranked Mages, but even they were subject to the whims of physics if they were unprepared. When the warhammer cut into the being’s chest, the force enhancement Runes activated and attempted to send the creature into orbit.

“Four!” Tom shouted gleefully as he watched the creature shoot upward, only to be caught in the crossfire of A-rankers battling above them. There was a flash of black fire, and the demon was banished. Painfully. “That’s the fourth demon I’ve landed a hit on today!”

“Ah, I was wondering what that meant.” Hans slapped the Barbarian on the back and smiled. “Good job, my star pupil!”

Tom - still holding a smile on his face - fell to the ground. Hans could have caught him, but he was so shocked that he didn’t even attempt to do so. Hans swooped down and checked the large man’s vitals, sighing in relief when he found that he was only unconscious. “Lack of Essence collapse! I told him that using that warhammer in extended combat was a bad idea.” Hans called to a cleric, who nodded and helped him drag the redhead into the protected center area. Dale’s group sighed with relief and got back into position.

“I’m so sorry about this. It’s really the only way the rest of us make it,” Adam said to no one in particular, gaining looks of concern when he spoke his next words. “Dale, remember… when you have only one option remaining, you have no options at all.”

Just as they refocused on the battle, a flicker appeared in the air in front of Adam and coalesced into a demon with a still-smoking crater in his chest.

“That hurt,” he hissed into Adam’s ear just before backhanding the cleric with all his might. A sickening crack rang in Dale’s ears as Adam’s twisted body was propelled into the lines behind them.

Chapter Forty-seven

The demon vanished with a furious roar as a knife with a Rune of banishment embedded itself into his side. Hans’ face was full of cold fury, obviously wishing he could cause more pain to the vanishing being. Rose ran to check on Adam’s condition, but when she pulled back his hood, it was obvious that his neck was broken in multiple areas and his face had been caved in.

“Celestial feces,” Dale whispered as Rose attempted to straighten their cleric’s neck.

“C-c’mon, Adam,” Rose whispered softly as she re-aligned his vertebrae. “You’re stuffed with celestial corruption, a little damage like this shouldn’t be an issue for you to fix!”

“Rose,” Hans stated quietly. “You need to-”

“Adam!” Rose shouted down at the prone man. “Adam, come on! You… you can’t…”

Once more, Hans’ voice reached her ears, “Rose.”

She whirled on him furiously. “Don’t! Whatever you are thinking of saying, just don’t!”

Hans took another step forward, wrapping her in a tight hug that she struggled to break free from. “Rose, he’s g-”

“No! Shut your abyssal mouth!” Rose stared at Adam, her eyes widening as his skin began to glow with a bright golden light. “Look! Look, he’s fixing himself!”

Dale, Hans, and Rose stared at their friend’s unmoving body as it began to glow brighter and brighter. Rose’s joyous expression faded as his skin started to flake away as a golden energy that flew like sparks, vanishing into the air above them. “No!”

Stepping closer to Adam’s disintegrating body, Dale put one hand on the cleric’s vanishing head and whispered a goodbye. Dale blinked, and in the moment his eyes closed… Adam’s body vanished with a blaze of golden light that shot upward. An almighty thundering boom echoed across the entire battlefield as the Legion Dreadnought Bone Lord - wrapped in an unholy aurora of hellfire - appeared in the air above them and bounced off the layer of hardened celestial Essence released by Adam’s body. Instead of landing on the two hundred or so cultivators remaining around Dale, it tumbled through the air and fell amongst the dead. A flood of black flame washed over the area of impact, cleansing the dead for nearly fifty feet and leaving behind a disk of molten glass as the Dreadnaught sprang back into the air to engage the S-ranked beings chasing after it.

Dale watched all of this happen with abject fear holding him in place. The thought that there was a battle happening above them on a scale he couldn’t imagine made him sick to his stomach. He looked over the empty robe and clothes left behind by Adam, genuinely feeling the loss of a close friend. He stored the Mithril laced robe, leathers, and finally, the topaz-tipped staff in his bag. They would honor his sacrifice… eventually.

Suddenly feeling a strange lurch in the air, all of the cultivators in the area went a little green. The overabundant spent Essence and Mana in the area were no longer wafting upward and around wildly; now the energy was moving slowly but surely to the ground. At first, this seemed to be an incomprehensible technique that someone was using as an attack, but as time went on and nothing seemed to happen, the oddity was ignored.

Twenty minutes later, Rose collapsed, fully spent. Dale didn’t blame her; he was getting close as well. Though he was constantly refreshing his Essence, the mental and emotional toll was starting to impact his performance. He had needed to be healed twice so far when a Ghoul or small swarm of undead had been able to bring him down and break a few bones. Just as Dale was considering giving in and trying to switch out, he saw a flash of purple and black. There was a necromancer hiding in a group of the dead! The man was at least twenty paces away, but at that moment, Dale had something approaching a mental break.

Ignoring the shouts of concern, he jumped over the chest-high barricade and sprinted forward. Sprinted was a bit of a misnomer, as the only path forward was by using the heads of the undead below him as stepping stones. A throwing dagger caught him in the back of the knee, causing him to stumble. He knew that dagger; it was Hans’. Dale was furious for a bare second, but then a demon that had jumped for him passed through the space he would have been in if not for the thrown knife.

Turning the stumble into a roll, Dale jumped forward and was suddenly face-to-face with a befuddled necromancer. Utilizing his training to its maximum, Dale delivered a full force punch to the man’s slightly open jaw. The Mage stumbled back, not hurt in the slightest but still thrown off and confused by Dale’s actions. As he straightened, something clinked against his teeth… from the inside. His eyes widened a fraction as the pre-crushed beast Core Dale had shoved into his mouth gave way and detonated with all the stored Mana Manny the Manticore had once contained.

Headless, the smoking body of the necromancer toppled to the ground. A hideous wailing filled the area as small portals opened and sucked several demons back to their plane of existence. A large portion of the dead surrounding Dale, as well as those around his fellow defenders, simply stopped moving and lifelessly slumped. A ragged cheer came from his group as the Mages stepped out to collect or destroy the fallen bodies before they could be taken by a different necromancer. Dale raced back to his group, a much easier task now that there was open space surrounding them.

More undead were coming, and Dale was sure other necromancers would target them for vengeance… but it was worth it. Seeing the number of undead that had fallen, Dale knew that this necromancer had been the one responsible for the assault on them and the death of his friend and teammate. Even if it had been murder by proxy, this man was the one controlling the things that had done the deed. Feeling triumphant, Dale arrived back to his position, expecting cheers or even nods of appreciation. Instead, only silence greeted him, and nearly everyone was staring at him. No… they were looking past him. Dale glanced over his shoulder and paled, then hurried to get behind friendly lines again.

Enormous meat slimes, the swift-travel form of Abominations, were rolling toward them. Once they had gotten close enough to attack, they would take on a form with limbs and smash through the living with extreme prejudice. A Tomb Lord was tromping along toward them as well, quite a way behind the rolling globs of meat. Doing their very best to prepare, the C-rankers formed up while the Mages prepared their most destructive spells.

“Alright, that is quite enough now,” the twisted voice was heard by everyone at the same moment, belying the idea that it was simply spoken. “While I am enjoying the show, I was asked to end the war, and I’m—heehee—going to oblige this wish.”

“That voice…” Dale muttered with wide eyes. “That’s…”

“I said that was enough!” the voice screamed, Madness obvious in the tone. The SS-ranked Dreadnought was suddenly visible and torn out of the air. It smashed into the ground and bounced back into the air, then did so again and again. Each bounce was half the height as the one previous but also seemed to strike the earth with double the force. By the time the bounces were less than a half inch off the ground, the effect was so strong that the demons were banished from pure physical force, something thought impossible to this point.

Only a strangely steaming liquid paste remained of the unholy being when Xenocide appeared in the sky. “Hello, everyone, and thank you for attending my ascension into the Heavenly ranks. How should I put this…? I couldn’t have done this without you? Thank you for the centuries of insanity that you propagated? Universal constants are a physical quantity that are generally believed to be both universal in nature and have constant value in time, so there is nothing that you could have done to avoid this outcome?”

He seemed to ponder for a moment, but his form flickered near constantly even while appearing not to move. People all over the field that had tried to use the lull to attack exploded into bloody mist. “Well, no matter. I did need you to do what you did, and now I need you all not to exist. Also, I finally have the power to do it! I am about to solve all of the issues our planet has faced for millennia!”

Xenocide’s voice rebounded crazily over the entire area, his speech echoing at odd angles. There were times that Dale heard his words before his mouth moved or where bizarre chanting or whispering was laced through the Madness cultivator’s words. “Hunger, poverty, subjugation of others, inequalities… and finally, finally… war! I’m ending it all! You can’t thank me later! Ha! Ha-ha! Haaa-ha-ha!”

The land the war had been fought on began to churn, and all the blood, juices, bodies, and detritus generated throughout the entire battle began to shift. All of it raised off the ground and formed itself into a massive Runescript, a formation… a ritual. A dark, twisted, Madness-designed ritual. The S-rankers that had been fighting each other instantly came to an agreement and turned their attention to Xenocide… and a new war began. A war they couldn’t win; a war to subdue Madness.

Chapter Forty-eight

<See? It all worked out, Dani!> I cheerfully watched the unfolding drama. <I didn’t need to risk my neck, and that extra-armed demon thing was still taken out. Not that I have a neck to risk, but the analogy is valid.>

“Cal, this is an even worse outcome! Look at that formation; what do you think that massive Runescript is going to do?” Dani practically shouted at me.

<Hmm. Let me see… I mean, it can’t be too bad right? He said he was going to fix all those problems, and I’ve heard a lot of people complaining about them.> I looked over the behemoth, unbelievably intricate, spinning Runes. I was actually a little jealous about the apparent ease in which he created them. I wanted to be able to do that.

“I’m pretty sure he meant ‘fix’ those issues in the same way you offered to ‘fix’ people with interesting bodies,” Dani ominously informed me.

<Oh, so you mean he is going to slay anyone who has those issues?> I paused and pondered a long moment. <That makes sense. Too bad, I guess the races of the world had a good run, though.>

“Cal!” Dani bawled at me, making me ‘wince’.

<What did I do this time?> The placement of the Runes suddenly clicked in my mind. <Oh, hey, that’s bad. Dani, that gigantic setup is designed to pull two objects together. I have no idea how he is going to power it, though. I’m pretty sure that sucker is designed to latch onto the smaller moon around the planet and pull it close enough to collide with the world. Even a triple S like he claims to be shouldn’t be able to generate that kind of power.>

“What if he had the help of all the other S-rankers from all the races?” Dani’s quiet voice interrupted my thoughts.

<I suppose, but I highly doubt that the other S-rankers and such would willingly end their world like that. It is more likely that->

“Cal, not willingly, but… look.” Dani directed my vision to the projection that every other being on this floor was watching. We were watching a few seconds behind reality, as we needed to slow down the projection to a level of speed we could follow.

Xenocide stood tall as Essence, Mana, and Spiritual energies assaulted his position. Instead of tearing holes in the world or ripping him asunder, Xenocide was able to direct every bit of power into the blood-soaked activation sequence of his floating formation of Runescript. Abandoning long-ranged attacks, the most powerful beings of the respective races worked together to contain all power and attack Xenocide physically.

The deranged cultivator somehow avoided all attacks by moving into strange, confusing or provocative poses. I laughed out loud when he put his index finger to his lips and bent forward, sticking out his butt and lifting a single foot in a sexy pose, somehow just not being included in the attacks of eight different S-rankers. Dani’s glare made my laughter peter off, and I was happy she couldn’t see my mirth when I kept from being loud. A human would be rolling on the ground if they were having this much fun!

A glint of something sinister appeared in Xenocide’s eyes, and his hand flashed out and caught a startled cultivator. He tossed the S-ranked man as easily as a C-ranker tosses a ball, and the thrown man splattered against the Rune. In an instant, all of his collected energies were drawn into the Runes, and that was when I saw that there was a dungeon Core being used to draw in the power. I zoomed in on the odd-shaped Core and heard a gasp from Dani.

“That’s…!” She sounded absolutely sick. “That’s Kantor! That means… mom…”

<Dani, I’m so sorry.> If Kantor, the Dungeon Core, was being used as a ritual component, that meant he was already gone… as was his bonded Wisp. Another thought tickled my mind even as I tried to comfort Dani: if the Core of an S-ranked dungeon was being used for this Runescript, it would be far more potent than I had originally credited. If this Runescript were fully powered… there would be no stopping it.

<We need to do something,> I demanded decisively. <All troops, prepare to attack. We are going after that ritual. We need to break it, and we need to do it now. Anything that can fight physically, get to a portal. Abandon banishing weapons, and grab any force enhancing or piercing weapons and get moving.>

Creatures began moving, sprinting to follow the orders of the dungeon. Me that is. My orders. I felt sick. They were all going to die because I was ordering them to. I was ninety-nine percent sure of it. <Navigation Bob, take us up. We are going to break that Runescript even if we need to sacrifice the entirety of Mountaindale and the dungeon to do so. Pour on the speed; power is not an issue.>

I diverted a large portion of the Mana and Essence I was getting into the flight controls. We began gaining altitude even as my creatures swarmed to my surface. The Mobs were going to begin jumping as soon as we were over the massive Runic circle, but Manny suddenly thundered his war cry and squeezed out of the entrance to the dungeon. He was much the worse for his travels, scales caked in mud and blood. He snarled at the assembled Mobs, “Fools! Return to the dungeon! I shall step in, and whether I fail or succeed… your deaths would have been in vain!”

I would have teared up if it were at all possible. Seeing a single file line of Goblins, Bashers, Cats, and Golems ready to jump over the edge so that they could possibly do something to help me was heartbreaking. Suddenly, having them all back… there was no way to thank the selfless Manticore. We climbed higher, and soon, it was almost time to throw our lives away. I shuddered at the intrusive thought, but I really believed that this was what was about to happen. My Mobs traveled deep into the dungeon and entered the workshops. I directed all of them to lay on the gravity Runes and increased the power of them until there was no way for the various creatures to fly away or be rattled from an impact. At least, I hoped this was the case.

Manny and I were even with the clouds that had begun to creep back into the area and were soon able to see the smaller of the two moons as it glowed unnaturally brightly in the late afternoon sun. If I were a romantic and didn’t know what was going on, I would try to woo my lady tonight, claiming that the moon had never seemed bigger or brighter. Now, the sight just made me wince; the connections between the Runes and the Moon must be forming vigorously for the light reflecting off the moon to be wavering like this. Celestial feces, I needed to speed this up. The humans on the surface of Mountaindale were falling to the ground one after another, unable to get enough air to breathe. If there had been many cultivators left there, this wouldn’t have been such an issue, or they could have saved the mortals. Whoops.

Manny launched his attack, jumping and diving off the cliff. I knew what he was going to do, and I was already horrified. He was going to slam himself into the Runes and use the destruction of his Core to enhance a single attack. We were both hoping that his ability to corrode nearly anything would weaken the spot I would be targeting. As he got closer, I couldn’t bear to watch.

I looked down at the spinning Runes of Xenocide’s formation, then up at the oscillating light surrounding the moon… and released my version of a sigh. Drat. Self-preservation was king; what was I doing? Before I could talk myself out of it, I let go of the power holding up me upright and began to fall. <For Kantor!>

The projection of my target so far below, the Runescript shimmered as the base of Mountaindale began to heat up. Soon, the stone was cherry-red and glowing, the friction with the air causing lightning to form and crackle along my surface. I adjusted my course a tiny bit, seeing the space my Manny was going to attack. It was one of the few stationary points on the massive, flowing Script, and as Manny detonated into corrosive poison and pure force… the Runes were painted red with his blood. I really hoped that had done what we needed. Now I had a target to aim for, and as much as I hated to admit it, Manny’s actions had helped me go through with my own selfless action.

A small part of me noted that Xenocide was cheerfully shoving his hand into an unknown cultivator dressed like a necromancer in elaborate dark robes. I saw the instant he noticed the falling mountain and frowned, but he failed to move in time to block me as the obviously high S-ranking man grabbed and distracted him for the quarter of a second I needed in order to be too close to stop. The entire mountain and dungeon slammed at terminal velocity into the section of Runes that had been painted in the blood of my Manticore, sending molten stone to the ground and crushing or burning hundreds of beings on the battlefield below.

As my projection cleared of the dust and loose energy, I noticed something unexpected. The mountain was still above the Runescript. We had bounced off of it. I hadn’t been able to destroy the Runes, though I saw a tiny stream of power escaping the Runescript from a crack that had formed. A crack. All of that for a crack. Xenocide appeared next to the energy stream, inspecting it with insane fury on his face. When his expression transitioned to relief, I got very, very nervous.

“Tsk, tsk. Bad dungeon! Punishment!” Xenocide smiled directly at me somehow, raised a hand, and smacked the mountain that was hovering in the air above him. A massive chunk of stone on the side of the mountain was blasted into dust, at least a few hundred tons worth. The rest of the strike sent me spinning through the sky. By ‘me’ I, of course, meant the entire abyssal mountain. If I had a stomach, it would have been emptied on the floors, walls, and ceilings. As it was, the humans that remained on my surface and outdoors were tossed off and sent falling to the ground far below. The ones indoors… I would try to clean them up before anyone saw them.

There was nothing I could do for several minutes. Even after the initial force of the strike wore off, I was now off balance and still out of control. It took a full half hour until I was able to compensate for the instability and spinning, and by then… well… the war was over. My dungeon was empty of everything but my Attendants and the Mobs that had been held to the walls and floor, and they were all heavily damaged. I had lost a tenth of my overall size, and my lake was gone. The Wisps were fine, but Grace was so dizzy that she kept falling into the floor and accidentally causing corkscrew spikes to form when she came back out.

“Well,” Dani paused to heave, causing a trickle of glitter to fall to the ground, “I’m glad you didn’t draw attention to yourself during combat. You were—hurk—right… all along. We should have just run.”

<Dani.> I gazed at her form as she stared at me. <I know.>

Chapter Forty-nine

“War is over, go home?” Hans was still supporting an exhausted Half-Elf as he queried the Mages hovering above them.

“This is bad. Dale, where are you?” Princess Brianna appeared among the combatants, causing a few people to curse loudly and one man to fire a stream of rocks at her. She dodged and ignored the small attacks, calling for Dale once again.

“Over here,” Dale called apathetically as he helped Tom get to his feet and stand on wobbly legs. “Please don’t tell me that it is worse than it looks.”

“At least it isn’t raining!” someone called brightly, obviously trying to lighten the mood. A lake’s worth of water suddenly sloshed to the ground a few hundred feet away, causing decomposing bodies to be washed toward them. Exhausted water Mages directed the flow around the group but glared daggers at the too-cheerful man.

“Dale, we should speak in… no… everyone needs to hear this.” Brianna took a deep breath and enhanced her words with wind, carrying them across the field, “Every S-ranker in the guild, the High-Elves, Dwarves, Northmen, Humanity… my Mother… they were all killed here. They were all used to power that monstrous Runescript floating in the air. Without an S-ranker, the Guild law states that-”

“Not every S-ranker, Assassin.” Dale stifled a groan as Barry’s voice echoed through the area. A sick smile was on his face even as a huge portion of the survivors began to cheer wildly. “I am quite sure that I am the highest ranked Guild member remaining, so I will take over from here.”

“First of all, we will need to find a way to destroy this infernal floating Rune and reverse the course of that moon.” Barry started, only to be cut off.

Xenocide’s voice drifted over, unenhanced and nonchalant. He had paused in the middle of doing sit-ups and was sitting on his Rune smiling at them. “Good luck with that! Also, the Church has a few S-rankers left! You should bring them here; I’d love to play catch with my boy a few times before the world ends!”

Barry paled, his hands trembling as he looked at the insane person who was staring back at him. He cleared his throat, resuming his speech, “As I was saying, we all have much to do. I look around this field and see undead roaming around, which tells me that we have not wiped all of the necromantic filth from this world; we will remedy that.”

“Will you, now?” A crack resounded through the area as Barry was backhanded and sent spinning to the ground. A man in tattered, once-intricate robes stood in the air where Barry had been only moments ago. Blood was leaking from his mouth and flecked the air whenever he spoke. “I am fairly certain that your only hope, the only hope for all of us, is to join together and launch a counter initiative. Once again, Barry the Devourer, your mouth is getting you into trouble.”

Chandra joined the group, looking up at the man who could easily swat an S-ranked man out of the air. There was only one explanation for his overwhelming power. “Why would you do this, Ra-”

“I go by The Master now, Madame.” The Master’s voice had lost a bit of its frigidness, and a touch of sadness had entered his tone. “We were all wrong. We were manipulated, we lost sight of everything we had hoped for, and all of the world events in the last five hundred years that brought us to this point were calculated and plotted.”

“What? Who would…?”

Chandra’s voice faltered as Xenocide waved at them lazily. “That was me! Thank you for the recognition! Do you have any idea how hard it was to convince the entire world to hate each other? Alright, fair enough, not that hard, but still, it is nice to be noticed for your dedicated efforts. Nap time!”

“There is no way a triple S-ranker needs sleep,” Dale muttered as Xenocide fell backward and snuggled up to a no-longer-animated zombie bear. Snores drifted to them in moments.

“We should strike now!” Barry was pulling himself out of the crater his impact had created and was intentionally not looking at The Master.

“Shut up, Barry,” the Master ordered coldly. “We are all exhausted, our forces are devastated, and if we couldn’t defeat him with the most powerful combined forces of the entire known world, what could we do now that he slew them? Listen, all of you. We were all led astray; it is clear to me now. Things in my past that confused me, the reasons people acted the way they did to my powers and the power of my followers… all of the blame rests at the feet of Xenocide.”

“Aww. I’m blushing.”

The Master grimaced and ignored Xenocide’s words. “We need to quit the field, and those of us that remain need to find peace amongst ourselves, no matter our personal feelings. I want this to happen, but I will warn you only once: attacking my people means that you forfeit your life.”

There was silence on the field, but slowly, the surviving people began grouping together. It took three hours for everyone to cross the massive battlefield, but soon, Elves stood by Dwarves, Northmen stood near Amazons, and Guild members uneasily eyed black-robed necromancers. The tension in the air proved that the only thing keeping these people from attacking instantly was the shared fear of what loomed above them. The Runes in the air shifted again, the once pure red was now tinged with green and creating a sickly light. The Master strode forward in the air, looking at the assembled people with tired eyes.

“Alright. Please, believe me when I tell you that this war is the absolute last thing I ever wanted. It should have never progressed to this point, and if pride, tradition, and fear hadn’t gotten in the way… we would be living in a much better world right now.” The Master took a deep breath, and in that moment, one of the Amazons tried to derail the conversation.

“Was destroying our society twice not enough for you, male? Wouldn’t this issue never have happened if you had followed the law!” Instead of a question, her words were an admonition.

“I had no interest in being a slave, nor did I care for your rules or what happened to males that learned how to cultivate. Murdering a child? That is what you wanted to do? Don’t speak; I know the answer. I was there, wasn’t I?” The Master’s words were a command with a touch of power in them, and the Amazon found that her mouth would no longer open.

The Master continued, now uninterrupted, “Everyone, I am uncertain what your individual cultures and practices are, but I doubt any of them include dying without a purpose. I am uncertain how much time we have before this Rune pulls down the moon, but I am certain we can do nothing about it right now. We need to gather the new leadership of nations and unite as a world to combat this threat.”

“We don’t even know for sure what this Runescript is doing! I say we call for Spotters to inspect it!” a new voice shouted out. “As far as I know, it is making illusions and you are working to set yourself up as the leader of the world!”

Power rolled off of The Master, causing everyone but Barry to be forced to their knees on the sodden ground. Even Barry was bending heavily, panting as he pushed himself to ignore the power. The Master’s voice thundered in the air, causing noses and Essence-enhanced ears to bleed, “Do you think I would need to ask to rule you? Your leaders are dead, slain by that madman! You want to resort to bureaucracy as the world is literally ending? I should castrate you here and now so that your genes don’t spread!”

“I have thirteen children,” the man whimpered in a desperate plea to be released.

“Of course you do.” The Master sighed and reined in his power. The pressure eased, and he looked around. “Find yourselves new leaders, gather the remnants of your societies, and gather on the flying dungeon. It… where did it go? I’ll go get the dungeon, you all have a day. Do not make me come dig you out of whatever place you think will be safe. I will guarantee this: it won’t be.”

He vanished in the direction he had last seen the dungeon, and soon, people were muttering and looking at each other with distrust. With no one overly powerful enough present to protect them, the necromancers started a hasty retreat. A few people discussed going after them, but after the world-shaking events of the day, no one had the energy to act upon their grumbling.

Tom looked around, searching the sky. “The dungeon really left us here?”

“Did you see what that slap did to it?” Rose shook her head sadly. “I would have fled if it were possible. Right now, though… I think we are stuck here until this ends one way or another.”

Chapter Fifty

<Gotta run, gotta run now! Move spritely!> I sang lightly as I flew as fast and as far as I could. I was staying low to the ground, which… frankly, I wasn’t sure if that would help. I was a mountain. I didn’t exactly do inconspicuous well. Although… I looked at the Elven Embassy that had been built above me and started absorbing it. <Nom, nom.>

“You seem a little loopy, Cal,” Dani stated unnecessarily. “Did that slap rattle you harder than I thought it did?”

<No, no. I’m just excited to be making a break for it. How long has it been since we got to hang out with only people that we wanted to hang out with? Maybe we should seal the entrances for a while and dive really deep into the ocean. I bet it’d be hard to find us down there!>

“Ha, as if! We’d never survive the deeps!” Dani chuckled like I had made a joke, and when she realized that I was serious, her tone completely changed. “Cal, you do know that the most powerful beasts in the world live in the deep oceans or deep underground where the Essence concentrations are highest…?”

<I guess that figures.> I sighed as I felt feet touch down on my surface. <Well, it was a beautiful dream while it lasted. Someone’s here. I suppose we should greet them.>

My attention turned to my entrance as The Master walked in. You could have heard a pin drop as the tension mounted in the air between us. I created a pin and dropped it on the second floor to test this theory. Yup. His head twitched as the tiny noise reached him. He cleared his throat, which was probably just as useful for him at the S-ranks as it was for me not having organs.

“So. Dungeon.” The Master’s powerful voice shook dust from the ceiling. I really needed to clean the place up. Xenocide’s slap had done a number on me. “I came here… to apologize. To you and your Wisp both.”

<What?> My voice was inaudible to him.

“What?” Dani’s screech could be heard five floors away. “Oh, abyss no, you don’t get to walk in here and-”

My pleading voice cut off the incoming tirade, <Dani, he can really do whatever he wants to do. Let’s not irritate the man that can kill us more than once?>

“I hear that your Wisp remembers me.” The Master sighed deeply, running a hand through his hair. “Listen, the both of you. I have been experimenting with Dungeon Cores for a century, and I have never encountered one that could be considered actually intelligent. Every single one of them was nothing more than a bundle of instinctual hunger. I had no reason to believe that Wisps were any different. I had heard legends of Wisps and Cores and assumed that binding them together was what made the intelligence of a Core happen. I didn’t realize it was… more.”

He paused, either deep in thought or pretending very well. “Little Wisp, when I had captured you, I was shocked that you were able to speak aloud. By then though, I stayed the course despite my better judgement. I have now learned why. Xenocide’s power is far-reaching and insidious. I met him when I was but a child, and he gave me something that allowed me to attain great power. I now am able to break past his control but only because I finally recognized it for what it was. A seed of Madness.”

Dani didn’t answer, though she could hear him clearly. The Master started walking deeper into my dungeon. “I know you have no reason to listen to me, and you certainly have no reason to trust me, but I do need your help. There are a lot of people that are stranded in a field between fallen Kingdoms that have no way to send aid. I need you to come back and be the bridge that connects us together. We are likely all going to perish to Xenocide’s plans, but without you, this becomes a certainty.”

<What would you like me to do, Dani?> I knew what I wanted to do. I also knew what I should do, but Dani was pretty great about making me do the right thing.

“If I may offer an opinion?” One of the Human Attendants piped up, breaking the current mood. This was one of the ones who was planning on taking the slow but easy route to his growth. “Can we convert them…”

<That sounds pretty good. We get something out of it; they get to survive->

“…into corrupted ash?” the man finished his thought, my words only now penetrating his thick skull. I made a note immediately that this man was never to be given a position of power over another person. Or animal. Probably not crops, either. When there was no response; he slunk to the back of the group and pouted.

<Dani, do you want to step in here?> I watched as she trembled, multiple colors and emotions playing across her body.

She bobbed in the air, her version of a nod. “Fine, Mr. Master. We will consider helping you.”

“I do thank you.” He stepped out of nothing, appearing in the room with all of us. The collective butt clench could have created a diamond if there had been a Mage nearby that could harness the sudden pressure. “There are so many lives that we can save, and that is all I’ve ever been after.”

<You’ve been trying to save lives?> I waited for an answer for too long before I realized that he couldn’t hear me. <Will someone please translate for me?>

“Cal! The Master is coming to drag you back to the battlefield!” Minya burst through a portal that connected to the surface, the sudden shouting causing the already tense Goblins to react in certain ways. A few squeaked, a few got into battle positions, and one fainted. Huh.

<Got that, Minya.> I watched the look of horrified realization cross her face as she saw the man himself in front of her. <Actually, you have perfect timing. I needed a translator. Can you speak for me?>

Her incomprehensible squeak of terror answered that question easily. I was going to ask Dani to step in, but Minya rallied and straightened her spine. “I will speak for you, Great Spirit!”

<Oh, not this again!> I groaned as nervous chuckles rolled through the room. I looked over to see The Master looking around in shock. Were those tears in his eyes?

His hand moved fast enough that I was certain no one else noticed, and the droplets were gone. He swallowed deeply, nodding a few times. “I have missed laughter. Actual laughter, not the… maniacal cackling version. No one laughs around me anymore, and even with my abilities… hearing it always catches me by surprise. I have only greater respect for you, dungeon. If your people are comfortable laughing near you, you are doing something very right.”

<Ask him if I need to turn around,> I directed Minya. She repeated my words, and the Man nodded. With a twinge of dismay, I turned Mountaindale in a wide arc and began flying back the way we had come, albeit slower. No need to be wasteful or get there just for Xenocide to decide it was killin’ time. <Will you ask him if he has a plan? I’d really like for there to be a plan in place before we do anything. Having a plan is a good plan.>

“Calm down, Cal,” Dani whispered soothingly.

“Cal? So that is your name, dungeon?” The Master got nods from all around the room. “Interesting! I only met one other dungeon that had a name, and Kantor was a worthy foe.”

The absolute silence that followed his words caused the incredibly powerful man to shift with discomfort. “Once again, I would like to reiterate that I-”

“Was it you?” Dani whispered darkly. Her colors were icy blue, and she was pulsing like a poorly created Rune. “Were you the one that killed them?”

The Master looked down at the ground. “I can neither confirm… nor deny that statement. I pledged to never speak of it, and so I cannot deny it without breaking my word.”

For some reason, Dani calmed down when she heard his words. She pulled in a deep gust of air and spoke normally again, “I see. Thank you. Is there anything you can speak about? The bound Wisp?”

<Why are you so calm? He might have…> I tried parsing the conversation, but Humans were confusing. If I didn’t have Dani helping me out, I would almost certainly get in trouble pretty often.

“I cannot say.” He sadly shook his head. “Please, once more, forgive me for what I tried to do to you, for what I tried to do to both of you. I need to get back, and I will see you soon. We… can we talk?”

He stared at the air, and in an inexplicable way through the air. Without awaiting an answer, The Master stepped forward and into something, vanishing without a trace. I watched the spot where he had been trying to detect any differences in the Essence or Mana of the area. Nothing. How bizarre. I looked at all the uncomfortable faces in the room and directed my thoughts to only Dani and Minya.

<Did anyone else notice that he was bleeding? Why would he be bleeding?>

Chapter Fifty-one

Rose was having trouble with the loss of Adam. They all were, but she didn’t seem to understand his heroic sacrifice. “I don’t care what he said at the end, Dale! If he had just told us, we could have found another way!”

“Rose, you know how Adam-” Dale was forced to drift to the side, letting another arrow skim past his head. Dale decided that Rose had been getting considerably more violent.

“Don’t you tell me how Adam… Hans, what are you doing? Do not get any closer to me!” Hans was staring at Rose, his face a blank slate. He trod forward with heavy steps and used his daggers to deflect the arrows she sent at him. With a scream, she swung at him with her bow, only for him to gently use her momentum against her and leave her wide open. He stepped forward once more, sweeping her up in a tight hug.

Dale could see Rose struggle violently, but Hans turned his head slightly and whispered something in her ear that was too soft to be heard from this distance. The fight seemed to go out of her, and she collapsed onto him shaking with shirt-muted sobs.

Tom stood near Dale, nodding at the horizon. “The dungeon’s on its way. See that dot? Pretty sure that is it, but take a look for yourself.”

Dale nodded as well, turning away from his friends and peering at Xenocide. The man always seemed to lock eyes with him whenever Dale looked over, and it was creeping him out. The man waved from his perch in midair, causing Dale to shudder and look away for the umpteenth time. He looked up, seeing that night was falling and the moon was extraordinarily bright. It was still crossing the sky, so at least it wasn’t moving so fast that nature lost all of its patterns.

In fact, as the darkness around them deepened, the moon finished crossing the horizon and vanished from sight. The Runes that had been casting a nauseating light went dark in an instant and ceased their erratic spinning. Dale’s eyes lit up in opposition to the shadows, and a hushed whisper left his mouth, “A reprieve.”

“Brianna!” Dale shouted into the night, causing several battle-damaged people to scream in terror. The Dark Elf appeared beside him in moments, nodding at him.

“I noted the change as well. I’ll seek out the others and… this Master,” she spat the name, “and call for a meeting. We may have more time than we thought we had.”

“Thank you, Brianna.” Dale reached out for her as she turned to go. “Is… is it Queen Brianna now?”

Brianna smiled at him sadly. “None of your abyssal business.”

She vanished, leaving Dale looking at her previous location incredulously. “Aren’t I a Duke? I feel like this is something I should know. Is she my Queen now?”

He shook his head, fighting off the fatigue of the day. Hans and Rose were now sitting and talking, and Tom had two fresh-faced female clerics healing his ‘wounds’. Dale really hoped there weren’t more serious cases because they seemed fixated on repairing Tom’s torn and strained muscles. For some reason, they swore they needed to massage him to ‘heal’, but Dale just rolled his eyes and looked away. What was it about the mountain of a man that drew ladies to him like flies?

A commotion near the edge of camp drew his attention, and he drifted over to hear what was going on. Two men were shouting at each other, a necromancer and a Mage. The Mage was being the loudest. “What do you mean I can’t take this armor? I killed the thing wearing it, and it has excellent Runes of protection on it!”

“You can’t loot our undead!” the necromancer bellowed in return. “How many times have you threatened us now when we got close to the people we killed?”

“They were our friends!” the Mage snarled, eyes getting a bit too wild for comfort. “You touch them, and we’ll tear you apart!”

“These were our creatures! You think they equipped themselves? I paid through the nose to get that armor crafted. Boris was my main defender!” Black air was whipping around the necromancer’s hands, and it looked like they would come to blows over this issue if no one stopped them. Dale waited, but no one else stepped in. Everyone seemed ready to join in, but no one looked like they would stop the fighting from beginning. He strode forward to put an end to it but was knocked backward and off his feet as the Mage slapped the air like it was water and a shockwave erupted from him.

“Feces.” Dale twisted in the air and landed on his feet, looking over at a scene from earlier in the day. Undead were rushing to the conflict, and Mana was zipping through the air, charging it with power. People were bashing each other at full strength, but thus far, no one had been too injured.

“Are you all as insane as the man sitting up there and giggling at you?” Barry appeared over the battle and screamed at the people below him. “Enough of this, you are all mine.”

Green light coalesced in front of his mouth, and his eyes went blank. He breathed out, and a thick green mist coated everyone below him. Fear filled Dale; Barry hadn’t particularly cared about accuracy, and the wall of fog was rapidly approaching him. The Master appeared next to Barry and shoved a single finger into the crackling energy. Lines of black and silver raced over Barry’s technique, and the fog split and rushed back to him. Barry shuddered and fell to the ground gasping.

“I was gone for thirty minutes,” The Master snarled, his fury palpable and crashing over the assembled people. “You are telling me that you couldn’t even go for a full hour without trying to kill each other? I’m disappointed in my people. As for the rest of you, thank you for reinforcing our stereotypes against you the very first chance that you got.”

The necromancers recoiled like they had been whipped, but the Mages would have ignored The Master if it were possible. “Greed, avarice, fear of the unknown or something different. That is how you are seen by my people. I will change how all of you interact with each other, by force if needed. If you cannot change, you will not last long in this new world order.”

There was silence that lasted only until the two sides had retreated a few dozen feet from each other. Then they all began talking, grumbling, perhaps plotting. The Master shook his head and turned to leave. Dale took the opportunity to call out to him, “Excuse me! The Master!”

The Master appeared in front of him on the ground, seemingly just an average man in damaged robes. “Who are you and why should I care about what you have to say?”

“Yeah. This is just as intimidating as I expected it would be, thanks for that.” Dale swallowed and tried again. “So, The Master, I was-”

“Just call me ‘Master’ when you are talking to me.” The man rolled his eyes and motioned for Dale to continue.

“Right. Listen, I am the owner of the flying dungeon, at least legally with the Guild. That’s not the point of this, though!” Dale promised when The Master started to snarl. “I’m not asking for special treatment; I’m just trying to establish my credibility with you! Listen, I had a council of people that helped me choose the best path for increasing our abilities and that of the dungeon. The entire point of it was to see things that other people didn’t and try for the best outcome. I’m… I’m rambling, sorry. Listen, I want us to work together.”

“I’m not overly interested.” The Master started to turn but paused at Dale’s next words.

“My council consisted of the Dark Elf Princess Brianna, King Henry, Queen Marie, High Mageous Amber of the portal guild, and Madame Chandra,” Dale’s voice firmed. He didn’t include Tyler; there was no benefit to telling The Master things that wouldn’t matter to him. “Chandra has been trying to advocate for you, for peace, and for discussion ever since you reappeared in the world. Not only that but we, together, represent a large portion of the races’ leadership. Please, come with me and talk to them. We may be helpful, certainly more so than you seem to think we will be.”

The Master was considering; Dale could see it and so didn’t interrupt. The Master shifted on his feet and shrugged. “Why not? At worst, I might even be able to have a conversation with… an old friend.”

Dale and The Master walked together through the middle of the fortifications, drawing whispers and causing strange conversations to start. As they walked past a tight-knit group, a familiar face stepped forward. Thomas Adams, the man who had lost his Nobility, had a look of absolute glee on his face. “I should have known. Of course you were helping the necromancers; it all makes sense now!”

“Shut your mouth, or I’ll break your nose again and mess up your face bad enough that it’ll take a flesh Mage a month to fix it.” Dale’s aura shifted, and bright flames dripped from his fingers.

Thomas smirked and bowed sarcastically, stepping back into his group. “Yes, overlord.”

Dale and The Master walked on, but now Dale was fuming. “I hate rumors. I do. Why are people morons, though? The planet won’t survive the moon smashing into it! Why can’t we fix the issues we are having before playing these games?”

A small smile played over The Master’s lips. “It is interesting to hear my words spoken by someone entirely different from my own people.”

They walked in silence for a few more feet, but then The Master asked a question that nearly made Dale fall over, “So you and the dungeon share a soul. How did that happen?”

Chapter Fifty-two

Dale’s head was spinning. “How in the world do you know that? I swear if you say ‘you just told me’, I’m going to be so mad.”

“Dale. Dale, right? I’m not great with names. You’d think with a perfect memory…” He trailed off, noticing Dale’s stare. “Souls are kind of my thing, aren’t they? I can see at a glance that not only are your souls linked, they are actually the same.”

“You aren’t a necromancer, though; how do you see souls?” Dale countered, getting a rush of pleasure from the shock on The Master’s face.

“How do you know that?”

“You just told-”

The Master cut him off impatiently, “None of that; I didn’t do it to you. This is actually important.”

Dale stammered out a reply, “Um. Madame Chandra has told us that several times.”

“So she knew. I had hoped, but this entire time, she knew it wasn’t me who…” The Master stopped talking, but if Dale wasn’t terrified of the man he would have shaken the rest of the sentence out of him. “To think… all this time I was afraid she would despise me. Perhaps we could even…”

“Dale? What are you doing with him? If we needed him, I would have found him.” Princess Brianna was looking up from a table that had apparently been grown in that spot, and she did not look happy. At least it hadn’t been The Master’s fault that her mother had been slain to power the Runes floating in the sky. That would have made this conversation extra awkward.

“We are here to discuss what we need to do to combat Xenocide,” Dale firmly stated, meeting her eyes. “The Master is by far the most powerful person that will be joining us in this venture, so he needs to be informed of the plan as well as be a part of it.”

“The Master,” Chandra greeted the man cordially, if a bit coldly. Dale swore that there was a hint of pain in The Master’s eyes for a moment, but any personal feelings were swiftly hidden behind his standard stoic facade.

“Madame. It is good to hear that you achieved your childhood desire.” The Master spoke politely, but his words caused her face to twist in a strange series of emotions: sadness, anger, pain… longing?

“And you, yours. I am happy for you but not for the world. Your dreams were built upon the death of thousands.” Chandra stared at him, and he shrugged.

“What can I say? I am a product of my environment.” His flippant answer almost brought tears to her eyes, and she turned her head to look away. Dale really, really wished he knew what was going on. He also knew that asking right now would only gain him silence, possibly anger if they were both hurting like he thought they were.

Dale decided that the best course of action was to move on quickly and try to pry the story out of them if they all survived. “I’m very sorry to interrupt, but there may be a moon crashing into us in the near future… I’d like to stop that from happening.”

“Fine.” The Master tore his eyes off of Chandra and focused on Dale.

“Fine.” Madame Chandra did the same.

Ahem. Dale cleared his throat as arguably the most powerful people in the world turned their full attention on him. His full council, The Master, and Barry were now around the table, staring at him with various levels of amusement or animosity. “Before anything else, we need to discuss what we know. One: Xenocide has set in motion a plan to crash the moon into the planet.”

“Hello!” a voice drifted down to them. Brianna closed her eyes in annoyance and inhaled sharply, but Dale ignored Xenocide and continued.

“Two: we would like to stop this from happening. Three: this Runescript is powered by the death of over a dozen S-ranked people. Can either of you shed some light on what that means for us?” Dale looked at Barry and The Master, who shrugged.

“Entering the S-ranks means becoming more,” Barry stated abruptly, catching Dale off guard. He hadn’t exactly been forthcoming in the past. More… murder hobo? “It is the final act of understanding the law that you have bound yourself to. It is becoming an incarnation of that law. This is different for each person, so attempting to tell you how best to disperse their combined power? Laughable.”

“I hate to agree with the walking stomach, but he is correct,” The Master grudgingly stated. “For those Runes to have absorbed all of the variations… it must be powerful beyond compare. The dungeon literally dropped a mountain on it from near-orbit, and it made a hairline crack. I had thought I was about to die, or I would have stopped the dungeon myself. Releasing that much concentrated power into the area would have devastated the entire continent.”

“Wait, I saw that! You stopped Xenocide from moving to block Mountaindale? Does that mean you were fine with all of us dying?” Brianna’s voice was filled with horror at how close their demise had brushed by them.

“I thought I was going. I planned to take him with me.” The Master spoke without a trace of regret. “At least there would have been survivors. Somewhere. Most likely.”

No one had an answer to that, so Dale, once again, had to get the conversation moving. “What were we at? Third? So, third-”

“Fourth,” Tyler interjected, squirming as soon as eyes landed on him. “Um, we were at number four.”

“A mortal?” Barry looked at Tyler with twitching eyebrows. “How are you here and alive?”

“I, um, sir, I came down to hand out supplies and specialty weapons. I have a weapons shop that-”

Tyler was cut off as Dale continued, “So fourth in our list, we know that the Runes above us seem to power down when the moon is hidden by the curvature of the earth.” Dale resolutely ignored the looks he was getting from the others. “What we need to do is find a way to stop those Runes from working, stop the moon from crashing into us, and find a way to survive Xenocide through all of this.”

“That sounds difficult!” Xenocide chimed in from hundreds of feet above them. “However will we make it happen?”

“That is actually a good question, but we need him not to hear us.” Dale sighed as Xenocide chuckled.

“I can do that.” The Master looked around, gauging the distance around them, and grunted. Something odd happened to the air, and all sound from outside of their group was cut off. All the light vanished as well, though Dale’s sunlight aura fixed that easily. “We are not technically in a different plane of existence, but we are cut off from outside influences here. We have about thirty minutes of air, less if anyone panics.”

He looked pointedly at Tyler, who did his best to regulate his air intake. Dale looked around at all of the people, getting ready for the inevitable arguments. “So what does everyone think we should do?”

“We can’t beat Xenocide, and we can’t outright destroy the Runes.” Madame Chandra tapped her chin as she thought out loud. “I guess that leaves-”

“Blowing up the moon!” Barry finished her sentence with his own thoughts.

“Idiot,” Chandra spat out. “How did you ever reach the rank you have attained? I was going to say compromising with Xenocide to stop this from happening. Not everything needs to be about killing. Perhaps there is something he wants.”

“How likely is it that he is actually going to go through with this? He is going to die too if the planet is destroyed!” Brianna growled with a tired voice. “He would have to be-”

“Insane?” The Master finished for her with an arched eyebrow. “I think that has been established. If this is how he plans to reach into the Heavenly rankings, nothing we will ever do will be enough to stop him. No, what we need is a way to get rid of those Runes. They are working to bind the moon, but I don’t think that the earth is being pulled as well or there would be other things happening to us. Could we get the Runes off this planet? Have the moon dragged elsewhere? For celestial’s sake, just bury them! If the curvature of the earth is enough, put them in a pit and cover them up!”

Silence greeted this suggestion, and it was the only option that sounded viable. Destruction was impossible without mutually assuring their own demise, and negotiation was also out. Redirection… that might be possible. Dale looked over at High Mageous Amber. “This is your area of expertise. Is it possible?”

“Putting them in a pit? No. There is a difference between a layer of dirt and the entire planet being between them. The other option? Getting rid of them? It depends on the amount of time we have to make this happen. If we are talking days… it is unlikely. If we have weeks and a way to generate the Runes and resources needed, then maybe. If it were as simple as waving a hand… humph. Xenocide must have spent decades putting all of this together. The Runes were fueled with S-rank power to function, yes, but his setup cost over a hundred thousand bodies and their blood, not to mention the Essence and Mana they had accrued. Ritual magic is poorly understood, but it is powerful.” Amber shook her head and fell silent.

“The dungeon is our answer to all of this.” Dale’s eyes were wide, and pieces were starting to fit together. “It can create perfect Runes, it can generate materials, and it uses rituals for various things. I’ve seen it. Rituals are just well-connected and timed Runescript after all, aren’t they?”

“If you want to use the most generalized thoughts on the subject, how you would explain it to a child, then yes, that is what rituals are.” The Master smirked at Dale’s eye roll. “No one has dared to scoff at me in a decade or more. It’s… I forget if I dislike it. I think you have a point. We need to bring this to the dungeon. If it will work with us… we may be able to make this work. We might all survive.”

“I’ll ensure that ritual magic is taboo after this,” Barry quietly muttered. “The only use it has is to destroy, and the cost is too high. It is an unsustainable magic, tricks for people who don’t have personal power. A joke.”

“A joke that could kill us all, Barry.” Chandra’s voice was a whiplash. “The Master, can you return us to our previous location on the dungeon so that we can get this project moving?”

The Master nodded solemnly. Sound and light washed over them a moment later. A necromancer ran over, braving the hostile looks from the people he passed. “Master! Something is happening to the undead! We can’t prove who is doing this to our summons, but somehow, someone here is severing our link to them.”

The Master looked over the assembled people coldly. “Right now, this doesn’t matter. Bring everyone here. Everyone. We are going to the dungeon.”

Chapter Fifty-three

I was maintaining a five kilometer minimum distance from Xenocide. I knew it wouldn’t help if I upset him or he decided to destroy me, but I was taking an ‘out of sight, out of mind’ approach. I was trying to, at least, but every time we looked at the projection, he would look at me, and our gazes would lock. He would always wave, too. No idea how he knew when or knew where I was watching from. Even my vision was passive light collection; I wasn’t sending anything back out!

<This guy is the ultimate creepy creep.> It was time to distract myself. <Dani, how are we doing on Essence and Mana collection? Should I be focusing my abilities elsewhere or just continuing to dump it into my foundation?>

“One moment, Cal.” Dani’s distracted voice told me that she was trying to stop Grace from doing something. Her next words confirmed that. “Grace somehow lit this thing on fire, and I can’t put it out. Not only that, but it keeps… I’d almost say dodging?”

<What?> I took a look, and sure enough, there was a ball of fire on the ground one floor up. Dani sprayed water at it, and it rolled wildly to the side. <What was she doing up there?>

“She was playing with the Golems, and one of them broke.” Dani growled as the fireball hopped away. “She started playing with the broken chunks, and…”

<Hold on, Dani. Stop trying to kill that.> I was watching the fireball hop around and got more and more excited. <This is it! This is what I’ve been trying to figure out!>

“What are you talking about, Cal?” Dani was trying to kill the fireball by staring at it, I could just tell. She didn’t like Grace playing with ‘dangerous’ materials. I decided not to tell her about the lightning room I had built to train Grace’s dodging abilities.

<I have been trying to decide where to go after Golems weren’t cutting it anymore. Look at that fireball, Dani! It is a Core surrounded by pure Scarletite! The mineral that has the highest fire corruption potential!> I waited for a response, but I’d have been there all day if I’d have waited for a comment. None was forthcoming. <Ugh, Dani! I’ve been making them into humanoid creatures, but why? Because that’s what I was used to! This one is tiny and weak, but if I do it like this…>

I pulled a Core filled with water corruption and Mana over and wrapped it in Gallium, then modeled the pattern of Mana release from the tiny fireball. <Boom. Water elemental.>

There was no reaction. I mentally prodded the double-fist sized item and waited a second longer. <Hmmm.>

“I have an idea.” Dani directed the water she had been using, spraying the mineral-wrapped Core. Instead of spraying everywhere, the water hit and collected on the surface. Soon, there was a massive blob of water twisting and turning. It looked around, at least I assume, before spotting the tiny fireball and chasing it. I wanted to see what would happen, so I let the blob catch the fireball. The fire persisted but was quickly growing dim. The water in that spot began boiling, but then the fire Core cracked, and Mana spilled into the water. Steam started pouring off the blob, but it neither dissipated nor was reabsorbed. A quick check told me that the elemental had eaten the Core and used the material it was wrapped in to upgrade itself.

<I may be in love with this creature,> I told Dani, who mimicked an eye and rolled around.

“I don’t know; it reminds me of a basic slime.” Dani critically inspected the blob of steamy water.

<No way, major differences.> I looked at the blob lovingly. <I’m going to name you Bath. I bet you are just the perfect temperature, aren’t you?>

There was no response, which was exactly as expected. Perfect. If it had somehow talked, I might have screamed and tried to figure out what was going on. Water wasn’t supposed to speak. Of course, who was I to get upset about typically inanimate objects talking. <Okie-dokie, time for the next test!>

I built up a Core with various Mana types and tried to match the minerals to it. I used all sorts of material, but… nothing I did worked to make a higher form of elemental. I couldn’t even replicate Bath! I even destroyed him and absorbed him, but… there was nothing that should have allowed him to be animated like he was. There must be some property of corruption that allowed it to function as it did, but it was energy. Energy was supposed to only be a tool, not a deciding factor in animation. There was only one thing to do.

<I’m gonna make a new floor!> I shouted to the beings in my dungeon. There were whoops and cheers, but most of it was a cheerleading attempt. They all knew they would likely not be visiting this new floor. I had previously been working on carving out a space and infusing it with my influence, but I had given up on actually putting anything down there for a long while. This war and my forcible inclusion in it had eaten my attention for far too long. It was time to be a dungeon again, and I had missed my experimentation.

So, a massive empty room that needed creatures. Creatures that needed to eat others of their kind to increase in power and complexity. This should be fun. I thought about making the room become filled with rings to battle through, but I decided to try something else that would be interesting and potentially deadly. The walls moved at my direction and closed in around the room until there was a huge conical shape created from the stone. The rim, the highest portion of the room, would be the start. The tip of the cone would be at the bottom. Was it a waste of space? Maybe, but it was only a few hundred feet deep.

My real concern was people flying. I needed a way around that, and I decided that I had figured it out. <Dani! Want to come see something neat?>

“What are you up to, Cal? You’ve been quiet for a while now.” Dani flew to where I directed her, Grace tagging along and bounding through the stone to create oddly flowing patterns in the rock. It was cute, so I left her art wherever she made it.

<So I had an idea for a new floor…> I trailed off, letting her mind play a few tricks on her. When she was sufficiently twitchy, I continued, <And I’d like your feedback before I continue.>

“Oh, thank goodness.” She breathed a sigh of relief while I chuckled. “What are you thinking?”

<I have this as the base model,> I let her look over the cone, <and was wondering how I should grant access to it? I want the exit, portal, and tree all down there, but hidden in a side room. I am going to chain gravity Runes together so that the strength of them increases the further down you go. What do you think?>

“That sounds neat. I’m guessing the Runes are to mess with flying people?” I confirmed her guess, and she thought for a moment while Grace played around. “We could… Grace!”

The tiny wisp had made a corkscrew spike grow from the ground and giggled when she heard her name called. Dani paused and looked at the spiral. “Well, there we go. How about a ramp that spirals around the entire thing? Take it from a cone to a screw. Two ramps. Start them at opposite ends and meet at the bottom. How does that sound?”

<Sounds like a plan!> I shifted the stone and began to carefully draw out the gravity Runescript. It took a few hours to get done, and when I finished, I had Bobs start going over it to double check my work. While they did that, I started making elementals. It was as fun to me as feces are to a monkey. I could direct the ones I made in terms of movement and attacking, so it was exciting and frustrating that I couldn’t direct their growth.

Another interesting fact to me was that the elementals could only be earth, wind, water, or fire based. How do you give celestial or infernal to an elemental? I created the elemental cores for them anyway, assuming correctly that the basic types would eat them to expand themselves. Neat. I made swarms of elementals and forced them to wait to do anything. There were various sizes of each of them so that the… beasts? Creatures? Entities? There we go. So that the entities could change in large or subtle ways as they fought. I’m sure that the celestial and infernal Cores would be useful for growth as well.

After the final Bob had given the Runes their seal of approval, it was nearly morning. I was getting much faster at this sort of thing! When the Bobs had left, and the Silverwood tree and I were safely hidden at the bottom of the cone, I released the reins on the elementals. It. Was. Awesome. I had kept all the types separated, and most of them ignored their own kind unless they were twenty percent smaller than themselves. Then they would latch on and absorb the smaller entity. The edges of the groups began to blur as elemental combat erupted. A water elemental went over the edge, not on a ramp, and began falling.

When it reached the bottom of the slope, it was so compressed that it was basically a superfluid. The Core of it stopped rolling and shattered, spraying water and Mana everywhere. I was so glad that I had thought to reinforce this area to an extreme. It was basically a panic room that even A rank-seven Mages would have trouble destroying in a single hit. They could do it, but they would need to put extra effort into it. I highly doubted they would bother.

The battle kept raging, and some of the elementals began moving down the ramps. Upon doing so, their bodies would become somewhat more compressed. This gave them an advantage over the non-compressed versions, and they quickly defeated and ate their closest rivals. If they progressed too quickly, they would break under the pressure and be scooped up by the others or their power would return to me. By the time one of them reached the base of the cone, they would be incredibly powerful.

If I could have purred in pleasure, I totally would have done so. I tried to make a similar sound, but only got an odd look from Dani. I ignored it; I was happy. So what if I’m a little strange? You have to be a little odd to be number one.

Chapter Fifty-four

Daylight started to touch my surface which always made me a little ticklish. Or something similar, I suppose. How could I be tickled? It seemed fun…? An issue for another time. I saw the light flare from Xenocide’s Runescript as the moon breached the horizon once more. What incredible power those Runes contained. I simply had nothing that I could compare it to. A miniature version of the sun? It didn’t give off heat or light, so no, but something about that comparison tickled my mind.

Speaking of power, my ley lines had never stopped expanding, even if they had only moved downward fractions of an inch. That was over the entirety of the planet, so it was still pretty impressive. Whatever power not used by me directly or for my purposes was directed back into expanding the lines. Loose Essence continued to flood into me, but I was also starting to notice the lack of Mana storms in the area. From all the power thrown around yesterday, I would have absolutely expected the world to attempt to purge it from the atmosphere in the form of a Mana storm. That it hadn’t… I was pleased.

This was the first direct confirmation I had gained that my ley lines were ironing out the overly concentrated areas of power in the world. Now, I wasn’t absorbing all of it, but as one area of high power concentration was removed, it would stop leaking power into the surroundings. When areas with low concentrations were drained, energy would flood in from a more highly concentrated area. I had several Bobs working to take samples of the power density, and they were making a second map to set over the first.

They called it a ‘power overlay’. Pretty basic, but easy to understand. Now, the hope was that we could increase draw on ley lines in the areas with the highest concentrations. Doing so could only be beneficial, at least to us. It was likely that powerful monsters would not appreciate their lairs weakening, but that was someone else’s problem or, at least, an issue for the future. Oh! I should extend my influence to the base of my mountain so that I can crush things and absorb their pattern! That would be my next goal after fine-tuning my elemental cone.

I was getting the warm and fuzzies from watching the rapid evolution of my new elementals. I felt like a real dungeon again and not just a ride or cash-cow for the powerful. How long had it been since I made a new monster? Made a new Rune? I had all the Runes the Spotters publicly knew about, but what had I done to seek out or create new ones? I was in a creative tizzy, and I felt like I was myself again after weeks of stress and uncertainty. Do you know what happens when you overstress a Core? Boom! I’m glad I avoided that.

The strongest of the elementals had reached the halfway point of the cone and had undergone significant changes. No longer were they blobs of basic elements. As the pressure had increased, they had been forced to branch out from their weak forms. Limbs were made, appendages, whip-like tentacles, but still no heads or other sensory organs. Why would they need them? The one I was rooting for had started out as a giant fireball and focused mainly on attacking and eating earth and infernal types. It must have killed a spider or something because, otherwise, I had no idea how it decided to make similar limbs.

It was now an infernal magma elemental and had twelve legs. It looked like a darkly glowing ball of molten stone, and it was interesting to watch. When it walked, it raised the front and back two legs - so four legs total - and used them as piercing weapons. It never had to turn: it only needed to use different legs. This gave it amazing mobility, even though I had originally thought it would be a weakness to need to change which legs you were using. What would I know about leg usage though? I called it Aranea infernum or Aranea for short. What can I say? I’m a very literal Core.

This elemental was directly across from one that I had been subtly guiding to be its opposite. This one was Bath version two: Imbrem Aureum. Strange name, but very fitting. It had started as a massive water elemental and had been eating air and celestial types like Dale ate jerky. Too fast for their own good is what I mean. Soon, water was no longer dominating, and it had turned into a Core with celestial-infused raindrops swirling around it at high speed. I was really interested to see what would happen if these two ever met and fought. Would the outcome be a chaotic lightning superfluid elemental? Want. I want it bad.

Unfortunately, their progress had stagnated. They couldn’t continue downward for fear of the pressure crushing them, and they couldn’t move upward without being overwhelmed by swarms of their brethren. They had to hold their ground and destroy challengers that came after them. I had started dropping caches of Cores along the path that matched their current progress, just so that they could continue to progress. I thought of it as a leader bonus. Everything else had to destroy to empower themselves, but the leader needed incentive to stay ahead of the rest. I loved it. Survival of the strangest! Imbrem closed in on a challenger, and the spinning droplets shredded its opponent in moments. Those drops… whew. They had the force of B-rank four Mana behind them.

Speaking of ranks, I could feel my path opening before me. I was sitting at B-rank nine right now, trying to find the key to unlocking the A-ranks. I was certain it would be an esoteric truth, an understanding of myself and my law that would drive me forward into great power. If it was something obvious, I would almost feel cheated. I wouldn’t mind, but I wanted to rise in the ranks in an awe-inspiring way, not quietly and surreptitiously. I wanted to hear the humans say: ‘Celestial feces, we should run.’ or something similar.

I just had to think of humans again, didn’t I? Almost as soon as I had, I felt footsteps on my surface. It was like a summoning spell. What the…? How many were arriving? I took a look; it appeared that the entire army of mixed races had flown here. Ew, necromancers. So many of them, too. I had gotten over my hatred of them, but having them around made me nervous. The Church tended to be less than careful when exterminating the ‘heretics’, and I had heard stories of entire cities falling. Of course, most of the Church’s most powerful had been slain…

“Go oversee the arrival of the new leaders of each race.” The Master’s voice made dozens of people start toward the portal, obviously thinking he was talking to them directly. It just had that kind of quality. I saw his lips twitch in either a grimace or laughter as the people tried to figure out who was supposed to be in charge. His next mutter was too soft to be heard, “Like herding cats.”

I could appreciate that sentiment. I was still trying to get some of my Cats to give up the special weapons and armor I had equipped them in, and I could supposedly force them to do it. Somehow, I kept finding one more Cat playing with the shiny superweapons. Dale landed with a group and walked toward The Master with Tom in tow. I also noticed that Hans and Rose were walking toward the tavern together. What had happened down there? She must have taken a blow to the head.

Dale was looking around, seemingly surprised by the lack of motion on my surface. “I guess everyone left through the portal to wait out the war?”

Wrong. The smart or lucky ones did. I wasn’t going to be the one to break it to him, though. As they got closer to The Master, Tom stepped forward, glaring at the powerful man. “Can I hit you?”

“What?” The Master seemed taken aback by this question.

Tom started pulling his warhammer out of his bag. “One of my friends died down there to prevent your summoned creature killing all of us. I would like a free hit.”

“Ah. A Northman. I understand and will allow this in thanks for the time your people saved me from the Valkyries.” The Master nodded, pulling open his tattered robe and baring his chest. “This will end things between us?”

“As is custom,” Tom ruefully agreed. “Hans! Rose! Come over here before you do other things.”

The two that had been walking toward what they didn’t realize was an empty building stopped, looking over and slowly approached. Their walk became even slower when they saw who was standing shirtless in front of them. Tom looked at the Master, swallowing. “I understand that this will not actually hurt you, but please do not hold yourself in place.”

“I will take the blow,” The Master stated noncommittally. Tom nodded, knowing that he was getting a chance he would never have otherwise. A crowd was starting to gather, but Tom wasn’t going to wait. Taking a few deep breaths, he enhanced his body to the absolute maximum he was able, got a running start that would make him into a blur in front of an average person, and swung his hammer with all the force he could possibly put behind it. Clang. The Master was hit in the chest, and though the warhammer bent and warped from the force, there was no visible damage to The Master.

He did allow the force to turn into momentum and was launched off the ground and upward several hundred meters. He slammed through a granite building, reducing the wall to rubble and a cloud of dust. As the people watched the dust mushroom into the air, The Master spoke from beside Tom. “Let this matter between us be settled. My mistakes will haunt me forever, but you have proven that my scars must remain mental.”

Tom nodded deeply. “I have proven that the strength of my arm cannot match the depth of my loss and so lose my claim against you. May we move forward in peace and prosper as we go our separate ways.” They each made a fist and tapped their forearms against the other person’s, creating an ‘X’ in the air. They stepped back, and Tom turned and strode toward Hans without another word.

The Master watched him go for a moment before turning to talk to Dale. “I spent quite some time learning from the Northmen. They are a brutal people, but their honor and traditions are the purest I have ever witnessed. If I had been able to have my way, I would have never left them. I would have adopted all of their ways and lived as they do. So… so many things I wish had gone differently.”

“Why did you need to leave them?” Dale asked the question before he could stop himself.

The Master looked over, hesitating before answering, “Their prince was assassinated, and his new bride was destroyed because of it. A faction of the Northmen used the chance to purge outsiders from amongst them, becoming even more insular than they already were. I… I was an outsider. Exile or death, those were my options. I had just started making a life there, and it crushed me to leave it behind. I left, and from there found a group of other exiles. That path led to the first great necromantic war, our desperate bid to gain a home.”

“You are not at all what I expected.” Dale reached out his hand and carefully set it on The Master’s shoulder. He was glad the man had already put his robe back on. “You sound like… just a normal guy looking to find his way. I’d love to know what happened.”

The Master snorted so hard that the air around him thrummed. “Would you believe me if I told you I was once one of the lowest in the Queendom and my greatest aspiration was to be a journeyman butcher? I was given an apprenticeship as a Butcher Boy, and… well, it is not only my story to tell. As you know Madame Chandra, it would not be fair for me to discuss her family without her permission.”

Dale wanted to shake the story out of him, but he really liked having his arms attached to his body. “I know how that goes. I was a failing shepherd when I stumbled across a dungeon on my mountain.”

“Ah yes, is that where this happened?” The Master waved his hand at Dale’s body. “I had thought that this dungeon was the product of my attempt to create a dungeon over a decade ago, but the soul involved is too different for it to be one of mine. What do you know of that?”

Dale was quiet while he decided how much to say. “Depending on how you look at it, this dungeon was created either well over a decade ago or just a month or so. When we attacked the Tigress Queendom to regain the dungeon’s Wisp, the necromancers tried to escape through a portal. Most made it, but as the final few were escaping, the portal was impacted by chaos. I… somehow… the portal connected through time, and I was sacrificed to create this dungeon. The current-day dungeon had been holding open the portal and took my memories back into itself. We share a soul because I was killed to create the dungeon, and Cal remade my body to rid itself of its newfound human morals.”

“That… that is the most incredible thing I have ever heard in over five hundred years of life,” The Master said after he had fully processed everything Dale was saying. “Is this common knowledge?”

“It wasn’t, but I have no doubt that it is about to be.” Dale looked around and noted how many eyes shifted away swiftly. “Ugh.”

Chapter Fifty-five

“Dungeon!” The Master spoke aloud, trying to get my attention without shouting. “Cal, we have need of your assistance.”

<Dale, would you please tell the scary man that I am busy doing dungeon things? If he’s going to threaten me like Barry did… I’m not sure what I’ll do, but I might just slam this whole place into the ground and see what happens.> I had already agreed to play ‘horsey’ for all these people again; if they tried to make me do stuff I didn’t want to, I might seriously start smashing things.

“Whoa, easy, Cal.” Dale at least sounded concerned about this; he must be able to tell that I was serious. “We are here to ask a favor. We aren’t here to attack you or anything like that, right, Master?”

“Of course not.” The Master seemed upset by the tone of the conversation. “I’m guessing the Guild was telling him they were going to cause damage? Maybe they gave a show of force? Morons. That is just asking for trouble. If someone doesn’t want to work for you, there will always be ways they can hurt you. Dun- that is, Cal, we would like your help in stopping Xenocide. We need to find a way to dismantle those Runes or possibly send them away.”

I waited a moment so that Dale would panic a little. That never got old. <So… what do I get out of this?>

“Well, the planet might be destroyed, so you get a place to live,” Dale shot right back.

<Pretty sure I’ll be fine either way, Dale. I’ll go to the other side of the planet and hang out in the ocean. After the planet breaks up, I’ll work on eating all of it. The amount of power generated would likely make me more powerful in moments than I can imagine.> I didn’t really think that, but it was a good back up plan. Dale didn’t need to know that tidbit.

Dale pulled a face, and The Master correctly guessed the reason for it. “Cal, just a hint of what this might entail. We are going to be attempting to send those Runes off our planet, to draw the moon away from our world. We would be pooling all of our most rare resources and esoteric knowledge to make this happen. I have forbidden Runes, dark knowledge that humanity was forbidden from ever learning for hundreds of years. Would you like to be a part of this venture, or should we do it ourselves… somewhere else?”

Water was pouring off of the ceiling near them, a visceral reaction that I stopped as soon as I noticed it. I don’t think I had ever drooled before. <Please let the very nice gentleman know that I would be happy to assist. Also, let him know that if I were in the A-ranks, I would be able to be far more helpful.>

“What do you mean by that?” Dale looked around, trying to find a hint of my advancement. “How high have you reached in the last few days? …Are you the reason there was no Mana storm? Did you go and absorb all of it?”

<In a way,> I responded evasively. <I got to B-rank nine, but that isn’t super important. Please go ahead and tell this guy what’s going on. He’s looking impatient.>

That snapped Dale back to reality. He repeated my words to The Master, who nodded. “Excellent. I’m happy to learn of your progression; it will be more helpful than you know. Hmm.”

He rubbed at his chin, then looked around. “B-rank nine… I remember it well. This rank is a difficult one to break through, and even when you do, it may not be apparent right away. The others all seem to have clearly delineated objectives, such as gaining a spiral, reaching a certain amount of power, forming an aura and empowering it, or gaining Mana. The A-ranks is all internal, within your mind and soul, and begins with the laying of your foundation. Only when you have gained a certain amount of solidity, when your foundation is settled, do you reach the A-ranks. In fact, perhaps it is simpler than I think, and I can tell you the key to the A-ranks right now. Being able to manifest your law and combine a portion of your foundation into it.”

“In fact, perhaps that is it. When you can store an item in your world, you will need to have settled your foundation. That seems to be the minimum requirement for anyone I have ever met in the A-ranks. Of course, you won’t be storing a living thing. You would need to create a soul-key for that, which requires that you sacrifice a portion of your soul. While people do it… they are typically beast tamers or some such. It is very dangerous and wasteful in the extreme if done without a purpose. Also, most people’s foundation simply cannot handle the inclusion of external life. Their souls would fight each other. Now, the benefits for those who can properly utilize…” The Master looked at the stunned people around him and smiled. “I always wanted to teach.”

“You know, we have been looking for an instructor in the infernal wing of our academy,” Dale stated hopefully, getting only a short laugh in reply. It had been worth a shot.

A young man cautiously approached the group. He bowed several times as all eyes in the cavernous room turned to rest upon him. “I am so sorry to bother you, but I was tasked with coming here and informing you that the Dwarves have arrived. The… um… their leader. King, I think? I-”

“We understand,” Madame Chandra jumped in to rescue the youngster from his babbling. “Thank you; you can leave.”

The boy bowed once more and ran away, obviously terrified of the ominous ‘Master’. Brianna stepped through the shadows and stopped next to Dale. “I suppose we should get moving then. Dwarven metallurgy and their talent with shaping the earth will be paramount to this project. Cal might be able to replicate it or even do a better job with the initial creation, but there is no one more versed in altering metal.”

“There was an actual reason to call the races together, then?” Dale looked askance at the Dark Elf. “I really thought that it would just end up being a power play.”

“It will,” the Elf responded pessimistically. “There is no other choice than for him to demonstrate his power. There will be someone, some insignificant speck that won’t listen to reason, who won’t see this as the end of the world but as a chance to add some gold to the pile. So The Master will obliterate them to show the rest how easy it was for him to do so. There will be no uprisings after that. No. If Xenocide doesn’t want to do it, The Master will rule the world by the end of the day.”

Silence followed her grim proclamation, even The Master unsure of how to respond. Madame Chandra let out a harsh bark of laughter and glanced at him. “Just like you always talked about when we were kids, huh? This whole event has sped all your plans up, didn’t it?”

“I wanted to do it through diplomacy, through words and deeds that sway the hearts of the people. You know better than anyone that I would have never chosen this path!” The Master angrily turned her words against her.

Dale joined into the conversation when it was obvious that no one else would, “Can we just go meet with them and start working on a plan? There is the possibility that they will understand the gravity of this situation, isn’t there? That we will be able to point at Xenocide and get them to understand that fighting is futile?”

“All we can do is try,” Tyler chimed in, having caught up to the group just as Brianna had turned glum. He wilted under the gazes sent his way and busied himself with a roll of vellum that he had brought with him.

“Dale.” Chandra reached out and brushed some dust off his arm, “I don’t think that you should attend the upcoming meeting. I know that it is a weakness of the powerful to see lower ranks as lesser, but the fact remains that you will hurt our chances of resolving this peacefully by your mere presence.”

Narrowing his eyes at her, Dale folded his arms to cover the fact that his hands were balling into fists. “You aren’t joking, are you? Madame, I have been the one who-”

Brianna impatiently stopped his speech, “No one is doubting your contribution or intellect, Dale. Those of us who know you understand, but for now, just shut your mouth and find something else to do for a while. Take this order from your new Queen, please and thank you.”

Dale looked at her somberly. “I’m… I’m sorry for your loss, Brianna. Long live the Queen?” Still, he took a breath to argue his point. Brianna flicked him in the forehead, sending him spiraling into unconsciousness against Tyler, who needed to scramble to keep him from falling on his face.

“Brat,” she murmured affectionately. “You need to learn to follow before you can lead, my Duke. Let’s get moving.”

The powerful members of the council vanished in a whirlwind of displaced air, leaving Tyler holding Dale’s limp body. Tyler started dragging him toward the entrance, moving faster and beginning to sweat when he saw a few curious Bashers approaching them.

Chapter Fifty-six

<A good, old-fashioned power grind,> I told Dani with satisfaction as I looked back over the progress of my foundation. I was extra happy with my choices to this point; the fact that I had been creating air instead of earth allowed me to shift around what I wanted to see in my inner world. Why did I need to create a copy of the world I lived in? Because it was easy? That wasn’t my usual process!

I projected an image of what I saw to Dani and started detailing my thoughts, <I was thinking of splitting the world like this. I’ll create seven very different sections and arrange them to be free-floating under my control. That way, I can make wild variations of climate, resources, and training zones. A dungeon literally within a dungeon!>

I paused and waited to see what Dani’s reaction would be. She pondered long enough that I was concerned about her final decision. “I like it, but you are missing a lot of details. What about the oceans that you will likely need to bring along with you? What if you make six landmasses, then another area that is ocean? You can freeze portions of it, boil others, and then you can always use it as a source of easy water if you need to instead of creating it fresh every time.”

<Great idea, Dani!> I combined a floating landmass with one of the others, then had to split it up when it was so much larger than the rest of them. Once it was nice and even, I created an image of a planet’s worth of ocean and lake water. I covered the plane in a layer of ice and made massive rivers of water that reached out to each of the other planes of my inner world. Now it looked like there were six continents orbiting a colossal sphere, connected by rushing waters. For fun, I also found a way to connect huge sheets of ice between the planes. I could freeze or melt them on a whim and laughed as I realized that I had accidentally decided to model my world almost exactly after the mythology of a city I had passed a long time ago. I wonder why I had never seen anything from those people again?

As a salute to their influence on my construction, I decided to name my new sketches of areas. The connective water would be a ‘bifrost bridge’, as it had two states: frost or steam. If I could replicate this in the real world or even do it in my inner world, I would have a lot of fun. Right now, I was only playing with my mental projection, but it felt right somehow. By my naming scheme, would that make my ice and water world ‘Hel’? Sure, why not. I could then— Oof. I felt like I had been punched directly and quickly needed to turn my eyes inward. What I saw was… not shocking but still very interesting.

My foundation was splitting, following the patterns I had designated in my mental projection. It wasn’t perfectly smooth, and I needed to intervene multiple times, or there would have been some catastrophic collisions, but my mental vision was soon realized within my soul. It was amazing how much my mind impacted everything I did, especially to my own being. If I had a head, I would have been shaking it in wonder. As the corruption-sketched landmasses settled into their positions, I felt like I had finally decided upon the shape my foundation would take. Something within me clicked, and the Essence in and around me vanished.

There was a small clap of displaced air as my Core took every bit of available power from the area around me, but other than that, I felt no different. Hmm. What was it that Master guy had mentioned? Was I in the A-ranks now? I focused on a small rock near me and tried to will it into my Core instead of absorbing it. I kept staring at it, pulling, pulling… and with a small pop, it vanished. There was no increase in the amount of Essence coming into me, so I hadn’t accidentally dissolved it with influence. Did I pull it into my inner space?

I looked around but quickly realized that I was looking for a small rock in an area with the landmass of a planet. Then again, it was my soul, so I felt like there should really be a way for me to scan the contents quickly and see what didn’t belong. I poked around for a moment or thirty and reeled back as I figured out the different ways to look. Everything in my soul had a certain ‘feel’ to it, and when I was looking at the world like this, I could feel what wasn’t entirely ‘me’. Even though I had created the rock in the real world, it was still by using what was available out there. There was no perfect way to describe how it felt, only that the difference was instantly apparent to my mind. The rock had found its way into the massive orb of water and was hidden by the sketches of what would be millions of gallons of water and ice. No wonder I hadn’t seen it.

Now, though, I had confirmation that I was in the A-ranks! At least by the metric given to me by the second-least trusted man on the planet. Still. <Hey, Dani, am I in the A-ranks now?>

“Cal, if you need to ask, you probably… oh. Yeah. It appears that we are. I didn’t even notice; that was the smoothest transition to a new rank. Wow, yeah. A-rank.” Dani seemed unsure how to handle the transition.

<...We did it!> I cheered with a ton of exaggeration. That was the most anti-climactic…

“Cal! Look at the Silverwood tree!” Dani broke my grumpy mood with a simple statement, and I turned to look at the Silverwood tree, which was blooming!

<Look at those flowers! Look at that pollen!> I was stunned by the majestic beauty of the flowering tree. <We are going to be fighting off Elves so soon! If they aren’t here in an hour, I’ll be shocked beyond belief.>

“I can’t believe how good that smells!” Dani sighed happily at the heavenly scent that I couldn’t experience. “Wow, we should definitely steal this scent for our own uses.”

<Already copied the chemicals in the air,> I told her with glee. Just because I couldn’t experience the smell myself didn’t mean I couldn’t use it to lure in prey. I looked around and saw that my newly increased power was already benefiting the elementals.

My two current favorites were absorbing the passively increased Mana in the air at a prodigious rate, and right then, I realized something amazing about my power. Not only was I able to absorb any type of Mana from others, it seemed that my own power could feed them as well. I was a universal receiver as well as donor. The power of my Mana was not only meant to boost myself, it could be used to power Mana-based creatures directly! It seemed that I had been underutilizing my powers to a vast degree and that I had kept the same ability that I had with Pure Essence. I had been splitting the power into its constituent parts and only feeding them Mana that fit their current archetypes, but for the elementals - at least - that was unnecessary. Interesting!

Naturally, I started running tests right away. I tried treating my Mana in the same way I handled my Essence-based influence, just to see what would happen. Instead of an invisible gas-like power, my Mana-based influence created sparkles in the air that caught any light and reflected it like glitter. The first time one of these ‘sparkles’ touched an elemental, their power would substantially increase. Careful testing showed that increased sparkles were beneficial but not nearly as much as I would have expected it to be. For instance, no matter the amount of sparkles I devoted to my new infernal lava spider, Aranea, it never reached my own ranking. As usual, the same rules for growth seemed to apply. No creatures at my own strength level without somehow making it happen either by luck or disaster, and even if I were able to… controlling it would be near impossible.

Back to my original realization, Aranea and Imbrem Aureum were swelling in size, then taking a few steps deeper down the ramps and being compressed by the gravity Runes again. They were both blazing with power now, having reached the mid B-ranks. When your entire being was compressed Mana surrounding a Core, rapid growth was more than possible; it may as well have been a requirement. Somehow, I had also unknowingly found the key to their progress by increasing the gravity to such intense levels. If the gravity in here had been merely standard, they would have simply become larger and larger blobs, almost certainly reaching a critical mass and losing control.

There was another aspect to these elementals that had me laughing with maniacal glee; they were almost purely Mana. Not only did this make them nearly immune to standard damage, it also meant that they had impeccable control of their Mana and were vastly more powerful than a standard Mage of the same rank. If a B-one Mage fought a B-one elemental, the fight was almost certain to turn in favor of the elemental.

My two highly favored beings were slowly and steadily moving toward the base of the room, so I made a pile of high-powered Cores on the ground to entice them further. Then I sat back to watch as they pushed and strained to become stronger, seeming to understand that the first being to make it there would become the first Boss of this floor. I loved being a dungeon.

Chapter Fifty-seven

Queen Brianna looked away from the ‘negotiations’ that were currently happening, wiping blood off her face as it tickled its way down her cheek. That Dwarf had been far too stereotypical, unable to change or bend in the face of overwhelming power and evidence. She knew this would happen, yet it was still disappointing. Something… something had changed, though, and it took her two more deep breaths to figure it out.

“It smells like… Silverwood pollen!” her hushed voice rang through the sudden silence, the words leaving her lips before she could consider not saying them. She cursed the faux paus as people tried to slip away from the negotiations as soon as they understood the gravity of the situation. With a touch of power, she called Moon Elves out of various locations and had them reveal themselves. “No one leaves. Secondly, the Dark Elves own all products of the tree according to a deal with the landowner that the Guild promised to uphold, so before you get any ideas, understand that we will slay anyone we find stealing pollen.”

“Your Majesty, permission to collect pollen?” The Moon Elf Elite that instructed Dale on fighting stepped into the room and bowed, a team of four others matching the movement.

Brianna nodded and spoke, “Permission granted-”

“Gomei.” The Moon Elf interrupted her. “It is something Dale started calling me that I thoroughly enjoy, and I would like to be known by this name in this location if you would allow it.”

“Understood. Is there any significance to the name?” Brianna noted The Master’s eye twitching as he held himself back from commenting on the derailed discussion.

“Ah. Yes.” Gomei almost smiled, and even the slight twitch showed more mirth than Brianna had ever seen from him. “Dale calls me ‘Grumpy Old Moon Elf instructor’ under his breath and turned it into an acronym. He thinks I don’t hear him, but I plan to use it as a training aid for our next lesson.”

The tension in the room broke when Gomei and his team vanished at the end of his explanation. Chuckles rang through the room, and The Master used the shift in attitude to press forward and extract promises of aid from all the races. The Dwarves were the hardest to convince after the recent display of power, but they knew there was no real choice. The fact that The Master offered certain powers and rare resources that were needed by each of them may have also played a part in their attitudinal shift. He was not above bribery.

After he had gained binding agreements from each of them, The Master turned the conversation over to High Mageous Amber of the Portal Guild. She stood in front of the room and began detailing her needs and the requirements of each of the people present. “...so not only do we need you to put forward the effort at a breakneck pace, we need it to be perfect. I’m sure I don’t need to remind you all that the fate of the world, the actual world is at stake here. There will be no surviving this calamity, this madness. Xenocide threatens every single person, being, and object on the planet. Only through our newly born alliance do we have a chance to hold off the desolation of our homes!”

After her slightly odd-phrased but impassioned speech, the groups slowly scattered. They left the floating dungeon through the portal, eager to get their people working. They didn’t have an abundance of time, that much was obvious. As the representatives of the different races moved around the skyland, the black-clad Moon Elves were moving toward the Silverwood tree. The unseen squad ran through the final layers of the dungeon, quietly remarking upon the Mage's Recluse and making plans to visit and claim a place to live.

When they got to the last known location of the Silverwood tree, they found the guards on duty standing around with faces filled with either panic or longing. Gomei stepped out of the shifting shadows and took them by surprise. “Where is the tree?”

“Oh, abyss,” the guard leading the group muttered as quietly as he could. “High Lord-”

“Gomei. Just Gomei from now on.”

“Right. Um. Lord… I mean, Gomei, the dungeon created a new level and has descended. We attempted to follow, but… we are not sufficiently strong enough to survive the next floor. We believe the dungeon reached the A-ranks, and the power of the monsters on the next floor attests to this fact. We sent a message to the Princess but have not gained a response. Frankly, I thought that you were here to investigate.” The guard seemed to become more at ease as he spoke, relieved to have such a powerhouse coming to take over. His tension returned when Gomei spoke.

“Foolish child.” Gomei’s voice was tight with anger. “Has anyone else gone down there?”

“No, Lord-”

“Do you not smell the… ah… you are all so young and have never had the chance to produce offspring. I see.” Gomei’s word made the guards flush with embarrassment and resentment. “That scent in the air, the sweet tang of the unknown and unpredictable? The Silverwood tree is blossoming, and pollen is available for collection. Learn this scent well, for it means the continuation of our race. Stand aside, and ensure that only Dark Elves progress. Any others that you cannot stop… ensure you learn who they are so we can end them.”

The Moon Elves moved forward as a single unit, sweeping past the Dark Elves who were now focused on ensuring that no one would pass. Gomei started leading his people along a strange staircase leading downward. The stairs had hard turns that hid what was both above and below, making him feel itchy, like a trap was awaiting him. Gomei glanced at everything portrayed along the walls, knowing that the dungeon liked to offer hints toward what was coming.

“Turn back! Only death awaits!”

“Yoo-hoo! Big summer blowout!”

Gomei ignored the screaming stones that tried to startle them or induce fear; they had been a constant companion in the tunnels leading to and past the Manticore. What actually bothered him was the utter lack of information on the walls. There were oddly-glistening spiders etched into the walls, strange abstract shapes that held hints of knowledge. Spotters would be trapped here for weeks if they ever managed to reach this level, only looking for the ‘hidden meaning’. Gomei shook his head in disgust. Seeking knowledge for no purpose, only to suppress that knowledge anyway? Pointless.

They reached the end of the stairs and paused as they took a collective inhalation. The air here was suffused with the scent of the Silverwood tree, but more than that, it was filled with power. There was a battle royale playing out between beings that made a near-zero amount of sense to Gomei. They were blobs of… Mana? They were generating power though, not losing it like typical constructs do. Not only that, but their basic attacks were as strong as full-powered incantations from human Mages. That one seemed to be pure lightning! It crawled across the ground at speeds the others couldn’t match, targeting a water-based being that had no defense against it. As the water boiled, the lightning beast seemed to feed upon it, taking on a new form and slipping over the rim of a gigantic hole in the ground.

“This is unusual,” Gomei spoke aloud for the benefit of his followers. “Be on your guard; we need to attack a lesser version of these things and learn the weaknesses.”

A few brutal blows later, they had determined that the only way to destroy the creatures was to either smash or remove the Core they carried around. This was no easy feat, as the Core was surrounded by a shell of minerals and Mana. Attacking the body of the creature may separate some of its power, but it did no permanent damage. If they had been much weaker, the Moon Elves would have been in serious trouble. When they had removed a Core, the other beings in the area had swarmed after them. The simple expedient of tossing the Core away had caused the Mana-things to fight each other instead of them, and so they had taken to using a removed Core as a way to clear a path to the rim of the hole.

Looking over the edge nearly killed one of the others as he was pulled forward by a strong force, but Gomei reacted swiftly enough to yank the oddly heavy Elf back to safety. “What was that? What did you see?”

The Elf, though internally shaken, responded smoothly, “There appears to be a powerful gravitational force in the pit. There are two ramps leading downward which are filled with these things in various forms. A light at the bottom of the pit seems to indicate that the tree and dungeon Core are hidden in an adjacent room. Also. Good catch.”

Gomei nodded at the thanks, not bothering to waste time making eye contact. “Let’s go.”

They stepped onto the ramp and could instantly feel the increased weight. Gomei stopped them and looked closely at the Inscriptions that seemed to flow around the entirety of the conic hole. “I see. These Runes are all linked. The weight will be extreme at the base; if at any point any of you are too encumbered to fight correctly, we will set you as rear guard. Make sure to speak up. Do not damage the Runes.”

He pointed out the linkages throughout as he spoke, then looked them all in the eye to denote his seriousness. “You see how this place is shaped? Destroy the Runes, and we couldn’t run fast enough to escape the blast. I doubt we would escape unscathed, though I have no doubts the dungeon and tree will be fine. With Runes breaking… who knows what could happen? We might even survive it but be sent elsewhere.”

They began walking downward and tossed an elemental off the ramp to see what would happen. The creature screamed like a boiling teapot as it was crushed in midair, shattering its Core before ever even reaching the bottom. The water released from its death hit the ground like a chunk of granite tossed from a building, slightly deforming the ground. Gomei spoke softly once more, “Don’t fall off. That might even be enough to severely damage us if done too fast. Until we can test it, assume it is deadly.”

They continued downward, finding it harder and harder to progress. Not only were they hampered by the gravity - which was somehow becoming strong enough to actually impede them - but the elementals were starting to become powerful threats. As they went deeper, the Mana was at such a density that their weapons were becoming useless without powerfully enhancing them. Gomei was still able to smash through with his techniques, and unless the others did something similar, the Mana - and therefore the Cores - were strong enough to resist instant destruction.

A little over halfway down, one of the Elves stopped and nodded, indicating that this was as far as he felt safe going. Gomei tried not to be disappointed, but he understood. His students were fresh into the A-ranks, and Gomei himself was only at A-five. These… things were strange and attacked in nerve-fraying ways. Not a single one of them followed the same attack pattern, which was frustrating to the logical Assassin. Another Elf needed to stop a short while later, and a third was forced to stop by Gomei when the Elf began sweating. That was a reaction he hadn’t seen on an A-ranker in a long time and showed the massive strain he was under.

The final Elf and Gomei were looking at a much more solid-looking construct, a sickly, boiling-stone spider. They were only a short distance from the bottom, and Gomei made a mistake in his impatience. Instead of smashing the creature, he tossed it over the edge. He had evidently expected it to be destroyed, and it almost happened. Instead, the spider landed on the ground. Specifically, it landed on a cache of Cores and began draining and incorporating them right away. Added to that was the fact that I started dropping the floor, and soon there was five feet of open space between the last gravity Runes and the new floor height.

The spider, no longer forced to maintain a perfect shape, began ballooning upward and was now precisely five feet tall and nine feet wide. Gomei saw the transition happening and rushed forward, diving past the spider and into the room with the Silverwood tree. “I’ll get the pollen, the rest of you get out of here!”

The molten spider watched the Elves flee, even as its power continued to skyrocket. Over the course of ten minutes, as Gomei gently scraped pollen from the tree, the spider being reached B-rank nine. It watched consideringly as its nemesis, the golden water elemental, slowly and continuously worked to gather power. It would eventually challenge the spider, but the new boss would be ready. It folded its legs and shrank down, appearing to become nothing more than a darkly glowing boulder. Every time a new Core appeared on the ground, a fiery leg would grab it and pull it in. At this rate, it would reach the A-ranks in days.

Gomei looked at the palm-sized purple bag he held in his hand. It was filled to the brim with pollen and would be enough to birth a thousand new Elves. He bowed to the tree and the Core that resided under it, giving his respects. His race had been on the brink of destruction; this would save it. “I thank you both. I shall return to collect the next batch in a decade. Dungeon, I want you to know that this room is going to become the training grounds of the Moon Elves. I have never found an area for resistance training that was this beneficial to my people.”

Obviously, there was no response, but Gomei felt as though the dungeon approved. A swirling portal snapped into place, and Gomei could see the fourth floor through it. He stepped through, allowing the gateway to wink out behind him. It seemed that this was a floor that the dungeon wouldn’t allow others to skip. Gomei nodded approvingly; that floor could have even been dangerous for him, so he agreed that others should need to prove their mettle with each attempt.

Chapter Fifty-eight

<Hey, Dani?> My lovely Wisp had seemed to run out of easy things to teach Grace and had taken to hanging out with me more often. <I forgot to add a portal to the other floors in my dungeon, but I had a one-way setup nearby that I dragged over last minute. Um. That Elf guy seemed to like it; should I make a keygem so they can get a portal to this level?>

“Nah, I kinda like the idea that people can’t just pop down here.” Dani grabbed a stray bit of Mana, burping lightly as she absorbed it. “Mm! I like those. I know they don’t actually do anything for me, but they are super tasty. Right, the portal. Keep it as a one-way, in my opinion. Maybe put a really high-payout token station in here though? Also, there was no loot from the elementals.”

<The Cores were supposed to be loot, it isn’t my fault they used them like lures!> I may have been getting too defensive. <But I suppose a few tokens would be a good idea. Maybe Hans will visit or something.>

“Plus, that Elf basically just promised that we would have high B-rankers and low-to-mid A-rankers in here.” Dani was getting excited at the prospect. “Just think how much more power we are going to be able to get from them! We are going to be the training ground of the Moon Elves!”

<You think they will let other people onto the floor?> My words acted like a bucket of cold water. Actually… I found Dale and saw he was sleeping. I poured a pails worth of ice water on him, and he woke up sputtering. Heh.

“You think they will stop other people from coming onto the floor? Oh, I hope not!” Dani was now zipping around being agitated, so I took a few moments to create a bubble around Grace that repelled Mana. I had been doing it manually, but if I needed to turn my attention away, I didn’t want her accidentally popping. Now, she chased after the sparkles, and they would curve around her no matter how creative she got. Why did it feel so wrong when I laughed at her failed attempts?

<I think we are fine, Dani. We don’t really need to eat people anymore, right? I mean, it’s tasty and all, but need to? Nah.> I felt a ripple pass through ambient Mana in the area and looked around. The Master was standing at the top edge of the cone, looking down at the view below. He stepped over the edge, landing lightly on the floor.

Aranea unfolded its legs with a high-pitched hiss as the humidity in the air was boiled. A heat haze settled over the area, obscuring the spider with a mirage of shifting light. It reached its full height… and impacted the back wall with enough force to crack the stone and make pieces of the protective coating around its Core flake off. Dani, being the brave ball of light that I knew and loved, zipped out to hover a few feet from the man as he approached the side room where my Core was contained.

“Hey! Listen up! You’re a jerk, and I really dislike that we have to work with you,” Dani’s voice made the man freeze up, his eyes narrowing a bit. “That said, I think that going forward, I can put the past behind us. I know that you had something messing with your mind, making it hard to see right and wrong. You’re still going to need to earn my trust, no matter how strong you are. Also, thank you for not breaking Aranea. Cal really likes it.”

“You are a whirlwind of conflicting emotions, Wisp,” The Master let a grin appear on his face, “but I like how upfront you are. I am here bearing gifts.”

He upended a storage device onto the table. “This contains the majority of my personal Runes, both ones I know and ones I have collected but cannot understand. Over here… these are the secret materials each race has found. Their conductivity for the basic affinities are-”

“We know all of those. Also? Rubies? Really? We know that Scarletite is at least five times as effective.” Dani’s words made The Master’s jaw drop, the first really human thing I had seen from him.

“These are some of the most jealously guarded secrets of the races, and you shout them at me because I got them wrong? I know craftsmen that would kill to learn these secrets, and you shout them in anger. Just. I am amazed. Are the Runes at least useful?” The Master winced when he saw that the books and stacks of paper he had brought were gone.

<Let him know that they were very tasty. Also, there were many I had never seen before. I’ll test any of the unlabeled ones and let him know what they do.> I paused as Dani relayed the information. <Also, can you please ask him what I should be doing to help the cause? Would he be willing to slay Barry for me when this is over? The usual questions. Also, figure out how long he has to live.>

“I can… wait. What?”

Dani’s voice made The Master’s face crumble. He knew from her tone that she knew. “Drat. I had hoped it wasn’t so obvious. Well, abyss. I hope I can hide the fact long enough to save everyone.”

“You mean he is right?” Dani seemed to be having a hard day. She flew over and landed on the Silverwood tree to calm down.

“Indeed, he is,” The Master confirmed solemnly. “If we are going to do this, we need to do it right and fast. Faster than even I had hoped. Here is how you can help…”

DALE

“Ahh!” Dale shouted in fury as icy water poured over him. “Fight me, Cal!”

As expected, there was no answer. Dale grumbled for a moment, then went silent in rage as he remembered his last few moments of consciousness. He went outside of the medical tent he was in, grumbling about water and wondering why he wasn’t at the church’s medical area. The teeming masses of people moving around caused his mouth to close with an audible click. He had never seen so many variations of sentient beings walking around together without fighting. To be fully truthful, there were often tense moments, especially when the Northmen and Amazons walked past each other.

Dale ran around Mountaindale, searching all of the usual places that his group members were fond of. After fruitless calling and searching by not only himself but messengers as well, Dale decided that they must be in the dungeon but was wondering why they would go without him. Deciding that he would simply need to find out later, Dale decided to go into the dungeon and take out his frustrations on the Goblins. Maybe he would stay down there for a few days… why not?

He left a message to his friends and team at the academy; as soon as a messenger saw them, it would be delivered. Until they came to collect him or for four days, he would be fighting Goblins. Dale was just leaving the academy to jump into fighting when he heard a voice calling out to him. “Dale, m’boy!”

“Headmaster, good to see you. I’m sorry to be blunt, but I was just going into… are you a Mage?” Dale had just turned to look at the older man and was now gaping at the aura he saw in front of him. “What in the world kind of…?”

Artorian laughed heartily, taking a deep breath and wiping a tear away. “Lad, you aren’t going to believe it. I got to the top of the tower. I wanted to thank you for bringing me to this amazing place.”

“But… what…?” Dale sputtered, trying to get a sense of the raw might coming from the man.

“Do you really want to know?” Artorian frowned at the youngster.

“Yes!”

“It's Love.” Artorian began laughing anew as Dale’s expression turned thunderous. “Oh yes, sunshine and Love. That’s Headmaster Artorian.”

“You are messing with me.”

“I swear that I am not.” Artorian’s words rang with Mana; there was no way for him to have made that promise and survived if he were lying. “Anyway, let me know if you need anything. I’m off to play with my new powers.”

Dale stood there trying to deal with the new information as Artorian became translucent and flew away faster than Dale had ever seen another Mage move, vanishing with a fading Whee! “Sunshine and love. Just… at least he didn’t find some law for pillows. Now I really need to hit something.”

He went into the dungeon, bypassing the early levels and popping out into the Goblin area. Bloodlust radiated from him, and a smile played across his face as he charged at the nearest fortress. He still needed to be careful, as sometimes, a wandering Bob would appear, which meant Incantations and Runic traps. Those weren’t something that Dale was ready to fight against. At least, not head-on. Yet. He ran straight at the fortress wall, leaping off the ground and tumbling over the sentry on duty. The Goblin didn’t even get a chance to see him or raise an alarm since Dale crushed his head from above in passing.

Now, a good chunk of the Goblins in the area were D-ranked, with the wandering Shaman, Bob, appearing every once in a while. This meant that there were wild variations in the average power levels of the Goblins, anywhere from upper D-ranked to upper C-ranked. Dale had just entered a fortress with only D-ranked Goblins. They never even saw him, though they understood that they were under attack. The human simply killed them with brutal and efficient assaults from invisibility, moving on as soon as they stopped twitching.

When the last Goblin fell, Dale was dissatisfied. He moved onto the next fortress, finding that it too was only home to D-rankers and a single Goblin in the C-ranks. “Cal, what’s with the Goblins on this floor?”

<Dale? What? Oh. Yeah, I’ve been using the others for a… special project. Plus, I was getting a lot of complaints. Minya had me shift things around so that there would be a more balanced setup on that floor.> Dale made a ‘continue’ gesture. <Fine. Look, I’m swamped right now trying to manufacture the stuff needed to keep us all from getting squashed. In general, get closer to the next floor, get higher powered Goblins. Have fun, and if you die, I am going to wait a week before bringing you back.>

“Won’t be a problem.” Dale looked deeper into the dungeon and cracked his knuckles. It was time for a proper fight.

Chapter Fifty-nine

Dale left the dungeon four days later, bruised, bleeding, and in a bad mood. He eventually found his companions, stopping and staring at them darkly. “Rose… are you wearing a dress? What in the abyss is going on? Why didn’t any of you come find me?”

“Dale! You are just in time!” Hans walked over wearing nice clothes and a wide smile, patting Dale on the back hard enough that he could actually feel it. “We didn’t get you because there was no point! We are taking it easy before the end of the world, and if we survive, there will be plenty of time for training afterword! What have you been up to?”

“Still, you couldn’t pop down and tell me that? I was so worried that you would arrive as I was leaving that I couldn’t force myself to come up for air!” Dale growled at the Assassin, who only smiled in reply. “I spent the last day working to perfectly hold my aura no matter what, and I made a ton of progress. We need to get back to training!”

“Sorry, Dale, not today.” Hans handed over a small box. “Hey, can you put this on?”

“What? Why?” Dale’s questions went unanswered as Madame Chandra appeared among them.

“Oh good, Dale made it in time.” Chandra looked over at the others with a frown. “Are we sure that this is the best course of action? We have a lot of work to do, and I can’t have you four vanishing for days on end like you have been.”

“It’s what we want, Grandma.” Rose smiled sweetly at Chandra before turning to face Dale.

“Alright, someone tell me what is going on!” Dale barked in frustration at their expectant expressions.

Hans laughed, causing the others to join in. “Well Dale, we’re getting married, and you are my best man. Let’s go. Put that flower on, will you?”

“What?” Dale hollered as the doors to the church opened. He hadn’t even realized where he was standing. “Are you kidding me? She hates you!”

“Nah, we got that all worked out. Flower, Dale.” Hans motioned at Dale to move, and when he didn’t, Chandra tsked and made a motion. The flower popped onto his chest and firmly grasped his shirt. “But… but!”

“No butts, let’s go!” Hans grabbed him and ran to the front of the church, and Dale watched as the surreal ceremony flew by. When the newlywed couple started walking out, Dale followed in a daze.

“Am I dreaming?”

<Yes.> The mind-voice made Dale look around in shock, expecting the scene to fade away. <Ha! Had you for a second there. Nope, they got married. Surprised me, too.>

“I have just… absolutely no idea how to handle this. There was no warning, no lead-up!” Dale confessed to Tom as they watched Hans and Rose step through the portal for lands unknown. They would be back in a day or two, when the assembled races of the world would launch their initiative against Xenocide.

Tom bobbed his head in understanding. “I agree, this is quite the shocking turnaround. I admit, though I did see it coming. Her physical attacks against him were an obvious sign of interest, and after she actually shot him, they were technically engaged by Northman standards.”

Dale looked sideways at the tall redhead. “Your country is weird.”

“I know.” Tom smiled halfheartedly. “I do miss it, though.”

“Have you tried…?”

“Not right now, Dale. I will if we survive this.” Tom looked away, leaving Dale feeling like an absolute jerk. “My family… it is not so easy as explaining that I have found a way to fix my issue as a berserker. I will be tested and tested and not allowed to heal.”

“When you say tested…?” Dale was cut off by a hand wave.

“Berserker rage has a chance to appear when you taste blood… or when you are close to death. Both… both forms will be tested.” His voice was heavy and dark, so when he stopped talking, Dale simply nodded.

“Any word on the portal? Or whatever it is they are trying to do?” Dale asked as they walked toward the tavern. They both needed a drink after the day’s sudden shifts.

“All I know is that it is going poorly. Though the materials are present, and the experts are working on it…” Tom looked up at the moon, which was looming large in the sky and put his fist up. It barely covered the moon from his perspective. “They think it will not be fast enough. Xenocide laughed at us this morning and left. He left, after saying that he knew exactly what we were doing. Then he told everyone that he had been staying on the Runes so that he could devote more power to them, and he was telling the truth. They are so much more potent that I overheard The Master saying that if the moon impacting doesn’t destroy the planet, the Runes breaking from the impact would. Not might, would.”

Dale shook his head and thought longingly about the small comfort that Hans and Rose had found. It made him realize that he may never have that or find it for himself. He slowed, then came to an abrupt stop. Tom continued a bit longer before noticing that Dale wasn’t with him. “Dale? What are you doing?”

“Possibly something very, very stupid.” Dale turned and started looking for The Master.

Tom watched him walk away, shrugged, and followed after. “Why not? Should at least be interesting.”

They walked into the academy just as a large structure lifted out of the floor of a warehouse Dale had never seen before. It was dug into the ground and was in the dungeon’s domain because of it. <Whew! Someone tell the Master guy that I need more work if he is going to try to get the other teams caught up.>

“You really want me to tell him that?” Dale spoke out loud, getting a few people to look at him.

<What? Abyss no! This man is a demon, I tell you!> Dale winced as the voice in his head reached new heights of volume. <He is making me tired, Dale! I didn’t even know that was possible! I was being facetious, and of course that’s when you show up!>

“Got it, sheesh.” Dale walked up to the craftsmen that were working at a frantic pace to try and build a mobile portal that they could send Xenocide’s Runes through. “Excuse me, The Master? I need a moment.”

“No.” The response was swift and brutal. “Far. Too. Busy.”

<What are you up to, Dale?>

“Something stupid.” Dale’s words to the air made The Master glance over.

“Oh, it’s you. Good, Minya needed to leave, and the only other person who can talk to the blasted dungeon is Artorian. I can’t convince him that he needs to focus on this, all he wants to do is play with his Mana! I’ve never seen a more unreliable… get over here and help me work with the dungeon.” The Master’s words cleared up a lot of confusion from Dale’s mind, especially how Artorian was able to progress to such a high tier of Magehood.

“Sorry. Listen, are you going to make it?” Dale looked directly into The Master’s eyes, waiting for the man to spout a platitude or lie outright.

“At our current pace…” The Master hesitated but forced himself to continue, “we will complete the project too late to turn the moon, let alone send it away. We still need to try.”

“I have an idea,” Dale spoke heavily, swallowing deeply as he thought about his next words carefully, “but I need your help to stay alive. Can you give me a moment?”

The Master saw the look in Dale’s eyes and forced himself to look at the people around him. What he saw were drawn faces, terror, and absolute exhaustion on people that typically never even needed to sleep. They had not rested, had not stopped continually using their power, for days. “I can spare a moment. The rest of you… go get some sleep. Be back in thirty minutes.”

There were protests, but even the staunchest of them stopped working when they saw the Master leaving the room. They may be enthusiastic about survival, but the pace they had been setting was brutal even by The Master’s standards, and he usually had tireless undead doing the work. They went to get food or quietly sat and took a short nap among those that had recently been racial enemies. A common goal and the threat of eradication was a good motivator for drastic shifts in mentality.

“Alright, Dale. You have my attention. What can you do for this that we cannot?” The Master listened patiently as Dale spoke, his eyes bulging slightly. When Dale had finished, The Master rubbed his eyes and released a long, slow breath. “You’re sure? Can you do it?”

“I see no other option.” Dale’s mind suddenly flashed back to Adam’s last words to him, and he felt like he had been punched in the gut. Was this what he had meant? His mind said yes… but his heart told him that this was not going to be his hardest tribulation.

“Then we try it your way, Dale.”

Chapter Sixty

<Tell me again why we aren’t figuring out some way for me to do this, Dale,> I told Dale as I ordered his powerful cursed weapons and armor to fall off of him.

“I mean, technically you are doing it,” Dale quipped as he donned simple wool clothes.

<Don’t be snarky with me.> I may have been taking my frustration out on him, but I was so mad that he had come up with a viable solution.

“Look, can you do it without shattering the Runes and killing us all?” The hope in Dale's voice made it even harder for me to admit that I couldn’t. Not for sure, and not in such a localized area.

<...No,> I finally admitted, seeing his face fall a little even though the answer was expected. <Not without leaving my dungeon behind, and that would… well, that would be bad for everyone.>

“Then here we are.”

<Dale, we might be able to get the portal to work in time.>

“You know what Xenocide said. He would know better than any of us at this point what his Runes were capable of. If he thinks that all our plans end in our failure… even though he is obviously insane, I have no reason to think that he is wrong. Our only chance is to do something as insane and hope that it works out.”

<I really don’t like that… I want to call it logic, but I feel that is being too generous to the words coming out of your mouth.>

“Too late now, Cal. I’m committed.”

<It’s not too late, and you should be committed.> Dale ignored the words and walked out to stand with the people waiting for him. One last sentence entered Dale’s mind, <Good luck, Dale.>

“Thanks, Cal,” Dale muttered under his breath as he stood before the others.

The Master looked him in the eye. “Are you sure about this? Once you start, failure means that a lot of people will die, including yourself.”

“Been there, done that,” Dale breathed the words softly, looking up at the now very concerned Master. “I’m ready. Let’s do this while we still might have time to succeed.”

“Then here we go.” The Master, Barry, and the group of Mages ranging from A to B ranks were airborne in an instant, flying toward the Runes Xenocide had left floating in the air. They were shining, the connection they created pulling the smaller of the two moons toward their planet at what must have been extraordinarily high speeds. As Dale settled into a seated lotus position on the swirling Runescript, he breathed deeply and evenly.

The Mages were a whirlwind around him, moving at breakneck speeds as they set up and activated various Runes of their own. None of them trusted what they were doing, as, in their words ‘the blasted dungeon made this in a day, and it has never been tested’. Barry and the Master waited until everything was in the proper position, then used their own energy to bring the Runes to full power.

When the new Runescript was humming with the same mysterious frequency as the Runes made by Xenocide, The Master nodded at Dale. “Feel free to begin when ready. At this range… I think it will be hard for you to fail. Just…”

“Get ready, Master,” Dale spoke in a dreamy tone, having been pushing to enter a state of trance-like calm. “I am about to start.”

The Master nodded, then stood back a few feet. If this didn’t work as hoped, being further away wouldn’t help at all. He watched as Dale’s aura shifted all at once, going from radiating light and peace… to becoming a slight sheen of water that began to collect on his skin. Not only that, but Dale suddenly became an aberration to the Master and to everyone watching. Instead of appearing as a human, as anything living or even inanimate, Dale became a black hole to their senses.

There was no Essence, no Mana, nothing where Dale was… unless they looked with just their eyes. Then all they saw was what appeared to be a sweaty, sodden young man who was breathing heavily. The ‘sweat’ collecting on Dale began to run off of him and drip onto the Runes below. The Runescript gave off a sinister hiss, like a powerful acid touching bone. Wherever the water touched, the Runes would darken for a long moment.

“It’s not doing anything!” Barry snarled at the waiting people. “It’s not enough!”

“Patience, Barry. The show hasn’t even started.” The Master’s words were just enough to make Barry stop, but his frustration was evident to all. “Disenchanting water is barely known, and I have never met someone who could actually produce it. All it does is turn the amazing into the mundane, and who would want to do that?”

Dale raised his hand slowly, forming his fingers into a shape the Moon Elves called ‘wyvern's talon’ and let the water collect on his fingernails. Just as it was about to drip, he slammed his fingers into the space between his folded legs, simultaneously disenchanting and breaking a section of the Rune beneath him. As the S-ranked energy began to return to the space below him, the part he had smashed began to leak vast amounts of power. Whenever the incomprehensible energy touched Dale, it simply… ceased to be.

Still, power was blazing around him, and Dale sank into the Rune as it crumbed from the outrushing energy. He focused harder, generating more of the water to not only protect himself but regulate the power seeping past him. The Runes The Master and the others had activated began to grab the energy, channeling it into a space a few feet above Dale’s head. The ball of power that formed was not within a human's normal visual spectrum, even when their eyes were enhanced by Mana. Instead, the area shifted to a gray monotone that expanded rapidly. The Master narrowed his eyes and shifted more of his power into activating the Runes. The gray ball stopped developing but didn’t condense any further.

Dale was now surrounded by S-ranked power, perhaps all the way to SSS, but it never fully touched his skin. If it had, it would have disintegrated his body entirely and nigh-instantaneously. Dale was trapped deep within his own mind, doing everything he could to hold this aura perfectly. He couldn’t mess it up for an instant, or everything would fail catastrophically.

The reasons he couldn’t ask the dungeon to do this was simple. The dungeon would have needed to find a way to send the disenchanting water through the energy stream as well as making it pool perfectly on the Runes. A single breeze, a single shift in anything, and no one would be left alive to know what had happened. Now, the dungeon could have managed to simply douse a section in the water if they only needed to stop the Runes from functioning, but… the moon was too close, and the Runes had been protected by Xenocide until this point. That issue was what the new Runescript around Dale was created to fix.

The ball of grey light collecting above Dale reached critical mass. Dale became entirely obscured by the strange light, and a torrential amount of power was now pouring out of the area around him. The power could not go side to side; it could not go down. So, following the laws of the world, it took the path of least resistance and went up. And up. And up. Now that the Runes had been set in place and the energy was in motion, the remainder simply followed the created path. In three minutes, they got to see what was happening in the sky far above them.

The energy reached the moon, seemingly doing nothing for one… long… second. Then the moon simply collapsed inward like a melon that had been hit by a club. There was no sound. There was no air, no way for the vibrations of its violent desolation to reach them. All they could do was watch as the moon that had been circling their planet for time unknown was blown up, shattered into millions and millions, of pieces.

The Master only noticed that they were falling because someone bumped into him. Looking around, he saw that the others were starting to make the same realization. No one had yet grabbed Dale, and the multiple tons of bones and various materials that made up the Runes they had been standing on were only a few dozen feet from the ground. The Master moved, grabbing Dale and gently pulling his unconscious body into the air.

“I suppose you weren’t able to get any air in there, were you?” The Master laughed harshly. He had heard rumors about Dale, but he hadn’t given them any thought. This young man kept accomplishing impossible feats of bravery and somehow surviving them. At that moment, The Master noticed Dale was nude. “Ugh. Just because you were untouched doesn’t mean your clothes weren’t, hmm? Good thing I noticed; that would have cast a pall on your triumphant return.”

Dale’s aura flickered to life, just a neutral network of pure Essence. And… something else. The Master looked down at the boy in wonder. No… could it be? He turned and made for the dungeon, appearing at the deepest levels and dropping Dale amongst the branches of the Silverwood tree.

<Of all the times for someone not to be able to hear what I am saying, this has me the most annoyed.> I heaved a sigh, then screamed, <Dani! I need you!>

“I know it, glad you realized… oh. What happened?” Dani flew into the area and inspected Dale.

“He succeeded.” The Master’s voice was still tinged with worry, making me wonder what was happening. “Wisp, he’s-”

“I can see that he’s unconscious. Oh man, Xenocide is going to be angry,” Dani snapped at the man. “Cal, can you take care of him?”

<Dani.> My voice, tinged with wonder and concern, stopped her cold. <I can’t do anything but drench this area in Essence. He’s not unconscious. I don’t know how, I don’t know why, but he’s ascending. Dale’s mind is in the Tower of Ascension.>

Epilogue

Dale stood on a vast, silver plane. He knew part of what was happening, but he didn’t know why. “This… I’m not seeing a tower. What’s happening?”

“Dale,” a voice came from above him, and Dale was blasted away. He landed over a mile from his starting point, flat on his back and somehow unhurt. Thanks to being on his back, he ended up staring up at a huge ball of something. “I am sorry, Dale. I do not mean to hurt you by existing, but that is simply an aspect of what I am. What you are as well.”

Each word sent Dale flying, buffeted by sheer power. If he had been here as a physical presence, he would have been slain and splattered across the ground from the first syllable.

“Please tell me what you can, in as few words as possible.” Dale coughed once he could ‘breathe’ again.

“Your soul is already bonded to a Law. It is bonded to Me. You are here to see what awaits you upon your return, what awaits you all.”

“And who… what are you?”

“I am Acme.” A flood of knowledge he was not prepared to handle entered Dale’s mind. Just before he began to lose his sanity, Acme shielded him with a sigh. “See.”

Dale watched as the world he lived on was destroyed. There was no doubt that nothing would survive, or at least, very little. The reason wasn’t even the debris from the falling shards of the moon, though that would wipe out almost everything and change the surface of the planet drastically. There was a simple truth that was utterly undeniable.

“Cal has killed us all,” Dale whispered as he saw the planet wither. The creatures and people that somehow survived the shards of moonstone, survived the freezing of the planet from long decades of winter caused by the ash and dirt in the air… they all died of Essence starvation as all loose Essence was torn out of the air and forced through Cal’s ley lines.

“Not. Just. Yet.”

New images appeared, humanity living on. The other races, the races that needed Essence and Mana to survive… none of them walked the earth again. Humankind thrived, though they were reduced to a dark age. Years - centuries - passed. All the while, humans improved themselves. Needing to progress, they took a different route and began learning all new concepts of technology. Essence, Mana, and everything about it was labeled taboo or faded into mythology, becoming a joke to the world. War became increasingly prevalent as chaos-infused smoke was released by transportation devices, to heat homes, or to generate a subpar lightning Essence. The impact of the raw chaos was noticed but chalked up to other various scientific reasoning, the real matter of the base elements not even being considered. Tears filled Dale’s eyes as he stared at the planet of the future, at the far-reaching impact of the dungeon’s grand plans.

But then, as if to tease Dale’s ability to cope, a light appeared. Cal somehow changed, became more, and Essence and Mana began returning to the world. With the return of the life-giving energy came the return of the races and destruction turned to exaltation. Dale watched as a golden age of knowledge, thought, and peace ruled over the world. The vision faded, and Dale stared up at the Node, stared up at Acme.

Tears filling his eyes, Dale asked the question he was dreading. “How? How can I do it, how can I save them?”

“Work has already begun, even if it was not known. Cal is the only one who can save all of them, but there is only one way for this to work, only one way they survive: you have to make the hard choice. I warn you, what you saw… was the best possible outcome.”

Dale blinked and found himself in his body, staring at silver leaves swaying in a breeze that he couldn’t feel. His body roared with power, and his back arched in pain and pleasure as he was remade by Mana. When he settled on the ground, he looked around to see one awed face and two Wisps.

“What…” The Master licked his lips, which were suddenly dry. “What tier? What type of Mana?”

Dale’s voice echoed with power that he didn’t know how to contain yet. “I gained… I have gained Acme. I’m so sorry, there is no time to discuss this right now. We have to make a plan. Cal… we need to save the world.”

<Celestial feces, Dale. We just did that! How about you go play hero, and I work on being a better dungeon? I think that I could just vanish into the horizon and->

“From you, Cal.” The newly minted Mage shook his head, cutting off the tirade. “We need to save the world from your dungeon’s desolation.”

DUNGEON ETERNIUM

Book Five of THE DIVINE DUNGEON Series

Written by Dakota Krout

Table of Contents

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-one

Chapter Twenty-two

Chapter Twenty-three

Chapter Twenty-four

Chapter Twenty-five

Chapter Twenty-six

Chapter Twenty-seven

Chapter Twenty-eight

Chapter Twenty-nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-one

Chapter Thirty-two

Chapter Thirty-three

Chapter Thirty-four

Chapter Thirty-five

Chapter Thirty-six

Chapter Thirty-seven

Chapter Thirty-eight

Chapter Thirty-nine

Chapter Forty

Chapter Forty-one

Chapter Forty-two

Chapter Forty-three

Chapter Forty-four

Chapter Forty-five

Chapter Forty-six

Chapter Forty-seven

Chapter Forty-eight

Chapter Forty-nine

Chapter Fifty

Chapter Fifty-one

Chapter Fifty-two

Epilogue

Afterword

About Dakota Krout

About Mountaindale Press

Mountaindale Press Titles

GameLit and LitRPG

Appendix

Prologue

“This is the most amazing thing I have ever seen. The best feeling in the world. Abyss, everything even sounds different,” Dale marveled, looking around with shining eyes. “I am faster, stronger, and my senses…! The B-ranks… I never imagined I could feel this powerful.”

The Master stared at Dale with a troubled expression. “You… you are in the B-Ranks. You, a Mage! I… I don’t understand how.”

Dale moved his hand through the air, marveling at the incredible power he could feel. The Mana wasn’t moving through his body, his body was Mana! His flesh had been transformed into something more than human; no previous increase in rank had hinted that achieving the B-ranks would be so drastically different.

He spoke in a nearly dreamy tone, hardly able to believe that this powerful voice was coming out of his mouth, “It was the water. When I created a coating of disenchanting water on myself and maintained it for long enough, I cut off all external sources of Essence. Then with my body drained of power, a hint of Spiritual power got through and grazed me ever so slightly. Instead of destroying me as I had expected, the energy flowed along and empowered the bond between myself and the dungeon.”

The Master’s eyes widened as he comprehended the next steps that must have occurred. “You share a soul! Since Cal is already bonded to a Law, the Spiritual energy must have sparked a preemptive ascension! Tell me! Did you need to climb the tower?”

<He couldn’t have made it to the top of the tower on his own.> I scoffed at The Master even though I knew he couldn’t hear me. Conversely, Dale could. Heh.

“I didn’t,” Dale admitted easily, his face shining with purest excitement. “All I did was interact with the Law, Acme.”

“Bypassing the restrictions of the soul? Maybe there is a chance,” The Master muttered softly. The eyes of the powerful cultivator went vacant as he pondered the implications, “Maybe I could–”

<Hey! Dale! Nice work!> I cheered for my human, and I knew he appreciated it no matter how much he pretended to dislike me. <Now, sorry to drag down the mood here, but you mentioned that I was killing the world? There was also something about how you were going to stop me? Are you planning to try to destroy me? I’m pretty hard to kill, I fight back.>

“Nothing so dramatic, you overrated chunk of quartz.” Dale’s lip curled at the interruption.

<Rude!> I called off the Goblin Bob hit squad, and they reluctantly released their prepared spells. I guess Dale gets to enjoy his first day of being a Mage.

“No, we need to find a way to rescue everyone from three things: the impact of the falling moon, the age of darkness and ice that will follow, and the deprivation of Essence caused by Cal.” Dale closed his eyes and did something that he had been loath to do in the past. He focused on the bond between himself and the dungeon, sending the memory of his interaction with Acme.

I reeled from the massive revelation. My ritual, my ley lines… they were going to transform this world into a dead planet? I did that? The best outcome was the survival of a single race unless we somehow—what—saved people and locked them away in time?

<Seriously, Dale?> The Master was still lost in his own thoughts, but I knew he would want to rejoin the conversation soon. <Why is your news never fun? I see you coming and think, ‘Oh look, it's Dale. I sure hope he’s just coming in here to kill things. Otherwise, something ridiculous or sad is going to happen’.>

Dale ignored the jab, snapping his fingers to get The Master’s attention. He was still unused to the power his body now contained, so his snapping fingers made a shockwave that ruffled The Master’s robe. “The Master? I need to know how much time you think we have before the moon arrives.”

“Time?” The Master blinked a few times, then seemed to remember where he was. “The moon. Yes. Without the Runescript that Xenocide created actively pulling the celestial body toward us, all we need to worry about is the momentum it built up, and the pull of the Earth as it approaches. I’d say… being as conservative as possible, that we have three weeks before the first fragments begin to impact. Maybe, maybe a month before the majority of the mass makes landfall.”

<Less than a month to save the world, hmm? Good luck, I guess.> I wasn’t concerned for my own safety. I was already reinforcing my worst-case-scenario escape zone. Runes for absorbing kinetic impact, heat, cold, and anything else I could think of. It helped that I also don’t eat, drink, or breathe. In general, I felt good about my prospects of survival. <Sounds like a real pain.>

“We need a plan.” The Master nodded at Dale’s words, and they started jogging to the surface. Dale’s movement speed had increased to far above human levels, but The Master still had to move slowly to keep from leaving him behind. Perks of being one of the most powerful people on the planet.

<Must be nice to have legs,> I grumbled as they left me alone with my Silverwood tree and Wisp. Dale snickered at me as they erupted on to the surface of my flying island. Heh. I knew he couldn’t ignore me for long. Dale loved me.

Chapter One

Dale opened the door to the council chambers just in time for a spray of blood to splatter on his face, the first blood drawn in a rapidly escalating conflict. While he knew that the delegates of the various races hadn’t exactly been on good terms, walking in on a full-on brawl wasn’t what he had been expecting. Dale stood in shock for a long moment, but The Master stepped in authoritatively and bellowed, “Hold, you fools! What is happening here?”

“Master!” A black-robed necromancer limped over, grimacing from both pain and anger. “Our undead have been constantly under assault, being attacked or destroyed! These people are killing us!”

“So you found and confronted the person or group responsible for doing this?” The Master looked around the now-silent room menacingly. “Who was it?”

The necromancer seemed pained. “Not… quite. A few of us came in seeking information, but they are all denying that they–”

“None of us are attacking your disgusting meat puppets!” An Amazonian woman kicked over a table and stalked over. “We don’t care about them or you at all! We have our own issues to deal with, and you weaklings that hide behind the corpses of our friends–”

“The issue is not one of us attacking you. This issue is, in fact, far more dire than you are all thinking.” Another man strode forward, his quartz-lens spectacles gleaming. “There has been a shift in the world’s energies recently, and as far as I have been able to determine… all of this began with the fall of Valhalla. I think that Ragnarök is upon us.”

Dale grew concerned; this story sounded familiar. The unknown scholar continued speaking, denying him the chance to ask questions, “I'm uncertain what exactly happened there, but as soon as the Seat of Power was destroyed… the energies of the world began to change. This is what I have been trying to tell all of you.”

“Oh, stop it already! We have heard your insane conspiracy theories, we have discussed them, and we have dismissed them. A single city could not have been the key to the entire world's supply of Essence.” This time, it was an Elven man who spoke, his scathing tone forcing the unknown scholar to wilt and slink away. “When someone knows what is actually happening or has a theory that is not impossible, we will discuss again. Until then we have more pressing issues.”

This time it was a Dwarf who took the reins of the conversation, glaring at the necromancers and gripping a double-bladed axe, “Like the fact that these filthy dark Mages attacked us without provocation? I feel that we need to remind them of their place.”

“I said enough of this.” The Master’s empowered voice caused people to stumble backward. He looked at the person who had been struck as he and Dale were entering the room, noting that their wound was already healed. “No lasting harm has been done, and this will not happen again! Now, as for what we are going to do about the fragments falling to the earth–”

“Not our issue.” The Dwarven delegation stood as one and began moving toward the door. “My people have already begun our retreat to the deeps. So long as the planet itself is not cracked in half, we will have nothing to fear.”

He paused, hesitating at the door. “We are not uncaring of the plight the surface dwellers face; we will accept any who wish to flee the rain of destruction… We will take them in as… servants. Unfortunately, we cannot allow the secrets of our people to see the light of day, and this is a rule that we must enforce. The doors to Centrum in Domum Suam will be open for one week, after that… we hope your ancestors will accept your soul with honor.”

Dale looked over at The Master, confusion written large on his face. “Are you just going to let them go without saying anything?”

The Master wore a pained expression but simply nodded. “As powerful as I am, right now I cannot devote the power that would be required to press this issue. If I am correct, we have less than a month to save as many as possible. We do not have the time to save those who don’t want to be saved. In fact, as we do not know how we are going to save ourselves, their plan may turn out be the only viable one.”

“It won’t help,” Dale’s prophetic words rang into the suddenly silent room. “At best, it will only prolong their deaths as the world dies around them.”

“Bah.” The Dwarf looked back and shook his head before slamming the door with a ringing slam.

Silence reigned for a few stretched heartbeats, but then Queen Brianna of the Dark Elf nation added her voice, “Dale… what are you talking about?”

Put on the spot, Dale told the gathered people what he knew about the recent shift in the world’s Essence. To be on the safe side, he left out the parts about it being the dungeon’s fault. This worked against him; to the gathered group, not having information about the source of the issue only lent credence to his ideas as being a wild conspiracy theory. A majority of them ignored his words, but Brianna seemed troubled and approached him, asking for a private conversation.

“Dale, my people are far more sensitive to the fluctuations of Essence than even others within our own species. We have trained our bodies and our constitutions to feel the slightest difference, always in the mindset of finding a new home or finding a scrap of Energy-rich Silverwood pollen. Some time ago, we felt that dense zones of Essence were being directed to flow along new channels.” Brianna paused, watching Dale’s reaction carefully. “It was far too sudden to be a natural occurrence. What do you know of this?”

“More than I want to.” Dale weakly smiled and began to explain.

Cal

“Cal, can I make a request?” Dani’s tone, more than the words, worried me.

<What’s up?>

“So, you know that there are things that I keep from you—things like the training that Grace has to go through.” Dani trailed off uncertainly. “You know I don't like keeping things from you, right?”

<Well, now I’m really interested in seeing where you’re going with this.> I chuckled at her wry groan.

“I just needed to mention… if there isn’t a way to divert this disaster, I might need to ask that we go to…”

<Ye~e~es?> I drew the word out but stopped trying to make jokes when I saw how uncomfortable she was. <Dani, what is it?>

“If the world is going to die from Essence reduction, I need to ask you to bring us to the Will-of-the-Wisp origin and save anyone that might be there,” Dani finished her thoughts in a rush. “I don't know why I’m having this feeling, but I can’t seem to get it out of my mind no matter what I do about it.

<Wait… hold on a moment.> I tried to mentally adjust. <I thought there was no information on your origins. I thought that anything you knew was passed down from previous generations. Any time we came close to anything that gave you a clue, you about lost your mind!>

“I know, I know.” Dani let out a long sigh and bobbed in place for a few long seconds. I wisely gave her the space she needed. I didn’t mind waiting so long as I got to hear about what she was hiding. “So… Wisps are typically bound to a single location. We can’t generate our own Essence, and we can’t really grasp at what is around us. We need a partner that can devote power to empowering us. This means… it almost certainly means that my race is a created race. We are not natural creatures. Even symbiotes in nature have some self-sustainability.”

<Right, I’ve figured that much out.> I was glared at for my ‘interruption’, even though she had stopped speaking for multiple seconds.

“This is information known to us, but over the centuries… other aspects became hazy. No history can be perfectly described and passed down thousands of times, but we think that there is more to it than the simple passage of time. Something made us forget, but one thing that we all know… is that if there ever comes a time where our species would be wiped out… we need to do everything within our power to return home.”

Dani would be hyperventilating if she had lungs. “Whatever the secret is, all I know for sure is that there is a powerful guardian protecting it, powerful enough that there has never been a Wisp that violated the taboo of making the journey, but even knowing it is forbidden, I know I need to go there. It pulls at me, and it is a sensation that comes from within.”

<So… let me know if I am getting this correct. You want us to make a trip to your extended family as the world is ending, find a way to get past ‘something’ that no one has ever survived—since the very beginning—and… what? Save something that might be there? Figure out your history and preserve it when no one else can?> I loved the mystique, but I had a Runecrafted, multi-alloy bunker I had already made plans to visit for a few millennia. <Can I interest you in a ‘not a chance in the Abyss’ during this trying time?>

“I understand that it seems like a bad plan, but I think it is something I might have to do.” Dani stopped me from speaking, finishing her thought, “Not something we need to worry about right now, just something you need to be aware of. But… keep it in mind.”

<Alright, I guess.> I cast about for something to focus my efforts on. <I’m going to go tweak my Elementals. I think I found a way to increase their Mana generation and maybe give them passive abilities, and I want to see if it works.>

“It’s good to stay busy with important things,” Dani announced breezily. I tried to determine if she was teasing me, but after eyeing her suspiciously for a few moments, I let my attention move to other projects.

Chapter Two

An unexpected explosion knocked one of the Mages off his feet, and he slipped over the edge of the pit on the seventh floor. His screams were cut off quickly as the gravity distorted and compacted his body. The infernal spider Elemental Boss at the bottom finished him off as soon as his ruined body slammed into the floor.

“Corey! No! It got Corey!” Those remaining in the party of Mages were hard-pressed, pushing upward along the sloping ramps toward a hopeful escape. “How? He survived going through the haunted living room in the Tigress Queendom! If they could take him down, the rest of us don't stand a chance! We’re all going to die! We’re dead!”

“Don’t invite misfortune, you fool!” Of the three surviving members of this expedition, this was the most powerful Mage. His control over pheromones and various biological skills had made moving through the higher floors laughable, but as they reached the deeper levels where such things didn’t matter, his authority over the others had waned. He had been especially stymied for a small while when fighting Golems, as they were artificial constructs, but had believed that he would have more success on the lower level. The party leader had been dead wrong—heh—and now his team was paying the price for his pride.

<Well, that was a wasted effort.> Perhaps I needed to refine that Elemental, or perhaps this was just an area of growth that was going to end here for that combination. The Elemental that had knocked the Mage off the edge was planned as a type of combustion or explosion Mob, but it turned itself into a self-sacrificing trap instead. <Actually… I think those are going to become a little more prevalent.>

“Great Spirit?” Etiquette Bob looked over at me in my Core room. “Were you speaking to me?”

<No, no. Just watching a fight going on in the pit.> I turned my attention back to the danger zone, slightly embarrassed over my habit of thinking aloud.

Why hadn’t I considered turning the explosive Elementals into traps before? I was going to turn this section of the pit into the single most deadly portion of the entire dungeon! I had already done all the heavy lifting involved in setting up the overcharged gravity Inscriptions, so why not start using them more fully? My mind wandered, and by the time I went back to watching the entertainment, the Mages were limping through the portal to lick their wounds. It was for the best—I needed time to implement my changes!

The simplest trap made the wall push outward, and if the target was caught by it, they would be shoved into open air to begin their deadly descent through the gravity field. When this trap was triggered, there would be sequential movement of the walls that would need to be accounted for until the area was clear once more. I was sure that I’d lose more than a few Elementals to the trap as well, but I wasn’t too worried about that. The smart ones would succeed, and this would improve the overall qualities of the feral Mobs lower down the ramp.

Next, I made small cubbies in the shifting sections that would house an Elemental like the combustion version. People that had thought they were safe from the moving walls would be in for a happy little surprise if they were unable to put down the Mob before it could ignite itself.

These traps together would take down the overconfident and the unlucky; the gravity and Boss at the base would do the rest. I then speckled in a few traps that had a different effect. When these were triggered, the floor would be pulled into the wall and a short slide would send the victim off into open air—if they were surprised enough not to catch themselves in time, at least. The rock was infused with Runes and corruption, so it was unlikely that someone coming through here would be able to dig into the stone to save themselves.

<What next…?> I muttered to myself as I looked over the changed area. <I can’t leave here and have the only improvement be a glorified pitfall trap…>

Was there a new Mob I could create for the area? I glanced at the rampaging war still ongoing at the top of the pit and decided against artificially selecting the best creatures. The entire theme of this floor was ‘survival of the fittest’, and I didn’t want that to change. Plus, after they got strong enough, it was nigh impossible for me to control them.

Wind traps and various other possibilities came to mind, but the powerful people that should be coming on to this floor wouldn’t be affected by a light gust of wind, and even the vanishing floor was honestly a stretch. Mages tended to be able to fly, and I was relying on surprise more than artifice to send them to their death. So, the question became—how to artifice their doom? I didn’t have the answer yet, but this question demanded research! I left the room to its own devices for now and cackled as my attention flowed into my testing area.

The answer to my issues moving forward had to be found in Runes. Mana could create effects that I simply couldn’t replicate with mechanisms or biological creatures. True, my Elementals were Mana-formed creatures, but as of yet, they were simple concentrations of pseudo-sentient energy. I started laying out Runes, trying to determine my path forward on this project. Should I work on improving the quantity and quality of the monsters or the room and the traps that it contained? Eventually, I would do both, of course, but sometimes, making that first decision would change the outcome of the second.

What would benefit me the most? Really… what would be the most fun for me to see in action? When I put it like that, I knew exactly what I wanted. I liked traps, but they didn’t have the same visceral appeal to me that seeing a creature of my own design did. One of my greatest pleasures was watching Manny the Manticore do battle with a group of Mages. They almost never went in to fight him again, so it was always an impressive show to see both sides going all out. I made my choice; I would find a way to empower my Elementals!

I had mentioned to Dani that I thought I could make passive effects, and it was time to see if I was correct. I started working with an Elemental Core in my testing lab and, over the course of a few hours, started to lose my enthusiasm. This was tough. I could shift around the composition of the Core, I could alter the Mana type and quantity, but this only had the effect of creating a new type of Elemental. I wasn’t trying to make a specific Elemental; I wanted something that could improve all of them. I did have an interesting result from my experimentation when I made a top-tier Elemental. It was half as big as even the smallest other Elemental, and it acted far differently than any other to this point.

It was a Love Elemental.

Again, not what I was going for, but I released it into the pit to see what happened. The… yeah, the result was not as I expected. When the gold-tinged, pink blob came into sensory range of the other Elementals, it acted like a massively overcharged taunt Rune. Everything near it charged and started brutally attacking… each other. The tiny blob rolled toward the edge of the pit, and I watched with fascination as the Elementals destroyed themselves trying to get at it. The little love-bubble hopped into the open air above the pit and seemingly ignored the increased gravity. It floated down, down, down… and was snatched out of the air by Imbrem Aureum.

The celestial water Elemental pulled the tiny love Core into itself and started expanding. Its golden droplets took on a pink tinge, and the B-rank-four Mob started to shrink, compressing and enhancing. When it finished absorbing the tiny love bubble, Imbrem Aureum had only reached B-rank-six, but its tier of Mana had increased significantly. As it moved, the spinning droplets that formed its body sliced through the corrupted stone floors with ease. It flowed down the ramp, finally making its move against the current floor Boss—Aranea.

<Alright… not what I was going for, but I can take a few minutes to see how this plays out.> As the two got closer, I thought about Dani. <Dani! Big awesome fight coming up! Get over here quick!>

She arrived just in time to see the two unbelievably powerful titans of elemental Mana exchanging their first blows. They were diametrically opposed Mana types—Aranea being mostly infernal fire and now a smattering of earth, while Imbrem Aureum was celestial, water, wind, and now something… more.

The spider-style Elemental wasted no time in attempting to shatter the Core of Imbrem Aureum, but its bladed legs were knocked off course and sliced into by the spinning droplets. Imbrem Aureum started flowing up the mangled leg, but Aranea simply sliced off its own appendage and rolled away. A dense concentration of black fire appeared in a small orb near Aranea’s Core, and it turned that orb into a cone.

Imbrem Aureum dodged, and all the droplets that were caught by the beam fell to the floor and evaporated. The black cone of power continued uninhibited through the rock of the dungeon, melting the stone less like fire and more like potent acid. It tore out into open air and out of my vision range. <Yup, I think it’s time to add some more defensive Inscriptions around myself and Mr. Tree here.>

“You think?” Dani muttered softly, enraptured by the ability of semi-sentient Mana to control itself. “I wonder if we can control this enough to make it happen how and when we want it…?”

Imbrem Aureum made a move, directing its constantly shifting motion into a directed stream. The Elemental swam through the air in a perfect laminar stream, piercing the exterior of the ‘spider’ and plucking out its Core. I watched in fascination as the Aranea’s body dissipated into motes of black energy and was reabsorbed by my influence.

<That was exciting.>

“I don’t think it’s over!” Dani excitedly drew my attention back to the glowing water, which had started to twitch and shake erratically. I looked closer, expecting to see the black-and-red Core being dissolved and eaten. Instead, I saw a pink light wrapping around both Cores. Then a tiny pink Core became visible, and the two larger Cores began orbiting it.

The fiery body of Aranea regrew around the three Cores, and soon, a smaller version of the original Boss stood on the floor with golden water swarming around it like a regal Aura. Dani was as stunned as I was but managed to find her voice first, “Did they just combine into a super Elemental, or am I dreaming?”

<Oh, that was neat!> I inspected the creature and found that it was sitting right on the upper edge of B-rank nine. <New floor Boss, Aranea Imbrem.>

“Spider shower?” Dani scoffed at my naming convention.

<And now I have a new trap idea as well!>

“Now that is pure evil.” Dani laughed along with me. I hoped she realized I was serious; I was already in the process of making a spider-loaded trap.

Chapter Three

While it had been interesting to see the effect of a top tier Mana type interacting with lower types, it was a huge power investment. I couldn’t make those and still expect to have enough strength to work on other issues. So, once again, I was banging my metaphorical head against a wall trying to think of something I could use to enhance all future Elementals. <Think, Cal! Think! Something in there… the solution is on the tip of my Core!>

I decided to review what I had already tested. Super-powered Mana types created powerful creatures, and in fact, the Love Elemental had been able to impact the others, drawing them in and making them fight like a… taunt Rune? …no. Would it be that easy? It couldn’t be. I created a Core that would be used to contain some form of nature Elemental that should be mostly stone. Before I poured in Mana, I dug in and Inscribed a spider web of linked taunt Runes on the surface of the Core. Then I poured in Mana and let the Elemental form, releasing it into the main pit area.

There didn’t seem to be much happening, but as the new Elemental joined in the war to get stronger, it naturally released a wave of Mana to empower its self-formed body. The stone cracked, and some form of a shockwave rolled off of it. Any being within range of the force turned and assaulted the new creation. They had been taunted! I watched raptly as the taunting Elemental defended itself, and the creatures it fought were attacked from behind by non-taunted versions. This melee was a thing of beauty!

The original Elemental was brought down, its taunt Rune along with it. I watched, wondering if the Rune would somehow transfer to the Elemental that had eaten it. The Rune didn’t appear on its Core, but since Runes were so difficult to damage, it did appear on its body! Soon after that, the Rune reactivated, and the process started all over again.

Finally, a path forward for these creatures! I got to work, enhancing new iterations of Elemental with various Runes and testing the effects. I tried to be creative with what I gave them, as the results were fun to watch, but I needed to balance this with my other projects. Sure, I had lots to do, but I decided I needed a fun break like this. I’d get back to being serious another time.

Dale

After moving away from the council hall—full of frustration over being mostly ignored—Dale decided that it was time to see what all had changed within himself. Case in point, he was walking along, but every tent he passed was collapsing in the sudden, hurricane-force wind his movements created. He went over to the training area in the Academy to test his capabilities and try to learn how to control or eliminate the issues he was creating.

Dale stood in the earth-focused area, staring at his target dummy a few dozen feet away. He focused on his earth-shattering technique and released a line of Mana. The target—and the ground between Dale and the target—detonated into a curtain of slowly falling dust. Dale himself had been thrown away from his position by the concussive blast, finding himself embedded in the wall that surrounded this training area. “Well. That didn’t work at all. It didn’t hurt though…?”

“Yoo-hoo. Hello there, young man!” Headmaster Artorian awkwardly strolled up to Dale, offering him a hand. As Dale waited a moment for his head to clear, a rush of wind made Dale’s damaged clothes flap. Only then did Dale realize that Artorian had been moving at breakneck speeds and that this was the first time he had been able to track a Mage traveling at that velocity. Not only that, but it hadn’t seemed fast or irregular in the slightest. “How about a hand? We can learn to be proper Mages together!”

“That would be a huge help.” Dale took the proffered hand and pulled himself out of the wall. “Why is this so hard? It's my body!” The old man nodded in agreement, having gone through similar adaptation issues.

“Mmm. There are likely a couple of things you haven’t realized about yourself.” Artorian took a cleansing breath and beamed a bright smile as he presented a harsh concept, “You aren’t really human anymore, now are you?”

“W-what?” Dale took a step backward out of pure shock. The force sent him reeling into the wall again and caused more of it to fall on him.

“You’ve left your human flesh behind when you ascended to Magehood.” Artorian sat down cross-legged on the stone floor and motioned for Dale to do the same—so he would stop running into things. “You still have a body, obviously, and although Mages have been through extensive tests in the past to show that everything functions the same, a human just can’t do what we can.”

The Headmaster let that sink in for a long moment. “A Mage is someone that has higher energetic tissue. Everything is there, but your flesh is now made of Mana instead of meat. First, we infused our existing bodies with Essence. Then as we progressed to the Mage ranks, we have replaced them altogether with Mana. You will find that essence techniques meant to empower oneself don’t quite function anymore. Using Mana is necessary to affect ourselves.”

Artorian motioned toward the still crumbling area Dale had launched an attack into. “As you recently found out, you also have considerably greater power than you are used to having. Even when one infused their entire body to the utmost with their essence, it compares to but a fraction of a Mage’s base form. I’ve come to the conclusion this has more to do with our change in nature than it does concerning a change in the output of our abilities.”

“As a higher-energy form of creature, the rules of how the world works impact us differently than when we were human. This does not, unfortunately, mean we are impervious to harm, regardless of how things may seem to C-rankers and below. Now, a simple question—do you know what the single greatest threat to a Mage is?”

“I don’t,” Dale mumbled with a downcast face, not certain how he felt about this revelation.

“Burnout.” The sunlight Mage chuckled at Dale’s expression, which soured further at thinking that the old man was playing with him. Artorian continued fondly and unperturbed, as this was an expression he often saw on students.

“Oh, I’m very serious. Did you mean to detonate the entire yard? Collapse the entire tent-housing district? Are you interested in having conversations with people at a regular speed or a leisurely walk in the afternoon with someone?”

Artorian offered the answers when Dale didn’t speak, “The way we do things has been reversed. Mages don’t need to learn how to empower things, they need to be able to reign in their Mana expenditure and learn control.”

Artorian regarded Dale sternly, his inner ‘concerned grandfather’ showing itself.

“You—especially you—have access to a high-tiered Mana of a rank beyond even mine. I can feel it from here. Heavens, I can just about see it radiating off of you. Which, by the way, is a puzzle I intend to tackle at a later time.”

Dale had a moment of concern; he hadn’t told the headmaster about Acme. “Wait, you can tell? How?”

The old man tapped the side of his nose while he scanned Dale over, being convinced that whatever Law Dale was bound to… It was not present on the tier his Love Law had been.

“My Law places a deep emphasis on connections, the relationship between things, and sympathies. Noticing things is my entire shtick, and many of my early forays into techniques had to do with the purest perception. Most Mages can roughly guess the rank of another, but for most, it is an imprecise estimate. It is not for me, unless one is intentionally shielding themselves.”

Artorian waved that off to return to the topic at hand. He was here to give his fellow freshly ascended Mage his wisdom and aid, not an extended questionnaire. “The important piece of information that will be useful to learn is that we don’t generate Mana, we channel it. If you can’t control yourself, your Mana will destroy you long before an enemy will.”

“You mean I’m using Mana to move?” Dale thought about that. It was obvious in retrospect, but ever since gaining Mana, he had slowly been becoming faster and stronger. His normal interactions were starting to suffer, and he was obviously beginning to damage things unintentionally. His real fear was that he would damage himself accidentally, as Artorian had so helpfully pointed out.

“Indeed!” Artorian waved at the freshly plowed yard and chuckled. “Have you had time to consider why it is so important to refine techniques? Become precisely skilled at them? This is because as a Mage, any flaw in the technique is patched by Mana. Where common essence users suffer either backlash or technique failure, a Mage instead has the requisite energy siphoned from them to successfully complete the intended effect.”

“As a comparison, crafters that work with Runes can make nearly anything work as they want… given enough power investment. Our spatial bags, for example. Those are either made by people that are able to channel so much Mana that they force it to do what they want or by people that really know what they are doing. Guess which one is worth more?”

Dale ignored the question and asked one of his own. He had been in a few situations already where his actions had been out of the norm, and he simply hadn’t realized until now. “How do I start moving at a normal speed, then?”

Artorian had gone off-topic again and righted his lesson, considering a useful answer. “That comes back to Aura control, typically learned and studied for years in the C-ranks. The standard method is to restrict the amount of Mana flowing through your body, particularly your nerves and muscles. Too much to your nerves, and you will try to walk faster than your muscles can react.”

“Conversely, too much power invested into your muscles, and you will crash into walls and the like before you realize you’re moving. It’s fun.” His tone dripped with sarcasm. “My preferred method differs, but it looks like you would like to ask something.”

“So, I’m sitting at full power to both right now, I assume?” Dale’s question received a nod in response. “Alright. Aura. I’m really good at Aura. I can do this.”

Dale focused on his Mana and felt it permeating his body. It was perfectly balanced, and the flow was strong and consistent. It really and truly felt like a crime against his hard work to try to tone it down, but if that is what needed to happen… Dale started putting limits on himself, and when he felt that it was correct, he started walking. Correction: trying to walk. His foot jerked forward, and he perfectly did the splits before falling on his side and letting his head bounce off the stone floor.

“Ha!” Artorian slapped himself on the knee in amusement. “Oh, it’s so hard to believe that I did the exact same thing only a few days ago! No wonder so many people were offering to help me out!”

Dale had lost control of his limiting factor, so he was easily able to get to his feet. The downside was that he was once again moving at Mage-speed. He tried to limit himself in a different way and, this time, found himself half buried in stone with a gravel-grinding crunch!

Artorian calmly worked to pull him out, adding a pat to Dale’s back.

“Good, yes, now let’s find a nice balance between those two levels!” Artorian poked and prodded at Dale for roughly an hour longer before the young Mage was able to walk around ‘normally’. Artorian was proud but still made a fatherly jab, “Excellent progress! Now, keep yourself limited like that forever and in every situation that is non-combat! Try to do it without scowling or looking constipated, my boy. You are currently making quite the show alternating between the two.”

Dale stared hard at the man teasing him, his eyebrow twitching. “Right. Thanks.”

“Well, I am your mentor!” Artorian quipped cheerfully as he wrapped up the lesson. “The standard method is a mess, is it not? I find the self-imposed limits bothersome and instead prefer to operate by concentrating and being mindful of what I am doing in a very patient and slow manner. Mages process and take in information at what we call ‘Mage-speed’.”

“Now, this is a bit of a misnomer, as the rest of the world still progresses in the mundane frame of motion. While it is by no means a flawless method, by extensively taking my time in discerning how my actions influence myself and the world around me, one is slowly able to reach a stable average of how such movements feel.”

Artorian raised his hand, keeping it flat and steady to show what he meant. Although the movement appeared serene at normal speed—full of control and grace—at Mage-speed perception, Dale could see the headmaster was patient as a tranquil willow, bending only in the softest wind. Movements that should take moments instead took a minute or more when viewed as a Mage. It was this calm process his tutor wished to teach.

“This is a more natural way to grasp pace, rather than one of self-imposed limits. Practice the methods and use what works for you, my boy. You will find that as the concentration of Mana in your being increases, the time dilation you experience between ‘Mage-speed’ and ‘mundane’ grows as well. This is in addition to something I am formulating an idea on, which is that higher tier laws may have an exponentially stronger dilation experience. It’s why you undoubtedly saw me wobble when I first came in. Let’s get to practicing!”

It took Dale some time to find a way to maintain his concentration without inhibiting his movement, but soon, the two of them walked at a normal human speed back to the church, where a meeting was scheduled to take place that evening. On their way, Dale saw Hans and Rose walking in the same direction and called out to them. Hans turned and, upon seeing Dale, ran and jumped into his arms. “Dale! You came to rescue me!”

Dale pushed Hans on to the ground and stepped on him on his way to give Rose a hug. He was extra careful to maintain his control, as he didn’t want to accidentally crush her. “Rose, so good to see you! How is the married life, and I also would like to know what the abyss you were thinking!”

Rose blushed and laughed. “Married life. Yeah, um, surprisingly good. Turns out Hans is mostly insecurity wrapped in vanity. When you can get through to him and make him seriously talk and think, he is skilled, knowledgeable, and genuinely caring. Even I was surprised.”

“I was once a feared assassin!” Hans called from the ground, where he was waving his arms and legs to make a dirt angel. “I used to command life and death for hundreds! Look at what I'm reduced to! I want a face tattoo.”

“Get off the ground. I just got you those clothes!” Rose demanded with a finger snap. Hans rolled to his feet and grumbled good-naturedly, smiling lovingly at her until she looked away. Then he stuck his tongue out and winked at Dale as Rose continued speaking, “Do you know how disgusting his leathers had gotten? I honestly think he may not have taken them off since you commissioned them for the group.”

“They’re lined with Mithril!” Hans protested heatedly, though in a hushed tone. “I’d rather not take a bath than take an arrow!”

“And we compromised, didn’t we?” Rose responded archly. “You took a bath in a locked stone room, and now you’re wearing normal clothes while those others are cleaned and get a cleaning enchantment added on to them.”

“I feel naked,” Hans grumbled as they continued walking.

“Be good, and maybe that can happen later.” Rose’s words shifted Hans’ attitude dramatically, making both Dale and Artorian heartily laugh. “Dale, in all seriousness, I think that we really do make a good couple. We have complementary strengths, and we have different interests but enough in common that we enjoy being together and always have something to talk about. We both found someone who is completely different than we are, but we work well together. It’s surprisingly good.”

“We get it, you’re shocked.” Hans sniffed with his nose in the air. “No need to be mean about it. Really twisting the knife over there.”

Before the banter could continue, they opened the door to the church and found that the open meeting everyone was able to attend was already in full swing. The Master was standing in front of the crowd and nodded at Dale as he and the people with him took their seats. “As I was saying, I think that we have determined a solution to the issue at hand. I’m sure there is a conversation that we are going to need to have, but I really think that this is the option most likely to allow us to survive.”

“Spit it out already, Dark One,” an Amazon called from the crowd, making The Master frown and Queen Brianna lock eyes with the offending person.

“There is an option that we have been overlooking. If you can think back two entire days, you’ll recall that our societies worked together to create a portal that would be capable of redirecting the Runes that had been pulling at the moon. I have had multiple discussions with the Portal Mages, and there is an ancient design that could be repurposed. We have enough time, perhaps, to link the portal to a being. If we could find a Soul Space large enough, we could fit our entire populations into a safe location. Then so long as that being survived, we could return when the world has stabilized.”

“Impossible!” a Spotter called from the front of the room, his contemporaries nodding along at his words. “There is no one with a Soul Space so large, and the age of darkness and ice that will occur—if the planet is not outright destroyed—will last potentially millennia!”

“We already have the person with a large enough Soul Space all sorted out,” The Master informed them, bringing stunned silence to the area once more.

“We just need to ask permission.”

Chapter Four

<I feel like something bad is about to happen.> I was getting odd chills, and talking to Dani usually helped. This wasn’t one of those times.

“How many did you make, and are they loose in the dungeon?” She zipped around and tried to pretend she was panicking. Her laughter made me glare at her.

<Ugh, that joke’s getting old! It was one, wait, two times!> I tried to think. It was only twice, right? The Madness Mushrooms and the original Distortion Cat. Yeah. Pretty sure just the twice. <No, I’m not sure what this is. But! Check this out. I upgraded the Elementals. I made what I’m calling ‘Rune-forged Cores’!>

We watched the Elemental war playing out and the new abilities they now activated passively. It was fun! There was something about having an army of powerful beings between you and things that could hurt you that really made you feel secure. I showcased a few examples of my favorite versions, especially one that would convert Mana passing through it into an attack of whatever Mana type the Elemental was using. The Converted Mana—only what was naturally released—would create a nova of power around the Mob. This made for random explosions, a really fun deterrent for invaders.

“Dungeon, we need to talk.” I screamed a tiny amount as The Master came out of nowhere and started speaking. A series of Bob Squads started running toward us, but I called them off. I really needed to find a way to prevent this intrusion from happening. “Is your Wisp nearby to translate?”

Dani flew into the open, cautiously remaining near the exit for a moment before seeming to remember that The Master is way faster than us. Especially me. No legs. “Hello again. As always, so wonderful to see you in person. I really love that you just show up. I’ll have to remember to return the favor when the people around you sleep.”

“Ah yes, the whole capturing you… unpleasantness. Now, don't bother with the empty threats. You know as well as I do that there are no people I care for that still need to sleep.” The Master rubbed at his neck, obviously thinking about something. “I’ll try to do something especially nice for you as an apology. For now, though, dungeon… that is, Cal, I have a request.”

<Nothing I can do but listen,> I told him coldly. Dani spoke aloud for his benefit, and I decided right then that I would keep someone around me in the future for translation purposes. Dani was usually really busy.

“You reached the A-ranks. I know you have, and I know that you have an extremely high tier of Mana. Your Soul Space. How large is it?” The Master didn’t bother to wait on getting to the point, it seemed. Maybe he should be bringing me bribes instead of nasty surprises like he usually does?

<Why do you want to know?> I really wanted him out of here, but it was hard for me to make that happen, and I felt that hostility would be the wrong choice for me to make.

“There is a chance that we might be able to modify and link the portal we had been designing to the soul of a being. Now, unfortunately, the standard size of a Soul Space would at best house one or two people. Not to mention that they’d likely suffocate before long.” The Master held out his hands and made a gesture. “The average Soul Space is about this big, just enough to hold a single object.”:

I looked into my soul, watching as my sketched-out world slowly became more and more solid. Right now, I had been working on creating air. There was little chance of suffocation thanks to this process, but the amount of available ground would hold—at best—a thousand bodies. <I have other plans for my soul. To be frank, the idea of having a bunch of people walking around in there isn’t exactly appealing. Hard pass.>

“But!” The Master’s veins bulged on his forehead, and he needed to take a few deep breaths to calm himself. “But you do have the space that would be required? If we could make an offer that was enticing enough, you would at least consider it? It wouldn’t be terrible to have the entire world owe you a favor.”

<Listen, The Master, I’m not saying ‘no’, but I kinda am. I just don’t think that there would be enough benefit to me. I don’t know enough about the capabilities of my Soul Space. What if someone could directly impact my soul while in there? Someone, say with a whole slew of necromancers or a type of energy far more potent than what I am able to contain or control?> I hoped I was getting my point across. <Actually, what rank are you right now? What Mana did you originally align with?>

The Master went silent, contemplating his options and ignoring my questions. “Will you help us, at least? We need to make this happen, and there are going to be things we need.”

<Supply a list of things that you need, and I will make them available as rewards in the dungeon. I think that you are all most likely going to die in the near future, so I need to conserve my energy. I can’t just be giving away potent artifacts and giant chunks of Mithril.> I tried to keep the glee out of my voice, but then I remembered I didn’t need to. Dani was translating everything in a monotone already since she didn’t want to be here. I was just pleased to be working as a dungeon again instead of as slave labor for Barry.

“That… it will be done.” The Master sighed in frustration and vanished once more.

<We really need to figure out how he is doing that and come up with a way to counter it,> I informed Dani halfheartedly. She nodded, knowing just as well as I did that it was unlikely to happen.

Dale

“Hang on, you just left?” Dale groaned and rubbed his head. He didn’t think that headaches were a thing he could get anymore, but old habits die hard. “He was obviously being greedy and looking for a way to leverage the situation to get a better deal!”

“I really don’t think that’s the case in this situation, Dale. He was adamantly against it.” The Master was sitting in a chair, obviously having given up on survival. “I think this is the end for all of us. We should all just visit the Dwarves.”

“Stop being such a prima donna!” Chandra stepped forward and lightly smacked The Master across the face. Light for her; it was hard enough to cause a glass to shatter from the reverb. “I know that you have higher willpower than this! You organized the world three times that I know of! You have a mindset that never gave up in the past, and I don’t want to see you give up now!”

The Master looked up at her in shock. It had been generations since someone had acted thusly toward him. “You and I should find some time… to talk.”

“Abyss yes we should!” Chandra crossed her arms. “I want your full story from start to finish!”

“Maybe I’ll even get a chance to tell it to you.” He smiled faintly at her, and they both fell silent with their eyes locked. “I’d like that a lot.”

 Ahem. Dale cleared his throat and brought them out of their moment. “Right, so. Can we try again with Cal? I’m pretty certain we can get through to him. Oh! No one threaten him, no matter how much of a pain he is being. It would end badly. Most likely it will just make him say no and mean it.”

“Do what you will, Dale.” Queen Brianna shrugged and waved her hand. “You have my blessing to do whatever you need to save my people, so long as we do not end as slaves. We are never going back to that life.”

“There aren’t enough of my people remaining to fight me on this, so you have the support of the Amazons.” The Amazonian delegation leader shrugged and flopped into her seat. “I honestly don’t think we’ll survive either way.”

Henry and Marie both nodded as well, even though they were now only Royals by blood. Father Richard agreed as well, speaking for the Church. The Master nodded, the final leader of a large group in the area beyond Barry, who represented the Guild. He hadn’t been invited to this meeting.

“Here we go then. Cal!” Dale called into the open air.

<I. Have. Been. Summoned!> Dale rolled his eyes at the theatrics.

“Right. Listen, we think that you aren’t thinking through the benefits of working with us. Consider this for a moment—you’d be saving untold thousands of lives and therefore becoming a hugely respected being.” Dale paused to take a breath.

<That sounds so fun, Dale, it really does, but ‘respect’ won’t–>

Dale interrupted in a rush, “Then think about how everyone will owe you a huge favor, be constantly generating Essence and Mana, and are trapped in your Soul Space until you let them out. Anyone tampering with things they shouldn’t would lead to their demise, right? Especially if they swore an oath not to do harm. You would be able to make the rules, for everyone. We would just need to make a deal.”

There was silence for a few long, long moments.

<Well… you have my attention.>

Chapter Five

Hours of negotiation had finally concluded. Luckily for me, I had Dani and Legal Bob to help me think things through, else I would have been steamrolled and shafted by this deal. As it stood, I gained more than I offered, which is all I really needed to be on board with this process.

<So, here is the final proposal from my end. Everyone that enters my Soul Space needs to offer a large donation of their Mana. I will need it in order to create everything properly. As much as I can get, for your benefit. I know that this means that Mages are going to be entering as weak as kittens, but that is a sacrifice I am willing to make.> I let Dale catch up to me, speaking to the others in the room. <Mages can always rest a bit and return to full strength, so I don't see this as unreasonable. That should also keep the fighting to a minimum at the start.>

<I will also want everyone to pay tribute in the form of everything they own. Until the point where I open the portal, I’m going to be offering token rewards in my dungeon that will let people get ahead in my inner world. If they want a house, they are going to need to have that token ready or build it when they get there.> I paused to let the gathered people keep up with Dale’s translation. <I will absorb anything that is brought into my soul—I don't want any surprises.>

<The more tokens you enter with, the better the options you are going to have. You want to build a Kingdom? Get your current power back? Have basic tools or food and water? Either get the tokens, have a deal in place already, or start from zero.> Here I got really serious, but the effect was ruined by Dale’s voice. <Let me be very clear in this little recap: every bit of material, knowledge, tools, curios, everything anyone has… it has to be given to me. There is no taking it with you.>

When people grumbled about my heavy-handedness, I pointed out, <There’s no point in leaving it here. It’ll just be destroyed or lost to time. I’ll give some basic tokens for this stuff in return, so they can re-accumulate wealth. Make no mistake though, it’s going to be tough times for people for a long time. I haven’t had enough time to make a huge amount of land or stuff in my world. My rules will need to be followed, or the offenders will be punished.>

By the time Dale caught up with what I was saying, the majority of people looked somewhat sick. Yikes, sure seemed hard for them to give up things that were meaningless in the long run. <Now, as for your requests. I will give you a place where you can live and thrive. I will do my best to let you continue to grow, and as people bound to me; you will never permanently die while you are in my care. Not unless you want to do so. When the world is safe, and I am able, I will return you here if you want.>

The perks I was able to offer weren’t insubstantial. They knew it, and it was the only reason that a deal was struck. The conversation dragged on, and all of the topics were refined. They got a slightly better deal, refusing to have Mages pay a steep Mana cost, and seemed pleased with the results. Once everything had been discussed, the group broke up, and the various groups dispersed.

They were off to tell their people about this possibility for survival and to convince them that it was the most likely option to succeed. That said, I had no doubts that there would be a lot of casualties from the incoming moonfall because of stubbornness… and the unwillingness to let go of material goods. Hmm. Maybe they would turn to ash near a ley line and I’ll be able to get their otherwise-wasted Essence and Mana?

Still, I could see that I had rekindled hope in a good amount of people. Frankly, I knew that they were desperate, and I used that information to get better terms on the agreement than I probably should have. As I was thinking about this, I watched as Tom walked over to Dale and pulled him out of the conversation he was having.

“Dale, I need to ask for your advice and help.” Tom took a deep breath and stood straight. “My people don’t have anyone here. There is no delegation from the Northmen, and I doubt that many people would be willing to go out of their way to attempt to rescue them.”

“Whatever I can do for you, Tom, you know I will do my best.” Dale thoughtlessly slapped the massive man on the shoulder, sending him tumbling away like a rock being skipped over a large lake.

A fuff sound popped in the space occupying the Northman’s trajectory. A mote of light blazed into the shape of a person as Tom was caught by a light-blurred Artorian. The impact-force made the old man drop with a baph right on his skidding back, but he raised his thumb to the sky once they were at a standstill, indicating they were unharmed regardless of the dust-cloud they had just kicked up.

Dale bolted over to the Northman and pulled him and the headmaster upright. “I am so sorry.”

Artorian shook his head at Dale with a smirk he couldn't quite contain as he dusted off his robes, attention turning to the living non-Mage projectile’s well-being. Dale, after all, was making good progress.

Tom stood on his own as soon as the dizziness wore off. “No, I’m… I’m fine. Hurk. I’m fine. Listen, my brethren will be preparing for this in their own, flawed way. They will likely see this as some form of ‘ultimate battle against nature’ and attempt to attack the moon as it ‘attacks’ us. Even in death, they will find satisfaction. But… they will die. I would prefer to prevent that.”

“What would you like us to do?”

Dale raised a brow as Tom once more straightened to his full height and spoke in a near-regal manner, “The portals into the North are sealed. The Wards are in place, and winter has blocked foot travel over the great barrier mountains. I doubt that there is anyone willing to fly me there, as everyone has their own issues to solve in order for their own people to be saved. Since this is the case, I formally request your assistance in convincing the dungeon to bring me to my homeland.”

<Well, that wasn’t what I expected to hear.> To his credit, Dale no longer flinched when I spoke. Perhaps he had gotten perceptive enough to know when my mind was present? <Ask him why I should bother to alter my flight path.>

“Tom, why would the dungeon agree to do that?” Dale quietly asked his friend and teammate, not bothering to mention that I was the one who was really asking. “The dungeon is already fairly begrudging about this whole ‘saving others’ process.”

“That's a simple question to answer, Dale.” Tom looked around, and then realized the futility of keeping his voice low around Mages. “The Northmen have progressed further in Rune magic than any other race. Inscriptions, Wards, Ritual magics. We have it, others don’t. Dwarves have better material and physical defenses, Elves have potent techniques and abilities, Humans and Gnomes have innovations, Amazonians have total pigheadedness… but the Northmen… the Northmen have the most advanced Rune magic.”

<Well, I’m sold. When do we leave? Oh right. I get to choose. What direction? It’s… North. We're going North. Shocker, there. Oh, wait a minute…I need to seal the deal first.>

Dale ignored me. “Tom, are you sure they would even be receptive to this? At all? Would they listen to you? Would they pay the debt that you would be incurring?”

“They…” Tom swallowed deeply, and a sheen of sweat appeared on his forehead. “I would need to do a… a few things. I’d need to have my banishment revoked. Then I would need to fight for my inheritance… and then I would need to challenge my brother for the position as the leader of our people. Any one of those steps… well… it will not be easy.”

“How not easy?” Dale questioned, a dark certainty appearing in his mind without Tom needing to speak at all.

“Each one of the steps is more likely to result in my death than in my success,” Tom reluctantly explained with a sigh. “Getting my banishment revoked—this means that I need to prove that I am no longer a bloodfire Berserker. That means I will need to fight against an unknown number of enemies that are strong enough to defeat me for an unknown amount of time. I will also need to sustain enough damage, lethal damage, so I can prove my claim.”

“If I manage to survive that, I may then need to fight someone that has a claim to my inheritance, if they choose to fight against me. As my position would be an enviable one, I have no doubt that the fight will be… extreme. Unless I can find a way to…” Tom paused and looked around, noting that he had the attention of everyone in the area. He hung his head. “Ahem. I would also need to either fight my brother, the Warlord, or convince him that my plan is the best for our people. As he is at least at the peak of the C-ranks by now, I truly hope that he will listen to my words.”

Dale looked at his friend, a man who planned to knowingly go into an area that would probably kill him. A man who would risk himself for his people when they would not thank him for it. Dale found nothing but respect for the barbarian as he looked at him. “How quickly would your win be known, and what sort of timeline would you have from that point forward?”

Tom waved his hand back and forth in a ‘who knows’ motion. “When last I was there, I would need at least a week for my people to be assembled. I know they had been working on increasing the efficiency of communication before I left. As for the actual trials… I am uncertain. I do know that everyone would know the outcome immediately, as everyone in our nation is invited to watch as these things happen.”

<Yup, I’m in. I'll transport us, but no admittance to his people without payment!> I turned to Dani and grinned savagely. <End of world entertainment is the best entertainment!>

Chapter Six

“Cal, I’m so proud of your negotiation!” Dani was zipping around the Silverwood tree with Grace, playing a game of touch and go while talking. “Not only did you secure a huge supply of free Essence and Mana generators, but they are going to pay you for the privilege! I’m really impressed that you included us in your negotiation this time around. I think that really helped”

<Mm. To be fair, they are getting out of being squished by the moon, so it’s not a terrible deal for them, either. Legal Bob is really working out surprisingly well. I thought it was a waste of time to teach a Goblin contract law, but you win again.> I was tinkering with various weapons and traps in the dungeon and had just upgraded the final pitfall on the first floor. Now, instead of thin stone, there was an illusion of the floor that matched the Essence type and density of the stone around it. <I set a course for the location Tom provided. Has Navigator Bob said anything about that?>

“You alright? It isn’t like you to abstain from gloating.” Dani flew closer to me, putting her game on hold for a moment. “Are you sick? Can you get sick?”

<I want to say ‘no’? I’m a powerful and pretty rock.> I finished what I was doing and focused on her. <I’m… actually kind of having a crisis. I’m pretty sure that this is the first time in my existence where I am moving toward an end goal that I chose. Everything else was either an accident, the work of an outside party, or coercion. It feels strange that the first thing I really chose would be what amounts to a rescue mission.>

“That makes sense.” Dani bobbed in the air. “Your life has always been a series of things that happened to you. What you are feeling right now is yourself grabbing hold of your future and actively working to make it happen. You are free, you are stable, and frankly, there is likely very little danger to you from the upcoming crisis. You need time to get used to your new reality and feel comfortable in it. I’m told that happens to everyone when they reach a new stage in their life.”

I thought about her words. It was difficult to swallow, but I’m pretty sure she was right. I was just waiting for the moment it all fell apart, the spot where things were going well enough to really beat me down when the good times ended, but I couldn’t continue thinking that way! I needed to be comfortable with who I was and where I was going. <Thanks, Dani. I needed that. Now I can focus on eating a few people.>

“There ya go!” Dani cheerfully went back to her game with Grace, laughing as the tiny Wisp escaped by dodging through the floor and created a spike as she exited.

Good stuff all around. I turned my attention inward, reaching for my Soul Space. As I entered my pseudo-world, I felt the familiar thrill of simultaneously looking at everything at once and knowing it on a deep and personal level. I had switched the Essence I was gathering, moving over to making habitable land after meeting with Dale. I was here now to see how it was going. I inspected one of the sketched-out continents, pleased with the progress I was seeing. A layer of bedrock to support the framework, followed by multiple layers of various soils, mulch, loam, and then grasses and plants to hold it steady.

I was cheating a tiny little bit, but who was going to call me out on it? The bedrock was a tenth as thick as it should have been, but it was still fine as I was using corrupted stone to form the layer. Otherwise I would have needed to devote a truly massive amount of time to forming all that rock. The other place I was cheating-but-not-cheating? There weren't any bacteria, mold, or insects in the layers that I made. I would need to add those in, else nothing on the ground would be… broken… down.

Wait. Scratch that. I could treat this entire world as one, single, massive dungeon. It was me after all. I would be the one to take all of that stuff in! Once I had the configuration I wanted, I could keep it that way by absorbing, regrowing, and respawning all the flora and fauna! In fact, I could even potentially add dangers and treasures, especially if I was going to have… guests.

Yes. Yes. I liked that. I should go and… wait, my main point, what was I doing? Right! The third and final way I was cheating? I didn’t yet have a heat and light source for the planet. That’s right, no sun. All the plants were sustained by the potent Essence in the air and literally didn’t need anything else. I had an inkling that the people that were going to come here would want light, even if only to boost their mood. I’d have to figure something out. As it stood… I had nowhere near enough Essence or Mana to create something that could even act as a sun.

Until I could figure out a permanent solution, I created powerful lights that cost very little energy to create and maintain. I didn’t need these everywhere since I currently had only a small stretch of land fully formed. A normal human could cross it with a half-hour walk. The light I came up with was pale and cast everything into high contrast, but it could be used to see; that would have to do for now. I looked at the ground, noting that with my current Essence collection, it was growing at the rate of about a square foot per second. Not as impressive as what I could now do when making air and various gasses, but this was still pretty good in my opinion.

Looking at the average size of people that I had interacted with, if everyone that came here stood really closely together… I could fit nearly ten million people in a single square kilometer of land. Sadly, based on how territorial even humans are, I highly doubted they would be fine with only that much space to wait around in for an untold amount of time.

Then again… I was pretty sure that I wouldn’t get that many people joining me… No! No, keep building up land and area. Better to have it and not need it. I did need to create it anyway to keep my rank increasing—I think—and that may have swayed my decision-making process. I set it up to run automatically and moved back to the real world as my internal instructions took hold.

<Ugh. I always get such nasty vertigo when I go from having fun playing with myself to looking at that window to the outside.> I was feeling ill. Going from watching a whole world at once to a flat representation of area I had never seen before and didn’t control… bleh. <Navigation Bob, how are we doing? How long until we reach the Northmen’s lands?>

“Great Spirit.” Navigation Bob nodded lightly, focused on his tasks as always. “We should arrive within a day. Having several Mages in the A and B ranks helping to push us along was an inspired idea. As always, I am impressed by your forethought. Our speed has increased by at least half.”

<I’m sorry, what now?> I looked out at the edges of my perception, and sure enough, there was a cadre of Mages talking with each other, laughing, and pushing my dungeon! Alright, I needed an explanation. <Who did this? How? I mean… I see the benefit, but…>

Dani chimed in privately to keep up my image in Bob’s eyes, “I’m fairly certain it was arranged by–”

<Minya.>

“–Minya. Oh, you did know?” Dani drifted away from the screen and began to roam around the room. “Grace is playing with some kittens, so we are alone for a little while.”

<I didn’t know, but this has her fingerprints all over it.> I chuckled and shook the head of a statue. Didn’t have one of my own. <I really hope she isn’t promising them too much.>

I listened in on a conversation I could ‘hear’ from the Mages outside. “Wealth, land, and a path advancement once we go through the portal!”

“She’d better come through; she was pretty convincing, but that seems a high price for a week of work.”

“She did swear to make it happen, so…”

I had no idea who was talking, but still, I groaned. Typical Minya. I think I needed a break, and I hadn’t been watching the myriad battles going on in my dungeon. That’d calm me down.

Chapter Seven

Manny the Manticore growled a deep, satisfied purr that didn’t at all match his gruesome and gory visage. He looked at his paw, where a C-ranked adventurer was weakly struggling to push himself off of the foot-long claws that were impaling him. Manny shook him back and forth as the man’s friends tried their best to distract him. With a flick and a claw retraction, the man was airborne. Manny snapped his jaws around the small snack, swallowing the human and letting his powerful digestive system convert the body and equipment directly into Essence.

“What a purrfect treat.” Manny snapped his wings open as the other people went red with rage. He launched himself into the air, spinning in place until he reached a good height, then allowed his wings to angle downward. Mana-laced wind propelled him forward far faster than should have been possible, and in an instant, his glide turned into a pounce. As Manny landed on his victim, yet another foolish C-ranker, the only Mage in the group raced forward and slashed a bright line into Manny’s flank.

Though it hurt, Manny only laughed lightly through the pain. The Mage screamed as poisonous and acidic blood instantly welted his skin and started creating black lines that crept along his veins. The huge Boss grabbed the C-ranker with both front paws, reared back, and used his amazing, opposable thumbs to keep a grip while tearing the man in half.

“Alex!” the Mage cried out. “No! Everyone, escape! He’s too powerful! I’ll hold him off!”

“We aren’t going to just leave you!”

“You must! I’m already done for!” The Mage hopped back and erected a barrier between the exit and the Manticore. He began channeling his Mana into the most powerful Invocation he knew. To his consternation, Manny simply sat down and watched the Mage as he channeled his power. Bright lines of power formed in the air and twisted into Runic formations that swirled around him. When he finished, he fell to his knees, gasping for air. This spell formation was half barrier… and half potent weapon.

Whoever interrupted the lines would have hostile Mana rampage through them until the power source was spent. There were few things of the same rank that could survive such a blow, but it had a heavy cost. If the Mage wasn’t already aware he was dying, this particular Invocation would have never been used, or if it were used, it should have been a very careful consideration. He was now too weak to walk more than a few halting steps; every resource he had was utterly spent. The most infuriating thing was that the Manticore was still just sitting there, simply studying the spinning formation. Ah, well. At least the others had escaped.

He looked back toward the exit and went white wherever the black lines etched in his body allowed. His few remaining teammates were on the floor already beginning to decompose from the acidic poison in their bodies. Manny cocked his head to the side and pulled his tail out of the tunnels in the floor that had been designed expressly for that purpose.

“You… monster!” the Mage tried to bellow, but the words came out as a weak croak.

“Indeed,” the Manticore agreed, showing bright white teeth. “Beast, horror, monstrosity, abnormality, freak, mutant savage, titan. Most specifically, territorial guardian.”

The Mage’s eyes rolled into his head, and he collapsed to the floor. The poison had taken him. I started working on the raw Mana that was in the air, siphoning it off while studying the formations. Very interesting, but it could be further refined; it was very wasteful. <Hey, Manny! Nice work. Question though—should I have named you a ‘thesaurus-icore’? Whenever you aren’t in a serious situation, you tend to monologue synonyms. I worry that’ll come back to bite you.>

“It is fun,” Manny informed me simply. “Confusion and despair in them add a flavor that I simply cannot achieve by only frightening them.”

After saying this and allowing me to remove the highly unstable spell work still drifting in the air, he popped the Mage into his mouth and chewed, apparently savoring his ‘special seasoning’. Alrighty then. Of course, now I wondered what things taste like. Maybe I should go over a few memory Cores?

I checked on my other traps and—as I had hoped—the upgrades were playing havoc with the adventurers. Dozens had died, falling through ‘solid’ stone or being trapped by the new cage-style areas. A few were screaming as they were showered with spiders of all sizes. It was glorious and beautiful!

There were already people spreading the information, which meant people were moving more cautiously, rolling rocks or tapping the floor ahead of them with a long pole. I laughed slightly at their antics; it was funny to see a man wearing heavy armor and weighing hundreds of pounds poking the ground with a stick. I had done way more than that though. In fact, I upgraded most of the simple mechanical traps into a Runic version.

Even an area where there used to be a pillar trap that would crush someone into the ceiling had been replaced by an interlocked series of gravity Runes that would all activate at once. It had the same effect, but was far more spectacular to see in action. A person would walk into the trap and suddenly be smashed on the floor like rotten fruit. This had the added benefit of making the less perceptive among them panic about ‘invisible Mobs’. I was starting to feel all sorts of better; senseless violence always calmed me down.

Let’s see… violence, cultivation, upgrades. I watched some fighting for the rest of the day as I tinkered with various things, but all too soon, our flight was reaching its conclusion. This was unfortunate because as we approached, we were able to notice a strange distortion in the air. Casual inspection revealed what appeared to be a thin dome of light that covered a crater of some kind. Closer inspection told me that this was some kind of Runework that was suspended in midair.

I was entranced by what I saw… was this the Wards Tom had spoken about? How did they keep this in place without binding the Runes to something? What would happen if we touched it? <…I’m gonna touch it.>

Dale

“The Wards of Fek’koff are active! They’ve seen us arriving!” Tom’s bellow echoed around the area. “Dale! We mustn’t touch the Wards! Warn the dungeon!”

“What’s happening?” Dale shouted back even as he noticed a strange distortion in the air… in the direction they were traveling. Uh-oh. “Cal! Cal! Don’t touch the Wards! Tom says something bad will happen!”

<Dale. They’re so pretty.> Dale had never heard the voice in his head sound so sleepy. <I just want to get a little closer…>

“Why are we still moving?” Tom looked on in horror as they got ever closer to the Wards. “No! The lure! It must also be active… they must be trying for rare and powerful resources if they would risk the lure… Dale! The dungeon! You need to find a way to have it look away from the Wards! Break its line of sight! If it can somehow see them, it will be drawn in, and the Wards will destroy this place!”

Dale started running toward the entrance to the dungeon, the world around him seeming to move in slow motion. Even so, the Wards were creeping ever closer and starting to resolve into squiggles in the air, Runes that were unreadable at this distance. Dale stopped short, knowing that there was no way to make it to the Core of the dungeon in time. Instead, he started focusing on his connection, then flooded it with as much Mana as he could.

He was blasted off his feet as the ground under him swirled and scattered at high speeds. A pulse of raw Mana traveled straight to the dungeon’s Core, guided only by their connected soul.

<Ow!> Dale had never been so happy to hear pain in another being’s voice. <How the abyss did absorbing Mana hurt? That shouldn’t be– Dale! What did you just do to me?>

“Cal! Listen! The Wards have a powerful lure written into them! If you look at the light, you, as technically a monster, will be drawn to them! You need to stop our travel! Cal, we are going to hit the Wards!” Dale was shouting, uncaring of the people looking at him strangely.

<What in the world are you… talking… about…?> Dale sent another pulse of Mana, burning the soles of his feet and scorching the leather of his shoes. <Ow! Will you stop that? …oh. I see. Navigation Bob, pull back, pull back!>

Dale couldn’t see what exactly was happening down there, but he knew that they were too close—and moving too fast—to avoid the Wards. They were going to hit them. it was only a matter of how hard and how directly. He turned and ran back to his teammates. They had all been shopping together, so he knew roughly the area they all had been in. He moved over to them at Mage-speed, then collected them into a bearhug as gently as possible and jumped straight upward.

Dale had a good view of the area underneath of him, his empowered jump taking them nearly a hundred feet in the air before they began to slow. The party clung to him like a huddle of confused koalas, but it only took a glance downwards for them to keep their silence.

Parts of the flying island had already passed through the glowing barrier, with no apparent ill effects. The dungeon was trying to course-correct, that much was obvious. The land was lifting toward him, and the mountain was tilting back to arrest their momentum.

Then something changed.

As far as Dale could tell, the area of the dungeon that was directly infused with the dungeon’s influence came in contact with the Ward. There was a thunderous cracking sound and a croaking tremor that shuddered through the dungeon as it rebounded. The Ward wasn’t safe either, shown by the quickly spreading cracks that ran along the entire dome of light. Several tons of stone and earth ran off the dungeon’s island, raining into the vast crater below.

Momentum caused the island to tip the other direction, screeching and vibrating where it came in contact with the highly energetic wall. It made an absolute mess for both dungeon and surface dwellers as the few non-Runed structures not locked to the ground literally shook to pieces. Comparing the constant rumblings to an earthquake was a kindness, as a simple earthquake would have done far less damage to Mountaindale.

Several other Mages made it up in the air along with Dale, having had similar ideas, each with their own Koala-huddle of people important to them latched on with significant awkwardness. Guild Mages had entire ropes of people lifted. Church Mages had more finesse and used a kind of flotation bubble to keep their flock from harm. Elves had complicated nets of woven mana keeping groups aloft, and even the Headmaster was visible in the distance, keeping entire classes of students elevated on platforms of stationary hard-light.

Slowly, the metal-grinding-metal sounds quieted, and the dungeon came to a stop, resting a few hundred feet above the Wards which were slowly but visibly repairing themselves. Dale returned to the ground and got an earful.

<Hey, Dale! We’re here! You think they know we’re here? I could knock again!>

Chapter Eight

“You dare to not only return but to bring unvetted outsiders and a linked portal to our capital?” Dale had thought that Tom was huge, but next to this man… Tom seemed almost normal-sized. “You smash into our Wards, you are riding a dungeon, and how could you possibly bring Amazonians?”

Tom was remaining remarkably calm for someone so massively outclassed. This brute, this giant of a man was shouting at Tom so hard that his hair was waving in the artificial breeze. Tom had an air of regality as he responded, so different from the man Dale knew. “Stand down. I have returned to reclaim my position in our society, and I will not stand here and be shouted at like a simple serf getting smoked by a squire. I know our rules, our laws, and I will take responsibility for them in front of the Warlord.”

“Our laws. Our rules. My Warlord.” The man nodded slightly. “Yes, you will take responsibility, but not as a contender to the ranks! As a trai–”

Tom moved so fast that Dale would have thought he was a Mage if he hadn’t known the difference. His warhammer appeared in his hands, and he hit the huge man with the Inscribed weapon hard enough to send the remains of his corpse raining to the ground far below them. “Would anyone else like to break the law in my presence? On that note, would anyone else like to call me a traitor?”

Toms last words had been roared, and his face was red with rage, but his hammer had once more vanished into his interspatial bag. A new man walked forward, his eyes locked on Tom. “Hello, Tommulus. Honestly, I cannot tell if you passed or failed this first trial. He went too far, and I would have killed him if he had been acting as such toward me. Only the fact that you put away your weapon immediately gives me hope that you are sincere. Why did you really come back?”

“Brother, I wish to save our people. I have information and a plan of action.” Tom nodded to his older brother, knowing that his harsh tone might not reflect his true feelings. “I also know that my words will not be heard unless I regain the favor of our Warlord. It is good to see you once more, Aidan.”

“I had never expected that would happen either, Tom. You were the lost, fallen soldier in my mind; sent away, never to return.” Aidan shook his head sadly. “I cannot call you ‘brother’, no matter how I wish I could. You know the law. In fact, remember not to call those of your blood ‘brother’ unless you have retaken your rightful place. Otherwise, they will likely use your exile to kill you, citing that you are illegally claiming Royal status. The rivalry still runs deeply.”

Tom winced, taking a step back. “Ah. My thanks for not taking offense, General. I have been away… too long.”

Aidan nodded regally. “Many things have changed. I hope you survive the unfortunate changes long enough to see the positive ones.”

Without another word, the man turned and walked away. The majority of the others went with him, but a few of the barbarians waited to take Tom away to an undisclosed location. Dale looked at the marvelous Ward that had already repaired itself, thinking that perhaps the generalized term ‘barbarian’ for this people was… erroneous. They were obviously highly developed in many areas and were known masters of combat. Right then and there, he decided to do his best to keep his mouth shut unless Tom asked him to speak.

“Do you have a cadre that will follow and work on your behalf, Outsider Tom?” one of the Northman stood forward and impatiently questioned.

“I think so.” Tom looked back at Dale, who nodded in agreement. He glanced over at Hans, who also showed that he would come, as did Rose. Tom walked forward, and his three comrades walked into the unknown with him.

There was faint amusement on Tom’s face as he looked at the others. “You know, you are going to be the first outsiders to walk the streets of our capital in several hundred years. You will see sights that I think only The Master has seen and is still alive to speak of. Prepare yourself to witness true strength. And beauty. Beauty beyond compare.”

Dale was still working out how to fly and so needed to be lowered to the edge of the huge crater along with the rest of the group on a mobile platform. As they approached the Ward, it peeled away and allowed them entry, closing instantly behind them. Dale looked at the shimmering curtain and grimaced. “No easy escape, hmm?”

“Already feel the need to run away?” one of the redheaded Northman jeered at him, tightening his grip on a double-bladed war axe. “You should have brought companions with more willpower, outsider.”

Tom didn’t even bother to look at the man, speaking gently to no one in particular, “Some would do well to realize that within a few days, this outsider may once more be a General of The People. I’m sure that there are areas still in need of latrine workers.”

The Northman who had spoken simply grunted and spat over the edge of the platform but remained quiet afterward. The platform stopped a dozen feet above the ground, and all the Northman hopped off, which made the platform raise even higher. Rose looked down, then at the others with her with an arched brow. “You’re joking.”

“If you fear heights or cannot handle the minor jarring a jump from here will inflict, you might want to leave now,” Tom sincerely informed her. “I will not hold it against you.”

Rose scoffed and did a backflip off the edge, landing with an easy roll and hopping to her feet. Hans laughed and followed, doing several twists and flips before landing gently on his feet. Tom went next, landing with slightly bent knees. Dale went last, deciding to have some fun with it. He hopped off, spreading his arms and legs, belly-flopping on the ground and leaving a small indentation.

“I love being a Mage.” Dale laughed as he pushed himself off the ground. “I barely even felt that!”

“Dale.” Tom had a hand against his brow. “Please do not act the fool in a situation where it could cost me my position and therefore the lives of my people.”

“Right.” Dale stood up and shook lightly, removing the dust from his outfit. The Mithril equipment he was wearing was obviously undamaged, and in only a short moment, he was fully presentable once more. As they walked, Dale looked around the area with barely contained excitement. The crater they were over was so deep that the base of it was lost to darkness now that the day was starting to creep to evening, but even so, the view was breathtaking.

They were walking on a bridge that spanned the entirety of the crater without any discernible supports. There were two other long bridges that connected to this one at nearly the exact center, creating an ‘X’ across the entire area. The exact center seemed to be their destination, and Dale was excited to see why. As they got closer, they could see that there was a circular roundabout created by the bridges surrounding a hexagonal hole in the bridge. Closer, closer they walked. One of the guards nodded at Tom, who used that cue to step off and into the open air.

“Tom!” Rose gasped, lurching forward. Two swords appearing at her throat stopped her movement, but the huge men didn’t move any further, finding that Hans had a wetly glistening dagger pressed to their jugulars.

“Stand. Down,” Hans hissed at them. They slowly stood back, then spat at his feet when they were clear.

“So, he consorts with assassins,” one of the men sneered. “This is good to know. I go ahead to warn the Warlord.”

“So, he ‘consorts’. That's what you sound like,” Hans mocked the man, eying him critically. “How about this? You threatened my wife and lived. Once. How about you pass that on, as the next person to try a similar action will not.”

Both of the Northmen glared at them before stepping off the edge of the bridge into the open air, leaving the small party alone. Dale looked at the couple, then at the drop-off. “He did warn us that a fear of heights would be a bad idea. Hey, if I splatter on the ground, just go ahead and head back up.”

“Will do!” Hans saluted sarcastically.

After rolling his eyes slowly so Hans could see it, Dale stepped into the open air and plummeted toward the ground thousands of feet below. He had plenty of time to look around, noticing that the sides of the crater were intricately carved with mosaics and… ah-ha! There were Runes hidden among the artwork! He didn’t have long to study them, but he was nearly positive that they were what created the Warded dome around this area. He made a mental note to mention that to Cal since he was pretty sure the dungeon would study that while it waited around.

In fact, he mentally reached out along his connection, “Cal. There are Runes carved along the walls of the crater.”

<That’s great, but I still can’t look at the pretty lights without something bad happening, Dale.> The scathing reply came nigh-instantaneously. <Thanks for rubbing it in, meanie.>

“Whoops.” Dale chuckled at the thought that he got to experience this and the dungeon didn’t. He wouldn’t let a location stop him from enjoying himself. Not today. Something else he noticed was that he fell straight down. He had fallen so many times that he knew that this was unnatural.

Typically, falling like this would cause you to drift around or something, but Dale instinctively understood that there was something pulling on him. Ninety feet off the ground, he started to slow down. At ten feet, he was barely moving. Then whatever force had been holding him gave out, and he flopped unceremoniously to the carved stone ground. “That was awesome!”

Chapter Nine

Hans and Rose landed at the base of the crater just after Dale was standing again, and the assassin was clutching the nonplussed archer for dear life. They were on their feet in moments and chose not to speak about the screams they had been issuing moments ago. The entire group started walking. At a normal human walking speed, the walk would have taken half a day, which meant that they reached a keep within a few hours.

“We have arrived.” Tom turned to speak to his friends. “Do your best to speak always to the rank of the person you are talking to, and be respectful without being deferential. We speak in terms of ‘King’ and such in outsider lands for your convenience, but we have no King. We have a Warlord. We don’t have Princes; we have Generals of various ranks. Our nobility are our Officers, and powerful individuals are various ranks of Sergeant. All of these positions are subject to rapid—and what you would consider brutal—turnover. Positions are won and held by blood and competency.”

“Wait, so how will you have any say?” Dale piped up. “Your Ki– Warlord must be at least in the A-ranks by now, right? No, wait, you said something about this earlier…”

Tom shook his head. “Anyone B-rank seven or above is given a different classification and serves as an Elder or Champion of The People. They are dismissed from service when it is not a time of war, to improve themselves in whatever way they deem fit. Being Warlord is demanding and leaves little time for rank advancement. It is not a position people typically seek and actually has the slowest turnover of all Officer positions.”

“But aren’t you trying to take that position?” Rose questioned him directly, and heads all around them snapped to them to listen to the answer.

Tom’s eyes went wide. “Rose! Don’t talk like that! You’ll have your tongue removed! Of course not, I only seek to gain an audience with the Warlord where he will listen to my words and consider them!”

When nothing else happened, Tom took a few deep, calming breaths. Dale wasn’t sure if he should ask questions but decided it was best to do so before entering the keep. “Why is the Warlord out here, at what must be the edge of your city?”

At this, Tom swelled with pride. “Unlike Kings, my people know that the duty of the leader of The People is to protect and nurture their charges. The Warlord is at the head of any confrontation and is almost always the first to join combat. They protect their people; they are not protected by them!”

The Northmen surrounding them slammed a fist into their metal chest piece, barking a ‘Huh’ at the same time. Hans looked around with a cocked eyebrow. “So there is a society-wide sign of approval? And it’s choreographed! Oh, my goodness, this is adorable! Why have I never been here before?”

“Hans… please…” Tom squeaked out around his embarrassment. They arrived at the gates of the keep, which rumbled open grudgingly to allow admittance. A hairless, shirtless man covered in countless tattoos stepped out, glaring at the newcomers.

“Here we go again,” the tattooed man grumbled, coming to a halt before them. “Who among you vouches for the others?”

“I do,” Tom responded instantly before anyone could talk or Hans could make a snide comment.

“You place these others in your honor?”

“I do,” Tom responded again.

“Know then, if they speak of the secrets of our people without proper authorization, your honor is forfeit.” The tattooed man locked eyes with Tom, giving a slight head shake.

“I so acknowledge and swear.” Tom’s words made the other man sigh softly and shake his head. Several tattoos lit up and vanished from the man, leaving bare skin behind.

“You always were too trusting, Tommulus,” the man stated with deep concern in his voice. “I truly hope you are right about them.”

They were ushered into the keep, and the doors slowly closed behind them. Hans looked concerned and prodded Tom with a non-poisoned dagger. “What was that all about? Did you just marry us? Did he have Runes tattooed on his body? That doesn’t work. Why did that work?”

“That was me guaranteeing that the three of you wouldn’t tell other outsiders what happens in this domicile from now on. If you do, I will be honorless, and all The People will know it.” Tom swallowed deeply. “Please watch your words carefully.”

Rose stopped in her tracks. “Tom… in the past I’ve heard you say ‘my honor is my life’. Did you mean that literally?”

“Yes. Just like a Mage, if I gave my word and it was broken, then I will suffer. In this case, I’ll die. Please keep what you see here to yourselves.” Tom looked at a thunderstruck Hans. “As for the markings on his skin… our people have followed the path of Runescript further than any other. I told you, when it comes to Runes, there are none better than the Northmen.”

“I thought you were being braggadocious!” Hans threw his hands into the air. “I had no idea you had a way to make Runed people! Can they actually use their Essence or Mana still, or are they hobbled by the tattoos?”

“No, they are fully functioning warriors.” Tom puffed up his chest, obviously proud of his home nation and having fun with the response he was getting. “We can talk about it later, but only here and only if there is no one else listening. Or I die. Are we clear on that?”

“Yes!” Hans was nearly shouting in frustration. “Now talk!”

“The Warlord is ready for you.” The guard opened a door.

“Whatever you do, do not speak,” Tom ordered the others seriously just before they walked through the doorway, some more happy about arriving than others. Hans was nearly having a fit, and his face was twisting as he tried to hold in his questions.

Dale narrowed his eyes leerily when he saw the man awaiting them in full armor. This was easily the largest person that could still technically qualify as a human that he had ever seen. His armor likely weighed half a ton but didn’t seem to impede his movement at all. Not only was the armor thick and dense, but it was also coated in so many Runes that the surface might as well have been a page torn from a book.

“Hello. I would say ‘welcome’, but you are not. An exile and outsiders, along with many others, a portal to our capital, and a flying dungeon. Not to mention, Amazonians?” The Warlord stood and stalked toward them, his movement eerily silent. “The orders were to destroy you all. Why are you standing in front of me?”

“Sir!” Tom barked, slamming his arms together. “This unranked individual has returned to prove his worth. I request to be tested for combat fitness!”

“You want to be reinstated?” the Warlord sneered, his eyes cold and calculating.

“No, sir! I ask only for the chance to prove that any reason for my exile is void!” Tom’s eyes stayed locked straight ahead, not following the Warlord as he paced in front of him.

“Breaking your exile, hmm?” The Warlord stopped, face inches from Tom’s. “Then I suppose you’ll want your old position back, and you’ll try coming to me to whine about something? I want to say no; I really want to say no. But what use are regulations if they are not followed? For anyone else, I would follow them. I can’t kill you outright just because you are the blood of my blood. Oh, Tom. How I want to ignore regulation.”

“Doesn’t nepotism normally work the other way around?” Dale hadn’t meant to say the words aloud, and he only realized he had when the back of his head hit the wall.

“Insubordination, speaking out of turn to a commanding officer,” the Warlord coldly stated. “Ten lashes. The punishment has been assigned and delivered.”

Dale stepped forward and coughed. He looked down, seeing that his clothes were slightly brighter in ten spots. Almost like metal that had been hit by a hammer. Dale looked around in confusion. He hadn’t even seen the strikes, and he was a Mage. He should have at least seen them coming.

The Warlord’s attention lingered almost approvingly on Dale’s clothing for a moment as well before returning to Tom. “As I said before, I will give you the chance required by law. When would you like to begin?”

Tom took a knee, bowing his head. “I formally request to rejoin The People as soon as possible.”

“Then we shall see if you are a force multiplier or detractor within a few hours, won’t we?” The Warlord smiled, but the expression held no joy. “Bring him to the Berserker cells, and place the proper schema. Our nation will watch you rise or fall, as is the law. Your… tagalongs will have guest rights. We will prepare the extractors in preparation of your failure.”

The man swept out of the room, and the group was shoved toward the door. Hans locked eyes with Tom. “Extractors? That doesn’t sound nice.”

“If I fail the examination, I will have proved that I ‘lied’. I will lose all honor. Then there is nothing keeping you all from speaking to others about national secrets.” Tom ran a hand through his hair. “They’ll take your memories of everything that happened since passing the Wards. It won’t come to that, though. I’ll pass. Please have faith in me.”

“Warn us before we agree to things like that by accident!” Hans chided him, his knuckles white from gripping his fist so hard.

“You should have guessed by now that he couldn’t,” Dale inferred, getting a nod from Tom. “A geas, yes? Where a Mage swears something and his own power ensures he follows through? That… can’t be safe.”

“Got it in one.” Tom sighed deeply as the smell of blood began to permeate the air. They were getting close to their destination. “The weight of a promise made by a Mage but in Runic form and applied to a willing non-Mage. Our life, the basis of our society, our honor.”

“How barbaric,” Rose whispered as she clutched Hans’ arm. “How many die… just getting the geas?”

Tom half-grinned and winked at her. “Starting to come together, isn’t it? Our moniker comes from people who knew some things but couldn’t explain them to the general populace. ‘Barbarians’ indeed.”

Chapter Ten

<Let’s see…> I looked over the analytics provided by Data Bob and found that there were currently more people throwing themselves against my defenses than ever before. Not only were the cultivators in the area working hard to gain the new Soul Space tokens I was offering, but the portal to Mountaindale was running constantly. People from multiple nations were cycling in and out night and day, supplying me with fresh victims every single minute.

The Guild’s attempts at regulating when people were allowed into the dungeon had broken down completely. They had been caught denying access to necromancers, and soon after that incident, people were coming and going as they pleased no matter the threat. Barry had vanished, going across the world in an attempt to rally the remainder of the Guild and bring them to safety, luckily for me. The downside to all of this activity was that I had no time to respawn creatures, reset traps, or get personally involved in many of the fights.

So, I increased the difficulty. I had Dregs managing the first four floors pretty well, and all it cost me was feeding that Wisp-Core team a fraction of the energies collected. That worked for me perfectly. Not only did I get to focus on floors that were more fun, but Dregs’ style of doing things was different enough that people didn’t expect the change when they got down to my more personalized floors. Dregs mainly used fire. Lots of fire.

Her style of doing things was fine, and as a bonus, it led to a lot of new people expecting that fire was the theme of the entire dungeon. They would get gear, potions, and weapons built around countering the fiery floors, then suddenly find that all their gear would be useless. Merchants were having a great time collecting tokens, which were now the only useful currency in the area. Gold had become worthless here with the knowledge that they couldn’t use it for long.

In fact, Mountaindale had begun flooding the world at large with gold, silver, and platinum, knowing that one way or another, the currency would soon be just shiny metal. They bought artifacts, knowledge, rare materials, animals, and anything else they could think of to tempt me into granting them tokens for things they could actually take with them. The number of patterns I was gaining daily had increased to the point that I was having trouble keeping track of it all. I had a perfect memory—of course I did, everything was crystal clear. Heh. Still, when a list is in the multiple thousands and growing, it can become difficult to think of what you want or need.

In short… it was glorious. I was getting bloated with power, or I would have been if I weren’t already devoting everything to my inner world. I was going to work on that later, but I was still caught up with watching everything going on in the real world. Most importantly for me right now, I was following a group of Mages as they pushed through the final challenges the golems offered to reach The Mage’s Recluse. I watched the wonder appear in their eyes and knew that this was the start of a great couple of weeks for me.

This wasn’t the first group of Mages to reach this level, but the Dark Elves hadn’t spread the word, nor had Madame Chandra, nor The Master, nor for some reason the group that had lost a few members a few days ago. It was less important that everyone know about it because I knew that there was a portal being built that would give me way more Essence and Mana, but I still wanted my work to be appreciated. This place had been my first real attempt to make an area beautiful and not deadly. I had trained Attendants; I had made housing and food. Abyss take it, I wanted people to literally fight over the honor of living here! Maybe someday.

After the group slowly calmed down and accepted that this was a non-combat zone, they meandered until they found the stairs down to the next level. They didn’t descend; instead, I watched as they claimed homes and got to some serious relaxing. Each of them had a small ‘welcome basket’, which, among other things, included a keygem for the portal to the surface and back. I watched as the rogue of the group snuck off, popped through the portal, and sold the information to the Guild, then to as many other people as he could before it started becoming public. He returned to the dungeon with a satchel full of tokens and got back to his new manor just before the others decided to regroup.

Heh. They were going to be surprised when they got back and found that their new discovery was already almost common knowledge. What a sneaky-sneak. I approved. They decided to take a look at the next floor but were forced to retreat before they got a proper estimation of the floor’s value. The lower they went, the more the suffocating presence of my Mana impacted them. Until they had increased in ranking more, they simply wouldn’t survive whatever was waiting for them; they knew it at a deep and visceral level.

Then again, it may have been the ‘fear’ Runes I had lightly interspersed on the stairwell, but who knew for sure? The screaming rocks might have done it, too. Really could have been anything. The Pit—as I had decided to call it—was designed for groups of Mages from B-rank-six to A-rank-zero. If you were fighting something at your own level alone, it would be a hard fight, but in the Pit, there were swarms of Elementals. You needed teamwork, the ability to adjust as you went, lots of trust, and a not-insignificant amount of luck. This group had the teamwork down, but if the rogue were an example of the trust between them… I would have enjoyed the snack.

I switched my view over to some C-rankers that were fighting Cats in the labyrinth. They had caught my attention a few days back, and I was trying to work out why. They were certainly skilled enough, but something about them felt strange. Not bad, just strange. A Flesh Cat swiped at their front liner’s midsection, but he evaded the attack and returned a blow that left a shallow line of red in the Beast. Odd… he had hit pretty hard there. That should have easily taken the Cat apart.

The battle with this Cat raged on with the creature eventually trying to escape when it finally became seriously injured. The group pursued, catching and eventually felling the mutated Mob. The sheer amount of time it took for them to succeed was really tickling at my senses. I mentally reviewed the combat, looking for flaws in their fighting style, watching their muscles to see if they were holding back… There it was.

They weren’t holding back, and they were even more skilled than I had originally thought. Now when I looked at the weapons and armor they were wearing, I looked at the quality. These people were poor. I mean, who uses a weighted iron longsword to fight C-ranked Beasts? Abyssal professionals, apparently. I was in awe, serious awe at their ability. I couldn’t figure out how they didn’t have better equipment; being in the C-ranks was not an easy or fast process for anyone except Dale.

I could only come up with a few answers. Either they were poor because they were funneling coins to someone else, or they were working to perfect their skills by using substandard equipment. I looked into them, noting that they had only the most basic of cultivation techniques. These were people who worked with what they had, and I was flat out impressed. I decided to test the waters and see what sort of situation they were actually in. I worked to create a treasure chest a few rooms away, one that would be hard to miss.

To maintain fairness, I directed a few of the stronger Cats in the area to guard the room, and I watched closely to see how everything played out. There was a Wither, a Cloud, and a Coiled Cat standing guard together. The tactics my Cats used now varied greatly from when they had first been created. When the adventurers appeared, the Coiled Cat sprang at them with the Cloud Cat on its back. The Cloud Cat jumped off of that Beast, then the wall, and came at the group from a different angle and above. The Wither Cat prowled around, waiting for a chance to strike.

The battle took for-freaking-ever. I had seen entire floors cleared in the amount of time it took for the outcome of this battle to be decided. Between the more advanced defenses of the Coiled Cat, who took almost no damage from any single attack; the agile Cloud Cat, who could avoid the heavy and relatively slow iron weapons; and the Wither Cat staying out of combat unless it was convenient… ugh. The people were skilled and had massive endurance. They took very few direct hits, and any grazing blows were absorbed even by the shoddy armor they wore.

Not to say that they ended the fight without any injuries, but they did well enough that they would still be able to press forward. Then they saw the treasure chest, the shining golden light it emitted strong enough to catch anyone’s eye. The five men walked over and tossed open the chest, staring at the contents in shock. The leader of the group looked at one of the weapons in the chest, then at his own hand. “Is that my sword?”

“It looks the same?” his second-in-command piped up. “How is that possible? I even see the same dent on that side!”

The leader picked up the weapon, turning it over and over in confusion. He gave it an exploratory swing, and his eyes lit up. “It’s the same… but better! So much better! It is light, and I can feel the power it contains!”

“Hey, my bow is in here!” the archer of their group exclaimed. “A quiver of my arrows, too!”

“My knives!”

“My shield!”

I laughed quietly to myself as they traded out their weapons. I was feeling pretty good about myself; my good deed of the day being finished and all. Then I heard them start talking to each other.

“This alone justifies paying for the portal to get here, but I can’t believe that this dungeon only gives out wooden coins or potions usually. It's a good thing we found that merchant who likes to collect curios from the dungeon, or we wouldn’t even be able to get home at the end of all of this,” the archer was grumbling, but the others took it in stride.

“I guess the wild claims of incredible wealth were a little exaggerated.” The leader sighed. “It's too bad. I could have really used the money.”

“Same all around, boss man.” Their tanker stood and swung his shield around with practiced ease. “At least we were warned about those traps at the end of each floor. Can you imagine going up to something, thinking you were about to get a reward, and then being dropped into a trap? Pretty sneaky of this place to make those.”

“I’m still confused about that,” the knife-user stated boldly. “I want to see what happens for myself. The odd cube almost looks like it is asking for the wooden coins this place gives us. How do we know that–”

“We already agreed not to tempt fate,” the leader calmly informed him. “We have too many people relying on us to return home.”

<Ugh. Just ugh.> I looked around until I found Minya, who was at a small shrine on the surface trying to convert people into Dungeon Born. Not many people listened after it had gotten around that none of the people she led down were seen again. Though, now that Mages would be in the Recluse, that might change. <Minya, can I ask a favor, please? A group of people in the dungeon are being scammed out of a huge fortune by a merchant up here. Can you find and punish him for me?>

“It’d be my pleasure.” I filled her in on the details, and her scowl turned into a mask of rage. “I cannot stand that there is someone out there taking advantage of people when they need help the most. Consider it done, Cal.”

<Thanks, Minya. You know I’m all about the fair chance. Succeed on your own merit and whatnot.> I was trying to calm down. <Abyss, I’m giving people a better chance to succeed and survive than this scammer is!>

“You sure are, you mass-murdering people eater.”

<You say the sweetest things.>

Chapter Eleven

I had just been given an interesting plant as a gift from the first Wood Elf I had ever seen. I really wanted to eat her to see what the difference was between the subsets of Elves, but she didn’t stick around. Next time for sure. The plant was a complicated herb that had some seriously potent medicinal properties, but that wasn’t even why I was so excited about it.

The leaves of the plant could absorb corruption from the air, cleaning and purifying it. Its roots had structures on them that allowed the plant to release the earth corruption it was taking out of the air, and the rest of the corruption was used to boost its growth and medicinal properties. This sounded similar to standard plants, but this one was way more effective. I’d say it produced clean air at least fifty times as efficiently as another plant its own size.

Of course, the first thing that I did with this miraculous plant was to freshen up my dungeon. There's only so much that regular ferns can accomplish when you get deep enough into the dungeon. Within hours, the monsters roaming around were breathing deeper, actually physically strengthened by the clean and fresh air. Their blood had been starved of air for so long that they had adapted to it, so this boost made them way more energetic. I was worried that anyone throwing a fireball around could be up to twice as strong as usual, but I think that the trade-off was worth it.

Next, I pulled a sample of the plant into my Soul Space and started planting it in unobtrusive locations. Not only would this help to generate new air, but when people did start arriving, I assumed that the quality of air would drop precipitously. This would help to mitigate that factor, and it was a timely addition to my collection. I took some time to roam around, inspecting the area and watching as the earth seemed to slowly creep upward on the horizon. It was very fun to watch, very pretty, and if it had been anything or anywhere else, it would have been very disturbing to see this happen.

A thought crossed my mind, and if I had a brow, it would have furrowed. I just realized that I had not increased in rank, even with the massive gains of Essence, Mana, and the rapid expansion of my Soul Space. I was doing everything I had been instructed was needed. I had more energy than any other being at my level; I was positive of this fact. So, why was I not increasing in ranking? I thought back over conversations and my personal studies. I knew that higher tiers of power required greater amounts of understanding and energy to advance… Was the difference truly this drastic?

I looked at the sheer amounts of energy I was taking in. A whole lot of it. But no matter how I looked at it, I could not yet be taking in enough energy to keep up with even a fraction of what the world produced. While my ley lines had certainly changed and regulated the flow of power in the world, it was not like I was taking all of that in at once! Was there a better way to collect the power? As powerful as I was, I was still taking in nearly as much energy as I could handle at once, every second of every day. Even still, I was always able to take in refined energies from anyone who had fallen within my influence.

Perhaps that was the key to this. Currently, I was taking in as much raw energy as my Core could handle. Was there a way to process, to refine, to make better in any way my raw consumption? This led me to a chilling thought—dungeons were absolutely stuffed with refined Essence and Mana. I had very little issues with any dungeon core that I had been fed, but what if I was not the first to realize this? What if dungeons, as a race, were created for that express purpose—to feed some greater being?

If that were the case… Well, even if it were, what would change for me? I would want to grow stronger? Find a better place to hide? I had all of that, and all of my contingency plans already set. The question became—how could I use this information to my own advantage? Every Core that I encountered in the past I had already either befriended or eaten. The only thing that really concerned me was that everything I had encountered so far was always lower rank than I was.

It could be that the world had hundreds or thousands of dungeons and that they were simply deeper than my effects could reach. If I had the time, I would eventually find them. Most likely, it would either end up as a fight or an uneasy coexistence. Or! Or, similar to Kantor, there could be stronger dungeons that simply were not on the surface of the planet or even below it; like me… they could be flying. There was a scary thought. Should I make some air combat creatures?

I shook myself mentally, getting out of that tangent of thought. This planet had roughly three weeks remaining of non-destruction. Frankly, the reality was that I would likely never have to worry about encountering a stronger dungeon or dungeon-munching being. What I did need to consider and work on was passing through the A-ranks and achieving S-rank. Unfortunately… I felt my cultivation one more time before sighing. That was going to be a long way off unless something drastically changed.

Dale

Tom grunted in pain as the whip came down on his side. It was moving oddly, nearly slowly, and seemed to caress his body like a lover as it tore open a fresh line for blood to pour out of. Tom had been moving between grunting, silence, and screaming for hours at this point. The only interlude from the beatings he was taking was when a new implement was chosen to use on him or when he was force-fed his own dripping blood.

“All you need to do to make this stop is admit that you cannot actually control yourself,” the whip wielder told Tom for the umpteenth time. “Just let your base instincts take over. Show us the animal that we all know is in there. Show us the Blood Berserker waiting inside of you.”

Dale was nearly sick again as he looked around the antechamber at the approving nods of the people who had gathered to watch. Apparently, there was some form of Runic system in place that allowed others far distant to observe what was happening as well. Dale could not reconcile the terrible things being done in this room with the absolute stark beauty and advanced magical systems he had seen since he had arrived.

He had no idea how this people had been so mislabeled. To call them barbarians, to scoff at their lack of advancement and militaristic society… it was obvious that their methods of hiding information were effective. Then watching Tom being beaten, whipped, and healed slightly just so they could restart the process again and again? The dichotomy of this nation was making his head spin. Dale looked down at his friend who was doing his best to hold himself up proudly even though his arms were tied to posts far above him. There had been several times where Tom had fallen and been forced to rely on the bindings to keep him upright, but he always got back to his feet under his own power.

“I say once again; I have defeated the affliction.” Tom somehow managed to say this calmly, even if his words were broken by his gasping breaths. “Outside of our own nation, this is such a common affliction that the treatment for it can be found with any who teach their students how to control fire. It is seen simply as a common risk of those with affinity for the flame. It is treated as such, just as a burn on the skin would be, with just as easy of a solution.”

For the first time since he had started this process, he got an actual response to his small speech. The man whipping him stepped forward and said, “So you say. How thoroughly is this tested? We know the weak ways of Outsiders, how they coddle their children, how they do not temper themselves. Can you tell me that they have dug as deep as we have? Can you point at any of them who would test for the madness as thoroughly as we? If so, swear it upon your honor, and we will be done with this. If not, stop trying to sway us with the words of a coward.”

“How is he being cowardly?” Rose whispered, burying her face into Han’s shirt.

The man with the whip waited a moment, watching Tom's face. When the young man did not respond, he simply nodded and resumed his position. A moment later, the whip landed on yielding flesh once more. This continued for hours longer, deep into the night, before Tom's arms were suddenly released from their binding. He fell to the floor, unable to support his own weight. The hairiest healer Dale had ever seen stepped forward and closed any wounds that were life-threatening.

“All we have determined from this is that you have a high pain tolerance now. Possibly that you have somehow been able to find a way to resist the taste of your own blood tearing at your mind.” A man nearly as large as the warlord had stepped on to the stage and approached Tom. “Now, we are going to take a look at you and determine if you have been bound by another. If so, if you have not actually come this far under your own power–”

“Sir, I have no fear. I have nothing to hide. Please commence the process.” Tom was slapped across the face hard enough to send him reeling. Interrupting an officer was always a bad idea, but Tom knew that the lecture the man was giving typically took a full ten minutes. It alternated between threats, bribes, compromises, all in an attempt to force the person on trial to give in to their baser instincts.

“Your impertinence knows no bounds,” the huge man stated coldly. “You have picked up the bad habits of the weak, of the lazy, of the undisciplined. It may be better for you and for us all, if you simply give in and allow us to put your name on the list of those that died with their honor intact. That is the deal I have been authorized to offer. Your exile will be posthumously revoked, and your body will be placed in the halls of the honored dead. What say you?”

Tom was silent far too long for Dale's comfort. It was obvious that he was seriously considering the deal. Finally, he shook his head. “No. As much as I do not fear dying for my people, I have made it my purpose in life to live for my people and to help them live on as well. I feel that I will not be able to–”

A second slap across the face cut off Tom's impromptu speech, hard enough to send a tooth flying. “Maggot, you will answer in the future with a simple yes or no! Binders, begin the process!”

Chapter Twelve

“You know that this entire system is designed so that we should never need to take in an exile. The law exists so that we can, but less than ten have ever returned.” Tom was strapped down to a table and fully stripped to a loincloth. His shirt had been taken off previously to prepare for the whipping. Five men stood around him, each of them carrying mystical implements used for purposes Dale could not divine. “What we are doing is not torture, I swear it, Tommulus. This is the only method that has ever been proven to force a Berserker to show themselves.”

The eldest among them looked at Tom and made one final offer, “As always, there is a one in ten chance that inspection of your honor will cause your life to end. As you have gone through this process once before, you have better odds than most. Still, I urge you to take the offer that has been given to you.”

When Tom did not respond, the Elder simply sighed and nodded. One by one, the five men plunged small daggers into Tom's limbs, the final one piercing his chest. There was a swell of Mana that battered the senses of everyone present, and an incredibly intricate Rune appeared in the air above Tom's face for a brief moment. Then all of the knives were taken out, and the men stepped away.

The Elder cleared his throat gently and softly called, “Medic!”

The extraordinarily hairy healer bounded forward once more and laid his hands on Tom's chest. Slowly, almost too slowly, the wound in his chest closed, and Tom took a deep shuddering breath. The Elder nodded and looked around the room. “His honor is intact and is his own. This man has taken no permanent mate, nor has he bound himself to another beyond seeking knowledge and personal growth. He has a teacher but no master. This man has not disregarded the terms of his exile and, by honor alone, is fit to return to service.”

“Binders, thank you for your time and expertise,” the huge man that seemed to be running this trial spoke respectfully. He then turned to look at the crowd once more. “His honor is intact. Unfortunately, we all know that is not enough for someone to be allowed to serve The People. The next test will begin shortly.”

“There is more to this?” Hans was livid. Knives kept appearing in his hands and disappearing into unknown folds of his outfit. “This is a farce. This is a way for them to discourage people from returning when they have been sent away in disgrace. The cure for Berserker rage is well-documented and available everywhere!”

“Do you think they just refuse to use methods they have not created or discovered themselves?” Rose looked at the two of them, hoping that they would have some answers.

“It sounds plausible,” Dale thoughtfully replied. “They seem to have extreme hatred for anyone outside of their own nation. I've talked to Tom about this before, and they might have good reason for it. Also, I believe the next part of this process is combat, to show that in a stressful situation, he is able to maintain himself.”

Tom was pulled to his feet by the healer, handed a warhammer, and pointed toward a door. He was barely standing, but it seemed that the people assigned to his trial were not going to wait for him to be in tip-top form. At least a dozen people walked out of the door and on to the stage, all manner of weaponry showing in their hands. Each of them wore shining armor and grim expressions. The man in charge of the trial looked at Tom—who was once more wearing only his normal clothing—and began to speak.

“If you give in to your Berserker instincts, if you kill any of my men or if you die, you will have failed.” He stepped back and off of the stage, signaling for combat to begin.

Cal

I needed to get a hold of some of the Warding schema I knew was below me. I was positive that it would be beneficial to my plans. In fact, it seemed almost tailor-made for dungeons and other stationary entities. Runescripts could make certain effects but needed to be powered with what amounted to a single-use charge. The ritual I had designed to carve ley lines into the world and make energy begin flowing was potent and powerful but still essentially was a constant drain of power while only having a very specific effect.

From what I understood… Wards were fundamentally different. All I knew was from the rumors floating around on my island, but if they were even a quarter as useful as people were saying, I needed them. Wards were—allegedly—ways to make shielding or other permanent phenomena and tie them to a power source. This power source could even be something as simple as ambient Essence, which would be consumed as needed. From what I could tell, Wards were the little brother of Runescripting and followed very similar principles.

I had been able to make things that were similar to Wards, such as creating areas of enhanced gravity. This had actually been the application of physical forces and not an energetic barrier that would stop people, projectiles, or techniques. I really hoped that Dale’s team was successful and they convinced the Northmen to hand all of that sweet information over. Otherwise, I would need to learn how to do it with trial and error or stage an assault against an entire nation and scoop up all the information before they destroyed it. Or… perhaps there was a third option. A dastardly option. Mu-hu-ha-ha!

I started carefully navigating the island toward the ground, using the resistance of the Wards to settle as closely as possible to the rim of the huge crater. Then—hee-hee—I began extending my influence and adding the wall of the crater to my ‘dungeon’. Eventually, I would reach something that was connected to the Wards, and at that point, I could outright steal it! I was betting that it would be placed in a central location—likely the midpoint and bottom of this entire depression—but depending on how long I’d be staying here, I might get at it.

Stone, water, dirt. I had been losing huge amounts from my Island, thousands of tons of material. I had the space; I knew that my enchantments and Runescripts were up to the task of transporting anything extra that I took on. Because of this, I really did not hold back. When I left here, one way or another, I would be taking a big chunk of this land. Of course, the majority of my efforts went toward sending a line of influence deeper and deeper, following the wall of the cliff.

I set my influence to flow along without my full attention, which turned out to be a very good idea. After only a few hours, I found something. Something beautiful. Now it was mine. Mine! I caressed this beautiful symbol, this Masterwork of swirls and loops, the most perfect conduits for energy that… oops. I accidentally ate it.

I couldn't help myself! It was so good that I'd simply needed to try it! Luckily, or unfortunately, or some combination of both… as I studied what I had just absorbed, I realized that it had to be part of the Ward that made the 'lure'. It was a self-contained symbol, which meant that, most likely, it was etched all over the entire crater. Destroying this one single portion of it should not damage the integrity of the Ward at large.

I was glad that I had kept my influence moving because every other active process I needed had come to a halt when I had started looking over the lure. I got back to work, then started processing the information I had gained. The lure was incredibly intriguing beyond its function to make it interesting. If this was an example of what Wards would look like, how they would function, how they were made… yeah, I was going to need a lot more examples.

Normally, I could extrapolate from incomplete data. I did not think that was going to be the case here until I had a much larger repository of knowledge. Frankly, I had no idea how fleshy brains had been able to create this work of art. In fact, it would not surprise me at all to learn that the Northmen had a captive or friendly dungeon that did the hard work for them.

As far as I could understand it, and using this lure as proof of concept, a Ward was a Runescript that contained a pattern. Then whatever pattern had been affixed to the Runes would have the intrinsic ability of the creature, usable as the creator saw fit. Seeing as how a pattern was used to create a creature an object from pure energy—such as a dungeon monster—it was highly unlikely that simple creatures like the humans below me could have unlocked the secrets needed to create this. This made my theory of a dungeon working with them far more plausible. What really scared me… as I studied the lure and chewed thoughtfully on the pattern… I realized why it was so effective.

This Ward was created using the energy pattern of a demonic creature, namely a succubus. The only reason I knew this was because I could now create a succubus—if I wanted to—with this information. There was only one reason I could think of that a dungeon would have access to this sort of information.

Somewhere below me was an infernal dungeon.

Chapter Thirteen

As I continued to take more of the crater wall as my own property, I decided more and more that I didn’t care if the Northmen were acting of their own free will. So, a dungeon gets control of a nation or two? Good for the dungeon! That’s an inspiration, not a detriment! Yeah! If I ever met this dungeon in person, I’d congratulate it as I tried to eat or take control of its area. Maybe I would even get my chance if I dug deep enough.

There was another benefit to getting this Ward. Now that I had the Runes that powered and directed the power of a succubus as well as the demon’s pattern, I could create a defense against it. I decided to slow down my influence spread and take a short while to design the needed protections. If I hit another lure as I was, I would once again eat it. Eventually, this would be noticed, and I would likely have a fight on my hands as the Northmen tried to stop me. I started to build my defense, selecting Runes that should specifically counter the lure. This was harder than it should have been since I needed to go through every single Rune I had and determine which would be the most effective.

This is one of the real issues that I faced with using Runes. Right then and there, I decided to start classifying all of them by type and give them a name. As it stood, Runes only had an effect listed. For instance, if I were to put a Runecrafted weapon with a fire effect out into my dungeon, it would be called a 'flaming sword' or some such nonsense. From now on, every new Rune combination would get a specific name, and I would save that for future use! Otherwise, I had to do everything by memory or remake it entirely.

Creating a new Runescript wasn't a huge issue, as I did have perfect memory. It was simply time-consuming and inefficient. Calling everything ‘Rune’, ‘Runescript’, or ‘series of Runes’ was also getting confusing. I put my new plan into action immediately, completing my anti-lure setup and keeping it in my mind as 'demonic attraction filter'. It was an excessively complicated schema, so I didn't feel too bad about the long-though-concise name. Besides, no one would be seeing it except for me. Actually implementing it was trickier, as it required me to filter my perception through a somewhat small circle. On the plus side, once I did get the hang of using it, I was far more confident about allowing my power to eat away at the crater wall.

Over the course of the next few hours, I was able to find three more of the Ward-shapes. I wasn't sure what the proper designation for them was, but Ward-shape seemed to fit fairly well. Each time I found one, I absorbed then replaced it. Within a few moments, it would be reactivated by the energy circling the crater. As far as I could tell, this was a minor drain on the Ward and should not be noticed. Using my new classification system, the Wards that I took were 'Allow Essence', 'Block Mana', and 'Repel Flesh'.

I was still looking for the protections against my flying dungeon. I needed to find and be able to disable them just in case I wanted to stage an invasion at some point. Another positive, since I had a defense against the lure—my Bobs and I were able to look directly at the Wards and plot a course that should maximize our efficiency. I had given Bob a task, and now my influence was flowing along the cliff face in a pattern I would not have expected. It was only thanks to his directions that we had found the three Wards that we had, and at our current pace, we should be able to collect a few extras before making it to the bottom of the crater.

Of course, though my attention was mostly on this, my mind was not as limited as a human such as Dale. I was also working on refining my monsters, traps, and rewards. Another part of my mind was working on classifying all of my Runes and putting existing setups into a different part of my mind. If this weren't enough, I was also begrudgingly working with The Master on his 'Masterpiece'. Personally, I thought it was quite narcissistic to name a contraption after yourself like that. Even though other people assured me ‘Masterpiece’ was common terminology, I knew he was calling it that for his own ego. He couldn't sneak one past me!

Now, in my own mind, I really wasn't doing too much with that project. The Master would submit a list of materials or various Runescripting that was necessary for his project. Diplomat Bob would take the list, get my attention, and take the Inscribed materials back to The Master when I had finished. Even without devoting my entire attention to that project, I was still able to complete it a million times faster than would have been possible without me. I should give myself more credit. I should actually call that non-inconsequential assistance.

After all, I ensured that my work was of the highest possible quality since I would eventually be directly benefiting from the possibly hundreds of thousands of people who would use the finished portal. That was worth more than considering myself as a minor assistant on this project! Still, I had better things to do and concerns that were more directly and immediately important to me.

For example, now that I had a lure Ward, I could work on fully reverse-engineering it and turning it into a zone of 'someone else’s problem'. The Elvish Embassy on my surface achieved this by Inscribing every single chunk of building material with a series of linked Runes. So wasteful. I had no idea how they were able to power that all day, every day, without some form of internal power source. Did that building house a dungeon…? No… probably not?

I eventually came up with a system of inverted taunt Runes linked by the connecting Runes of the original lure. It sounds simple, but making the connections sync up was the work of a master artist, carver, and philosopher all rolled into one. They did not want to play nice. The next step was testing it. A single Ward like this should project a bubble of power only a few feet in diameter, and since I did not have the massive linkages that must have been used in this crater, I was going to need to figure out a system on my own. Or I could steal the one that was currently in place down below, but I didn't think I had that kind of time.

I put a shining gold treasure chest on the first floor in a highly traversed area with the Ward placed on its lid. I supplied the initial power requirements, but I had upgraded the original Ward system with 'essence collection' Runes on the outer edge. They would only supply a trickle of power, but there would be almost no impact on the ambient Essence. There were only thirty seconds where people were not in the area, and in that time, I lifted the treasure chest out of the floor and into the selected spot. Then it was time to wait.

Dozens of parties walked past the brilliantly shining treasure chest, some of them even tripping and falling over it; I had placed it in the center of the room. This test run only continued until a Mage-led party entered the room. The cold, bored eyes of the Mage lit up when he saw the treasure chest. When no one else with him seemed to be excited, he grew confused and became worried that he was looking at an illusion. He went over and touched the treasure chest, throwing it open and destroying the Ward in the process.

The people with him were all students, and though they were excited to see the chest, they knew that they would not get anything out of it. The rules were you had to participate in gaining the loot to get any of it. For me, this highlighted the fact that Mages were far from simple creatures; it would take a greater amount of effort to trick them.

I replicated the setup of the chest on a lower level, this time using my powerful Mana to create the Ward. As soon as I applied this to the treasure chest, it exploded into a ball of fire and chaotic energy. Well. Ah. Hmm. Well. It seemed that I needed to upgrade the materials I was working with if I wanted them to handle the stress of the magical forces moving through them.

That was easy enough. I didn't need to alter the design of the chest too much, simply adding a small disk of diamond about the size of a person's hand to the lid. I placed the 'ignore me' Warding schema on the disk and tried again. This time, the setup was stable—even if only just barely.

If I tried to use my full power to create the Ward, it was likely that I would need to use more varied materials and likely a Core that could contain and distribute the power. Somehow, I was also going to need to find a way to enhance this to the point that people above my own rank would be impacted. This would require quite a bit of trial and error, research, and dangerous experimentation. At the same time, it was good to have hobbies to work on in the future.

Chapter Fourteen

I continued the expenditure of my influence deep into the night. The undamaged Moon—and the shattered Moon fragments—were all glowing brightly with reflected light, halfway through the night sky by the time I reached the bottom of the crater. I directed my mind along the path and began worming my Essence through the created path. I was straining to control all of the newly acquired land by the time I reached the center of the crater, thousands of feet down and across. Having so much land so far from my core without other factors in play made it difficult to keep everything stable.

I had expected to find some form of control mechanism where I had just touched. Instead, I found a Runescript that I immediately named 'Kinetic Dampener'. Apparently, it would create a force about one hundred feet above its activation that would slow things down gradually as they approached. Though interesting, it was not what I had been hoping for. I was starting to get frustrated; practically speaking, this crater was far too large for me to explore every bit of it with my influence. I didn't have the sort of forces needed to explore it in person with creatures… I decided instead to consolidate my control and decide from there.

As an outlet for my frustration, I disabled the kinetic dampener before moving on. Someone should splatter for this inconvenience, and I didn't particularly care who at this point. I moved my mind along the path of influence created overnight, following it to the first point where it began to get shaky. Then I dug my influence a little bit deeper into the stone, hollowed out a section, and installed a totem. This totem was a simple amplifier, similar to what I had used to destroy another dungeon back in the Amazonians' capital but far more refined. Which meant smaller, more compact, and harder to detect.

With a totem in place, my shaky control strengthened and solidified. I repeated this process as necessary, even boldly placing a totem a few feet underneath the center of the crater. Then since I had no way to explore the crater at large, I decided to go straight down and see what I found. Dig, dig, dig. Dirt, rock… empty space? I absorbed a section of the surface of the stone and created a tiny viewing Rune at the start of the empty area. When it was complete, I linked it to the viewing portal in the navigation room. What in the…?

There was a city down there! Did I find a Dwarven stronghold? What was this place? Under a layer of… let me see, one hundred and eight feet of stone, there was a city! I placed a totem just above the stone and decided to start extending my influence through the air. This was much more difficult than stone, as I needed to also spend an equal amount of Essence in order to maintain the influence in a bubble, but it would still be easier and more cost-effective than trying to get to a wall.

Ow. My influence rebounded painfully as I began moving downwards. Here it was—the dungeon I had been expecting to find. This place was not Dwarven made, nor was it made by hand. I had found the true secret of the Northmen, the fact that their entire society lived in a single, massive, dungeon. I couldn't wait to tell everyone! Wait, perhaps there was a better way. I 'tasted' the air, and just as expected, this was an infernal dungeon. There were hints of other forms of Essence, Mana, even an unquantifiable energy that must be Spiritual power. But the dungeon itself? It was in the Mage ranks. As far as I could tell, the lower A-ranks.

How? How did a dungeon that must have survived for so long and housed an entire nation, end up staying in the A-ranks? Then again, perhaps it was for the simple fact of the matter that it only had access to a single type of Essence. This would have been mitigated somewhat as it ascended into the Mage ranks, but it was extremely normal for even Mages who could move around to take hundreds or even thousands of years to ascend again. I did not exactly have it easy, but I had a great head start over most other beings. Even so, my speed of advancement had slowed to a crawl, and this dungeon outranked me. Drat.

Theoretically, I could fight against this place. It was possible that my maximum-tier Mana would allow me to fight above my rank. It was also possible that this place could crush me with overwhelming waves of Mana if I tried. I needed to take the middle ground and not in a 'territory claiming' way. This meant that I needed to get this dungeon’s attention.

I sent a burst of Mana along my stream of influence and slammed it against the dungeon’s territory three times, like someone knocking on a door. On the third knock, the power in the air for twenty feet around the 'knock' collapsed like a soap bubble and created a sound like thunder. Whoops.

Dale

“Get up, Tom,” Dale whispered into the suddenly-silent amphitheater. Tom had taken another body blow and was losing too much blood. He had fallen to the ground and was barely moving anymore. Tom must have found his thirtieth wind because he pushed against the floor and staggered upright. Flames danced across his open wounds, sealing the blood in his body and forming thick scar tissue. Normally, this was begging for infection and a slow death by sepsis, but if Tom survived this ‘trial’, he would be given healing by powerful clerics and healers.

The trial was ‘fair’, in that Tom’s opponents were only a little more powerful than he was. Only a rank or two, which meant that if there were ten of Tom against one of them, it might have been in his favor. Instead, there were ten people arrayed against Tom, and the only thing keeping him alive was his skill and his opponent’s hesitation to go all out against someone at a lower rank.

This was the only time Northman culture had been in Tom’s favor since they arrived, and Tom was making sure to capitalize on it by calling out challenges to an individual. The others would pause and step back while Tom battled. He had defeated two opponents this way over the course of the night, but now, he was barely able to hold himself together. The redhead stood as tall as he could and bellowed a pained war cry into the air. He raised his hammer, knowing that this was likely as far as his attempts to save his people would bring him.

As Tom took a step forward, the echoes of his shout still resounding in the area, all of his opponents—and indeed the entire population of Northmen—visibly cringed and clutched at their chests. Moments later, the sound of far-off thunder reached their ears. When the Northmen regained their bearings and glanced at the stage, sounds of shock and rage filled the room.

Tom was standing over the crumpled forms of the dozen men he had been facing and was now holding a hammer in each hand. His chest was heaving, and many of his wounds had reopened across his body. Tom coughed, and a spray of bright blood flecked his lips. “I… claim… victory.”

The proctor of the trial stepped forward, red-faced. “You can’t claim victory, you che–”

An explosion of fire and air knocked the proctor off his feet and sent him sprawling to the floor. He looked up to see Hans’ eyes glittering nearly as dangerously as the knives at his jugulars. Hans spoke softly, but his words were audible to the entire room and anyone viewing from afar.

“Oh, please inform me how my student cheated. I would love to hear how using the environment to your advantage in warfare against a much stronger group of enemies is cheating. It’s just, I really hope I like your answer.” Hans was wearing a faint smile, and no one dared to move. The proctor’s throat was bobbing furiously as he alternated between rage and caution.

A door slammed open, nearly causing Hans to flinch and open the throat held hostage under his daggers. The Warlord stalked into the room, taking in the scene and dismissing it. “Tom. Did you have anything to do with that thunder?”

“Sir. No, sir.” Tom was swaying on his feet.

The Warlord stared at him for a few more moments, then glanced at the fallen people, finally rolling his eyes at the scene Hans was making. “Tom, you are cleared for duty, having proven that your instincts do not control you. You are to report for basic training at three bells. Any questions?”

“No. Sir.” Tom took a deep breath. “But I do have a request, sir.”

The room went deadly still, and the air seemed to thicken. The Warlord narrowed his eyes. “Is. That. So?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Oh, by all means, make your request.”

“I would like to issue a challenge to General Beinn for his position. My old position.” Tom could no longer remain standing and collapsed to the floor.

“I offer a duel. Uno Ictu.”

Chapter Fifteen

“By one stroke, eh?” The Warlord shook his head firmly. “You realize that as the challenged, Beinn strikes first?”

“Yes, sir.” Tom’s voice was fading.

“Medic! Keep him awake.” The Warlord strode closer and leaned down even as the healer started working on Tom. “When?”

“As soon as he can get here and I am functional enough for combat,” Tom spoke slightly more firmly, the color beginning to return to his cheeks as the magic replaced his leaking blood.

“Hmph.” The Warlord stood tall and looked at a Rune on the wall. “You heard him, Beinn. Get down here. A challenge in front of the nation cannot stand unresolved. Foolish little brother.”

The last words had been directed at Tom, who simply smiled slightly at the massive warrior. “Sir… it’s good to be part of The People again. I thank you for the chance.”

“It was the law.” The Warlord shook his head. “You know as well as I did that you were supposed to die in this challenge. I also know that the Binders weren’t especially gentle.”

“Life isn’t gentle.” Tom coughed a ball of phlegm and blood out. “It is good to be one of The People. It is good to face the world. It is good to see the truth.”

“Private, reign in your tongue,” the Warlord chided more gently than he had spoken to Tom in the last day. “I will call this blood-loss rambling, but any more will be insubordination. Just sit there, shut your mouth, and be healed. And you, get off my soldier.”

Hans plastered an innocent expression on his face and vanished in a flash of heat. Dale was able to track his movements, but anyone under the Mage ranks lost sight of him completely. In a moment, he was back in his seat with an arm around Rose. “Yes, sir!”

The Warlord rolled his eyes and started impatiently tapping his foot. Another door opened, and Tom’s belongings were unceremoniously dropped by his side. The courier saluted the Warlord, gave an almost imperceptible shake of his head, and ran off. The massive Northman sighed and leaned in to talk to Tom, but Dale’s sharp ears could hear the whispers nonetheless.

“Fool, the only magic in your armor is a cleaning spell. If I know that, Beinn knows that by now. He’s going to cut you in half with contemptuous ease. Apologize to him as he arrives, kowtow if needed. I’ll blame the strikes to your head and blood loss, and you might live to see the rising sun.” The Warlord’s words were an order, but one that Tom couldn’t follow.

The main stone door slammed open, cracking into the wall with a sharp snap. “I am here to accept the challenge and welcome the opportunity to finish what was once between us, private.”

“General Beinn.” Tom stood under his own power and began to put on his leather armor. “Do you accept the terms of the duel and swear on your honor to abide by the outcome?”

“If the terms are a single attack each, with the Warlord determining the victor if both survive, then yes.” Beinn walked slowly down the main aisle, smiling as he drew a long katana out of an interspatial bag. Beinn looked to be in his late twenties, similar to Tom, but was far more muscular and obviously well trained and equipped. He had long, black hair pulled into a tight bun, and his severe hairstyle accentuated his cold, brown eyes.

Unlike the bulky armor others were wearing, Beinn was wearing almost thin armor. Tom recognized it as the base armor that Northman War armor would fit on to and realized that Beinn wasn’t taking this duel seriously. Beinn must have had an informant tell him about the results of Tom’s leather armor being scanned for magic as the Warlord had warned him.

Cough.

The two duelists tore their burning glares away from each other and looked at the Warlord. “Tom. Do you have anything to say?”

“No, sir.”

“Oh, you little–” The Warlord snarled and shook his head sadly. “Stand apart. This is Uno Ictu, and as such, only one blow will be exchanged. This is a test of your weapons and ability, not collateral damage. If either of you are hit hard enough that you will impact a wall, you will be caught gently. As the challenged… Beinn is allowed to strike first. Live by your honor… “

“Die by your honor,” the rest of the room, except for Hans, echoed with the saying. Hans made a rude gesture at Beinn.

The duelists faced each other, both in a ready stance. Beinn allowed his lips to curl upward, and his malice-filled eyes took in Tom’s much smaller form. “So much less than you used to be, private Tom. It took a few years, but I finally have a chance to earn my position instead of getting promoted to it. Even if you are lesser, I am glad to finally have this worry behind me.”

“We’ll have time to catch up later, General.” Tom’s lips barely moved as he braced himself.

“Oh… but we won’t, will we?” Beinn gripped his sword handle in one hand and its sheath in the other. For a tense moment, they simply stared at each other… and then a crescent of silver flashed through the air. Dale watched almost in slow-motion as the blade was drawn, slashed Tom across his midsection, and was resheathed. Beinn stood tall as the force of the attack seemed to transfer to Tom, and his smug face slowly registered shock as Tom began flying away.

The Warlord was suddenly behind Tom, and the young man was pulled out of the air and returned to his starting position. He coughed a painful, chest-wracking cough. Three of his ribs were broken on his right side, and his lung was punctured by one of the fragments. Still, terrified confusion was the only emotion present on Beinn’s face. In the entire room, there were only four people unsurprised by Tom still being alive.

“B-but… how?” Beinn’s sword appeared in his hand, and he inspected the edge to see if he had been sabotaged. “You aren’t wearing magical protections, and my sword is intact… Are you disguising your cultivation?”

Tom’s massive warhammer came out of his bag and broke the stone where it landed. “My turn.”

He gripped the handle of his warhammer with both hands and swung as hard as his critically-injured body could manage… and Beinn dodged. Tom couldn’t fully control his swing anymore, and his warhammer continued on and struck a stone protrusion, reducing it to powder. Tom looked at his opponent in confusion. “…What?”

The Warlord had Beinn in an iron grip and was holding him in the air by his neck. “Did you just dodge a blow during Uno Ictu? A blow by a lower-ranked cultivator? A private?”

“He couldn’t have possibly survived my attack!” Beinn choked out, trying to pry the thick fingers from his windpipe. “Someone… saved… him.”

Tom stepped forward and pulled apart the flap in his armor that the super sharp katana had created. Gleaming, silver-purple metal shone through. “Mithril weave. My own preparations are what saved me.”

“Cowardice is what saved you, Beinn.” The Warlord threw the man to the ground. “That blow would have killed you, and you knew it. Someone told you all the capabilities of General Tom’s armor and weapons, or they thought they did. You came here full of arrogance, not even bothering to wear your full armor. Report to basic training at three bells, private. Dismissed.”

Tom’s face was a rictus of conflicting emotions. “Sir… did you call me General Tom?”

“I did, and speak freely.” The Warlord allowed a grin to play over his face. “Generals are able to converse with the Warlord without issue, after all.”

Dale was watching Beinn, expecting foul play when the man didn’t get to his feet right away. To his surprise, Beinn stood and marched out with a depressed but resigned look. What was going on with this society?

“I suppose you didn’t come here without a plan of action. Something drove you here.” The Warlord tapped the armor on his hip. “Is this more of a private conversation or something to announce to the nation.”

“I… both. Sir.” Tom looked down, then up, face full of determination. “Sir, I must speak to you first.”

“Then let us speak.” The Warlord put a hand on Tom’s shoulder and directed him away from the room. “Privately, then we will return what was taken from you. Then we will address The People once more. We have missed you… Brother.”

Chapter Sixteen

Well, no one panicked, and there didn’t appear to be people swarming out to fight me. Maybe the dungeon recognized that I wasn’t trying to be hostile? I extended a tendril of influence once more, just to see what would happen. Would I be attacked? Would we be able to chat? I was not expecting the influence in the area to flinch and run away.

<Hey! I'm just trying to talk to you!> I mentally shouted into the area so far below me. I had a moment of deja vu, and I wondered if Kantor had ever been frustrated in his attempts to reach out and discuss with others of his kind. Perhaps he had, but I kind of assumed that he would have destroyed anyone who ignored him. Maybe that is what this dungeon was worried about; maybe it knew that being an infernal dungeon was a death sentence from the outside world.

Seconds ticked by, and finally, a reply came. The voice was smooth, charismatic, reminding me of oily politicians and the now-devoured merchant that had been scamming people on my surface. <Why, hello there! I can't say I have ever had the pleasure of speaking with a friendly being such as yourself! All I have ever seen of our kind is raving animals or some form of weaponized, overly judgmental crusader.>

<That is unsurprising. Everything I have learned points toward our type not gaining intelligence until they are truly ancient.> Small talk! I was making small talk with another dungeon! The Dungeon Core, Dregs—who I had captured and placed in charge of my first few levels—and I spoke a little, but holding a conversation was beyond the magma Core.

I quickly put my excitement aside and got down to business. <Listen, we are here because one of the moons that circles our planet was destroyed and is falling to the Earth. We are trying to save as many people as we can, and to me, that means any intelligent being. Do you have an exit strategy or a way to survive the oncoming calamity? I can take you with me if you like.>

<I have heard about this. Sounds terrible. Well, my plan is to ride it out and absorb all of the death energy that I'm certain will be permeating the planet at that point.> The dungeon quieted at that point, obviously expecting me to say something chiding, or maybe it was just feeling out my reaction for the next thing it said. <If I gain enough power, I may even be able to create a stable portal to the abyss!>

<And… what about all of the Northmen living in your depths? Are they dungeon born, and you can raise them after they are wiped out?> Please say yes, please say yes…

<None of them! They all have a simple binding that makes them malleable to my will, but I found that simply letting them control their own fate brought me a higher return on Essence and Mana than if I had been trying to use them directly. My experiment on them was coming to an end either way. At this point, they have become too stable, and I would have needed to clean the rats out of my tunnels.> The dungeon seemed very pleased that I was seemingly unconcerned. <The fragments of the Moon will simply help me to make that happen with minimal risk to myself!>

I did not think it would be so easy, and frankly, I did not think this place would survive the moonfall. Even if it did, there would be so much disruption to the ambient Essence that this place would probably starve to death. I had originally planned on offering asylum, but its goal of opening a stable portal to the abyss was a deal-breaker for me. Still, perhaps it would be a good idea to offer a negotiation.

<Best of luck to you!> I replied as winningly as possible. <I'm going to be moving away from this area shortly, and I was wondering if you would be interested in an exchange of knowledge before I went?>

The dungeon seemed to relax; apparently, it thought that it would have an edge in making deals. Actually, I decided to be extra careful. This was a being that was likely used to making extremely complicated deals with entities that would destroy it. <I suppose we can arrange a little something. What do you have to trade?>

<First let's talk about what I'm hoping to gain!> If I could sweat, I would be right now. I flipped its opening tactic against it, trying to avoid giving away information for free and decided to be as direct as possible. <I've gained access to a few of your Ward designs, and I really like what I see. Seeing as how I am building up as many defenses for myself as possible, I would be remiss in not attempting to supplement them with these ingenious creations.>

<Ah, direct flattery!> The Infernal dungeon chuckled. <I can see why the rodents infesting my area like it so much! As I'm sure you can understand, my Warding system is the work of several hundred years. Truly, it is my greatest achievement! How could I possibly allow myself to trade it away?>

I groaned internally; he was obviously trying to artificially increase his price. That was the point where negotiations began in earnest. Tiny bit by tiny bit, we created a deal. The dungeon would give me a significant amount of Ward schemas, and I would supplement its knowledge of Runes. My knowledge of Runes was only as extensive as it was because the town where Runes had been researched, collected, and stored had been demolished and its people had moved to live on me. A deal had given me the full collection of the Spotter's work in book form, and I was making full use of this knowledge now.

Of course, the Northmen and dungeon in conjunction had a vast repository of Runes as well. This meant that I had to supplement my offer. I eventually added samples of plants, traps, some experiments I had been working on, knowledge of Elementals and how to make them, and each of the most efficient materials for various basic elements.

I knew that I was being taken for a ride, but I had a few more things I was planning on getting out of this infernal negotiator. Before we finalized our deal, I put my plan into play. <Now, before I hand any of this over, let us both swear on our Mana that we will act in good faith during this exchange. I will give you everything I promised; you will give me everything you promised. I will leave and take no action against you. You will not send anything—or anyone—to attack or work against me.>

My trading partner was silent long enough that I was very glad I included this addendum. Then it pretended that it had not had any malicious intent whatsoever and joyfully agreed, <Of course! I so swear, on the condition that you will as well.>

I also made the oath and could feel the tightening in my Core that signified a binding oath. We exchanged all of our promised knowledge and goods, and I casually slipped a little more into the conversation, <Before I go, I just wanted to mention that I have an interest in taking the barbarians infesting your depths when I go. I know that you mentioned that they were not yours to control perfectly, but if you were to swear that you would push them my direction if they were considering it… I might have one more thing you would be interested in.>

Distraction was evident in its voice, as it must have been perusing what I had given it. <Is that so? So far, I am not disappointed, but what else could you have that would–>

I sent along a few images of Manny the Manticore. A few of it fighting adventurers and a few where it was using the spikes on its body to banish demons. I assumed that this was a dungeon driven primarily by fear, and it would be open to the idea of having a Boss monster protecting it against the things it summoned getting out of control. <This is a creature that I made, an amalgamation of multiple patterns, talents, and oh-so-much trial and error. There is nothing natural like it on the planet, and it is currently absolutely unique.>

The bait was presented, so I silently waited for it to be taken. It didn't take long. <All you want in return is a promise that I will nudge the Northman into your depths if they are on the fence about it? I suppose I could do that…>

The dungeon made its oath to me, and it took everything I had to hide my glee. I sent along the detailed instructions on how to create a Manticore, exchanged a few more pleasantries, then followed my oath and started retracting my influence. I giggled to myself. <Goodbye forever, sucker.>

Devoting only a small fraction of myself to reeling in my power, I sent the majority of my attention to parsing and cataloging all of the new magical effects I now had access to. As much as it seemed that I had been scammed, it was obvious that over the years, the infernal dungeon had forgotten what was at the center of all of its Warding schema. Namely, the full pattern for whatever creature ability was powering the Ward.

I love two for one specials, and now, I had a lot of research to complete.

Chapter Seventeen

The Warlord stood stock-still, staring at his supposedly subservient sibling. He shook his head back and forth slowly, unable to believe the words that were about to come out of his mouth. “Tom, moments ago I had planned to rebuke you. I had planned to have you returned to your position and prepare for the greatest Glory along with our entire nation.”

Tom sharply inhaled and made as if to speak. Only the Warlord holding up a hand stopped him. “Something has changed. In my mind, I knew that you were correct. Your way forward is valid. Still, our traditions and laws are in place for a reason, and I was going to deny you. But now, now… I feel the will of The People pressing me to accept your words. I do not know why it favors you so highly, so much as to even intervene when you should have died during your trials, but it is clear what we must do.”

“But, before we address the nation…” the Warlord opened his desk and pulled out a single, shining Core, “you have returned, and you have earned your place amongst us once more. It is my duty and my pleasure to return to you what was taken upon your exile.”

Tom stared at the red-tinged Core on the desk and, with trembling fingers, reached forward and reverently grasped it. He wiped a manly tear from his eye, removed his upper-body armor, then tore his borrowed shirt off as he moved the object toward his chest. The trace work of a Rune began to appear, shining on his chest. Tom pressed the Core into the only open space of the luminescent tattoo and stiffened as energy began to course through him.

More than the flood of Essence, greater than the return of the Northman Royal cultivation techniques, Tom basked in the details of his childhood returning. When he had been exiled, all information not pertaining to his direct chain of command had been stripped away. Many of the events remained in his mind, but all of the fine details, all of the emotions, and especially all of the joy had been taken. Only certain key memories, such as his mother, had been left to preserve his mind. With their return, Tom began to undergo a radical shift.

The previously well-muscled and impressive figure began to swell. His muscles bulged outwards, his bones lengthened and became denser, and it was obvious by the new clarity in his gaze that his intelligence had been increased. Tom's body was now on par for size and musculature to match the Warlord himself.

Tom's cultivation spiral was shattered and used as fuel to rebuild a better version in an instant—his long-ago original. More and more Essence began to flow into him and was bound by the spiral. Just under ten minutes later, Tom was restored to his previous glory—body, mind, and cultivation.

“Looks like I’ll need to get my armor adjusted.” Tom looked down at the previously-baggy leather pants that were now straining to contain his thick legs. It looked like he was wearing children’s leggings. Then his fiery gaze snapped up to the Warlord. “Sir. It’s good to be back.”

“Welcome, General.” The Warlord’s tone had shifted, and respect now suffused his voice. “The People have missed you.”

“As I have missed The People.” Tom moved his arm, marveling at the motion. His cultivation had been fully absorbed, and he was currently at C-rank-five. “I feel like Beinn has let the D-ranked armies rest on their laurels while I’ve been away. How bad is it?”

“The quality of our weakest army has suffered somewhat,” the Warlord admitted freely. “You were the best trainer in two-handed weapons that we had seen in generations. For abyss-sake, even without that memory, you came back here with a weapon practically humming with power and perfectly suited to your old style. It is a part of you that we could not seem to take.”

Tom smiled viciously. “I do wonder what it will be like to wield ‘Thud’, now that I remember the proper way to do it.”

“You always did have a terrible naming sense.” The Warlord chuckled, slapping an arm around his brother and guiding him toward the exit. “Let’s go address the nation.”

They walked back to the amphitheater at a pace easily double their first trip. Tom kept his eyes on the space he expected to see his team and allowed a wide grin to run across his face when he saw their reactions. There was delight and interest showing on Dale’s face, surprise and sizing up from Rose, and finally, shock and outrage from Hans.

“Are you kidding me?” Hans stood and shouted into the silent room. “Is everyone I know able to jump ranks like this? Have I just been held in the dark and there’s an easy way to ascend? Am I a joke to you?”

Dale grabbed Hans and pulled him down into his seat, fixing Tom with a penetrating stare. “Easy, Hans. I’m sure we’ll all hear the reason for this later.”

“My People!” The Warlord was standing on the blood-soaked stage and bellowing into the air. “A new path forward has been exposed! A new hope for our survival and continued prosperity. We are going to throw our might—and our magic—behind the creation of a portal to a new land!”

Silence filled the room, only the reverberations of the Warlord’s voice still being heard. Then another man stepped on to the stage. The Warlord glared at him, his hands falling to his sides. “General Aiden, what is the meaning of this?”

“Sir, I am concerned that you are suggesting that we flee,” Aiden spoke the last words bitterly. “By law, we cannot run from our nation’s issues.”

“Feel for the will of The People, Aiden,” the Warlord stated calmly. He looked around at everyone gathered. “All of you, feel for the will of The People. This is the correct course for all of us, and it is going to be the path we tread.”

Aiden saluted and stepped off the stage. The Warlord had an annoyed expression on now, but he continued explaining the plans he had made. Finally, he began issuing orders to be carried out at once. When he was finished, he came to talk with Tom and the Outsiders. “You four, can you secure a portal from your floating base for our use? If we have to follow you across the world, we will not be of much use.”

“It should be manageable.” Dale nodded at the Warlord, and they were given permission to go back up and begin working to accommodate the Northmen.

Turning toward Tom, the Warlord harrumphed. “I know that you have only just returned, but would you be willing to work as our go-between? It would be helpful for the people above to see a familiar face, and you can resume your duties after we survive this… inconvenience.”

Tom paused only for a moment but relaxed when he saw that he wasn’t being set aside and this was a true issue. “I see. Would I have permission to bring my war armor along?”

“Everything that isn’t attached to the ground by indelible magic is going, Tom. Bring whatever you want.” The Warlord stopped and turned away. “Since… since we are going to be donating everything to the dungeon in return for a new home, I lift the restriction on all of you. You will be able to explain whatever you need in order to secure a powerful position for us.”

“I will do my best.” Tom slumped a little; he had been looking forward to seeing old friends and visiting family.

Hans reached over, patting the huge man on his upper back even though he practically needed to jump to do so. “Don’t worry, Tom. You’ll have plenty of time to visit, make new friends, and tell me how the abyss you jumped in rank!”

The people around him laughed, and Hans started to twitch. “I knew it! There’s a conspiracy to make me the world’s slowest cultivator! I’m–”

Hans had his knives in his hands and took a menacing step toward Tom, but Dale had decided to intervene and whacked the assassin in the back of the head. Dale lifted the unconscious man and started walking back the way they had entered. “So, how do we get back up?”

“I can bring us to the surface, and all Outsiders can take the lift from there.” Tom started walking away, leaving his friends to follow. Now that he had his memories back, he was starting to return to the mentality of his previous life. There was an air of command about him, and he seemed to expect that the others would listen without question. As they walked, Tom stopped a squire and ordered him to meet them at the lifts with his armor. In fact, several times through their journey he stopped other people and ordered them to bring him goods.

“Going a little power-mad, Tom ol’ buddy?” Hans poked Tom with a finger from his princess-carry position in Dale's arms. When that didn’t get a reaction, he did it with his dagger.

Tom winced and flinched away, then turned and glared at his mentor. "Weren't you supposed to be unconscious?"

Hans held up a hand. “Seems like you’re getting back to old habits. I’m just gonna go ahead and remind you that your old habits got you exiled. Your new habits and friends got you back into a certain position you are already apparently abusing.”

Tom’s mouth clicked shut, and he could only nod wearily. “Fair point, Hans. It’s just… I have decades of conflicting information in my head now. For abyss sake! I didn’t even know that I was in my late sixties. I thought I was in my mid-to-late twenties at most.”

“Wait, what?” Hans’ grin lit up the room. It must have been a trick of fire Essence. “You’re older than me? Yes!”

Chapter Eighteen

I was losing my mind over all the new effects I could create with Wards. In fact, I was planning on designing an entirely new floor based around the Wards. Essentially, I was going to make a series of connected rooms that were a skills test. Normally, this was not something that would be dangerous; after all, a skills test is a way to improve yourself! Not my skills tests, though. If the person trying to get to me were unskilled, they would likely explode.

I had been debating on where to place this new trial. After all, it would be easy enough to put it between different areas that already existed. After careful experimentation, I decided that while I might use some of my new Warding schema throughout the dungeon, an effect overlooked by the infernal dungeon. I thought it was deserving of its own floor.

It was a simple concept; whenever a Mage entered the room, they would need to destroy an object in an area they could not physically access. I was thinking the target might be through a small tunnel or something. They would also need to put Mana into a Core the same distance away. It did not have to happen simultaneously, but I assumed a lot of people would think that it would need to happen that way.

The reason this would be difficult would be the style of Warding in the rooms. I would make five rooms on this floor, and to progress to the next in the series, you would have to complete them in order. The Wards would be designed to increase the flow of Mana and Essence in an area. If a technique was executed flawlessly, there would be no leakage of Mana or Essence. Unfortunately for most Mages, they did not bother to perfect their techniques, focusing on learning to push out more power rather than getting good at what they did. Typically, they would simply flood the spell form they were attempting with power, knowing that it would do what they wanted it to do in the end.

I planned to take advantage of their laziness by doing nothing except making the power draw increase by double in each room. Since there were only five rooms, the maximum I could get away with was increasing the cost of a technique or incantation by thirty-two. Even so, I could increase the strength and power requirements of the object they needed to destroy as well as the object they needed to fill with Mana.

I started designing the rooms, and my hopes to create a new floor entirely were dashed. I could only make the rooms so big before the Wards would not affect them entirely. If I wanted to concentrate the power requirements, the largest I could make the room was a perfect square about ten feet wide. I was not going to waste an entire floor on five tiny rooms! Instead, the rooms were added to the bottom of the Elemental Pit.

People who made it to the base of the pit could exit the dungeon immediately or go into the skill rooms. Of course, I moved myself and the Silverwood tree to the end of the rooms, so now anyone who wanted to get to me needed to not only be vastly powerful but extraordinary skilled! Or simply powerful enough to make up for their lack of skill. Or an S-ranker who could essentially ignore my setup. Or… yeah, there were potentially a lot of people that could just come to see me. I really needed to find a way to defend against the S-ranks.

I shook off the morose thought, returning to the fun I was having creating this next trap. I mean… skill room. Heh. I was fairly certain that these five rooms would account for more Mages dying than any other portion of the entire dungeon combined. When they tried to shatter the target I was going to make, the Wards would siphon off any Mana that was not perfectly controlled, causing the Mages to increase the amount of power flowing through them, which would be siphoned off… pop goes the Magous!

Conversely, this would be an excellent place for a Mage to perfect their abilities. If they could make it through all five rooms, whatever ability they were using to make it happen should be completely mastered. This would allow for incredible power and personal growth. Or they would be hasty, and I would see if they were tasty. Was that a poem? Can I call that a poem? Whatever, I am the dungeon Core! I can call it a poem if I want, and no one but Dani can stop me! Since she’s been busy training Grace, I have free reign! Mwa-ha-hah!

I had created the five rooms, but I had only completed the Warding in the first two before I felt my control fluctuate. Drat, there must be adventurers stepping on to this floor. Creating anything permanently magical—such as Runes or Wards—was a task that demanded perfection. I had learned my lesson on this long ago, so I stopped what I was doing and waited for the challengers to make themselves known. I took a look at the adventuring group and found myself slightly shocked. The lowest ranked person in this group was in the upper B-ranks. There were even two people in the early A-ranks, and all of them seem to be taking this floor extremely seriously.

The group waded through the Elementals, their movements efficient and refined. Not every strike was a deathblow since the condensed Mana bodies of the Elementals allowed them to be extremely resilient. Still, this group of people outclassed the Mobs by a large degree. Luckily for me, their progress slowed greatly when they came across the first of the Runeforged Elementals.

This one was an Elemental that had taken to defeating opponents and attaching their Cores to itself. It looked like a series of balls that were barely touching each other, and all of the Cores could be launched to allow the original Elemental to create itself once more. I called this a Hive Elemental, and I had Runeforged the controlling Elemental upon the principles I had learned watching the Love Elemental take over the Boss at the bottom of the pit. When this creature was in control of all of the Cores, its power was boosted by a varied percentage.

It could sacrifice that bonus to create a small—if uncontrollable—army to do battle. If these adventurers had not appeared, I had fully expected that this would soon be the floor Boss. It had collected a large amount of power and Cores, and it began using them to great effect. Three Rune-enhanced effects began: a powerful taunt, a swirl of crystalline shards, and an insidious Aura of rot.

The Mages who were able to resist the taunt did their best to assess the greatest threat that was coming from the Elemental and started throwing Mana around. They were targeting the spheres that seemed to be creating the potent effects, but the Elemental used the rotational motion it followed to swing the spheres out of the way and to dodge at angles that were entirely unnatural.

A saw blade of crystals cut into a Mage as he lashed out at close range, but the Mage only took a shallow cut. He tried to ignore it, but the Aura of rot set in instantly and the wound began to fester. Since this was an unnatural occurrence, and the rot wasn’t a weak variation of tiny creatures, black lines started to race up his arm. His teammate noticed the issue even if the taunted Mage didn’t and tossed his partner behind him

The A-ranker swept forward, crossing the distance in a series of forty-five-degree angled movements. Her elbow came down on the orb controlling the taunt effect, and the Elemental connected to the hive-mind popped as if it were a soap bubble.

Another orb came around, revealing itself to be an explosive Elemental by detonating in her face and sending her flipping toward the edge of the chasm. She got herself under control and forced her feet to the floor only a few feet from the edge. She flipped her singed hair out of her face and glared at the creature blocking their path. “Alrighty, now you’re more than just an obstacle. Die.”

One of the other Mages appeared behind the hive mind, holding up his hands and starting an incantation, “Omae wa Mou Shindeiru.”

Just as his Mana started to churn out of him, the hive mind proved that being able to see in only one direction at a time was a poor evolutionary decision. A cone of corrupted water slammed into the Mage and bound him to the wall with an unbelievably sticky solution. It raced toward the struggling Mage but was intercepted by a massive plane of force slamming it to the ground as the second A-ranker finally used one of his more potent abilities.

Since it was held in place, the female A-ranker dove at it and started smashing the Cores until she finally found the controller, and the others all tried to escape. It seemed that my Hive Elemental was too young to survive such a competent group, and I was really beating myself up about not giving this one more time to mature. Next time for sure.

Chapter Nineteen

The female A-ranker stepped forward and picked up the Core of the hive-mind, seeming to be shocked at what she saw. “This has a mind Rune Inscribed on it! Do you think that was how it was controlling the others? Or is there something more sinister at play?”

“We already know that the dungeon has near-human intelligence. Why is it so surprising that it can come up with new, more powerful monsters?” her opposite drawled. I suppose he was correct if by 'near-human intelligence' he meant far, far smarter than a human. “This does not change our goal at all, and we should be able to secure the necessary resources with a few passes through this floor. Let's get back to work.”

They collected every Core they found, everything they considered a potential resource, although they did their best to avoid large groups of Elementals. When they got to the ramp, they started descending into the pit, and I was able to watch my newest traps in action! When the first of them triggered the moving walls, the rest of them groaned in annoyance. I laughed at that; in fact, the only thing I like better than annoying someone with traps was hearing them groan from a bad pun. That’s how you knew that a pun was mature, after all—when it was full groan.

“Alright, looks like they are at least moving in sequence.” The male A-ranker looked at his team and rolled his eyes. “Just make sure not to get knocked off. If our information was correct, even we would not survive the fall.”

“Which is just the weirdest thing!” a high B-ranked, female Elf grumbled. “I haven't taken damage from falling in two hundred years. I just can't seem to wrap my mind around a fall being dangerous, you know?”

“Right?” The third person in line laughed. “I'm guessing it has something to do with all of that connected Runescript around this inverted-tornado of a pit?”

“You know as much as we do.” The female A-ranker shrugged and moved ahead. “Let's get going. You never know if something is going to jump over the edge of the pit.”

I stopped an Elemental just before it was going to jump over the edge of the pit at them; that would have been too cliché. Every two or three seconds, the walls would shift, and the group would be separated from each other. I kept attempting to activate traps, but this was a group of serious dungeon crawling professionals. If the floor dropped out from under them, they braced themselves against the very walls that were supposed to ensure their doom. Three times, an explosive Elemental popped out into the small area they were trapped in and was chucked into the center of the pit before it could self-detonate.

In fact, they were so efficient and effective that I did not want my newly upgraded Boss's trial run to be against them. I opened a small trap door, and the Boss sunk into the floor. To compensate, I added a slightly larger treasure chest to the room with several tokens in it that should easily distract them. They cleared the entire ramp down to the base, and though they were struggling with the increased gravity, they hadn't passed through it fast enough to cause them harm.

Seeing that there was a follow-up room, they became excited and elated instead of confused and concerned as I had hoped they would. One of the Mages spoke, giving me an 'aha' moment, “The information we had about this floor is wrong! We must be the first ones to see this change!”

As a group, they passed into the next room. The door shut behind them but did not lock, since I didn’t think that would be fair. If the only way to escape was to master or at least greatly improve an ability, leaving no way to retreat would result in unfair deaths. Also, I had flat-out written instructions on how to pass to the next room, so there should be no confusion as to how to get through here.

I didn't explain that the Mana cost would be doubled in this room, but I was sure they would figure that out very quickly. One of the B-ranked Mages stepped forward and sent a vibration-based attack at the crystal sculpture they needed to break. He was successful and shattered the object on his first try. I was pleased with the outcome as well since I had been able to absorb a huge wave of siphoned Mana.

The Mage grunted and sank to one knee, breathing heavily. “Celestial feces, that really took it out of me! Not sure what just happened, but I couldn't stop channeling Mana into that technique. It wasn't deadly, but I sure wasn't expecting that! It took… at least triple the amount of Mana I had thought I would be investing.”

“That’s strange… Let me try meeting this second requirement.” The male A-ranker looked over at the Core that was waiting to be charged with Mana and sent a stream of power toward it. His diffuse Mana rolled off him, and in a few seconds, his face tightened in pain and his fingers began to smoke. He squinted his eyes, tightening his Mana into a controlled thread. The Core was soon full of power, and the door to the next room popped open.

“Abyss, that hurt!” The A-ranker shook his hand, then poured a flask of water over it. The water turned to steam upon contact, and the eyes of the onlookers widened in concern. “If I didn’t put a leash on my Mana and carefully control it into the Core, the room sucked the Mana out of me! How is this possible? This is a level of sophistication I haven’t seen anywhere in this dungeon before now!”

“Then it must be new.” The female A-ranker looked into the next room and narrowed her eyes when she saw an identical setup. “Who here has the best control?”

No one said anything for a long moment. Then the lowest B-ranked man stepped forward reluctantly. “I spent ten years longer in the C-ranks than any of you, but that was because I had pretty dense corruption. I needed to develop my Essence control really well to break into the B-ranks… so I’m likely to be the choice for this task.”

Any further discussion was interrupted as a treasure chest flipped out of the wall. The sudden movement of the wall opening up startled the Mages so much that they attacked it, even though the two High Magous shouted at them to stop. The room began to hum with power, and the stone floors were vibrating as the Mages tried to rein in their power.

Two of them managed to stop themselves, but the last one panicked. His body began to glow as more and more Mana was channeled, but before he could detonate, the A-ranked female tackled him and pulled him out of the room.

The Mage fell unconscious from pain arriving from multiple sources—the backlash of the draining Wards hitting him as well as his body over-channeling Mana and nearly burning out. The others didn’t mind carrying him along, so when they felt it was safe to return to the skill area, they dragged him back into the room—mainly so an Elemental didn’t get a free snack. The male A-ranker nodded at his partner and addressed the group.

“New rule: no Mana, physical attacks only unless necessary to face these challenges.”

The treasure chest was long since melted to slag, and everything in it had been similarly destroyed. A plane of energy ran down one wall, and a one-way portal appeared. One of the Mages sighed. “Should we head out or try the next room?”

“The first one nearly got us, and if we want to come back here, we are going to need to clear the entire Pit again. We can try the next room, but we are using extreme caution.” The female sent these orders, and I was confused about who the party leader was. Or… maybe the two top-ranked people simply shared the responsibilities? That seemed like a power struggle waiting to happen. I wonder if I could make it happen sooner…?

Chapter Twenty

The group of powerhouses moved into the next room, and the portal in the first fizzled out. If they wanted to leave now, they would need to either complete this skill room or climb out of the Elemental Pit. This time, they started their skill test with attempting to fill the Core. The male A-ranker focused his Mana into the tip of his finger and sent it spinning as a double helix to the dull gem. In a few moments, the Core was glowing a potent and beautiful cherry-red, and the High Magous stopped.

“Whew!” He wiped imagined sweat from his brow. “That’s really tough, but I actually think it’s helping me control myself better. I sure wish this was somewhere easier to access, but it makes sense that the hardest challenge yet is right at the end. Filling that Core is like trying to walk through those gravity Runes but with your mind!”

I enjoyed the comparison and watched excitedly as the ‘well-controlled’ Mage sent an ability at the diamond target that needed to be destroyed. He really took his time, and there was hardly any Mana wasted as he threw out his assault… which bounced off the target and into the wall. “Drat, that sucker is pretty tough.”

“Think you can break it with a different attack, or do we need to give it a try?” The female put a stabilizing hand on the Mage, who shook his head.

“Thanks, Anna, but I want to try again.” One of them finally said a name out loud! I was getting sick of thinking of them as person number one, two, and so on.

Anna nodded and gestured for him to continue when ready. The Mage took a deep breath and began focusing intently. Just as he started releasing his Mana in a condensed spellform, I let a treasure chest pop out of the wall and slam on to the stone. The sudden noise from an unexpected direction distracted him just enough to introduce instability into his attempt.

Instead of a clean technique, his divided attention allowed a thread of Mana to remain connected to the ability, and the Wards began draining him. Anna picked him up and charged out of the room, but I didn’t mind. In the next room, the draw was halved, but he continued to leak Mana like a sieve. The great part about these Wards was that they were multiplicative, and they were all connected together within their area of effects. There was no escape from the pull once it had latched on unless you got out of all the rooms.

The Mage fell unconscious from the pain as they escaped the final room, but the thread of power was cut off. Now there were two down, but the group had successfully cleared the rooms. If only I had been able to set up the last few rooms before they got down here! Anna returned to the room and looked over at her co-leader. “Anything good as a reward?”

“Looks like we got a farmstead package.” The High Magous held up a few tokens. “Five acres of land, a farmhouse, ten of three animal types, various seeds.”

Anna sighed and nodded. “Good. I think we are on the right track by coming down here. It wasn’t what we were after, but if we want to set up a sect, we’ll need farmers, right?”

“Right.”

“Keep going into the next room, or head to the surface?” Anna seemed to be putting the question to a vote.

“Already looked at the next room.” The only conscious Mage shook her head. “Exact same setup. Correct me if I’m wrong, but this room was even harder to use Mana in, right?”

“Yes,” responded the male a touch despondently. “Looks like each room requires greater control to get through. I say we go get these guys taken care of and try another day.”

“Works for me.” Anna and the others left through the portal, carrying their fallen with them and arriving in the Mage’s Recluse with a single step.

<Oh, thank goodness they didn’t try the next room!> I started getting busy, frankly a little nervously. <My reputation would have been ruined.>

Finishing my thought with a low chuckle, I finished working on the remaining rooms, getting all of the Warding in place and reinforcing the walls. I hadn’t considered it before, but if a Mage burnt out in here, the result would be explosive, and I needed to have a way to release the pressure. Before even that, I needed to make sure the blast was contained. Celestial, but it was getting difficult to eat people quietly.

Dale

As the group rode the levitating platform upward toward the imposing flying mountain, Dale wryly grinned and glanced at Tom. “Hey. How did this city get named Fek’koff?”

“What do you mean?” Tom blinked a few times; he had been lost in thought.

“You told us when we got here that we were about to crash into ‘the Wards of Fek’koff’. How’d the city get named that?” Dale waved at the glowing, dome-covered crater.

“It didn’t, this is Outpost Alpha One.” Tom rolled his eyes. Dale was funny sometimes. “The Ward system is named Fek’koff. Every time someone did find this place or asked too many questions about it, the only response was ‘Fek’koff’. The nickname stuck.”

“What the…?” Hans grasped at his chest. “You mean to tell me that the Northmen have a sense of humor? This might be the most startling discovery of our entire stay here!”

“And you wonder why the place is named Fek’koff,” Tom muttered loudly and darkly. His words made the others laugh, and he allowed a slow grin to crack his stony face. “Also, to me and mine, we aren’t the ‘Northmen’. We are ‘The People’. It is an important distinction.”

“Yeah, he just… hit the ground. Didn’t even try to slow down.” One of The People was talking to another who was controlling the platform. “We got his armor back, but… it’s gonna need some serious cleaning.”

“That’s unfortunate, but I’m also glad I wasn’t the one who found the issue.” The platform controller shook himself.

Tom raised his voice to get their attention, “Sergeant. What was that about?”

“Ah. Sir.” The guard with them flushed, then stood at attention. “The Rune work in the crater that arrests the motion of people falling has failed. No one noticed until it was… already fully inactive.”

Rose turned slightly green. “That’s… odd timing. I guess I’m glad it happened after we got here.”

“Yeah…” Dale agreed slowly. Then he squinted his eyes; who did he know that had a habit of taking Runes and setting traps? Sending his thoughts along his connection to Cal, he tried to keep his mental voice cool, “Cal, did you disable the Runes that catch people in this crater?”

<May~y~be?>

“Hah. That’s a good one. I’d normally be pretty upset, but I’m not super happy with the Northmen. Hey, we have good news. Tell you all about it when we get back.” Dale could feel surprise flowing back along the connection.

The voice in his head made a valid point, <Why not just tell me now while you are stuck on that platform? Less wasted time.>

This caused Dale to pause; that was probably a better idea than making both of them wait. He described everything that had happened, including how the Northmen were going to be joining them and bringing all the magical knowledge and items they owned. Dale played back the fight that had occurred, the saving grace, and the resolution of the conflicts.

The air shook as the dungeon shifted from how hard Cal’s laughter was. <Dale! Hah! This is amazing! Listen, I can fill in a few blank spots for you. Let me tell you what part I played in you succeeding down there. I can’t believe I get everything I bargained for and all the stuff the other dungeon has! I bet it didn’t even think about that!>

While the story was being told, Dale’s eyes got wider and wider. At the end of the story, Dale shook his head ruefully and joined in the laughter. That scenario had worked out better than they could have possibly hoped. The part where Cal had tried to get the dungeon’s attention and the infernal dungeon had sent confusion to everyone connected to it? That had saved Tom and allowed every other event to progress. It was likely wise not to tell Tom about it until they were alone, but frankly, his status as unconnected and exiled from ‘the will of The People’ was what had ultimately saved his life.

They became level with the island and stepped off the magical lift. The platform began to drop, and the returning heroes started walking toward the area the leaders usually congregated. Really, the only impediment to this plan of relaxation and debriefing was when a blurred figure slammed into Dale and sent him careening into the stone of the mountain a hundred paces away. The rock shattered, and Dale flopped bonelessly to the ground.

“You think that just because you reached the B-ranks, our agreement is complete and you no longer need to show up for your training?” Gomei was already standing next to Dale. He picked the human up off the ground by the neck, then threw him toward the training arena. “All it means is that I no longer need to coddle you!”

Gomei turned to look at the other members of the returning party. “What? Don’t you have something to go report, or do you want to participate?”

The three people started walking away without missing a beat, staring straight ahead and allowing the suddenly pouring sweat to trickle down their faces unabated. By the time they felt safe enough to look around again, Gomei was gone and loud crunching noises were coming from the arena.

“Is it wrong that I want to know what’s going on?” Hans sighed and almost started walking toward the arena. “You know, it is the dream of every assassin to learn the Moon Elf combat style. Do you think he might be serious about participating?”

Rose took his hand and pulled him along firmly. “I can nearly guarantee that when he says ‘participating’, he means as a target. Gonna have to let that dream go for a while, I’m afraid. Though, who knows what the future holds?”

Chapter Twenty-one

<Hey, Dale. Question for you.>

“Yeah, Cal?” Dale whispered the words. Not in an attempt to hide himself or be stealthy, it was because currently, he could barely breathe. A strike to his chest by Gomei had driven the air from his lungs, and now, he was trying to regain his wind while holding off three ‘flame-touched greater lizards’.

<So, there are a few people working on setting up a portal for the Northmen. I’ve been talking to my Wisp, Dani, and she’s pretty adamant that we go to another hidden location.> The words paused as Dale focused on some tricky footwork to avoid a blast of flaming Mana. <Right, so, there’s no more help from me in seeking out people. Just wanted to let you know. I’m not really excited about this trip, but it is really out of character for her to be this pushy. Any advice?>

“That’s fine, Cal. We’re in crunch time anyway.” Dale landed a blow on a lizard’s neck, using his Aura to simulate ‘sharpness’ or ‘sword Aura’. With his fingers held rigidly, his hand acted as a sword and sliced open the creature from neck to groin. Dale winced; he was still getting used to using only as much Mana as intended. “Advice on… what? Relationships? Try Hans.”

“Is this too easy?” Gomei shouted at him. “You can talk to your friends at the same time as working through my training? You should have just said so! I’m happy to increase the difficulty!”

Gomei pulled a few leavers, and a swarm of the lizards charged at Dale from the wide-open gates. “Let’s go over today’s lesson again, Dale! I’ll ask a question, and you answer! What are we working on?”

“We are working on controlling my body when my Mana is at full power!” Dale shouted in reply, stomping on the foot of a lizard to bury it in the stone and give him a moment to dodge away from its follow up strike.

“Why?” Gomei’s word physically rattled Dale.

“So that I am used to the motions, and using my body as a weapon becomes second nature!” Dale flipped in the air, grabbing a Beast as he moved and chucking it ignobly at another of its kind.

“Why doesn’t everyone leave their full-powered Mana in their bodies at all times?” Gomei shouted over the meaty sound of two bodies crushing each other.

“They don’t want to damage themselves and the people around them!” Dale snapped back thoughtlessly.

Gomei appeared next to Dale and slapped him across the face and into a huddle of the lizards. “Wrong! Try again!”

“Leaving the body stuffed with Mana can cause burnout!” Dale turned the slap into a corkscrew dive, drilling through the chest of a lizard and emerging coated in blood on the other side.

Once again Gomei was next to him, and this time, Dale was whacked straight into the ground. “Wrong! Wrong! Wrong! The real reason… is that most Mages don’t take the time to learn how to actually control themselves at all times! They only act as a true Mage when it is convenient or when they are in battle! This. Makes. Them. Weak!”

Gomei was shouting in his winded trainee’s face. He flickered and vanished, giving Dale a view down a lizard’s open mouth as it lunged for him. Dale reached out and gripped the jaws closing in on him, tearing the mandibles off the Beast’s skull.

“I don’t understand.”

“Correct!” Gomei laughed from his position by the levers. “Do you think Moon Elves leave their bodies undefended, weak, barely perceptive? What is even the point of being a Mage if you are going to act like a C-ranker in your normal life? Today’s lesson is this: you will have your Mana flowing through you at all times. Control it. Control yourself. People ‘burn out’ because they cannot control their Mana or stop it from rampaging in unwanted ways. They damage things around them because they cannot control themselves.”

Dale was so shocked over this revelation that he failed to properly execute a block and was taken to the ground by a scaly tackle. The other lizards in the arena piled on, and Dale was hidden under a sea of biting and wiggling bodies. A flash of Mana made all of them still, and Dale pushed through the pile of steaming meat and scales. “You mean that Moon Elves… always?”

“Always,” Gomei confirmed, leaning forward with gleaming eyes. “This is why we are better at everything than a normal Mage. We don’t neuter ourselves for convenience. Also, a point in your favor. I’m a trifle surprised that you grasped Sword Aura so easily. In another life, it would have likely been your ultimate ability. Here, it will be only another tool in your arsenal.”

“It does feel natural,” Dale admitted as he shifted his Aura back to a thin mesh of pure Acme Mana. He had found that the natural state acted to dampen any Mana coming toward him, as it would absorb a portion of any type. It wasn’t suited to truly being used in combat in its raw form, much to Dale’s displeasure. “But how will I get anything done in the next few weeks?”

“What have you been training with us for?” Gomei closed his eyes, remembering that Dale was a human and needed more hand-holding to reach a conclusion. “Use the martial forms for movement. You’ve been working to learn our habits and footwork. Use them. You think that the silent steps are only used for murder? Apply them to all your motion. They are crafted to create minimal impact on your surroundings, keeping you hidden. Moving in such a way will reduce the risk you have of blowing down the camps with a sonic boom, at the very least.”

Dale coughed, trying not to blush from the less-than-subtle jab. He hopped in the air and twisted, flinging off any blood that hadn’t already dried on him. “What about speaking or listening?”

“I won’t lie—it’s going to be boring listening to people speaking at what feels like half speed. It’s going to be hard not accidentally hurting someone.” Gomei was now inches from Dale’s face, seeming to have flowed across the ground to arrive. “I cannot express how important it is to have fine control as a Mage. Even the dungeon has started to recognize this, much to our amusement and the near-death of multiple Mages.”

“What?”

“Nothing for you to concern yourself with right now, Dale.” Gomei looked around and confirmed that every opponent had been defeated. “I think you have a solid grasp on what we were trying to teach you today. Ignore societal norms. Be better than those around you. They are lazy; you are not. If you are lazy, we will fix that.”

Dale swallowed deeply and nodded. “Not lazy, teacher! Not lazy at all over here.”

“Alright. Looks like the sun’s coming up.” Gomei glared at the sky. It was throwing off his sense of time. They had been traveling east and north, and thanks to the portal system, he was familiar with the fact that the sun rose at different times during the day around the world. Still, he had wanted to keep Dale fighting until sunup, and this technically counted. “Get going. I have my own work to do.”

Dale grimaced as the Elf vanished. He must be using some combination of invisibility and speed because Dale still couldn’t track him using normal methods. Walking toward the mess hall of the Academy, Dale did his best to ignore the people around him. You would think that the early morning would mean people should be sleeping, but most of the students and all of the teachers could go without sleep for extended periods. Add that to the fact that the world as they knew it was ending, and the only way to prepare… was to fight.

It was obvious that tensions were mounting. The portal to Cal’s soul was still not operational, and since that was the only escape plan, people were getting ever more nervous. The sleep deprivation and constant fighting weren’t helping with that. Dale accepted his portion of food from the attendant and found a table, groaning as he sat. With a small amount of focus, he shifted his external Aura to a sunlight pattern and let the light healing take care of his bruises and irritable mood. Anyone who came near him was touched by the Mana-powered Aura and walked away with a smile.

He noticed that and shrugged. Why not let them gain a benefit from his presence? Dale stood from his seat and smashed into the ceiling, reducing his chair to kindling at the same time. He fell back to the ground and destroyed the table as he landed. “Ugh. I had been doing so well.”

“Hey!” One of the people serving food came over and glowered at him. “You can’t just smash the place up because you don’t like something! Pay for this damage!”

“Sorryaboutthat.” Dale’s words were so fast that they were nearly unintelligible. He took a calming breath and tried again, “I. Am. Sorry. About. That.”

When speaking slowly and deliberately, he was able to mimic a normal sentence to the man’s ears. Dale handed over a few silver coins, and the server nodded stiffly. “Good. Didn’t mean to come over so angry, just a lot of people smashing things these days. Looked like you did it intentionally ‘cause you really wrecked that table… but you used your face to do it. Listen, I hear they have a training center for Mages now if you need help? You new at this?”

“I’m good, thank you.” Dale sounded normal, and he carefully shifted his weight around in the steps needed for total body control. To those watching, Dale stood smoothly and seemed to almost flow out of the room. His extreme grace was actually him moving very slowly and picking where to put every footfall, but anyone under the Mage ranks simply wouldn’t be able to tell. Dale rolled his eyes when he saw people watching him. “Too bad I didn’t train as a dancer. I bet I wouldn’t get smacked in the face so often.”

Chapter Twenty-two

“Dale.” Hans grabbed Dale’s hands and pulled him down into a seated position across from him. “Dale, I need…”

“Yes, Hans?” Dale was trying not to laugh out loud. “Are you finally going to confess your deep and true love for me?”

“How did you know?” Seeing Dale’s shocked expression, Hans slapped him hard enough to make his face move slightly. Hans grumbled at the lack of reaction. “Abyss-touched Mages. No, you little blighter! I need your help. My cultivation progress is basically nonexistent. Rose is catching up to me in cultivation, which is great, but she’s been cultivating for less than a year. I need to advance again. I want to be able to spend forever with her, and I am aging by the day. Sure, it’s slow, but I don’t want to look like Mr. Wrinkles—Artorian that is—by the time I’m a Mage. Can you help me?”

“Woof.” Dale shook his head and grinned. “That’s pretty rough, Hans! Have you tried this little blue potion I’ve been hearing abou–”

“No ‘old man issue’ jokes please.” Hans forestalled the inevitable and his mouth formed into a hard line. “Can you do something? A technique, a–”

“Can I see your cultivation?” Dale cut him off with a direct question. Hans looked nervous at this, and for good reason. Normally, it was easy for someone to look at someone and get a sense of their cultivation, and below the C-ranks, it was in plain view for all. But when an Aura had been formed, the actual cultivation of a person was hidden, and only estimations could be made. Since this information could easily be used against Hans, Dale was essentially asking for a huge amount of trust. Hans swallowed and nodded, sending a small thread of Essence to Dale. Then he sat and tried to absorb as much Essence as possible from the surroundings.

Latching on to the thread, Dale followed it to Hans’ Center and looked around. There was very little corruption, and from what Dale could tell, the Aura was well-made. The only thing… the amount of Essence trickling into his Chi spiral was absolutely miniscule, and Hans was currently actively cultivating. Dale’s passive Essence collection was higher than this by a large amount. Dale opened his eyes and looked at Hans with a huge question spilling out of his mouth, “Do you have only the Guild’s basic cultivation technique?”

“Yeah.” Hans rubbed his head and looked down. “Noble ones have protections or… people that hunt you down if you steal or use them.”

Dale started to scoff but thought back to his own experiences. Now that he thought on it, he had never seen a cultivation technique for sale, but then again, he had only left Mountaindale a few times. Even the Academy didn’t teach cultivation methods, only ways to use the cultivation you had previously acquired. Then again, it was a new Academy. Truth be told, everything Dale had, he had been gifted. How common was this issue? “Do you want me to help you?”

“If you think you can,” Hans calmly replied. Dale took his hand again and went to look at the Chi. The pattern wasn’t bad, but with Cal around, there were far better methods. There! In the wall of Hans’ Center… that was an affinity channel that was blocked. Dale’s mind zeroed in on that, and he grunted. If only he knew how to open affinity channels, he could help his friend just by opening them. As far as he had heard, it required a specialized Mage to–

Dale brushed against the blockage and felt a spark of Acme Mana travel along the connection between them. Hans gagged and spewed black bile all over Dale’s lap. The assassin dry-heaved rotten fluid for another long minute, then looked up at Dale with tears running down his face. “What the abyss did you do to me?”

“I… I’m not sure, I was only–”

“I thought you were just looking.” Hans coughed a few more times, spitting out black and sludgy mucous. Then he went still, his eyes half closing as he focused inward to look for damage. “Alright. Dale. What… Why do I have a perfect water affinity now? How did you? I. What?”

“You’re kidding,” Dale flatly announced.

“I’m not.” Hans looked at Dale in awe. “Never tell another person about this. Most Mages can force open affinity channels for others but usually only partly, and it isn’t something that people who do it for a living will appreciate. What you did would cost someone the same amount as a castle, Dale. No, even more. Perfect affinity?”

Hans shook his head and looked like he might cry. “It’s impossible.”

Dale coughed and looked at Hans sidelong. “Um. So, you are happy about this? Or is this a bad thing? I know you have a fire affinity…”

“Are you joking? Obviously, this is the best thing ever!”

“So. Want me to do the rest of them?” Dale’s words made Hans freeze momentarily, but then he started laughing like a madman. When he could finally contain himself again, he nodded vigorously.

The process took some trial and error, but within an hour, Hans had six perfect affinities. Looking at his Chi spiral now showed the same amount of Essence coming from each source, but now, the cumulative passive collection outpaced Hans’ previous active collection by at least double. Hans was completely thunderstruck and nearly had tears in his eyes. “I just… I can’t believe it.”

“I have no idea how to give you a cultivation technique,” Dale informed him sadly. “Otherwise, I totally would. You know that, right?”

Hans waved him off. “Don’t worry about it. Frankly, with the world ending and… with all of these affinities… I’m thinking now might be the time to risk stealing one or two from a certain family I’m not fond of.”

“Wait, what?” Dale rocked back on his heels, Hans’s words managing what his slap had been unable to a short while back.

“Well… I do know where a few Noble houses keep their secrets.” Hans grinned darkly. “I might be able to fool their owners for a couple weeks, and that’s all we need, right?”

“What would Rose say about all this?” Dale directly questioned him. “Would she want you to do this?”

“Not a chance,” Hans stated without concern, “but she needs a better method as well. What she got from Madame Chandra isn’t suited to her. The High Magous was an elemental cultivator, and the trickle of celestial and infernal was all she ever needed. Unless Rose joined the church with a binding vow, they wouldn’t give her what she needs. Just like with the Guild, actually. The more closely you bind yourself to them, the better the perks are but the less freedom you have.”

“Why don’t I just clear her affinity channels like I did for you?” Dale made the offer easily.

“Please do!” Hans stared his friend in the eyes, then winked broadly. “But I’d like to give her a gift from me.”

“You’re out of your mind.” Dale watched as Hans turned and started stalking toward the portal. “Hans! If you plan to be sneaky… take a bath before you go! It really matters!”

Hans didn’t stop walking, but his path changed just a little. Dale snorted, glad he had been able to do something great for his friend. Then he looked at the whirlwind of dirt created by snorting and had to hold back another one. Full-power-everything was really hard to get used to.

“Hey, Cal,” Dale said to the open air as he barged to the front of the line and stepped into the third floor of the dungeon.

<How’s it going, Dale?> There was a pause. <Are you about to go on a rampage or something?>

“Depends. When we go to your inner world, do I get nice things?” Dale stared at a small fortification in the distance. “I mean, it’s my inner world too, right?”

<I… see what’s about to happen, but no. You want things, you earn them like everyone else.> Dale didn’t even wait to hear the entire answer, sprinting at the hexagonal fortification and clearing the wall in a long leap. The Goblins in the fort never got a chance to fight back, all of them dying to a single finger jabbed against their noggin.

<I was wondering about the whole ‘you going through the portal’ thing. I think that would be a paradox. I think you are not going to be able to do so, or you’d just be reabsorbed into me.> Dale grunted at me, though I could see the fear start to rise up in him. <Can I interest you in a fight against something else to take your mind off your concerns and get you to stop murdering Goblins? Perhaps a Manticore on the fifth floor?>

“Well,” Dale started as he kicked open a chest and pulled out the tokens it contained, “if I do survive the transition, I’m looking for resources, weapons, armor, and land. I want to make an Academy, maybe put it on a mountain that doesn’t fly all over the place and get into dangerous situations? It sounds appealing.”

<It sounds boring.> Dale heard a groan in his mind as I considered my options. Didn’t want him trying to tinker with my Soul Space. <Fi~i~ine. I’ll make you a deal. You beat Manny alone, and I’ll give you a mountain. Everything else you mentioned is already in chests on the lower floors—just clear them, and you’ll get what you want. Stop killing my Goblins. They didn’t do anything to you. Recently, at least.>

“Thanks, Cal ol’ pal.” Dale started walking toward the stairs, then caught himself and returned to the portal area, skipping to the end of the labyrinth by using his keygem. As he stood staring at the door to the dungeon’s Manticore Boss, he had a sudden worry. “Hey. Cal. If I die in here, will you bring me back?”

<Eh.>

“What!” Dale shouted into the empty air. “Why wouldn’t you?”

<I don’t know. It seems like a pain?> My reply was completely unsatisfactory for Dale, it seemed. <Look, I mean, at this point, do I need you walking around out there? Maybe it would be nice to have control of my entire soul again, you know?>

Dale thought furiously for an answer and snapped his fingers when he figured out what to say. “Cal. I’m only a B-rank zero human. You’re already in the A-ranks, yeah? What happens if I reconnect to you? Do I get into the A-ranks, or do you drop down to the B-ranks?”

Silence reigned for a long moment. <Fine. But if you die, you lose your gear. I can convert Mithril into a hefty amount of Essence. About seven C-ranker’s worth, if you remember.>

Dale paused, debating on if he wanted to go in this room. Slowly, he nodded. “Alright. I need battle experience as a Mage. I have to control my body. I need to be comfortable with my new power. I’d also like to own a mountain again. So… deal.”

The door in front of him slowly opened on its own, a sign that the dungeon was watching. Dale sighed at the theatrics and passed a bit of Mana through his armor, locking it in place at his joints. He unrolled the fabric that lay around his neck and fully covered his face and head. The Mithril weave should stop the Manticore’s stinger and give Dale a fighting chance in this battle.

As he stepped into the room, the Manticore swooped down and alighted on the ground in front of him. “Chump, soft touch, sucker, mark, victim, dupe… fool. I know this scent. You came here once before, unprepared. Again you arrive, also unready, but this time without powerful allies. My thanks.”

Dale had no idea why this creature could speak, but it gave him pause. This creature was intelligent; it used not only its body for combat but its mind as well. He may have made a serious mistake. An impact to his back sent him stumbling forward, and his head whipped around fast enough to see the Manticore’s stinger retracting into the ground. Knowing he had only an instant to take advantage of the creature’s immobile status, Dale sprinted forward and began battling in earnest.

It would have already been over for Dale if he hadn’t been wearing the armor that he was, and he knew it. He threw his frustration into his attacks and punched directly into the paw coming at him. Dale’s Mana was of a higher tier and purity than what flowed through Manny, and this helped mitigate the fact that Manny was at a higher ranking… but it didn’t negate the fact.

Frankly, that was a dumb move by the human. Dale was spun around by the collision, though the blow coming at him hit his torso with far less strength behind it. Still, he was tossed across the room and into the wall.

Chapter Twenty-three

<Hey, Dani. Want to watch Dale fight Manny?> I called over to my lovely Wisp, glad I had remembered even if the battle had already started. <It’s already started!>

“Feces, Cal!” Dani zipped over as I connected my sight to a viewing rune that would allow the Mobs in this area to watch the entire fight. “Give a Wisp some warning!”

Dale appeared on the wall just as he was sliding under a paw swing that would have torn him in half when he was still in the C-ranks. There was a collective cheer in the area as a few Bobs clustered closer to see what was happening. Fights featuring Dale were getting rarer, and he always had a large number of my people rooting against him.

As Dale went under the paw, he punched upward into Manny’s wrist and put the Manticore off balance. The sheer improbability of this happening was an interesting conundrum for me. I knew that Mana increased physical abilities, but it still astounded me to see a human punch a creature ten times his size and make the Beast stumble or go flying. Lots of cognitive dissonance tied up with Mana.

Manny was really hard to keep off balance though; the fact of the matter was that he had excellent control of his multiple limbs and body. The Boss turned the stumble into a stab, jabbing Dale with a thick spike from his wing. Ha! Dale would have a nasty bruise in the morning if he survived this. If not, oh well. I’d recreate him with a nasty bruise.

Dale had gone tumbling away, but now, he grabbed a rock in his left hand. Was he going to throw it at…? Mana surged into his hands, and he crushed the rock as he brought his hands together. Using the friction generated by his actions, Dale directed his Mana to empower the static, and a bolt of eye-searing lightning erupted from his palms. The power surged across the intervening space, hitting Manny in the wing and causing the appendage to spasm uncontrollably.

<What in the…? He figured out lightning? Watt?> I glanced sidelong at Dani. <This is a shocking development.>

Dani ignored me. Not unexpected. Back to the fight.

Manny sat down on the stone floor and glared at Dale, snarling as his wing stopped twitching. Dale caught his breath, seemed to focus, and stomped. The floor around him collapsed downward, trapping the Manticore tail that was moving through the tunnel beneath him. Manny screeched and pulled on his tail in an attempt to dislodge it from the floor, but it was slow going. Dale took a few more deep breaths, focusing inward and building to a crescendo of Mana usage. He stepped forward, landing a punch on Manny’s neck while breathing out a Pah.

If I hadn’t been able to see Mana, I would have had no idea what he had just done. Manny’s head slipped from his body even as the mirrored ceiling above him shattered in a spectacular explosion. Dale had used a technique; he absolutely must have. His Mana had flowed into a pattern and captured a thin line of air. Then his movement had sent the empowered gust at Manny, where it acted as a garrote—a cutting wire of super-compressed air that had broken down after reaching the target and began rapidly expanding.

The cut it had initially made had been small and possibly not even deadly, but as the air expanded, it had created a cavitation bubble inside Manny that literally tore his head off. Then the leftover energy had continued forward and rebounded off the ceiling, making it look like an explosion. Something I had seen inside Dale had me even more excited than the fight had been. I had never noticed what actually happened when someone activated a technique because their innards weren’t visible to me. Even Dale’s hadn’t been until recently, but he hadn’t used a technique in my depths since well before then.

<Dale… do you have any idea what you’ve just done?> I slowly asked the human.

“Looks like I won.” Dale smirked even as he sat down to conserve energy. Heat was rolling off of him, a sure sign that the technique he just used wasn’t even close to mastered yet. “So, about that mountain.”

<Yeah, yeah. You’ll get your token.> It can’t actually be that easy… can it? <Hey, Dale? Want to try a new technique?>

“What?” Dale popped to his feet, excitement glowing on his face. Oh, wait. That’s body heat from overuse of Mana. “Someone lost a technique in here?”

<Mmm,> I murmured noncommittally. Which one, which one? I’ve been using this a lot recently—let me quickly turn it into a memory stone, add in the constraints needed for moving through flesh, and… <Here you go!>

A memory stone dropped out of the air, quickly caught by Dale. He pressed it to his head, looking up in confusion after letting the information flow over. “That’s odd.”

Drat. He’s on to me. <What, ah, what’s the matter, Dale?>

“This must have been from a super amazing memory stone crafter. There aren’t any emotions attached to it, no strange memories of the actual creation process. Just… pure information.” Dale looked at the stone in his hand in amazement.

<Why don’t you try it out? Here, I’ll give you a target.> A moment later, a Basher appeared in the room. It hopped around in confusion, squeaking softly in terror from the scent of Manticore blood in the air. <Sorry little guy, you only get to live for about thirty seconds.>

I turned my attention to Dale, who had his hand outstretched. A look of intense concentration was showing on his face, and the air began to distort around his hands. He pressed his hand down, and the Basher squeaked and splattered on the floor. Dale stopped using his Mana, staring at the remains of the Basher in shock. “What just happened?”

<I learned how to make techniques is what happened,> I informed him smugly. <All you have to do is move your Mana through your meridians in a certain pattern, then hold that pattern out in the world, right?>

“Right?”

<What you are actually doing is creating a Rune and converting Mana into the type of Mana or Essence needed for the Rune to work!> I shouted in excitement. <That’s why not everyone can use every type of technique, why they need to have a certain amount of ‘affinity’ for it! That must also be why you can’t put Runes on flesh—it distorts the natural meridian pathways below! I’ve just made a massive breakthrough, Dale! I can’t wait to start experimentation on people!>

“I’m happy for you.” Dale looked at his hand and then the Basher once more. “What was that? What did I do?”

<Ah. It was a gravity… spell? It’s a Rune, not an inborn ability, and ‘technique’ sounds silly after I finally know what they actually are. Since you are ‘spelling out’ the Rune in your body and pushing out what you ‘spell’, I’m calling it a spell now.> I saw his confusion and realized that I was getting off on a tangent. <You made the bunny too heavy. It went squish. Do it again to make other things go squish. Add more Mana to make the squish harder and faster.>

“It took so little Mana though.” Dale sat down and crossed his arms. “Why was this so much more effective and efficient than the other memory stone techniques I’ve studied?”

<Spells,> I corrected him, getting an eye roll in return. <If you want to know why things work correctly, use the words I use. The reason it was better was that I know exactly what needed to be done, and this was tailored directly to your meridians. Using someone else’s spell—that they created for themselves—will always be inefficient.>

“Does this mean I can master this… spell really easily?” Dale was excited about that prospect and for good reason. He had been able to direct his Mana more precisely than with any other tech– spell. Dale could also feel that this was more directly powerful than most of his other options, and mastering it would mean that he could use it nigh-instantly and with very little cost.

<It should. Gotta warn you, even though it is a high tier spell, it isn’t gonna be too useful against other Mages unless you really outclass them. At best, you’ll slow them down to a standstill. I have a floor set up with hundreds of this Rune interlocking and empowering each other. Even then, half the time, Mages will survive going through them. I know what you’re thinking: ‘why haven't I met them?’ Easy. The shock of falling and getting hurt lets the Boss finish them pretty easily.> I could see that Dale had a lot to process and play with, so I figured it was time for me to do other things.

<Here’s the token for a mountain.> A wooden chip dropped down and bounced off his head. <Here’s a keygem for the next floor. I’d go check it out if I were you.>

Oh, hold on. The next floor was all golems. He had seen it before. Eh. Whatever, the portal was in the entryway of that floor. Dale would figure it out. Until then, I had a lot more work to do. My panic… orb… was coming along nicely. Should I call it a safe house? Safe orb? Run away sphere? Whatever, it was the place I was stocking with all sorts of goodies for myself. I had reinforced it again but this time with Wards and Cores. Even if the planet were destroyed, my little safe area should now keep me safe, secure, and well-fed for a few decades if I rationed properly.

All I would need to do then is secure a new source of Essence and hope for the best.

Chapter Twenty-four

“Well, that was a fun run.” Dale stared at the faceless Golems waiting for him to step on their paths and fully decided against going through here alone. “Back to the surface, I guess?”

He walked toward the portal, using his newfound gravity ‘spell’ to hinder the movements of the huge Cats that patrolled the edges of this space. Dale grunted in dissatisfaction when he realized that he couldn’t use the spell to squish the Cats, only make it nearly impossible for them to move. He had been hoping that he had a new and glorious weapon. Still, Dale had to smile when he realized that he had a long way to go before mastering this ability; maybe squashing Cats was in his future!

The silver lining was pretty clear with this spell—the Cats not being able to move did make it easy to end them and gain a Core. He was happily attacking another as a second one caught him by surprise. Then he realized the real weakness of the spell. It had a very small area of effect, at least compared to some of his other abilities. Dale smiled at the Coiled Cat, which was ineffectually gnawing on his leg. The C-ranked Cat was causing Dale some pain, but it was too weak to break through his Mana-infused skin. “Thanks, little guy! I’m learning so much today!”

Then he punched down and siphoned off some Essence using the Runes on his gauntlet. The Cat, suddenly weakened and dizzy, stumbled away only to be met with a heavy blow that made everything go black for it. Dale swiftly added another Core to his bag and walked out of the portal. “Huh. Normally I come out and really enjoy the fresh air… What changed? Something stinks.”

“Dale!” A voice Dale still flinched at broke his peaceful mood, and Minya appeared in front of him. “I knew if I waited around here, you would show up.”

“Didn’t you ask Cal?” the Mithril-clad Mage asked with crossed arms.

“You can’t possibly still hold that against me!” Minya asserted while matching his hard look. “I know what you’ve been up to and all the benefits that you’re getting from working with him. You know that there are a lot of people who hate you now, ever since your talk with The Master in public about sharing a soul with the dungeon. They think you are benefitting from the death of their friends and loved ones.”

Dale was speechless. He hadn’t thought about that at all, and he had known that it would be an issue. Whoops. Minya smirked and continued speaking, knowing that her point had been driven home, “So, I was wondering if you would go with me to the Pleasure House and we could… talk about things.”

“I don’t… you and I are… ah, fine. I guess that’s okay.” Dale sighed and started walking with her. “I have been avoiding you for a long while, and we really should clear a few things up. Clear the air, if you will. What is it that stinks out here, seriously?”

“I’m glad you see it that way.” Minya softly laughed, lapsing into silence as they traveled and ignoring his question. Maybe she just didn’t know. Dale was watching the people they passed and saw recognition on far too many faces. Whether it was happiness, excitement… or resentment on their faces, Dale decided that Minya had been speaking the truth, and his days of anonymity were over.

As they walked into the massive tree that had been grown as the restaurant, Madame Chandra herself was there to greet them. Dale had interacted with her a few times recently but only when they were in a group. Looking at her now, Dale nearly fell over in shock. “Chandra! What happened! Your power… your rank! It's like looking at the sun! What sort of upgrade did you get?”

“Ha!” Chandra laughed in his face. “I’m surprised and pleased with you, Dale! Most of the men who have talked to me recently never even notice something has changed. Let me look at you, Mr. Mage. That took us all by surprise, so I thought I’d let you take a peek at my power to see what it was like to notice a sudden massive power shift! Tables are turning in here!”

“In fact, you have a lot of Mana moving around in you right now, don't you? Hmm. Oh, I see… following Moon Elf traditions, are we?” As she spoke, Madame Chandra’s voice sped up, allowing Dale to have a conversation at a normal pace. He smiled in relief as she did so; everyone being so slow had been making him grumpy. Maybe that was why Mages had always seemed so arrogant in the past? “Careful with all that power, Dale. Failure absolutely means death at… whatever tier you’re playing around in. You have beautiful Mana, by the way, even if your Aura is doing a great job of concealing your exact ranking.”

“Speaking of tiers, you weren’t this powerful the last time I saw you—as you just stated—but what changed?” Dale looked the five-foot-tall woman over, shaking his head in wonder. Then his eyes lit up as he remembered a conversation from a few weeks back. “Is this a Path advancement? Is this what that means? What’s the new one, and how did you do it?”

“Nature.” Madame Chandra’s eyes glinted in pleasure. “I’m near the pinnacle of the elements, and I’m easily able to fend off any type of attack that contains even a drop of elemental power. Fire, stone, water, air… I can control it all better than someone who is an expert in just one of them. I am quite pleased. As for the advancement, I followed the paths laid out in the dungeon. It was quite informative.”

“No kidding.” Dale smiled at her, then surprised her with a hug. “Congratulations, Madame. This is exciting!”

“Yes, yes. Now, I see you’ve brought a lovely lady with you today. Let’s get you seated.” Madame Chandra winked at Dale, who turned red in an instant. He had not thought through how this ‘meeting’ would appear from an outside perspective. Did Minya plan this? Was this intended as… a date? Celestial feces. There was no way, right? He and Minya were so very opposite in views.

They were led to the top of the restaurant, where only the very best ingredients were used to create only the finest dishes. The branches around them opened up, allowing a spectacular view of not only the skyland but the world below them. As far as Dale could see, there was only blue. When had they gotten out over the ocean? Dale’s brow furrowed, and he nearly stood up to go investigate why they were out to sea—when Minya began speaking.

“So, Dale. We finally can relate to each other, and I really think that we have a lot to talk about.” She clasped her hands and leaned forward on the table, locking eyes with him and keeping a very serious expression on her face.

“Sure. Yeah. Let’s talk.” Dale sat and waited for her to begin asking questions. The silence stretched a little too long, and Minya sat back with a groan. “What’s… on your mind?”

“Ugh. Let me guess, you have a couple of friends that you are close to and not much other social interaction at all, right?” Minya rolled her eyes at Dale’s predictable defensive response. “Listen, relax, and we can just talk for a while. It’s hard to find people that actually understand what I mean when I speak about the dungeon and the odd jobs that he gives me.”

An hour later, they were still at the table, laughing over the remains of the food. Dale was trying his hardest to catch his breath and speak but was having trouble. “And—ha—and then Cal says ‘oops. Hey, Dale, I did a thing’. I tried to ask what he meant, and by the time I was able to form the words, I was flying across the room, bleeding as the rocks around me began screaming!”

The laughter quieted, and they lapsed into companionable silence. After griping about Cal for the last hour, they were actually feeling connected and were getting on good terms. Then Minya did something Dale had not been expecting. She stood up, came close, and kissed him deeply.

While this was a surprise, at this point in the date—turns out, yes, a date—Dale was not opposed. Another kiss followed the first, and another… soon Minya closed her eyes and softly sighed, “Oh. Cal.”

Bam.

Dale was on the other side of the room—half embedded in the wooden wall—and had let Minya fall face-first to the floor as she leaned forward with closed eyes. “What?”

Cal

<Hey, Dani. I’m getting a little worried about what’s happening in the upper layers of the dungeon.> I watched as the fight I was observing began to get more intense, growling a little as the walls began to shatter under the pressure the Mages were exuding. <There’s a fight going on between a few of the factions. I think they are using my influence to hide what’s going on from The Master.>

“So, what’s the issue?” Dani connected with me and watched as a few necromancers fought off nearly double their number by pulling corpses out of interspatial bags and adding them to the fight. “Let them kill each other off. So what, why are you concerned?”

I changed what she was seeing, and as a Mage died, their Mana seeped away and out of the dungeon. I was able to grab a portion of it, but the vast majority vanished into the world. <See what I mean? I’m too far away from them to grab all of that, and Dregs can’t take in foreign Mana without exploding. I wouldn’t care if they were fighting a few layers lower. Also, they are smashing up my walls and floor.>

“Well, get someone down here,” Dani told me brusquely, and I had to hold myself back from snapping at her.

<For some reason, Dale and Minya are both outside of my influence. I could call them through our bond, but it might take too long for them to get back from wherever they are. Oh, see, the fight is already over. What a waste.> The Necromancers had won but had lost half their number. Their friends were shoved into bags, and the undead quickly followed. They seemed furious, which could have been because of the attackers that survived had run off, carrying the bodies of their fallen. No net gain for the necros, which was a frustration I understood.

<I’m not a fan of necromancers, even if I’ve mostly gotten over my old hatred of them. I do think that this is the second time this has happened down here, and I’m going to need to start setting up fail-safes for when it happens again.> I thought about that for a long moment. <I’m going to go have fun with this actually. At some point, this place is either going to cleanly work together… or erupt into open warfare. I’m betting on open warfare, so we need to prepare for that.>

I sent my mind up into the council chambers, which were as empty as they always were when not in use. I took measurements and began putting the preliminary requirements in place… time to set up some Wards. If they were going to fight, there was nothing that said that it was going to have to happen in my depths, right? Mu-hu-ha-ha.

Chapter Twenty-five

<All done!> My words caught Dani off guard, and she tumbled through the air in surprise. <Wards set up every ten feet in the council chamber—not as useful or dangerous as the ones down here, but still. Wards created at the mouth of the dungeon. Mana leaks in the dungeon, tries to escape, and it gets funneled to me before it can. Fighting breaks out in the council? Attacker goes pop, and I get the Mana. Now no one can accuse me of not caring if their race survives!>

“Why can’t they accuse you of that?” Dani asked a few moments later, trying to pretend she hadn’t been caught off guard by my enthusiasm. “At least one person is going to explode before they figure out you have turned against their infighting, and then they’re going to think you trapped the place just to kill important people.”

I stared at her, trying to make a good comeback. An explanation. A… to the abyss with it. <I tried?>

“You sure did, Cal.”

<Listen, there’s a meeting today to discuss the progress on the soul-portal thingy. As far as I can tell, they are getting close to finishing it but have no way to test it. In other words, this should be fun.> I laughed lowly, knowing that there would be a fight. There was always a fight. <Tempers are going to go out of control, and Mana will follow. Hopefully, multiple people will attack at once. It’d be good to get rid of all the hotheads at once. Certainly don’t want them in me.>

“Speaking of you, how is the world coming along?” Dani sent happy joy-joy thoughts as I did my best to create a satisfactory answer.

<It’s fun! The first several miles are complete, and it’s getting faster and easier as time goes on. It’s as if… how best to put this… ah! My soul recognizes what I have been making. As long as I make more things that are similar, I am able to make them at a pace much faster than normal.> It was the best answer I could come up with. Soul-stuff was hard to explain. <Like how using a spell gets easier over time for people.>

“That’s excellent, Cal!” Dani verbally applauded me. “So, you think that we’ll have enough room to keep people, then?”

<Oh, easily. I’m a little surprised at how few people are interested in going to my soul, but that’s fine by me. I bet that’ll change as impending doom looms and a valid option is presented.> I looked over my little world and took the time to add a few details to one area or another. It would be important to add variety to the landscape and the plants eventually, but for now, grass and endless plains would have to do. I had placed a few trees and various herbs to test what it took to make them there and had added plenty of ‘extra air’ plants, but otherwise, the world was currently fairly monotonous.

But there was room, and there was air and food, and this entire place was a shelter for the races. <Water! Abyss! I forgot to add water!>

It was a good thing I had remembered since there were only a few things people actually needed to survive. Forgetting one of them wouldn’t have gone over well, though I could have kept the people alive by force. I cut a few channels for water and let my soul take on the image of the water that would fill them. As the life-granting liquid appeared, I felt something change.

<I ranked up! I’m A-rank one now!> Dani was excited for me, and I was able to guess the answer before she asked the question. <I needed to provide the basics for life! Now that life is sustainable, I’m betting that my Soul Space has been recognized by Acme!>

“I hate to be a pill, but you forgot to add water to your world?” Dani paused for a moment, and I chose not to fill the silence. “Cal… what other basic things does your world need? Have you added Essence to the place yet? Free-floating Essence, that is, not just what was used to make land?”

Celestial. Fecal. Matter. <Do you really…?>

“Think that it’s needed? Yes. Yes, I really do.” Dani watched me closely as I reached into myself and started allowing a portion of the collected Essence pour into the air. Some unconscious part of me relaxed, and I could feel my world actively growing instead of remaining stagnant-yet-perfect in the state I had left it.

<I don’t understand…>

“Did it help?” My silence spoke for me. “Well, it was a power-rich place. Mana rich, Essence rich, but there were no resources available to expand with. I’m betting that it was like every bit of your soul was holding its breath, waiting for something to happen. Like being paranoid at all times.”

<I didn’t even realize how horrible it was.> Relaxation was flowing through me, and the strange bottleneck I hadn’t realized even existed vanished. <I feel good. What’s next?>

Dani started to list off a few things that needed to be done, and I diligently worked my way through them. A few hours passed like this before one of the Bobs got my attention. “Great Spirit! You wanted to know when the next council meeting was going to be starting. You have only a few moments until they begin arriving!”

I sent a pleading emotion to Dani, who snorted and bobbed in the air. “You can go have fun, but there is still a lot to get done, so you are going to have to come back and work afterward! That section where the Mages were fighting is still all messed up, and you need to fix it!”

<Let Dregs do it. Why do we even have them around if they don’t do anything?> I grumbled the words even as I turned my attention to the chambers so far above me. I hadn’t seen this before, and I wanted to know what went on when people didn’t have anyone to impress.

“Magma Cores are lazy, and you know it! If she didn't have her Wisp pushing her to create, Dregs would have just sat in the area for millennia.”

<Oh, Dani, meeting starting—gotta-go-bye!>

An Amazonian strode into the council chambers, looking absolutely exhausted. I actually felt bad for her for a moment. Typically, her people only showed their proud side, hiding anything that could even be thought of as weakness. Losing ninety-nine percent of their entire civilization to the attacks by The Master must have been a more serious blow to morale than I had thought it would be, at least, if this were the person I was going to base my judgment off of. Perhaps I had been too quick to judge them in the past? After all, if they were here and working with The Master, even though he had destroyed them…

The next person to enter was a High Elf who seemed to glide across the floor and sit with exceeding grace. I looked on in surprise and then started laughing. I was able to see under the robes he was wearing, and his steps had been so quick that it looked like he was bouncing in place like a hopped-up Basher. Was that what they did so they could look pretty when walking? Ha! Also, ever since the door had opened, the Amazonian had regained her haughty demeanor, but now, I at least knew it was an act.

Each of the groups that arrived had their own little ways to ‘subtly’ show dominance. Every time they did something ‘special’, it made me laugh. There was a new group that had joined—Wood Elves. They came into the room in perfect step with each other, and even more than that, they mirrored each other perfectly. When one turned to look to the left, they all turned left. Weird. I think it was a way to show unity?

Prince Henry and Queen Marie were the only group to walk in and have no apparent ego. They simply took their places and plopped down. I approved of this for a few reasons and let them know. <You’re both doing great. Listen. You are representing humanity again, but you are also here for me. Whatever you do, don’t throw any Mana around in here. I’ll let you know why in a little while.>

They nodded, keeping their eyes flickering between the other races and peoples. Watchful. I like that. Of course, they looked like they had been dipped in metal, specifically Mithril. That meant that they didn’t look particularly human and, in fact, could nearly be considered on the same level as my Golems in terms of features. This armor was different than Dale’s and would always cover them when they were in the presence of other people. Only when they were alone—or with just each other—would their armor melt away, actually into their skin. Hope they continued to like each other long-term.

The Master was the last to arrive, and he did so by simply stepping out of nothing and sitting down in his seat. The already-quiet room went dead silent, and so he began to speak, “Let’s discuss.”

Those words were enough for the room to erupt into shouting, and powerful lungs made for painful echoes in the enclosed space.

“We were brutally attacked–”

“Why do we bother with these lower–”

“Hello, it’s good to be included–”

“You were attacked? We were the ones–”

“Oh, stop it.” The Master’s words weren’t as forcefully ejected as the others were, but still, he cut through the noise like a flame-enchanted sword through a Basher. There was a flare of light as a Guild member ignored him and sent a bolt of death at an unprepared necromancer. Luckily for the necromancer—and not so great for the attacker—my Wards latched on to the poorly-built spell structure, tearing the bolt apart and draining the man at double the rate of his Mana waste.

He dropped to his knees as power was pulled through him, and his arms began to glow. “What… what did you do to me, necromantic filth?”

Sadly, I hadn’t been able to create the Wards to the same intensity as the more dangerous skill rooms in my depths, as that required a three-dimensional space. The ceiling was just too high to be effective, and the shining man wasn’t near any walls. Too bad. Still, no one was moving to help the attacker, and his clothes started to smolder as Mana continued flowing out of him.

“I did nothing. This must be divine retribution!” the attacked necromancer replied smugly as he watched the Mage slowly burn to death. “You all saw, he attacked me for no reason!”

“I… pant… I don’t know what’s happening!” The Guild member’s clothes officially burst into flame, but the small fire found no purchase on his powerful flesh. “I can’t… I don’t know what’s happening!”

“Someone get him out of here before he explodes and singes my scarf.” One of the High Elves made a ‘shoo’ motion, and a few Guild members grabbed the man and dragged him away. Of course, as soon as he got out of the room, his Mana stopped seeping away, and he came back into the chamber. Ignoring the looks and his singed shirt, he took his seat and stared at The Master stoically.

“Apparently, my words are not enough.” The Master growled dangerously, raising the hackles of everyone in the room. “The next person to make an attack like that dies. How does that sound?”

The room shook with his fury, the table cracked, and dust rained from the ceiling. The world around him began to lose color, bleached by his power. I watched with rapt attention, waiting for him to lash out and smush these insects like I knew he could. Instead, he calmed down, and they began speaking about logistics and the morale loss of various populations. Then they began to talk on migration efforts, and I completely lost interest. Ah, well. It had been a fun attempt. Maybe my efforts would pay off in the future?

“I’m sorry I lost my temper.” The Master was visibly restraining himself, knowing that any emotional displays could only mark him as weak. That was not what he needed right now, especially as he had not been able to close his wounds. The fight against Xenocide had been a tenth of a second away from ending everything for him, and the accounting was still coming due.

The Master waited a moment to see if anyone would speak up for him, but just like always before… it seemed he was going to have to rely on himself. “We simply do not have the time, we cannot spare the energy, and we cannot fight amongst ourselves. Two weeks. We have at most two weeks to put together a mastercraft portal that should be the work of a generation. If we are going to save our people… put aside your hatred at least until your own people are safe.”

There. The Master decided right there that If self-serving interests wouldn’t end this internal conflict… that he would just find another use for their energy. As a point of fact, the bodies of Mages provided rare materials for crafting.

Chapter Twenty-six

“There he goes now. The cheater.”

Dale whipped his head around, but enough people were looking at him that he couldn’t pinpoint who had spoken. Normally, he wouldn't have associated that title with himself, but after what Minya had told him, it was starting to get under his skin. He nudged Hans very gently, calling attention to himself. “Hans, what was that all about? Someone just called me a cheater? What does that even mean?”

“Oh that?” Hans waved his hand dismissively. “They just think that you rose to power too quickly, that you achieved a high rank too young, and that the dungeon unfairly benefits you. I’m pretty sure there is only a nebulous plan to murder you to relieve tension. Nothing to worry about, just rank jealousy. Ha! Rank jealousy. Literal and figurative!”

Dale stopped short, took a deep breath, and slowly let it go. It was important to have a positive relationship with those around you, but right now, he had other things that were more important. Dale was having serious doubts about the quality of and reasoning for their relationship, but he had decided to go into the dungeon with Minya to challenge the Golems. Hans was walking with him for ‘moral support’, but in reality, he simply wanted to see the person that could cause Dale to become so flustered and frustrated.

Minya was getting a lot of attention, and it was obvious that they had seen her before she had seen them. There was a crowd of people around her that she was speaking—perhaps preaching—with. “There is an easier way, everyone! Instead of the need for a huge, unprotected portal, why not simply use the direct method of putting your mind into a Core and giving it to the Great Spirit below us? Why do you need your old bodies?”

“Because otherwise we still die! What’s wrong with you? Of course, we want to go there in our bodies!” The crowd was growing restless, and this comment made the more fidgety amongst them go still before allowing their hands to drift to hidden pockets… almost as if they expected blood to soon fly.

“Minya,” Dale softly called, knowing that she would be able to hear him.

She glanced over and smiled at him, sending a bright comment to the onlookers, “The option will always be there! At least for, well… you know what I mean.”

Dale wasn’t sure how to handle the looks that were an odd mixture of hatred and jealousy he gained simply by having Minya saunter over to him, take his hand, and pull him to the entrance of the dungeon. Hans giving him a thumbs up and salacious wink didn’t help the situation. “Do you have to be parading me around like this?”

“Of course, I do!” Minya’s expression took on a dark edge. “If you’d rather fight through the tower of ascension alone, for the first–”

“Alright, alright already!” Dale sped his steps up to Mage-speed, and they left all the wandering eyes behind them. “Plus, whatever Cal has in here, it can’t actually be just like the tower.”

“No. It really can’t.” Minya smirked at him. “Cal’s version is far easier. You just need to fight something.”

“Can we just talk like normal people, or do you toss around ominous sayings for a living?” Dale growled, still not looking directly at her. He was embarrassed by their last encounter; how could he not have understood that she was only after him for his connection to Cal? Dale held out a keygem, and a rift appeared in the air before him. Stepping through the portal, he caught a Cat by the scruff of its neck and chucked it toward the nearest Golem.

The Cat never reached the target, instead getting caught by gravity Runes and dropped into a portal that opened to the bottom of the mountain. It had a long way to fall before it would reach the arctic waters of the ocean far below. Minya shook her head disapprovingly. “You should know better than to put monsters outside of Cal’s influence like that. What a waste of Essence!”

Dale gave her a flat stare, and she turned to the paths, full of annoyance. “Whatever, Dale. What path would you like to challenge? One of the base elements, infernal, or celestial?”

“It shouldn’t matter. Fire?” Dale finally looked directly at Minya, who had her eyes closed and seemed to be counting. “Actually, I don’t know your Mana type. What’s your specialization? Tier?”

“Effervescence. Two.”

Dale waited for more, but it seemed nothing was forthcoming. “I have questions…”

“You and everyone else that ever hears that.” Minya waved him off like an extra-annoying insect. “It’s tier two, wind and water. It’s a valid Mana type.”

Dale could hear the invitation to say something. He ignored the dare in her voice, waving at the path of fire. “Let’s go on that one. What are you after, by the way? What is it that you are hoping to get out of this dungeon dive?”

“I’m trying to get a field of rare herbs,” Minya responded succinctly. “I am a beast tamer, a dungeon explorer, and a researcher. Powerful herbs are useful for all of my jobs and hobbies, but all of my sway with Cal has been used up just by him keeping me alive. So, I’m going to hunt for what I want.”

Nodding along, Dale put his other concerns out of his mind and focused on his immediate goals. “Agreed. I want to secure a stable area for myself and the people I want to be around. I don’t like the instability I’ve been dealing with, and want to find a way to do what I want in safety and comfort. Let’s go fight our way to a better future.”

“To a better future!” Minya shouted, charging into the flames ahead of him. Dale cursed and followed, arriving on the small island just as a torrential blast of flames ignited the air. Minya shifted her Aura to deal with the attack, deflecting the fire to either side even as the heat scorched her outfit. Dale burst through the remaining blaze, ignoring the minor pain of the Mana-infused fire that penetrated his defenses.

He hopped over Minya, reaching back and translating his momentum into power as he punched the Golem’s torso. The force he exerted cracked the mineral structure, and the Golem went spinning ass over teakettle. It righted itself using a directed blast of fire, riding the momentum and catching Minya’s leg as she tried to dodge. She screamed as it began superheating its body by directing pure fire Mana into its hands.

Minya had to directly pit the water Mana in her Aura against the pure flames and was quickly losing the battle. Dale arrived with a crushing blow, splintering the Mob’s left elbow. It was forced to release the hold it had, and Minya gained distance by kicking off the construct’s already-damaged chest. Dale followed her motion with an earth-infused attack using his knee, and the Golem’s Core was broken out of the main body. It rolled nearly to the edge of the platform before Minya caught up and stored the Mana-filled object in her spatial bag.

“Whew!” She wiped her forehead though no sweat had appeared. “That was fun. Should that have been so difficult? That was only the first Golem in the area!”

“Don’t forget that these are commonly set up for a five-person team,” Dale reminded her even as he worked to decide the best path forward. “We are going to need to be careful. I have a lot of raw power and my bodily training, but I don’t have a ton of experience or refined skills. You…”

“Yeah, yeah.” Minya waved off his discomfort. “You assume I don’t have a lot of raw power, so I need to rely on what I have learned over the years. I’m still recovering from multiple years of Mana deprivation, so trust me when I tell you I understand my limits.”

Dale decided against pointing out the handprints burned into her thigh and pointed instead at the path that connected to the earthen element. “Want to run down the lava path? It would be easy for you to defend since it would be elements opposed to your own. Also, I’m pretty sure I can handle most of the low-tier Golems on my own without too much trouble.”

Minya put her hands on her hips and cocked an eyebrow. “Didn’t we just agree not to underestimate them? I’ve been watching these things since Cal made them. They are dangerous.”

Dale let his head roll back while he groaned. “Can we just go before the moon strikes?”

“Fine, lava path it is.” Minya strode away forward, though Dale soon overtook her and stormed down the path at the lava Golem. He used his earth-shattering tech—that is, his spell—in hopes of ending this battle as it began.

A thick barrier of Mana intercepted his spell, eroding it to the point that only a few thick flakes of stone fell from the construct. Dale was forced to dodge to the side as the Golem’s retaliatory strike mimicked a small-scale eruption, flooding the space he had been standing with superheated stone. Dale’s skin sizzled as empowered sparks charred his exposed flesh. “Son of the abyss!”

Minya burst through the heat, a gout of steam trailing behind her as the protective water coating on her body vaporized. A staff appeared in her hands, and she struck the floor just in front of the Golem. The water and air interacted with the suffocating heat and exploded upward, tossing the Tom-sized golem into the air. Seeing his chance, Dale focused his new gravity spell, and the Golem slammed back to the platform. With the Golem off balance, it was simplicity itself to smash the Core out of the prone body.

Tossing the Core into his bag, Dale looked around at the hazy air, only able to get a general understanding of where he was in relation to the center of the room. “Minya… we’re gonna be here a while, huh?”

“Yup.” She cracked her neck by tilting her head to the side sharply. “Once we get past a few more, the ones at the start come back, so it is also a fight to retreat.”

“Alright, maybe we take a few minutes and figure out how to work together a little better?”

“I thought you’d never ask.”

Chapter Twenty-seven

General Aiden stood still in the dungeon as the Amazonians cautiously explored the area. His squad was with him, using the cover provided by the dungeon to set up their ambush. These oathbreakers thought that they would just wait around? That they would let people without honor into a world where killing them meant nothing? No. No, Aiden would ensure that if any Amazonians survived… it wasn’t for lack of effort on his part.

As the Amazonians walked toward the treasure chest in the center of the room, Aiden shook his head in disgust. They didn’t even bother to check for traps; they didn’t think anything on this level could possibly hurt them. Normally, they would even be correct. Not today. Today was the start of vengeance. Most people wouldn’t understand how dangerous people who had nothing to lose could be. They wouldn’t understand the terrible things these Amazonians had done. That they needed to be destroyed.

Whamp!

The strange sound of a Ward activating and suffusing the air with power sounded through the room, and the Amazonians froze. One of them had touched the chest and had keyed the trap to her power. It was vamping her, using her own Mana to power itself. Since he and his people were wearing keys to the Wards, they sauntered up to the paralyzed group and watched hope flee while despair set in.

“Oh, look what we have here.” Aiden smirked at the members of the group, who were all struggling mightily.

“Maybe if you had gone to an area appropriate to your rank, you would–” Five swords swung out, and five heads fell to the floor. The Ward snapped and popped, fizzling out. “–have been better prepared. Maybe you would have even survived. Instead, you took the easy way out, a way with no struggle or growth. We don’t need people like you in our new world.”

“C-rankers killing Mages!” Aiden released a sigh of contentment as the bodies began to vanish, converted into raw power for the dungeon to use at its leisure. “A gift, a sacrifice to you, dungeon! May we bring you ever more power! May we grow in strength together, forevermore!”

The squad of Northmen cleaned their weapons with a flicker of Essence, their densely Inscribed weapons being handled with more care and respect than the lives they had just ended. Aiden glanced around at the men with him, motioning for them to walk. “Let’s move out! These Amazonian oathbreakers aren’t going to go extinct by themselves!”

Cal

Three entire days. That was how long it took me to make my way through and categorize all the information given to me by the infernal dungeon. That being had been scary smart, even though it had seemed that most of the info was of an unusable affinity for the being. The raw information it had dumped into my mind in return for what I now realized was a pittance was astounding. I took control of a Cat and made it shake its head, just so that I could visually express myself.

<Dani, I’m always amazed by how much more there is for me to learn. There is an ocean of amazing things, and all I have is a bucket to hold a little in.> I was happy. Really, I was. The thought that there was nowhere else to go, that I had reached the epitome without realizing it, had been haunting me. Now… now, I at least realized how little I actually knew and how little of what I knew that I understood. <Can you imagine it? We are going to be together for eternity—learning, growing, and eating!>

“How do you go straight from deep philosophical and existential thinking to talking about food?” Dani laughed at me as I sent an image of a sheep back at her. “Feeling sheepish? Is that what that is?”

<Hey, you’re getting better at understanding what I mean!>

“I just understand that I was overthinking what you were sending in the past,” Dani retorted archly. “Taking it at face value, also known as simply as possible, usually gives me the correct answer.”

<Ouch.> I winced, by which I mean the Cat I was controlling started making strange faces. <Anyway… um… what was I saying? Right! All of this new information has been sorted, and I have a good handle on how things are interacting. What I’m doing now is looking for patterns, repeated schematics or variables that are interchangeable on a micro or macro level. If I can find what I’m looking for, I’ll be able to parse any data or use modular, formulaic options for the creation of new Runes.>

I paused, waiting for a response. There wasn’t one. <How’s that for taking my words at face value? If I explained everything I do all the time, I’d drive you insane.>

“Fine, fine. Maybe there is a mind somewhere in that overgrown crystal.” Dani’s words were a backhanded compliment, but I still smirked about the fact that I had been able to shock her into silence without making a monster appear out of thin air. “The question now becomes—what are you going to use all of your new Wards and… formulaic options for?”

<Well, Dani…> I paused for dramatic effect. <I’m not entirely sure.>

“Ugh! All that talk was just hot air, wasn’t it?” Dani groaned and nearly fell to the ground.

<No, I’m sure an option will present itself to me. I might not have time to go around and make a whole bunch of new floors and the like, but this will all be information useful within my Soul Space, right? When other people are using it and finding uses for these, I will as well. All of that knowledge will be mine to use as I see fit.> I trailed off, starry-eyed. Might need to fix this poor Cat when I left. Starlight pouring out of eye-holes tended to leave them… crispy.

“So, you’re going to use people to power yourself as well as explore ways to use their ideas? This sounds dark, Cal…” Dani’s voice trailed off uncertainly.

<It isn’t like that, Dani!> I protested my innocence. <You know as well as I do that without me, they don’t stand a chance. It isn’t like I’m going to keep them locked up inside me for tens of thousands of years just because I can. The deal was as soon as they can be released safely, I will make it happen. They are getting a lot out of this too!>

“Yeah, yeah.” Dani slowly stirred the air around her, a Wisp’s version of a sigh. “I get it, Cal. Just remember that when people are trapped against their will for a long time… they get resentful of whatever is keeping them there. I’d hate to see someone get out and try to smash you just because you were the instrument of their detainment.”

<I will work to ensure that is something that never happens,> I promised her. <Also, really off topic, sorry about this. There is a group of Northmen going around and massacring Amazonians. Should I just go with it or…? They are dedicating the kills to me and taking no trophies. Lots of power tied up in some of the stuff I’m… acquiring.>

Dani took a look at the situation and grunted noncommittally. “No, they know that they have enemies. The Northmen are technically giving them a fighting chance. Traps… traps are a danger people are supposed to be well aware of. This is on them, and let me repeat why—the Amazonians know that they have enemies.”

<That’s kinda what I was thinking, too. Glad to have it confirmed.>

“If they did anything else, even taking some of the gear, I’d have you send a Bob Squad after them,” Dani continued with her thoughts, taking me by surprise. “They have a blood feud, so I understand their logic, but if they aren’t going to let people survive, we need as many resources as we can get to complete the project at hand.”

<Alright.> I thought about it for a long minute. <I am slightly confused by your logic because they are breaking the rules and deal we had in place, but it means less work for me, so… meh.>

“There will always be time to punish them when there is no escape, Cal.” Dani’s words conjured dark images in my mind, and the Cat I was inhabiting started shivering violently. “Hundreds of years of punishment will be a better deterrent than a few simple deaths now.”

I underlined a point on my mental checklist once more. This made eighteen lines under this particular point—Don’t cross Dani.

Chapter Twenty-eight

Dale and Minya literally crawled out of the portal, fresh blood pasting their clothes to their bodies. Dale was gasping, directing his Aura to create the healing-light-aspect of the sun. Minya was in even worse condition, barely conscious and gasping for as much air as her lungs could take. Only the aftereffect of Dale’s Aura kept her moving.

“We… cough how did we survive that?” Dale wheezed the question using every last drop of stamina he had.

Minya didn’t answer right away, simply lying next to him in a slowly growing pool of their co-mingled blood. “Luck?”

“Must… have…. been,” Dale agreed over the next few seconds. As he calmed himself, he was able to allow Mana to flow into his body once more. He had been dangerously close to losing control of his power when they were fighting the final golem on that floor and had been forced to cut himself off as soon as he struck the final blow.

Now, his armor siphoned a drop of his Mana and tightened in a contorting pattern on his limbs, re-aligning the serious breaks. Dale shook his head wearily; he needed to find a proper healer, but he took a moment to thank Cal for his foresight. His armor was nearly sentient and would tighten to act as a splint and cast when needed. Unfortunately, it required power from him to do so, and if he were Mana deprived… so was his armor.

He was able to get to his feet but couldn’t really help Minya since his arms had both broken during the final fight. He nudged her with his toe, and she grunted to show that she was still alive. “C’mon, Minya, let's get to the clerics.”

“Just let me bleed to death, Dale. Cal will bring me back, right?” Minya whined her words, and Dale laughed despite himself. “That’s dark, Minya.”

“Nah, just like necromancers, Cal is simply a really late healer.” Minya got to her feet, took a single step, and turned her head to vomit. “Ugh. I think I have a concussion.”

“Not surprising.” Dale remembered her stepping in and saving him from taking a blow that would have broken his neck, but she had bounced off a few rocks as she tumbled away. “Thanks, by the way.”

“It’s what teammates do.” She growled, focusing on putting one foot in front of the other. Luckily, the healing station wasn’t far away from the exit of the dungeon, and they were soon surrounded by people who could restore them. After agreeing to the price, they had glowing Mana pouring into their wounds. A gentler light was entering Minya’s head, and her irises slowly came to be the same size.

Dale tipped the healers a full gold coin each after paying the fee, and when he got a look of shock from Minya, he shrugged and walked away. When they were far enough away, he explained himself, “It might as well be dirt at this point. Can’t take it with us into Cal, right? Why not make a few people happy, maybe build some good will?”

Minya thought on that for a short while, nodding as they continued walking. “That makes a certain kind of sense. Looks like I’m about to have a shopping spree.”

“There ya go.” Dale let a slow grin creep across his face. “Get it all out of your system—no shopping for a long time after we get into Cal.”

Minya blanched, making Dale laugh long and hard at her expense. Shopping was her treat, her reward, her guilty pleasure! Maybe someday, she could convince Cal to let her set up fun shopping centers or something…? Just then, she realized that she looked like a murder victim. A wave of bubbly Mana fizzled along her body, and the blood on her clothes, hair, and skin was removed and destroyed. She turned to offer the service to Dale but then realized that he was perfectly clean.

When he was asked about that, he told her about his sunlight Aura and the huge versatility it offered. Suitably impressed, she continued making conversation until noticing that a constant stream of people was moving along the path to the Academy. “Dale, do you know what this is all about?”

“Nope, I can ask though.” Dale tapped a person who didn't look as eager as all the others, asking for information.

The man was wearing students’ robes, obviously a member of the Academy. “You didn’t hear? The Master let it be known that he was going to be offering a lecture today and that any student or member of the Academy was welcome to attend. Since no one knows anything about him, everyone is losing their minds. I bet it’ll just be some stupid motivational speech again.”

Dale thanked him and glanced at Minya. She nodded, and they both joined the stream of people pouring into the stone structure. They got to the main courtyard, finding it stuffed with people of all walks of life. There was only standing room, and a few Mages had even begun levitating groups off the ground so more people could participate. Dale saw that and grumbled, “Abyss, I really need to learn how to fly.”

“Just one more thing I could teach you, Dale.” Minya was speaking into his ear to be heard, and the buzz of her lips made him shiver… not unpleasantly. “I hope that our time together today has made you more receptive to my advances.”

Dale couldn’t think of anything to say, overcome as he was by conflicting thoughts and emotions. Luckily for him, The Master made his appearance at that moment. Stepping out of nowhere, the dark figure soon had the attention of everyone present.

“There is more to the world than most people will ever understand,” The Master launched directly into his lecture without preamble. “Today, I am going to give you a closely guarded secret of those in the S-ranks. The key to ascending into the Spiritual ranks, in fact. Feel free to write it down, to share the knowledge with anyone you’d like.”

His words caused shocked muttering, which turned into aggrieved clamoring. People were trying to decide if he was being condescending or if… just maybe… he was telling the truth. If so, he was about to answer a question that had plagued the races for generations. As the first syllable left The Master’s mouth, all extraneous noise ended. “Many have walked the path of Magehood, only to become foiled at the final step, and so many have never understood why.”

“I would be doing a disservice to the Academy if I did not impart other wisdom to you beforehand.” This caused groans to spill from a few undisciplined mouths, and a crooked smile to wash over The Master’s. “Let us walk through the various methods of advancement.”

“Firstly, there is the original step upon the road of cultivation. All people are able to absorb the Essence of the heavens and the earth. As we all know, the purity and quantity that we can bring in will determine how far we can advance on the path… for most.” The Master stopped here, but only annoyance was reflected back at him. He didn’t particularly care; the fundamentals were important.

“Once we have obtained a method of cultivation, a way to keep the quality and quantity high, the Chi Spiral becomes of the utmost necessity. In fact, most cultivators do not recognize anyone under the D-ranks as actual cultivators. I’m sure many of you have experienced this truth. In fact, point at anyone accepted by the Academy as an F-ranker, and I will give you a spatial bag right now.” The Master waited, and a few people quickly exchanged whispered conversations, but no one took him up on his offer.

“Exactly. Something for you all to be careful about is that most Mages see anyone below the C-ranks the same way. Use caution, for in the hearts of many lie arrogance.” He collected his thoughts for a moment. “From the D-ranks to the C-ranks, collecting power is of the utmost importance. Beyond large quantities of Essence, there is only one feature that defines a C-ranker—Aura—the ability to enhance every bit of your body and mind with Essence, create a passive shielding around yourself, and shape your power for raw usage.”

People were nodding in the area, and a few D-rankers were writing the information down. Typically, information was given on a ‘need-to-know’ basis. “From the C-ranks to the B-ranks, becoming a Mage, advancing through the tower of ascension is needed. This binds your soul to a Law, an aspect of reality, a fundamental node of pure meaning. Now, the higher you climb in the Tower, the higher the tier of Mana you will be able to channel.”

“There is a way to gain a higher tier, but it is normally considered too difficult to truly consider. The only known way to climb higher is a ‘Path Advancement’. This is not only the acquisition of a large amount of information, but the new path must be a Law that contains the Law to which you have been bonded—a set of power that contains its lesser self.” The Master grinned as he saw the plethora of confused faces.

“If you think that is hard to understand, you need to begin taking your studies in this Academy more seriously. Having a strong body is important, but a strong mind will always bring you further.” The Master stopped his chiding and continued, “From the B-ranks to the A-ranks, you need to create a Soul Space. This is a term that many of you have heard recently. As you know, going into a Soul Space is our plan to survive the incoming desolation.”

As he finished speaking, he pointed up at the shards of the moon that were visible even during the day now. “A strong soul, a firm understanding of your capabilities and responsibilities, and lots of practice will allow you to enter the S-ranks. Maybe. There can only be a single S-ranker of any given Law. At this point, you have bonded to your Law to such a degree that you become the embodiment, the Incarnation of that Law.”

“You may wonder why then is the S-rank called the ‘Spiritual’ rank? Why not the ‘Incarnation’ rank?” The Master let people nod along before moving on. “Do you remember me speaking of Soul Space? To step into the S-ranks, you must invert your power. What is outside becomes the inner world, what is outside becomes made of what had previously been solidified. When you look directly at me, you are not seeing flesh or Mana made flesh. You are seeing my soul, formed into a facsimile of my actual body. Upon obtaining the S-ranks, the body goes away. Your mental self shapes your being, fueled by the power you now have. It's similar to the Mage-rank body replacement, just with another—higher—energy. Good luck using this information to attain the rank I have.”

With that final phrase, The Master vanished the same way he had arrived. For a long beat, no one made a sound. Then a Mage broke the silence and sent the crowd into a frenzy with a simple phrase, “What the abyss?”

Chapter Twenty-nine

<Oh, look!> I brought the Academy grounds up on a screen in the navigation room. <It expl~o~oded.>

Chaos filled the courtyard. People were falling out of the air as Mages forgot to levitate them, people were shouting at each other, and large swaths of the crowd were attempting to leave and discuss what they had just learned. I brought up Dale, who didn’t even notice as someone tried to stab him in the kidneys. The dagger—with the word ‘hubris’ printed along its blade—broke on his armor, and he did pause momentarily as the sound of the metal bouncing off the ground reached his ears. Ugh, Dale. That’s such a Dale thing to do. To not even notice an assassination attempt.

“Did any of it make sense to you?” Dani interrogated me adroitly. “Did you gain any enlightenment, make any plans for the future?”

<Well… I won’t really know if the S-ranks are what he says for a long time, right? Beyond that, it seemed like he knew what he was talking about. At least none of it was false.> I pondered on The Master's words. <No, he was as accurate as he understands how to be, but just as we have all found out, there’s always another path to power.>

“You mean like what Artorian did?” Dani accurately inferred. “How he designed what seems to be an entirely unique system for cleansing his corruption while still increasing in rank?”

<Exactly like that,> I confirmed while steadily eyeing the situation above. <If he hadn’t been desperate to advance to the B-ranks, he would have never made a deal with me. He was that close to being able to do it on his own.>

“I forgot to ask you, what did you get out of making that deal? What were the details of the offer he made to you?”

I grinned wolfishly, and the Cat I was still toying with toppled over into unconsciousness. <Whoops, too much strain on Mr. Kitty. I’ll heal him up in a few minutes. He deserves a big reward. Anyway. Artorian needed power for some kind of a rescue or something. Didn’t really care too much. What I got out of it was–>

Boom!

I cut off my comments, looking around the immediate area. <Sorry, do you hear people screaming?>

“No. What? Should I?”

<Yeah, oh, neat.> I was looking at the surface where a few Mages were being beaten down by a huge creature in articulating metal armor. <There is… something going on up there. Dani, I have no idea what that thing is.>

“I’ll get Grace to the escape portal.”

<Could you please just look at that thing?> Her jokes weren’t even funny! I brought my ‘sight’ on to the creature as it fought, and Dani gasped.

“Cal! That’s! That’s one of Kantor’s B-ranked Boss Mobs!” She was so shocked that I wasn’t sure how to take this information.

<Um. How is that possible? Kantor died a while ago.> Her glare shut me right up. <I’m so sorry for your loss.>

“Uh-huh.” Well, that would mean a fight later. I wonder if I could use my Mobs against her during an argument? …Probably a bad idea. “We need to get her in here. I’m sure she will have information that we are going to want, if not need.”

<I’m on it!> I promised her seriously. <Dale! Minya! Need you for a… thing!>

“What kind of ‘thing’, Cal?” Dale’s typically paranoid mental response came.

“Yes, Great Spirit!” Minya’s replies always cheered me up. “Where do you want us?”

<Rescue operation! I need you to get over to the Pleasure House. There’s some kind of Mob that just landed and was attacked. It’s holding out for now, but it is apparently one of Kantor’s original Boss Mobs.> I let that sink in, even as they began moving. <We need her alive! She came here willingly!>

One of the greatest benefits of becoming a Mage was the reduction in travel time. Dale caused barely any damage as he ran, a sign of his improvement. He still caused some damage, but I fixed it on the fly since he was doing me a favor. They came into view of the massive creature and pulled up short.

“That’s a she?” Dale muttered under his breath, getting swatted by Minya for his rudeness. They looked over the huge humanoid, and we realized at the same time that this Mob was coated in armor similar to what I had put King Henry and Queen Marie in. “Are you sure it’s here with peaceful intentions?”

<Nope.>

“Lovely.” Dale spat to the side even as he moved closer. Blades were bouncing off armor, spells were being redirected, and Mages went soaring whenever a hit connected. “Everybody back off!”

It took a few repetitions of this shout for him to be heard, but Minya played a part by stopping people from rejoining combat after they were knocked back. A simple phrase from her made them stop and think. “It is hitting only non-lethal areas! Back off!”

When a stalemate had been reached, Dale stepped forward with his hands to his sides. “Boss Mob, you come from Kantor’s dungeon? Why are you here?”

The metal along the huge being’s body shifted, popped, and reformed. All dents and damage had been fixed, and the creature now seemed twice as imposing. “I come to place for Dani. Have final order to find and arrive. Got present from Kan-tyor.”

Deep in the dungeon, Dani gasped and let out a shuddering gust of wind.

“I knew it!”

Dale looked up at the creature, deciding to just go ahead and bring it into the dungeon. “Follow me… um. I’m sorry, what is your name and, ah, race?”

“Am Ogre!” A fist bounced off her metal clad-chest. “Enemies weep, run in terror! Ogre have no mercy!”

“Your name? Are there more of your people?” Dale prodded as they walked slowly and carefully through the crowd.

“Just me! Am Boss!” she stated proudly, then hesitated. “Never earn name. You want give me name?”

“Um. Sure.” Dale tried to play for time as he thought. “You are the only one of–”

“Oni!” the Ogre bellowed happily. “Me the Oni! Thank you for name, Born of the Dungeon!”

Dale sputtered as he heard what was happening, but luckily, people were laughing at him too hard to really think about what the Ogre was saying. Dale got the Ogre to the entrance and let her go ahead. He seemed like he planned to follow her, but I stopped him. <Thanks, Dale. We’ve got this from here.>

As soon as Oni stepped into my area, I had noticed something… off. There was a conspicuous lack of Essence or Mana wasted by the Mob, and any power that came too close simply vanished. <Hi there, Oni. Welcome.>

“Hi there, young Dungeon. You did good for only… eleven years old? Twelve? I ‘member when we met you, but you were bad at talking!” Oni laughed like a proud nanny, and I seemed to have been robbed of my ability to speak coherently for a few moments.

<Erm. I’m not actually sure… I have difficulty with time.> I shook my poor Cat to clear my mind, and it fell ‘asleep’ again. Oops. <Listen, I need to know why you’re here before I let you come all the way down here.>

“There be no let. Me free Mob. Oni is a free Ogre! Oni does what wants!” the Ogre bellowed excitedly. “Oni was given a sock!”

<I’m… I’m not sure what that means?> I turned to Dani. <Does that mean something to you?>

“Nope?” Dani was just as confused as I was. Good, at least that was cleared up.

<Would you please tell us why you came here?> I tried going as polite as possible.

“Can do!” Oni nodded deeply as she waded through the streams of Bashers bouncing off her armor. “Was given task by Kan-tyor when he was being… word is hard… means attacked and taken over. Invaded!”

Her last word was screamed with such ferocious glee that two bunnies had to flop to the ground and put their paws over their damaged ears. “I did it! I ‘membered word!”

<Very good job, Oni,> I soothingly congratulated her. <What was the task?>

“Oh.” Oni concentrated, and her armor began to vanish, retracting from her limbs and body and being sucked into a small backpack she had been wearing under the armor. “Easy task, hard to do. Had to bring Dani’s brudda to her. Something about helping him and… nep… nepo… nepotism! Nepotism keeping him safe!”

“Wait. Brother?” Dani had no idea what was going on, and I smelled a trap.

I decided it was time for the direct approach, and I started waking up my heavy hitters. <If it is Dani’s ‘brother’, then why are you carrying a dungeon Core in your bag?>

“Wait a second, Cal! Mu? Mu, is that you in there?” Her voice was strange. Was she happy or angry?

Then a voice I had never heard before reached my mind. <Hey there, lil sis! Yup, it’s me! I hear you are putting together a rescue mission? Was that for me, or is something else going on?>

“Cal. Eat them,” Dani ordered me. Ah. Mad. Mad is what her voice had been. Got it noted for future cross-checks against strange delays in responses. Filing information under ‘aspects of terror, avoid at all cost’. All set, back to the conversation at hand.

<Consider it done, person who is really in charge of this operation!> Six Bob Squads should be enough for this. <Go get ‘em, boys!>

Chapter Thirty

<Wait! Wait!> the strange little backpack dungeon begged. Nope. My lovely Wisp wanted him gone, he was gone. Let’s see… Next, I should work on building up my inner world. Maybe I would work on the ley lines that were crisscrossing the entire planet? I could- <Hey! Listen to me, you crazy Wisp!>

I was a little startled that they were still alive. Oh, right. Travel time for bipedal Mages through the dungeon still exceeded seven seconds from the lowest floors. The Bobs were moving but hadn’t yet arrived. Silly me, I had just considered it such a done deal that–

“Mu, I told you that if I ever saw you again, I would make sure to kill you,” Dani coldly informed him. “Instant death like Cal is promising… is the best-case scenario for you.”

<I shattered one other Core! Didn’t it work out? Would you prefer to be teaching a drooling Dire Turkey Dungeon Core how to speak? That’s where you’d be if you weren't here! Look at this place! It’s flying!> Mu was getting desperate, and it was showing.

<Hey. Why can’t I find your influence? I should be able to crush you from here.> It didn’t really matter to me, I’d win either way, but… still, I was curious.

<Cal, right? Cal? Listen, buddy. This bag I’m in is my entire dungeon. I have only one Mob, and it isn’t even… Oni? My actual Mob is a living metal construct that can act as armor!> Mu was close to being ended, but that was still fun info. <Dani is mad because I shattered a Core she was supposed to bond with before we met you. I didn’t think it was good enough for her, so I took it out on the sly. That’s why she’s mad at me! Help me out here! You should be my best friend right now!>

<Hmm. I’m not typically the voice of reason in our relationship…> I pondered for a bit, letting him sweat. Or… whatever the equivalent was. <Usually I’m the one to run screaming at projects with massive enthusiasm, but in this case, I’ll give it a try.>

Dani was waiting for the battle to begin, but I told the Bobs to back off for a moment. <Dani, my sweet. Could you maybe, possibly be willing to hear him out for a little while?>

“I’m sure Oni will be able to tell us whatever we need.” She dismissed my words coldly. “We can let her live. Good compromise.”

<I’m sure you’re right, but still… he is your… brother, right? Actually, how does that work?> I was going off topic, but she was more than happy to explain.

“Obviously, there is no way to actually be brother and sister. Not like humans are. We were both simply trained in the same area for a good long time. Since we knew each other for so long, we started teasing each other about being related. Now he’s trying to not die by bringing up our prior good relationship.” She stopped talking, and I knew that I was going to need to put my figurative foot down.

<I don’t often do this, but I’m gonna go ahead and not kill them. I’ll bring them down here, and Mu can beg for his life really hard.> That last part was directed at Mu, and I think he got the picture.

<You won’t regret this, Cal! I have a ton of info to share with you. Kantor gave me as much raw data as he could, and I can’t even use it.> Mu certainly knew how to play on my greedy interior, but if he was lying… he would find out that I was even less forgiving than Dani. Feed the greed, happy. Otherwise, feed the dungeon. I’m still happy, though slightly disappointed.

“Fine! But he’d better stay away from Grace. I don’t even care if they’d be compatible!” Dani flew off in a huff, but her words made me twitch. Excuse me? Abyss right he’d better stay away from Grace! I’d go full murder-Mage on him!

<Mu, are you here looking for a Wisp?> I voiced my question as calmly as possible.

<Do you have other Wisps here?> Mu seemed hopeful, but then his tone changed. <No… I’ve never found a compatible color. I’m really average, but I’ve kinda given up on it, hence—backpack dungeon.>

I laughed out loud at that—in a manner of speaking—and opened a secret panel in the wall to let them bypass a few issues. Oni entered, and they walked through the darkness for a few minutes before sliding off a ledge and into a hole that would bring them all the way down to me. Oni didn’t scream in fear as was expected but laughed instead. Ah, the Mob mentality of expecting to always return to life.

From the freefall, she was taken on to a perfectly smooth rock slide that had water pouring through it. A very safe and comfortable ride… I was pretty sure. Yeah. Okay, good, she survived. This part was new, so I wasn't sure she would.

<Welcome!>

Dale

“Aiden? What are you doing here?” Tom had just met up with Dale to discuss some issues he foresaw, when his older brother walked into the area. “Aren’t you supposed to be working with the troops and getting them prepared to march?”

“Tom!” Aiden walked over with a bright smile on his face. “I am here to pick up a portal to use for our people. It should be coming through the main portal soon, and we are going to bring it back to the outpost. Good to see you!”

“You look well!” Tom’s smile could have melted the heart of a Golem. “Getting plenty of exercise?”

“You know, I’ve been having a very large amount of success in the dungeon here!” Aiden matched Tom’s enthusiasm, clapping him on the back and sitting down to talk. “We were just about to head out, but I wouldn't mind–”

“Aiden? No, this is too surreal!” A metallic voice floated to their table followed by a huge, armored form appearing next to them.

“Henry? Is that you in that wall of metal?” Aiden shot to his feet and inspected the perfectly fitted gear. “B-ranks? How in the abyss did all of that happen to you? Is this entire suit Mithril?”

“Ha! I made the best deal of my life!” Henry couldn’t take his eyes off of his childhood friend, even if Aiden couldn’t see it. “I’ve missed the Northmen and you especially! Did you ever decide on a Mana recipe for yourself? We should go on a hunt sometime soon!”

“Hold on, hold on!” Aiden laughed in reply, his conversation with Tom forgotten. “Yes, we’ve missed you, too. I have plans for a Mana recipe, but I’m not entirely sold on the idea yet. Where would we hunt, and finally, what deal do you speak of?”

“Ah, I apologize! It has been a while since I have seen anyone from…” Henry trailed off, looking away.

“Oh, that’s right. Your family.” Aiden placed his dinner-plate-sized hand on the King’s shoulder. “I heard the news, friend. My deepest condolences go with them. They are honored by my people, having stood strong even in the face of certain death.”

“My thanks.” Henry cleared his throat and tried again in a falsely chipper tone, “As for a hunt, why, this dungeon contains a labyrinth filled with game and creatures to test ourselves against! There is even a forest along one of the paths. As for the deal… I traded service to the dungeon for access to the power that I needed. And now, ha! Everyone and their tamed Beast has to go into the dungeon! Best deal I’ve ever made.”

“No kidding.” Aiden seemed to be considering something and looked back at the mouth of the dungeon. “That sounds very interesting.”

“I think that path is closed for most,” Henry seemed uncomfortable, thinking that he had said too much, “but as I said, why don’t we get together for a hunt soon?”

“I would like that very much.” Aiden grasped Tom’s bicep and gave a tight squeeze. “For now, I need to speak with my brother and resume my duties. Henry, we will make it happen.”

Henry left with a brilliant smile that no one could see, and Aiden spent a few minutes discussing plans with Tom before heading out. Tom watched him go, disgruntled by having been ignored. “Dale, I really wanted to see respect in the eyes of my brother. I wanted to hear his congratulations and preen under the influence of a man I respect. Why do I feel so let down?”

“Oh, Tom.” Minya had arrived just in time to catch his words. “You can never gain respect from your family or those who knew you as you grew into the person you are now. They will always see you as the child they once knew. Honestly, big guy, do you want your family to see you so drastically different than you once were? You might find that their reaction to having shattered expectations is not as happy as you wished.”

“Got a story there?” Dale tried to tease an explanation out of her, but she simply shook her head sadly.

“Nothing I want to share.” Minya glanced around and leaned in to speak to them more directly, “Dale, Cal is acting weird, and people are losing it over the fact that monsters are showing up to visit the dungeon. They are wondering what it means for them, how this will change things.”

“While I’m worried for Cal, is there something I can do about all of this?” Dale showed his palms and shrugged.

Minya took a deep breath. “There’s more. Barry is back, and he found out that The Master is weakening. He’s staging a coup, making a bid for leadership of the area again by getting the people on his side.”

“Oh, come on!” Dale dropped his head into his hands.

Chapter Thirty-one

Barry and The Master stood across from each other, staring daggers back and forth. The intense pressure they were devoting to the action was actually enough to kill a standard human if it were directed at them. Barry took a deep, satisfied breath and then smirked.

“I see the rumors are true. You are leaking power like a sieve. I cannot believe that I missed it before, but you had hidden it so well when I saw you last!” Barry laughed and took a decisive step forward. “Right now, I might not be able to fight you and be guaranteed to win, but I bet I could force you into a stalemate at this point. If I can make that happen… Let’s be honest with each other, The Master, people would side with me against you. I think that this much is obvious! Here is what I offer you now—I’ll let you stay here and finish the soul portal, but otherwise, there are going to be some changes.”

“I could just kill you right now and take my chances on the rest,” The Master mildly stated, also taking a smooth step forward. Barry’s eyes bulged out, and his breath started coming harder. “I think that with you out of the way, your minions wouldn’t be too much of an issue. You also seem to forget that I too have an army at my beck and call.”

“They’ve been losing power!” Barry barked in a fury, losing face in front of the crowd, forcing his hand. “Their corpses fall to the ground, and unless the dead stay within visual range, they either go wild or falter! There simply isn’t enough free power for them to maintain control!”

“Mmm.” The Master’s eyes were locked on Barry’s heart, and the man could tell. “I wonder… how much I care at this point? Is it worth finally destroying you? Should I follow my instincts after all these years and all of our skirmishes?”

“Give me control! Don’t make me fight you. Do this, and I will allow the people in your care to remain unharmed. I will punish any of my people who harm them, to the same extent as the harmed individual. Your dark army will be allowed into the portal and to safety. I will personally care for them.” Barry narrowed his eyes. “Conversely, if I need to fight, and when you lose… I will personally eradicate them.”

“Swear it,” The Master stated softly. “Swear to me that they will be treated properly. That you will personally care for them. All of the things you just said. Especially that all of my people will be allowed access to the portal. That I will also be treated as such if it is within your power. Then… I care not who is the one that needs to squabble for power and make the treaties that get us through each day. You can be the one to deal with the minutiae and annoyances of the day-to-day.”

“So long as you agree to my demands on this specific subject, I so swear,” Barry solemnly announced, causing his Aura to wrap around himself and create a new bond. The ground fell apart under his feet, and the earth hovered in the air around him. The world, and his power, had accepted the deal.

“Good enough, I suppose.” The Master sighed and stepped aside. “You deal with the politics. I’ll go get this portal finished, and maybe even find a way to save those of the higher ranks. I heard a great idea—from the non-cultivator Tyler no less—about shoving A-rankers in Mana-containment crates and seeing what happens. Might be fun to try.”

The Master vanished with a pop, and Barry’s face seemed to melt and reform into a malicious grin. “Excellent. First off, we have some new rules! Humans and High Elves alone are allowed access to the dungeon if they are not a member of the Guild. All others must petition the Guild for access. No more monsters getting in!”

“High Elves?” Queen Brianna stepped forward dangerously.

“Yes.” Barry stared at her, not backing down a bit. “Feel free to petition for access or fight me for the right to make the rules.”

Brianna took a deep breath and vanished from the area. Barry grunted and watched an empty space move away at high speed. “That’s what I thought. There have been many disappearances recently, so for the safety of all involved, the Guild decree is that only those proven to be effective may enter. So, humans and High Elves only. Get moving.”

Guild members began flooding out of the portal, moving to secure the dungeon opening. Any who resisted or complained were sent away with a beating at the least. Several shops were ‘requisitioned’, but when they tried this with the Pleasure House, anyone making demands was snared by the tree-building and thrown over the edge of Mountaindale. A different kind of power-grab in that area and not one that was going the Guild’s way.

In short order, the area and Mountaindale itself was once more heavily under the control of the Guild. This didn’t go over well, especially since this version of the Guild was a regime instead of the self-sacrificing group it used to be. Tensions between the races began to flare up once more. Grudges that had been put aside when there was a clear-cut goal in place were remembered and acted upon.

More than one body was dumped into the dungeon over the course of the next few hours.

Cal

<So, Mu, tell me some stories about Dani when she was younger.> I was teasing Dani, and it was working so well! She was bright red, shifting to green every once in a while. <I want to see her squirm!>

<Sure, Cal! So, there was this one time that she was supposed to be learning how to channel fire Essence into water so an adventuring party could boil water for a stew.> Mu started laughing, and Dani started to growl. <Well, there was a big bowl of salad next to it, and let’s just say that’s the story of how we learned that Dani can’t and shouldn’t cook… by her burning a salad!>

We shared a good laugh, right until Dani grabbed some Mana and chucked Mu’s backpack into a treasure chest. “I’m gonna give you to a fishy as a trinket!”

<Cal, help! I don’t want to be a reward!> Mu started laughing here, knowing that he could easily escape on his own. I'm pretty sure he could, at least. Maybe he didn't want to test Dani. Wise. Still, had to keep the joke going!

<Dani, we can’t give him away! I only give out useful rewards!> I shouted this, which seemed to cheer Dani up. Mu was protesting loudly, and finally, Dani gave in and brought him back into the open. After we had gotten all of the fun out of the way, I decided to get down to business. <Mu, what made you seek us out?>

Silence followed my question, for long enough that I thought he wasn’t going to respond. <Ehh… so I have a message from Kantor. He was old and smart enough to see that there were going to be bad things happening, especially to him. People kept appearing and taking Mana readings, then more than just readings. Still, he thought he had enough contingencies in place to survive.>

Mu continued after a few seconds of remembrance, <Obviously, he was wrong. Contingencies only work if you have time to use them. Now, frankly, I have nowhere to go, and I really like my backpack. Wyvern leather. But, all of this information is going to waste, and I want you to have it. But that’s not the message. Kantor told me that under no circumstances were we allowed to go north… where you are currently going. The origin.>

“Do you know what’s there?” Dani instantly queried.

<I don’t.> Mu growled at her. <You aren’t listening. Kantor knew what was there, and he told me that when he went there… that was the closest he ever got to dying. Before… you know. Actually dying.>

“I have to go, Mu. It’s too important, even if I don’t know why. I need to go.” Dani wouldn’t hear any more about this and kept changing the subject whenever he tried to press the issue. “So, what would you like to do while you’re here?”

<Fine, Dani. I just hope that you aren’t making a huge mistake.> Mu waited, but Dani didn’t speak. <Cal, we need to get an information transfer started. This is going to take a while, especially since there is a lot of it that I don’t understand. I have the info but no perspective or way to relate it to myself. A lot of it is designed for a dungeon in the upper A-ranks.>

The entire dungeon started to rain. That was how much I was drooling about the idea of gaining this information. Mu kept speaking, but I barely heard him, <I don’t want anything in return—I’m just following the last wishes of Kantor. So, are you ready?>

<I am so ready.> I nearly snarled. Extending a tendril of Essence, I connected to the backpack and was met with a wall of information, mathematical equations, genetic information, and various untapped uses for Essences. In short, it was everything I wanted it to be and so much more.

As the last of the raw data came into me, the entire lifelong studies of Kantor, Mana began to well up in my Core. A spiraling concussive force knocked a few leaves off the Silverwood tree, marking my advancement to A-rank-two.

Chapter Thirty-two

Dale stood on the edge of Mountaindale with nearly every person that lived in the area—as well as a whole lot of people that didn't—watching as the first chunk of the moon came close enough to fall to earth. He had seen shooting stars before, but this was… different. No one knew what was about to happen, and the portal to the Soul Space wasn’t operational. This could be the end. It certainly wasn’t the largest chunk, maybe a few thousand feet wide, and it was only moving a little faster than gravity would normally bring it down. So, there was a chance.

The chunk of the moon seemed to catch on fire, making everyone gasp. Was the moon full of fire Essence? That explained why it was so bright at night, but… the flaming object vanished over the horizon. Nothing seemed to happen over the next few minutes. That should have landed in the ocean since the entire world was a single landmass with only a few islands dotting the rest of the sphere. Thirty minutes passed, and people began to disperse in relief when it became obvious that the world was still surviving.

“Hans, do you think we are getting scared for no good reason?” Dale asked his friend as soon as they were in a more private location. “Perhaps most of this will miss us, and we will simply get a few extra landmasses out of the deal?”

“I have no point of reference, Dale.” Hans lifted his pint and drained it, smacking his lips as he finished it off. “Listen, sorry you haven’t been seeing much of me lately. Been hitting the cultivation pretty hard after we worked out that… thing. I also found a Noble family that was willing to ‘donate’ the other ‘thing’ I needed.”

Dale smiled with a hint of relief; Hans sometimes liked to mess with him to see what would happen. “No worries–”

The room they were in shook so violently that the windows fragmented and lost their glass. The shaking didn’t subside right away, continuing at the same intensity for nearly a full minute. The air was roaring with strange sounds, like thunder mixed with a forge as the tide came in. When everything settled, Dale calmly stood up, helped Hans and Rose to their feet, then stepped outside.

One of the great benefits to building the area in the way they had was that most if not all of the structures were more than built, they were Runecrafted. Not a single building had toppled, which helped to keep any casualties to a minimum. “Anyone know what’s going on?”

<Sure, Dale.> Dale jumped as the voice entered his mind directly. <As far as I can tell, there was huge destruction from that flaming moonrock. One of the reasons we survived unscathed for the most part is that not only are we really far away from where it landed, we are also airborne. You can’t see it from where you are, but the ocean below is… is just… borked. Broken and churning beyond reason. All the water is flowing toward the impact, and that’s really strange. Gonna see some strange stuff soon, I bet. Heh. Looks like the tide is really impacted by the moon, huh?>

“You’re making jokes about the moon hitting the ocean? Now? Cal, focus. How much damage do you think we are looking at?” Dale quietly asked amongst the screaming and loud questions flying around. He kept telling himself that nothing good would happen to him if he reacted to the dungeon’s jokes, but he couldn't help himself.

<Lots. Dale, the ocean is moving. Whatever happened when that chunk hit us isn’t over yet.> There was a pause. <Lo~o~ots of damage.>

“Extra ominous, thanks.” Dale tried to think of something useful he could be doing and couldn’t really think of much. He shrugged and started emitting a sunlight Aura. If nothing else, this would help calm the people around him and slowly fix any injuries they had sustained. “Hans, I’m betting that this will light a fire in anyone who hadn’t been all that concerned about this moonfall before.”

Rose spoke up after looking at all the concerned and hard faces around them, “I think you might be on to something, Dale. Hey… if it were this bad in the air, do you think anyone on the ground—or underground—is happy right now?”

Dale didn’t move, considering her words. “Let’s go and make sure that there is room to start receiving refugees and the like. I’m… yeah, I’m not the best one to make choices for people. Can we see if we can get a higher-ranked cleric to run logistics? That way we know that people coming in will have someone that cares if they live or die. I don’t think that the Guild is a good place to be anymore.”

“I don’t mind going,” Rose offered, getting a nod from Dale. She turned away, but Hans reeled her in for a quick smooch.

“Be careful. When people think they have nothing to lose, they start doing very dumb things,” Hans whispered in her ear.

“I’m a pro. Let them try to catch me.” Rose gave him a cocky grin and a thumbs-up before darting off. In moments, she was running along rooftops and bouncing off walls to maintain momentum.

<Speaking of people you expect to do stupid things…> Dale wasn’t sure what was meant by this statement at first, but then Barry appeared in the air above the Academy.

“Listen up, everyone. From this point forward, every resource is devoted to completing our escape from this dying planet.” Barry was enhancing his voice, and Dale winced since he could just imagine the terrible plans going through the Guild leader’s head. “We are going to be accepting ‘donations’ from everyone. One-tenth of everything you have, whether you have been here or are just arriving. That is how much you get to keep. The remaining nine-of-ten resources will be donated to the Guild, just in case there is something that we might be able to use to speed our escape.”

Silence reigned, though the fury being directed at the S-ranker was palpable. His gaze sharpened, and his voice took on a dangerous edge. “Unless, of course, you’d rather not be allowed to escape with us when the portal is functioning.”

His unsubtle threat made most people turn away. Not wanting to be left behind was a big motivator. People began justifying their inability to say no, telling themselves that it didn’t matter, that they couldn’t bring much with them into the Soul Space anyway, Barry vanished shortly thereafter, allowing everyone to breathe a little easier.

“Cal. As far as you can tell, how close are they to finishing the portal?” Dale voiced into the empty air. Hans looked over with shining eyes, very interested in hearing the answer to this.

<They are close, but they are missing something. They keep thinking it is done, but then they can’t find whatever it is that’s keeping it from activating.> The flow of words paused, then resumed in a sour tone, <The Master is having a hard time. Oh, and he’s getting weaker every day. So that’s fun. Real great for my mental health.>

“Thanks, Cal. If there’s anything we can do to help, let us know?” Dale didn’t get an answer, so he relayed the information to Hans, who was patiently waiting to hear what he had to say, “No good news, Hans.”

“Well… abyss.” Hans rubbed the back of his neck, looking in the direction Rose had vanished. “Do you think it is time to start looking into other options? Making a few contingency plans of our own? I finally have something I’m not willing to risk on a gamble.”

“Very sweet, I’m sure.” Minya appeared with a sound like a giant soap-bubble popping. Hans screeched and did a backflip, landing with knives in his hands. “Nice. Hey, Dale, I think that we are getting into a dangerous area. Something Cal has been discussing with Dani recently… We could be getting into an area that’d be worse for our health than simply finding a place to sleep for a thousand years or so.”

“Do you have details?” Hans politely inquired, his weapons once more hidden somewhere on his body.

“I don’t, but I think we are going to find out sooner rather than later.” Her grim words were punctuated by a blaze of shifting light that filled the sky. It looked beautiful, but they could tell that there was a huge amount of Essence and Mana in those lines. “What in the abyss is that?”

“The lights of the North.” A barbarian had come close enough to overhear their conversation, and he was staring at the sky with eyes full of wonder. “I thought that they were only a myth!”

“Can you… What is the myth?” Dale tossed politeness to the side and went right for the information he needed.

“The lights of the north.” The barbarian looked at them knowingly, but upon seeing their confused faces, he rolled his eyes and explained, “They light the way to the greatest treasure upon this earth, but only one man has ever followed their siren call and returned. It is said that whoever follows the path without the willpower to sacrifice their dreams can never return, but that there is no need to return. Immortality, the path above the S-ranks. That is what lies at the end of those lights.”

“And we are flying straight at something straight out of mythology,” Minya pointed out, swallowing deeply. Even myths and legends usually had a kernel of truth in them, and most likely, the truth here… was that no one returned after following the lights.

Chapter Thirty-three

<Whoa. That’s some serious power echoing along those lines.> I siphoned off just a little taste, feeling a texture I had never tried before. It contained a hint of celestial, sunlight, and something. <It almost feels familiar, but I just can’t place it.>

“What feels familiar?” Dani wondered idly, watching the light sparkle above the clouds. “The energy in there? Yeah, The Master uses something similar.”

<That’s where it’s from!> I excitedly exclaimed. <I knew it was… actually, what does he embody? What Law is he bound to?>

“Not a clue,” Dani returned with her version of a shrug.

<What are you guys doing? Can I come see?> Mu’s muffled voice called from his treasure chest. He must have been trying to make a point because a small wall like that meant nothing to our method of communication.

“No! Learn not to say dumb things, and you can come out!” Dani snarled at the box. Poor little backpack dungeon. On a tangent now, I found that I felt bad that Mu was a millionth my own size. Maybe I could donate some land to him in my Soul Space.

<Sorry, Mu! If it helps, Oni is having a great time out here.> I was watching Oni’s body decompose rapidly, but I was pretty sure I could make a convincing new copy before Mu was let out of his chest.

<Oh, good! I hadn’t heard her speaking in a little while. I was getting worried.> Mu’s words made me grimace. It wasn’t my fault that the Ogre insisted on testing her mettle against Manny. I actually tried to stop her out of respect to Mu, but I wasn’t going to lie and say that I tried hard. I now had an Ogre pattern! That was pretty neat. It was a Kantor original, even!

“I feel like you are being silly over there,” Dani whispered to me, to which I could only agree.

<Yeah… I’m feeling a little like a collector of shiny pebbles. Even if I have a superior pattern of something, I always want to get a variant or interesting version. I want a shiny version, you know?> I was hoping that she would simply let the conversation go, but I had to end it when she pestered me to explain myself. I guess she didn’t see Manny take Oni down in under three seconds. Prolly for the best.

I had to change the subject, and the brilliant sky gave me a perfect out. <So, does this spark any of your racial memories or whatever it is that you have?>

“It… something about it does.” She watched the sky a while longer. “I guess it is the fact that the patterns in the sky have a bit of a Will-of-the-Wisp to them. Not a heavy effect, but anyone seeing the sky wants to follow it to see what is going on.”

Just like that, the slight nagging compulsion that had been nagging me broke, and I realized that I had been under an incredibly subtle lure effect. <Wow. I… that had me, Dani. How was it so easy for me to break?>

“You’re bound to a pink Wisp, Cal. Mind-altering effects just have less hold on you when you realize they exist.” Dani was still staring at the sky, but I was reeling from the news.

<What?>

“Oh, abyss, did I just–” Dani went into near-panic mode and started zipping away.

<Hold it!> I barked at her, probably the roughest I had ever been with her. <You mean to tell me that you can shield my mind from certain effects?>

“I… Cal, I shouldn’t be discussing the secrets of my people.”

<I don’t have any secrets from you!>

“Cal…” She stirred the air in agitation. “It isn’t my information to give. It’s just… you know what? To the abyss with it, why shouldn’t I tell you? Look, different colored Wisps have different abilities, which is why you need to bond with a certain color. It creates a balance.”

<Care to offer an example?> I was feeling twitchy about this for some reason.

“I might as well.” Dani came over and landed on the Silverwood tree. “You’re a blue Core, and so you needed a Wisp that could more freely balance your mind. You were supposed to be a water Essence Core, prone to flights of fancy and extremely changeable. Luckily, that still held true.”

<Hey!>

“If I’m wrong, tell me I’m wrong.” Dani smirked at me, pausing briefly to give me a chance to speak up. “Thought so. Now, we aren’t ever supposed to talk about this because it builds resentment, distrust, and animosity when it’s known that someone is coming in to… guide you.”

<Control you,> I responded flatly.

“Balance you,” Dani firmly stated. “Mu over there needs a Wisp that can help control Essence so that he could build a dungeon. Otherwise, he can only inhabit preset, prebuilt areas. Or backpacks, apparently.”

<Like a Wisp that can move through stone and shape it?> I lost some color. Mu was going to ‘play’ in ‘his’ treasure chest anytime Grace was anywhere near this area.

“Exactly.” Dani quieted and sighed. “Someone that can get you to be doing your best together. A partner in all things. You and I are a really good example.”

<Alright, Dani. I’ll let it drop, but you know I just want to be included in all this… secret Wisp society stuff. Just tell me, and I promise I’ll let it go if needed, okay?> An implosion of Mana signified that I was bound to my words, shocking her.

“Ah… alright, Cal. I’m… thank you.” Dani zipped in a tight circle around me, which I had found was her version of a hug. “It’s good to know that I can tell you anything. I don’t know why I had doubts.”

<Hard to break the habits of a lifetime, I get it,> I consoled her, even though I was waiting for the flood of information to begin. I’d be patient. For now. <Listen, is there anything else you can tell me about these lights?>

“If I remember correctly, they are called the ‘aurora borealis’. I don’t have much information, but they are not a natural phenomenon. That’s… really all I know about it.”

<Then I guess we get to learn about this the fun way!> I tilted the gyroscope forward, and the Skyland sped up once more. <Let’s go learn what’s at the top of the world!>

“Yeah!” Dani responded enthusiastically.

We watched the terrain pass, but still, nothing came into view. Now feeling a tish silly, I laughed and delved deep into my inner world. If there was no danger, no land, and therefore nothing for me to do beyond upkeep, I needed to do everything I could to get my Soul Space up to snuff. There were three giant factors for me to consider: keeping people alive, getting as many of them as possible, and keeping them under control. Maybe I should figure out a way to keep people away from who they hated? Was that even a good idea?

Nah. Instead, why not just let them sort all that junk out for themselves? Populations can sort themselves out much more quickly and accurately than I can do it for them, right? So, I really feel like my time will be better spent on solidifying and populating the areas. It was getting to the point that I was getting bored with the repetition, so I decided to have a little fun. I am a dungeon after all, and people would be expecting dangers and monsters!

I built up a series of defenses around a small area, then copied the new area a few times and remade it in multiple locations. Alright. Starting areas for people to migrate to have been set. Easy enough. The next step was to introduce creatures to the new system and let them build up naturally and over time. Once again, I was starting an ecosystem from scratch and hoping that everything would settle nicely. It was one thing to make this happen in a contained and easily controlled system like a dungeon, but across a world? Much… slower. Luckily, I had only a few miles in total created.

The bugs were just getting settled when I felt my dungeon get rocked to the side. Seeing as I tended to be moving much faster in my inner world than the actual world did, so I wasn’t too worried about getting back in time to understand what was going on. Drifting out of my Soul Space, my focus fell on the Bobs just as they began reacting to whatever had hit us.

<Bob, what’s happening?>

“Great Spirit!” Bob called back, not taking his eyes off the viewing screen. “It appears that we are not the only ones following this stream of power. There are creatures in the air and in the sea below! They are powerful, and I think we will start taking losses if we are attacked!”

<How powerful? B-ranks? A? How many, and is there any reason you can see that they’re here?> I paused and would have rolled eyes if I had any available. <Beyond the potent lure of the lights, that is?>

“There seems to be very little consistency.” Bob paused and looked over the screens. “In fact, they are from all over, as far as I can tell. As if–”

<As if they ran out of energy, especially the energy they need to survive, and started gravitating toward anything still radiating free power?> My thoughts were going down an ‘uh-oh’ route. <Could it be that we found the creatures that my shifting of ley lines evicted? I think this is something we should let the people upstairs know about.>

“Probably best, Great Spirit.”

Chapter Thirty-four

<Dale, sweetheart!> Dale’s eyes popped open, and his irises dilated in annoyance. <Time to wake up! We’re under attack.>

“First off, I was cultivating, not sleeping. Next, how are we under attack? Did we land?” Dale’s words were angry, but his tone was defeated, fully understanding that there was nothing he could do at this point to ignore the dungeon.

<Right, well, it seems that we are flying into a swarm of creatures that are hungry. Mana or Essence starved, actually. So, they are likely going to be landing and attacking the delicious sources of power on the surface, starting… now.> In the distance, Dale heard a scream of pain and terror, echoed quickly by many more.

“The Academy!” Dale was on his feet and running toward the screams in an instant. The people at the Academy were weak, just learning how to control their bodies and cultivation! If they were attacked—no, Cal said that the attackers were after power… Dale adjusted his charging sprint, aiming for the entrance to the dungeon. In moments, the attackers were in view. “What are…?”

Dale didn’t finish the question, instead landing among the flight-capable creatures with his fists leading the way. He winced as the first blow felt like punching a wall had when he was a fishy. <I’ll keep you updated as you fight, Dale, just so I can get you their weaknesses and types.>

“You. Just. Want. Free. Monsters!” Each of Dale's words were clipped, and he was speaking at Mage speed as he punched the leathery creature below him. When blunt force trauma didn’t seem to be doing the trick, Dale coated his hands in sword Aura and shifted from fists to rigid palms. Empowering his blows with Mana, Dale sunk his hands deeply into the unknown creature and grabbed on to any organs he could find, tearing the monster up from the inside. At this point, it finally noticed his existence and screeched in pain.

The screech was a potent ability, some form of sonic or wind attack, and if Dale hadn’t been holding tightly to the body, he would have been blown away. Instead, he layered a drop of Mana over his ear canals and continued his grim work. He opened the creature more deeply, then released a burst of sword Aura that damaged the beast enough to bring it down entirely.

<Nice job, Dale!> There was a slight pause and a low whistle. <Looks like this is a ‘young adult Wyvern’. If this were a human, it would be a nineteen-year-old farmer. If there are stronger versions of this creature, be careful. Its capacity for growth… its potential… it’s off the charts.>

Water started to collect on the ground around Dale, and he snorted condescendingly. “I knew it. You’re drooling, Cal.”

<It was a good meal is all!> The words sounded especially defensive to Dale, but the water vanished in an instant, and a new order came in, <Feathered creature over there! Caution, it seems to be an aeromancer of some sort. If it gets you in the air, it’ll tear you apart. Likely level in the mid-B-ranks, but it has a few people fighting against it currently. You might tip the scales in your side’s favor.>

“Thanks, Cal.” Dale dashed off, debating on how to handle the creature ahead of him. It was likely far stronger than him, but he had a few extra tricks up his sleeve that most people didn’t. He swung his arm through the air, and a hair-thin line of sword Mana extended away from him and… bounced off the smallest feathers of the creature. “Yikes.”

“You’ve been overusing that ability.” Gomei appeared next to Dale, staring at their feathered foe. “If you use something too much, you become predictable to your enemies. Remember, Dale, you do have enemies. You can handle this opponent. I’m off to find more worthy prey. Consider this battle your training for the evening.”

“Gomei?” Dale looked over, but the Elf was already gone. At least Dale wouldn’t be punished for missing a training session. He was secretly relieved; uncontrolled monsters that didn’t have an issue with him personally were a comparative relief. Dale sprinted forward, trying to think of a way to take down this huge beast. He landed on its back and started punching, but the thick feathers and downy fur underneath absorbed the blows with ease.

He flipped off of the creature as it swiveled its head around like an owl to snap at him, but his distraction was beneficial in allowing a Mage that had been under attack to dance out of the way. Slashing talons tore a deep furrow in the ground, and a gust of wind threw dirt into the faces of the attacking Mages. It wouldn’t have damaged them, but the people affected still raised their arms to shield their vision as the Beast had intended. It lashed out and tore a chunk out of one of the attacking Mage’s calves, downing the man and pouncing on him.

“No! All of you, punch forward in three, two, now!” With a synchronicity that could only be achieved by hearing, reacting, and moving at superhuman speeds, the gathered group punched straight forward. Once again, Dale had the disconcerting feeling of hitting what felt like a wall though there was nothing in his path. The creature collapsed as the back of its head exploded outward, and it collapsed on the fallen Mage. “Good! Get him to the healers. Let’s get moving!”

Dale watched the group run off, wondering how they had just achieved that feat of power. <Dale, looks like you guys took down a ‘Griffin’. B-rank-six, nice work! Must have been an air-dungeon designed creature. Woof there is some shoddy systems in that beasty!>

“Can you please just direct me to the next threat that I can handle? Also, can you get some Goblins out here or something?” Dale winced as a small, stone building shattered from the pressure of a few higher-ranked Beasts fighting Mages. “We are starting to take damage.”

<Sorry, Dale, can’t do it. Too much chance of people attacking the Goblins instead of the monsters, and I need to be ready in case they try coming after me down here.>

Dale grunted and returned to battle, doing his best to find ways to join a group of fighters in attacking Beasts whenever he got the chance. His next few battles were relatively easy, but then he joined in against a giant toad with tiny wings. Somehow, likely Mana, the Beast was able to jump to extreme heights and remain hovering at that altitude. This allowed it to chase any Mages that were attempting to escape, or it could avoid attacks that should have taken it down.

Dale’s sword Aura skittered off the creature, its skin somehow refusing to part for the incredibly sharp Mana. Like the Griffin, the toad didn’t seem to be hurt by blunt attacks, so Dale was having trouble finding ways to damage the Beast. It landed on the ground to crush a student beneath it and made to jump away as a potent lightning bolt was being directed at its face. In a moment of inspiration, Dale sent out a bit of Mana and connected tendrils of air-aligned Mana to the air around it. He had used this method in the past to slow himself when falling, and now, it was far more potent. The toad tried to jump but only made it a few feet off the ground before slamming back down—just in time for a surge of power to fry its brain.

“Nice work, kid!” someone called to Dale, but the man vanished before Dale could get a good look at him.

“Thanks!” Dale called back uncertainly. There was more work to do, so he rejoined the fray. He threw himself at enemies with abandon, knowing that if he didn’t take them out, someone else could very well be badly hurt. Each time a student or lower-ranked person was squashed, smothered, crushed, or torn apart, Dale felt that he was failing them. Though he was no longer legally the Noble in charge of this area, it was still important to him, and the people were supposed to have someone fighting for them!

“Where is the Guild?” Dale bellowed into the air, gaining attention more from the monsters than the people fighting against them. “Where are the High-rankers. Where is Barry?”

There was no answer, and the fighting raged for another hour before they seemed to pass some sort of zone that kept the monsters from following. Or, perhaps, they had simply passed through the swarming beasts and come out the other side. Either way, Dale could finally take a moment to breathe and look around the area. The Academy was missing several buildings, the ground was awash with blood, and bodies of creatures and people were strewn all over the place.

Dale closed his eyes and breathed deeply, then opened them upon hearing a noise. He saw someone lifting the bodies of the Beasts that had been slain, and a cursory glance showed that this was happening all over. What infuriated Dale was the sight of the Guild crest that each of them was wearing. “What are you doing? I killed that one.”

“The Guild has claimed all the fallen for resources.” The man shrugged and held up his hands as Dale’s Mana started to boil into his Aura and press down on the man. “You want to go to war with Barry? Be my guest, but I’m just following orders. I won’t fight you for the body, but someone else will just come to collect it from you.”

“I am getting sick and tired of this… dictatorship!” Dale snarled, turning his eyes toward the location the bodies were being carried or dragged. He blanched as he saw that it wasn’t just the Beasts being carried there. Now he understood what the man meant when he said ‘the fallen were being claimed for resources’. Something needed to be done.

Chapter Thirty-five

While all the fighting was going on up top, there were a few developments deep in the dungeon. Certain people were not using their time wisely and were instead using the attack as a distraction to forward their own agenda.

Aiden sauntered toward a trio of Amazonians that had been caught by his most recent traps, pulling out his daggers and drawing them across the throats of his unresisting racial enemies. He smiled as the blood splatter hit his face, barely even trying to get out of the way. “There we go, three fewer foul oathbreakers for the transition. I hope that you’re enjoying all this free power, dungeon!”

Almost as in response to his words, a section of the wall rumbled upward, revealing a small room with a golden treasure chest in the center. Aiden’s eyes went wide, and he hastily cleaned and sheathed his blades. He walked over to the chest, being careful to watch for traps and ensuring that he had a way out if the wall started to come back down. Aiden wasn’t about to be trapped by his own methods of hunting, after all!

After double and triple checking everything, he carefully directed his Mana on to the chest and used it to pry the chest open at a distance. There was a letter inside, an actual paper that had words across it! The Northman General chuckled at how quaint that was and brought the paper close enough to read. His eyes widened in abject greed and filled with manic glee as he read what could only be an offer from the dungeon.

You have proven your power over others and have clearly shown what lies in your heart! I, the dungeon Cal, hereby make you an offer! I will grant you physical strength beyond the realm of possibility for your current form in return for only a decade of continuous and dedicated service which will begin as soon as you enter into my Soul Space. If you die during this time in an area that is under my influence, I will return you to life until the end of your service. To agree, all you need to do is drop a drop of blood on to this document and press the seal to your forehead!

Aiden stared at the document, unsure if he was going to take this offer. The scent of blood washed over him, and he looked back to see that the bodies of the Amazonians were not decomposing, and sounds of movement and speaking were reaching his ears. He smiled darkly, knowing that he had been played by the dungeon. “Fair enough, Cal the dungeon. I have been wanting to make a deal with you anyway!”

A drop of blood touched the paper, and the crest was brought to his head. “I’m just happy to know that you understand the value of my–”

With a grunt of pain, Aiden’s words cut off. His entire mind had just been copied! How? There were no memory stones that could hold so much potency! Aiden’s protest fell flat as a voice entered his mind. <Oh, Aiden, Aiden, Aiden. This was never a reward. You’ve been a Beast the entire time that you've been here, preying on the wounded and weak. I try to balance things, to make things fair and understandable. Now I have your permission to show the rest of the world what kind of a creature you really are.>

The ground fell out from under the Mage, which wouldn’t have been an issue if the roof above him hadn’t begun dripping a rain that left him feeling weak. “Disenchanting water?”

<Very much so.> Aiden fell down and into darkness. <Let’s get started, shall we? Physical strength beyond your capabilities it is…>

***

A strangely spiraling bolt of lightning landed on one of the few Beasts still in the area, and as the intense light vanished, a man faded into view where the energy had impacted. A spear was in his hands, and the Beast he had stabbed fell to the ground with severe energy burns covering nearly every inch of skin.

“Good. Now that this is taken care of…” The man looked around, one eye covered by a patch of golden cloth that radiated a strange energy. “Who is the measly worm that destroyed my people?”

A huge, black raven circled down out of the sky and alighted on his shoulder, another one visible in the air far above them as daylight threatened to arrive properly. The raven warbled into the air, and the grizzled fighter whipped his head around to rest his gaze firmly upon Dale. “You? Ow? Impossible. But… just in case.”

Another flash of lightning, green this time, struck from the clear sky. Dale seized up as the power washed over him, and he fell to the ground shivering. The man apparently thought that this was a sign of his death and started to stride away. The raven croaked, and the man stopped and turned to look at Dale once more. “He lives?”

Dale opened his eyes, launching to his feet and staring down the man who had just attempted to murder him on a hunch. “Why would you do that? Wait… you’re…”

“That voice.” The man dissolved and reformed inches in front of Dale. “I went on the hunt with you and my brothers before that tragedy. The Noble. The Apprentice. Dale?”

“Yeah?” Dale shook his head to clear out the static. “I never went hunting with someone as strong as… wait. You’re–”

“I am now Odin.” Lightning seemed to flash in his eye as he stared into Dale’s now-exposed face. “First, how did you survive? Second, how did you kill my people?”

Dale certainly wasn’t about to inform the world about his Mithril clothing that seemed to redirect the Mana to go around him instead of through him. “I have no idea what you are talking about… Odin.”

Better to call crazy people how they wanted to be called, in Dale’s opinion. The charged man in front of him cocked his head to the side. “Yes, I am uncertain how you were involved, but Huggin hasn’t been wrong yet. He tells me that your Essence signature was all over the area, that you somehow killed hundreds or thousands in mere seconds.”

Dale snorted derisively. “If I had that kind of raw power lying around, do you think I would be hoarding it instead of trying my best to keep people alive?”

Odin looked around at the dead with dispassionate eyes, shrugging and staring at Dale once more. “I once thought that I understood human nature, that I was a good judge of character. I have been proven wrong far too often. Now, I do what I feel needs to be done.”

“Quick, instant, deadly.” Dale looked at the man deeply, trying to understand how a person could undergo such a drastic change over the course of… months? “You seem to embody lightning, but there is more underneath. I just can’t see exactly what it is.”

Odin’s eye flicked to the birds, but he didn’t answer any of Dale's following questions. Instead, he raised a hand to vaporize the young man. Dale raised a hand and waved at the forming lightning. “Oh, stop it. How about we just chat for a few minutes. See if we can’t figure out what is actually happening here?”

In spite of his casual words, Dale was tense and preparing to defend against the attack. There was a tracing of Mana swirling around him, enough to give someone a nasty shock if they grabbed at him. If Gomei’s lessons had taught him anything, he knew that using lightning to defend against lightning was a good plan. For unknown reasons, it would follow the tracing he had created in the air if he were stuck again. That coupled with his armor and Dale figured he had a good shot of surviving long enough to get somewhere… safer.

“My sect is dead, wiped out in an instant.” Odin reached up and touched his golden patch. “I’ve given much in order to gain enough strength to avenge my people before the moon takes that last simple joy from me. If I need to destroy the entire world to make it happen, I swore I would find the killer and exact justice.”

“Was that exactly what you swore, Thunderer?” The Master literally walked out of nowhere and put a hand on the startled Asgardian. “If so, I may be able to help you. If not, I will need to destroy you to stop you from hurting all of us.”

“Those were my exact words, Dark One.” Odin glowered at The Master, preparing to fight. “I warn you. Even at your rank, I may be able to destroy you if you attempt to deceive me.”

“I see what you are wearing, and I understand its significance.” The Master put a hand on Odin and looked him in the eye. “Possibly more than you do. Let’s talk.”

The two vanished, and Dale decided that it was a good time to sit down. He didn’t mind the slight splash of blood as he landed in a puddle, that had been way too intense for him. He closed his eyes, and a thought crossed his mind that refused to be banished.

“Somehow, this is Cal’s fault.”

Chapter Thirty-six

<Well, that was all exciting and fun.> As much as I really wanted to make light of the situation, I was truly shaken and out of sorts. There had been a huge number of creatures in the area, and I was hesitant to be the one to inform Dale that it was only thanks to the really powerful people that we were still flying in one piece.

“Can we not do that again?” Dani shuddered and flew over to the Silverwood tree to her usual perch. “I don’t understand why you are always thrust into deadly situations so suddenly.”

<Hey now, to be fair, we are only here because you forced our hand. For the first time, I can really say that us being out and about in a dangerous area is your fault! Ha!> I crowed my laughter to the skies, though only a few people could actually hear it.

“Yes, well, if we are being actually fair,” Dani snapped back wryly, “then we would look at those creatures and see that they are only out and about because you displaced them.”

<You know, because we all need to be on the same side, I think we shouldn’t point fingers here,> I quickly backtracked my statements. <Let’s just focus on what we need to do next. Fix it forward and all that.>

“Neither of us have fingers.” Dani chuckled at my expense.

<As I was saying,> I pushed forward, knowing that Dani had me on this one, <the ambient Essence in the air is getting stronger and stronger. We must be getting close to whatever it is that is releasing all of this power. What do you want to do here? We have already seen that there is a huge number of monsters in the area, and I doubt they’ll get weaker as we get closer to whatever this place is. Forward… or run for it?>

“I need to go forward, Cal.” Dani shook her head sadly as I remained silent. “I… if I need to go alone, I understand. This is risking a lot, and I can just–”

<You obviously know that I’d never go for that, right?> I responded drolly. <Dani, for now until forever, wherever you are is where I want to be. If that means we charge forward into the unknown and fail, then by the abyss, we will be doing it together! Forward it is.>

A few minutes passed in silence as we continued, each of us silent for our own reasons. Bob coughed uncomfortably from one of the screens to the navigation room that I kept up at all times now and started speaking, “Uhh. I really hope that I’m not interrupting too terribly, but I really need to let you know that we have spotted a landmass on the horizon, and if we continue this pace, we should arrive within an hour.”

I jumped at the chance to kickstart the conversation again and sent feelings of joy and pleasure to Bob. He relaxed and continued working as I thanked him. <Alright, here is the plan, everyone! Charge forward and hope for the best, and we'll be ready to escape at any moment and restart elsewhere!>

Possibly not my most inspiring speech ever, but that was fine by me. Everyone here knew that their job was a permanent one—one way or another. So long as I lived, they would as well. The landmass in the distance was getting clearer with each passing second, though there was an oddity that took me too long—in my opinion—to notice. <Is the sun not shining on that? No, it has to be, right? You all couldn’t see it otherwise?>

“I think that whatever sunlight is landing there is just kinda stopping?” Dani hypothesized leerily. “You’re right though, there has to be some light on it!”

<We have an hour to guess, I suppose. It’s way too far to know for sure since I obviously can’t reach out and test it directly. Yet.> I sent a command to the Bobs, <Alrighty. People! Give me your best guesses. Think about it for a little while we fly. I’m going to take the next little bit to look around and see the changes that occurred in the aftermath of the fight here. Ready? Go!>

I followed a well-worn path up to where The Master was working on the super-intricate portal. Odin was standing near him, listening to the reasoning behind their plan, the merits and detriments, and he didn't seem all that impressed. The thundering voice of his shattered the calm of the room, causing multiple technicians to flinch away, “You are asking me to abandon my oath? You dare?”

“Your oath to whom, Odin?” The Master’s voice was calm, but his words cracked like a whip. “A dead people? A city that no longer exists? Do you think I haven’t visited your people in the past? Are your traditions dead as well, or do they carry on through you? What was the final will of your people? Death and forgetfulness of everything they held dear or was it seeking the restoration of your society? You are the only one who can accomplish that feat, are you not?”

“I am also the only one who can say exactly what my traditions are now, Dark One!” Odin stepped forward, and a static build-up discharged into the air, causing a small peal of thunder to crack the air, forcing the room’s occupants to glance over in annoyance. “If I say my intentions are vengeance, then that is my people’s intentions!”

“What of the transformation I see two of your people have somehow been put through?” The Master continued without a single change to his demeanor. “I feel that they should have some say as well. Do they wish you to go on an unrepentant murder spree? Will killing people weaker than you be helpful? Are they pleased with your actions?”

“They will follow what I say.” For the first time, Odin glanced away. I was watching this with great delight. What fascinating things sentients would do to convince others! I needed to try this out. Appealing to morality and not even of the person in question but a larger group that might condemn their actions? It made sense. Everyone seemed to want to have the respect of others. I just wanted to eat them and get more powerful, but maybe I was just more honest with myself than most people were.

“What a great life you have chosen for them, then. To die so that you can satisfy misguided wrath.” The Master shook his head. “Walk among the people here then, and tell me that all of them need to suffer the same fate as your people because you are sulking. I warn you, slaying an innocent will be the last action you are allowed to take. This place is under my protection.”

Aww. What a big ol’ softie. How did he ever get such a terrible reputation? Oh right, the giant, bone-clad demons. Beyond that though? Well, the murders. Alright, yeah, I keep forgetting about those pesky laws that people bind themselves with. This conversation seemed to be at an end, but before I left, I took a look at the portal and fixed a few small imperfections in the power flow. It wouldn’t make sense to have this thing explode and undo all the work that we were doing trying to save the world.

Let’s see… what else was there to do? Dale seemed to be fine, good for him… Oh, there was that one little project I had going with the Northman that had been murdering people. I looked in at him and watched for a minute as he fought against the Inscribed bars that were holding him in place. Good, the flesh grafts were taking hold. I had been worried when the blood I had been creating in his veins started to clot all over the place, but with some modifications to his liver and kidneys, the clots had soon stopped appearing.

I felt a little bad about all the pain he was experiencing but wasn’t too worried. If his mind broke, I had a backup copy that I could put in place. I needed to see the limits of what I could do to a living person, and I needed him to be alive and aware as the process continued so that he could let me know in real time where things were going wrong. Case in point…

“Ohh… my jaw…” the words were slurred and barely recognizable, but that was an easy fix! The bone broke in a few places and lengthened. Then I generated new mandible tissue to fix everything up. Good, good. Everything was going correctly. The design for living flesh modification had been one of the many things I had been traded by the infernal dungeon. This was also the method the Northmen had been using to have Runes put into their flesh. They were not tattoos as I had originally thought; they were actually growths inside of them! It was utterly fascinating to me. Normally, I had to do this all directly, and now there was a method for automating it! Pure excitement, but obviously, this wasn’t something I was going to be able to test on someone I liked.

“Great Spirit, we are only a few minutes out from the landmass!” Bob interrupted my thinking, but I liked that he only did it for important events.

<Sounds great, Bob, let me–>

A section of my influence was destroyed instantly and easily, collapsing inward and blowing a few tons of stone off the side of my mountain. I never knew that I could feel nauseous before, but, yu~u~p! I felt really bad suddenly because I knew what this was. I had even done this a few times before, and I could tell that this wasn’t an attack.

There was a dungeon out there, knocking on my influence to get my attention.

Chapter Thirty-seven

“Sorry, Dale.” Hans shrugged and scooted a little closer to Rose. “Those are monsters. Monsters that we can’t really hope to defeat in any kind of reasonable way. Did you never wonder why teams were always comprised of a C-rank maximum? Then all Mage rank groups were all Mages or better? Those guys that all hung out at the Mages’ Guild, did their own thing?”

“I guess I hadn’t really thought of it that way.” Dale sat down carefully, knowing that he was all riled up and liable to break something if he let his power or emotions run through him unchecked right now. “I really liked our team though. I don’t want my advancement to keep us from being together.”

“Well, you are always welcome to guard us in deeper layers of the dungeon while we cultivate as fast as possible. That is what the instructors in the Academy do, isn’t it?” Rose squeezed Hans’ hand and looked Dale in the eye. “On a serious note, Dale, you really should be taking this time to get stronger. We don’t begrudge you that. We would be doing the same thing, and you need to work really hard to stay ahead as a Mage.”

“‘We’, huh?” Dale sighed and leaned back, using light currents of air to hold himself in place as he thought. “How’s that going? Also, seriously, that was a really short turnaround from hatred to marriage, Rose. What was up with that? I know that we kinda touched on it a couple weeks ago, but it still seems… too much.”

“Hey now, no need to delve too deeply into the underpinnings of my relationship, thank you!” Hans glared at Dale, only to back off as Rose poked him in the head.

“Just stop. I’m not about to change my mind!” Rose waited for the expected wink, then responded to Dale, “To be perfectly honest, Dale… we had been in a relationship since the second week of knowing each other. I insisted that we didn’t tell anyone since I was worried that you would treat us differently if we were a known couple. Hans agreed to keep it from everyone but told me that the best way to hide it was by him acting like he was into me at all times. So, I was overly mean to him in public, and he stayed the same.”

“And you had no faith that it would work.” Hans laughed at her, getting an elbow to the ribs for his ribbing.

“Well, it worked on me.” Dale showed his palms and shook his head.

“You are the epitome of relationship awareness,” Rose dryly informed him. “You can’t even tell when people are after you. I can't say I’m surprised that you didn’t see our romance. Anyway, when Adam died, we… decided that it was better to be together as much as possible. Hidden romance is fun and all, but when you are afraid to accept a hug in public because you are worried about what ’they’ will think? We realized it was time to put all that foolishness behind us.”

“She actually almost killed me with an arrow when I was going in to comfort her.” Hans shook his head. “I’m not often one for ultimatums, but I feel like I was justified in demanding ‘stop shooting me’.”

“Huh.” Dale watched the two of them, then simply sat up and examined them. Now that his senses were so much better, it was obvious that they were together. A slight lip-dye that hadn’t come off of Hans that matched Rose’s lip coloration, a scent from their clothes showing they had been washed together, and a slight spray of blood on Rose’s clothing that only came from close range stabbing—and she was an archer. “Well, I guess it makes sense. It just really seemed to come out of nowhere for me.”

“That was the intent.” Hans shrugged and looked up as the door to the place blasted inward. Tom trotted through the entryway, a look of serious concern on his face.

“Friends, I have two serious issues.” Tom took a deep breath and looked between them. “First and most concerning is that it appears my brother, General Aiden, is missing. He was last seen entering the dungeon, and I fear the worst. Second…”

A huge shape loomed behind him, and a pair of arms as wide as his torso reached around the Northman. “It seems that I have attracted the ardor of the Ogre that– hup!”

Tom stopped speaking as the air was driven from his lungs by a tight squeeze. “T-hom! You cannot hide from Oni! I find you anywhere!”

“Cal? What’s going on here?” Dale directed his attention downward, but this caused a headache for some reason. Was there something that was messing with their connection? Was the dungeon keeping him out for a specific reason? “Cal? Ow! What the…? Ugh, my head. Sorry, Tom. Looks like you’re on your own for this one.”

“How did you two meet?” Rose drew out the last word, a grin playing across her lips as she watched the Ogre.

“He killed me with hammer!” Oni proudly declared. “Was most instant and painless death I’ve ever had! I knew it was love, right then!”

“It seems that she really likes my weapon,” Tom bitterly admitted. “As my hammer is bound to me, she seems to like me as well. I really need to find my brother, Dale. We can’t afford a war right now.”

“Do you think it will come to that?” Hans asked as he stood up from the table and walked towards the Ogre. With the flick of a wrist, he injected something through his daggers and into her arm. She glanced at him in a fury, then collapsed. “Don’t look at me like that, all of you! It's just a really strong muscle relaxant, designed to impact Mages, pushed through heavily Inscribed daggers that allow you to inject poison deeply into people. She’s fine, and my bet is that she can move in a few hours at the latest. Let’s go find the brother?”

Tom looked at Oni sprawled on the floor and groaned. With Dale’s help, they moved her into a corner and sat her upright, then left the area. They were walking across the courtyard of the Academy when a door was smashed off its hinges, and Odin stormed past. Dale watched him walk by warily. Hans had no such compunctions. “What does everyone have against opening doors normally today?”

Dale stepped forward and grounded the lightning that surged toward Hans, dispersing the offhanded assault with minimal effort. Odin grunted and vanished with a flash, taking no care to keep his passing from damaging his surroundings. Hans watched the trail of damage whilst shaking his head. “Some people have no manners.”

“Listen here, you little–” Rose growled at her spouse, only to be cut off as someone shouted in the distance.

“We’re above land again!” The group paused and looked at each other. Were they at the mysterious destination the dungeon had been taking them to? A blast shook the entire mountain, and the scream of tortured stone rang through the area.

“Something's wrong!” a new voice took up the cry, obviously aided by Mana. “We’ve been attacked, and the land below us… it isn’t earth, it’s… ice? And it is positively swarming with creatures! We need anyone who might be able to explain the situation to report to the Guild at once!”

“Listen, Tom,” Dale prodded his friend, “when Cal starts talking again, I’ll ask about your brother, but for now, we need to trust that he wouldn't put himself in a bad situation. I think we need to get a handle on whatever is going on around here. The monsters, a new land… I think we are somewhere we really shouldn’t be. Can we handle this and give your brother privacy for a little longer?”

“I suppose I don’t really have a choice, do I?” Tom growled, looking away. “I should have known better than to ask for help.”

“That’s unfair.” Dale gestured at the panicking crowds. “How would we explore the dungeon faster than just asking it when we can? People might be hurt, and we could be under attack! I was just walking with you to find your brother!”

Tom looked away in shame. “Right, I am sorry. I am a little… stressed.”

“It’s fine, man.” Dale clapped the barbarian on the side, sending him reeling. “Let’s go take a look.”

“That’s seven hits I owe you now, Dale!” Tom called as he regained his balance.

The group walked to the edge of the mountain and peered over, something that had been far too common in recent days. Below them stretched a dark land filled with oddly shaped creatures and obvious beasts. There were no obvious monsters in the air, luckily, but it was so cold outside that any non-Mage needed protective gear or to keep an Aura of fire on themselves at all times. While the sun was peeking over the horizon, it seemed reluctant to rise any distance above the waterline.

This meant that the land remained in shadow, and the stars, moon, and falling moon were all still visible. Hans scooted closer to Rose and wrapped his arm around her. “It would be so beautiful if I wasn’t so sure everything I'm seeing is ready to jump out and kill us. Or fall on us. You know. Like the moon.”

“Isn’t danger part of the beauty?” Rose queried with a half-smile.

“Only on you.” Hans kissed her on the cheek. “Everything else can go ahead and be dangerous at a nice, safe distance.”

“If that were anyone else speaking, I would throw them off the edge,” Tom grumbled good-naturedly. “Sickeningly sweet is still sickening.”

Chapter Thirty-eight

I extended a tendril of Essence, allowing that to reach into the air below my dungeon. I felt a presence connect to it for a moment before it was obliterated. If I were a human, I would be so pale right now. But… the feeling hadn’t been malicious. It felt like someone that had a really high grip strength grabbing a delicate glass cup without being told that it was fragile. Alright. I could work with that.

Again, I extended some Essence, but this time, I used the purest Essence I could manage and packed it into a dense slip of power. Okay. Now, all I needed to do was wait until– gah! Again, the Essence shattered and dissipated, but it had almost survived. Time to take it up a level. Mana this time, packed and dense enough that there would be some questions if a human or other sentient saw it. As it was Acme, the highest tier of Mana and I had poured some serious power into it, I figured I would– ow!

It held… barely. I was shocked that it had been a close thing, but now, the presence on the other end of this connection began to communicate with me. That is, I think it was trying to do so. The thoughts were mountainous, monolithic pictographs of energy that I was fully unable to comprehend. I decided to try speaking, and I really hoped it wouldn't be seen as rude. <Hello there! I’d like to thank you right away for not killing me accidentally or intentionally.>

There was a pause in the link, and it seemed that the dungeon on the other end was thinking. I kept speaking, mainly to offer as many words as possible and complimented it on everything from the environment to the creature swarms on the ground. The aurora was of particular beauty and allure today, wasn’t it? Then I felt something, a kind of… hole in the connection that I was feeling. I was ecstatic because I knew exactly what this was! The dungeon was requesting information from me, and I was almost certain that it wanted the language I was using. Done and done.

I sent over the information happily and waited a few moments as the dungeon digested the information and translated its own thoughts for me. <This… language is… inaccurate. It leaves… much to interpretation and context. An unparagoned sesquipedalian as myself prefers the accoutrements of language acumen which facilitates non-anomalistic vernacular.>

Well, that had escalated quickly. Going from not speaking the language to becoming beyond an expert showed an intelligence on par with my own. <Hi there, I’m Cal. I’d like to mention right off the bat that I make jokes when I am uncomfortable.>

There was a slight pause, and then the dungeon spoke again, <Would you feel more comfortable if I used language you are more familiar with? I reanalyzed the language packet you sent and found the words you use with the most frequency. I see that you are both comforted and disturbed by this choice so I will move on to the true topic of conversation. Why are you here, young dungeon? I do like visitors, so much so that they typically never leave, but I feel that in this case, you are here for a reason… not selfish. Very rare and worth hearing out before I obliterate everything that you are.>

It was a good thing that I was a Core and didn’t have the same panic-inducing chemicals running through me like a human brain did, else I would be shivering in a corner right now. <Yes, I… ahem… there is a bit of a story behind that. So, there is this guy, Xenocide, who–>

The connection between us snapped, my extended Mana being absorbed into what felt like an unending chasm. I had to forcefully cut off that extended tendril, else there was danger of this draining my Core as well! In a moment, the feeling stopped, but my mountain was slowly falling through the air, all of the ambient power having been sucked out of the area. I had to devote some of my Mana to keeping us afloat, and even still, we were spiraling down too quickly for comfort.

I regained control about one thousand two hundred fifty-six feet off the ground and slowly started to climb into the air again. It took a half hour or so before I could try again, but I hesitantly extended a Mana tendril again. I had a feeling that if I tried to run, I wouldn't get very far. The Mana was grasped firmly nigh-instantaneously, reaffirming my choice. <I am sorry, little one. As you know, I have not had that name given to me, as your language is so… new, but the physical description that you sent matches a troublesome insect that has been pestering me for centuries. I will inspect you to see if you are his creature, and if so, I will make an example of you.>

<Does he kill your creatures, make insulting gestures, then strip and dance around on their corpses?> I was already exhausted by this conversation. There was far too much panic involved. Just ignore the threats and move on.

<Yes,> The dungeon growled, making me vibrate hard enough that I felt microscopic cracks form across the entirety of my surface. <I want him dead.>

<Right, so this guy tried to end the world.> I paused, but there was no information flowing back to me right now, so I continued, <He set up a huge Ritual that was designed to pull the moon to the earth, ending all life. He was planning on using the accumulated madness to ascend.>

<Fool,> the response was succinct, but it got the point across. <He may well succeed, but then what? If he stays, he would become the weakest cultivator in existence even as he became the strongest. His plan would backfire on a scale that I doubt he has the sanity to consider. Now, what of you? How did you come here?>

<I was asked to come here on account of my Wisp. Dani.> I looked at her and linked her into my thoughts. <She was the one who felt utterly compelled to come here, and I couldn’t do aught but listen.>

His serious and formal speech was infecting me, it seemed. Dani sent a mental acknowledgment but didn’t speak. Odd, for her. The dungeon spoke again, <Why? Did not this aberration fail in his plot to destroy us all? You are not here to offer me the power that you have accumulated as a tribute?>

“Yes, no, and no. Not sure why that last one had been mixed in. His plans were delayed, but the moon was demolished and even now is raining chunks of rock to the earth,” Dani carefully explained. “The moon… we were given a vision that there would be very few survivors. We are doing everything we can to save those that it is possible to save, but we are making only slow progress.”

The dungeon spoke to Cal, words that Cal had been dreading and expecting, <I suppose I could help you… for a price. I have surrounded you with my creatures, though I could swat you like a fly from here, so I have no doubt you will acquiesce.>

<What could someone like myself offer to you?> I was flabbergasted, honestly. Really. It was dangerous ground, but it was also a little flattering to know that this ancient being wanted me to do something for it.

<First of all, look up.> Up? What was up? I glanced upward and nearly stifled a scream. I failed, and the scream came out, though weakly.

Ahhhh!

Dani gave me the strangest look she could possibly manage, so I explained myself and my oddly-intimate sounding screech. <Right, so, it looks like the main body of the moon is falling here. It’s huge, and I have no idea why I didn't see it earlier.>

<My luring ability kept any truly unsettling things from being perceived. That is until I opened a space for you to look out and see what was waiting for you. Though you may not have been pulled along by my lure directly, there are simply things I can do that you cannot,> the dungeon explained easily. <As for the favor you can do for me, first, I need access to all of your memories. I need to know that you can be trusted, and this will also grant me the ability to know what it is that you need most.>

<You want into my head?>

<Your Core, actually.>

All I could think of was the fact that this dungeon was so powerful that he was smashing my most potent Mana by twitching. <Right, well… I don’t know if that's a good idea. You seem, um, smashy.>

<You will come to no harm from this.> An aurora exploded outward from the sky, a signal that his power had accepted his words as fact and would destroy him if he were wrong. While it would be nice to take someone with me, I still didn't want to offer myself up to be broken like that. <Or I can decide that you are not trustworthy.>

Creatures faded into existence around my dungeon. Huge, flying serpents, strange amalgamations of creatures, dozen-armed humanoids in a lotus position… the list went on and on. <Oh, good. I was wondering why you didn’t have air defenders. The lure thing again?>

<Correct,> came the stern response. <Choose.>

<Lovely. I suppose nothing to do but work together, huh?> I nervously opened my mind along the connection and felt a whisper of pain as unintelligible energy swept over my mind, taking a copy in an instant.

<Done.> At least it had been fast. <I see. There have been many interesting events in your life. As it currently stands, Cal, it seems that your greatest threat comes not from the falling moon but from angry and uncontrollable cultivators that mean you personal harm.>

<As far as I know, which of course… you know.> I felt really strange about this scenario.

<Then it would only make sense for me to teach you how to defend yourself against the S-rankers that mean to harm you.> The dungeon chuckled at my incredulity.

<That’s possible?>

<Very much so, as you shall soon see. You were on the right track with the infernal cannons you have stored and prepared.> There was a pause. <Your other plan, to drop this ‘Barry’ into fewmets… not as good.>

“Told you,” Dani chimed in.

<And… the favor?>

<Is simple, Cal. I need you to save me.>

<You’re joking,> I responded flatly.

<Cal, the moon is falling on me.> There was exasperation in his tone as if he really didn't want to admit weakness. <Me specifically. Xenocide has targeted me with this weapon, and a weapon of this magnitude will likely actually work. Truly, Cal, it will not be difficult to take me with you. All you need to do is finally connect to that Silverwood tree you are underutilizing and allow me access though mine. Frankly, containing me will be a much more taxing proposition.>

<I see that I have a lot to learn from you,> I wearily gave tacit approval. <What should I call you? Teacher? Master? Is sensei a thing?>

<Just call me by my name, Cal.> The dungeon was laughing now, a deep and terrible sound that honestly terrified me even as it caused the entire continent below us to shift. <I am Dungeon Eternium.>

Chapter Thirty-nine

“Dale!” a voice called out frantically. Dale felt a flash of irritation; why did so many conversations start like this for him? Couldn't people just say ‘hello’ like they were supposed to do? Then he understood as a dark cloud seemed to obscure everything. No, wait… nothing was hidden! Everything was just… empty. Then Mountaindale started to fall out of the sky, and the screaming started.

Grabbing everyone in range that wasn't a Mage, Dale tossed out streamers of Mana and connected them to the walls so they wouldn’t break if the dungeon hit the ground. This, sadly, was a bad idea as he felt Mana surge out of him and into the nothingness around himself. Then as if it had never arrived, the feeling was gone. Dale was panting hard, and the dungeon started to slow gradually. “What was that?”

“I have no idea,” Hans started, then looked at his hands. “It was if all the Mana and Essence was sucked out of the world. I could only see what was touched by light. There was… nothing else.”

Dale agreed; that was exactly what it had been like. “I never want to have to go back to only seeing the surface layer of things. That’s what being a cultivator is all about! Yuck.”

A necromancer stumbled into the area, his face ashen and tears rolling down his cheeks. “Please… get The Master… an enslavement of my people has started.”

“What?” Dale was shocked for a split second, his high-order processing skills allowing him to grasp the situation and sprinting off to The Master. By the time he got to the area where the portal frame was kept, he found that there were people waiting. Specifically, Barry had already arrived and was speaking to The Master.

“Just like that, all of the tricks and corpses that your people were using to defend themselves fell at the exact. Same. Moment.” Barry laughed in The Master’s haggard face. “Now, finally, your people will be put back in their proper place! What fortuitous timing as well, just as you were planning on announcing that the portal was complete!”

“I can still consign you to oblivion, Barry the Devourer.” The Master threatened, his power seeping outward. “How did you bypass your oath to me?

“I think not, trash.” Barry smiled. “I’ve also kept my word perfectly. The necromancers, you see, are perfectly fine and are being taken care of by me, personally. It is just that most are in holding units that we have been making and importing or wearing this handy device.”

The Master paled at the ugly, Inscribed collar that the de facto leader of the Guild was holding up. “You dare to–”

“I see you remember your time in a slave collar. Don’t you, male?” Barry’s grin was a snarl, but though his word choice was odd, it seemed to have personal meaning to The Master. “I heard the whole story from the Amazonians. So… you then remember that if the person controlling the slave dies, all of them do as well? Because I currently control the necromancers that live. I am ‘The Master’, if you will. Now, you will hand over the gate key to this portal, or all your people will remain enslaved forever. Also, the portal itself will be destroyed. You have a choice. Kill everyone that could possibly be saved by going through there, or let me rule them all. Choose.”

“You are a twisted man, Barry.” The Master held out an object which was carefully taken by Barry.

“Huh.” Barry squinted at the key, then at The Master. “I honestly expected you to say some cheesy line like ‘death is better than servitude’ or some malarky.”

The Master shook his head slowly. “As long as there is life, there is hope.”

“There it is!” Barry shouted with false joviality, grabbing The Master and throwing him through the wall. “You’re under house arrest. You’ll get a beautiful, first-hand view of the world ending. In the meantime, it’s time for me to consolidate my power and start the migration process!”

Barry turned and vanished, his laughter echoing in the area for a long moment longer. Dale walked forward, passing the dispersing crowd and stepping up to The Master. “Now… now what?”

“Now nothing,” The Master responded flatly. “He wins. I recommend… bowing, I suppose?”

“You aren’t actually… giving up?” Dale frantically demanded. “You are The Master! The herald of freedom for the oppressed! The man who never gave up even when all seemed lost! You are going to throw all that away now?”

“Throw away what? Throw away a reputation?” The Master scoffed. “Dale, do you understand what is like to spend four. Hundred. Years. As the person who fought back when all was lost? That’s how long I’ve been fighting for the freedom and respect that we are owed, and now—in the final hour of our world—the people relying on me were collared and rendered powerless. I’m not going to do anything to hurt them anymore. Fighting back now will only kill them.”

“Won’t that be preferable to most of them?” Dale demanded with clenched fists. “What heinous acts will they be forced to participate in? What will happen to them? What if Barry just orders them to stand out in the open as the moon lands on them?”

“If you want to do something about it, Dale, then I suppose you should,” The Master snarled back, the power in his body resonating with the world around him and causing the color to be leached out of the area. He coughed, and the world snapped back to normal. His anger had fled, and he was clutching his chest and grimacing. “Ugh.”

“What actually happened to you out there?” Dale demanded, feeling like the man in front of him was getting weaker by the second.

“I lost,” came the bitter reply.

“I meant when Xenocide grabbed you and acted like you were a sacrifice,” Dale explained more fully.

“Oh.” The Master sighed and sat down. “Nothing that would normally be an issue if I had time to fix it. Xenocide grabbed my Center and damaged it. With everyone else, he fed it to his blood Runes, but mine was simply dispersed. Damage to an S-ranker is damage done to the soul. This typically means very little, as the soul is incredibly resilient, but what he did was damage the actual image of me that was imprinted on my soul. Until I am able to heal that, the image my soul has of me is a weakening and hurt person.”

Dale tried to accept the explanation at face value but was having trouble wrapping his mind around it. “Your… soul image? You mentioned this before, but it is a confusing idea.”

“As an S-ranker, our body is made of our soul,” The Master explained with a heavy sigh. “While I am very good at soul-based attacks and defense, Xenocide specializes in soul attacks. Madness can infect who you are as a person, it can insidiously alter the very makeup of your soul, and I’m afraid that Xenocide had his hooks in me for a very long time. He was tearing out his artificial madness and using it to drag the entirety of the soul’s power into his Runes. That was why he could handle all of the most powerful people in the world like children… He had power over us for centuries, and we never even noticed.”

“What will it take for you to fix this?” Dale queried uneasily. “Can you defeat the collars? Can you heal yourself?”

“Give me about ninety years to focus on healing all the damage in myself, and sure.” The Master shook his head gravely. “Sadly, we have a week—at best.”

Dale turned and stalked away. He couldn't believe that the man who was supposed to be the greatest threat to life and civilized society would end up in such a state. Such a weak and pathetic state. Dale decided that even if it took his entire life, he would fight against this being that had taken the world for his own. Then when all of that was over, somehow, he would work to end Xenocide as well.

He paused, reevaluating his new choices. Dale shook his head, trying to figure out where these thoughts were coming from. This wasn’t natural, was it? To dedicate yourself to defeating opponents that were so much stronger than you that it was the difference between heaven and earth? Even as he thought the words, he found that he hated that phrase. Then he had to chuckle. “Who would say that in a serious manner?”

In a more realistic sense, Dale knew that his first priority should be ensuring his survival in the new and current world order. That started with making sure that Barry had no issue with him, and he was sure that the man held grudges against him for working so closely with The Master if nothing else. What would be the next step? Going into the world Cal built? That seemed like a dangerous proposition, even if it would allow them to survive for a longer period of time. There was nothing that said for sure that it would keep them alive, after all.

Dale needed to do something active; his mind was going wild with all the various scenarios and circumstances that he could find himself in. He walked around until he saw Minya talking to a large group of people and waited patiently until she was free. To her credit, there was no more talk of joining Cal, there were only answers to the myriad questions being tossed at her.

As the small crowd went about their business, Dale walked up to Minya and struck up a conversation, “Hey, Minya! I’m feeling pretty out of sorts, and I was really hoping that you’d be interested in coming with me to get some exercise. Interested?”

“A little stress relief?” Minya smiled at him and blushed lightly. “While I wasn't sure if we would pick things up after my faux pas, I’m really glad that you came back. I’d love to get you some stress relief. It’s been a long while for me as well.”

“Let’s get going then!” Dale smiled at her as she took his arm. Odd, but that was fine. They started walking and soon were at the portal to the dungeon. She looked at him with confusion in her eyes, but they sparkled as he laid out his plan. “I hear that there is a Mage’s area under the next level? If we can get to it, apparently there are great… benefits?”

“That sounds lovely.” Minya’s face turned predatory as she looked at the portal to the second layer of golems. She planned to have plenty of fun today.

Chapter Forty

“Just wondering, Dale,” Minya started as she looked out at the various paths leading to the center of the room, “but didn't we leave here all torn up last time? Do you have a plan to get past all the creatures in our way? Are we sneaking somehow?”

“No.” Dale hesitated, then shrugged at her. “Look, to be frank… even though I know we might not make it, I know that there is little chance of either of us staying dead if we die in here. Maybe that isn’t the best mentality to have, but I want to start taking serious chances. I think that's the only way for me to actually get stronger. If you want to go back, I understand.”

“No, no.” Minya smiled happily. “I’m just happy to see you start having some faith in Cal! Let’s get to fighting!”

Dale was agitated. Was that what was happening here? He was trusting the dark half of his soul? Maybe that was good, in the grand scheme of things… but he didn't like it. Cal was base greed and hunger. Maybe not hunger in the traditional sense, but he wanted power, knowledge, and new things like the mythological dragons did. In all the old tales, there was never a case of that going well for the people involved. Right now though, the only thing he could do was move forward. Specifically, at that golem that was taunting him.

He opened his assault by throwing a brick at the construct and using his earth-shattering technique on it midair. The brick exploded and sent shrapnel flying at the golem, and Dale was certain he would get a reaction from it. Somehow, the golem dodged even the smallest speck of the stone and then returned to its original taunting posture. Dale tore through the air as fast as he could move, swiping with his fists to land blows. Each time his fists came close, the golem slipped away. Dale was getting more and more frustrated with each attempt. He had no fear of getting tired out, but he wanted to vent on something, abyss take it!

Just as he was about to unleash a torrent of Mana blades at it, the Golem shivered and vanished into motes of light. Dale landed and looked around in confusion. “What?”

Minya got his attention by holding up a small Core. “Looks like this was a rainbow golem. Illusions, no actual substance except the Core and a little armor on it.”

“That’s a thing?” Dale shook his head and glowered at the Core that had been fooling him into attacking the air. “How did you find it?”

“When I saw it dodge a cloud of debris, I figured something was up.” Minya gestured with her hand, and a wave of water swept over the floor. “I did this, and the spot that broke the water turned out to have an illusion Core sitting and patiently waiting.”

“Huh. Smart thinking.”

“Well, I have all this mental acuity from becoming a Mage, it just felt like such a waste not to use it.” Minya flipped her hair dramatically, and Dale could only laugh at her antics.

“Fair enough, but let's keep going.” Dale started walking deeper on to the floor. “I really want to hit something.”

“I get that. I also want to hit something,” Minya commented, checking out Dale’s butt as he walked ahead of her. “What, ah, do you think this next opponent will be?”

“If this is the water and celestial path, that one will likely connect with…” Dale squinted at the shifting curtain of Essence that impaired his view of other platforms and tried to see what kind of golems were on them. “Either fire or wind? Not sure. It shouldn’t matter too much.”

“Let’s do it,” Minya said, eyes locked with Dale.

“Alright, great! Here we go!” Dale charged at the next platform while Minya sighed. Dale decided to go for the blunt attack out of the gates and filled his body with the ‘spell’ Cal had granted him. He released it on the golem and smirked as it stumbled. It had tried to jump, making Dale lean toward the idea that this was a wind-enhanced version. “Careful, I think I'm keeping it on the ground!”

“Got it, Dale!” Minya ran forward with foaming water covering her arms. She swung a fist at the golem, and the water extended into a bubbling blade that seemed to vibrate as it tore into the mineral body. The Core exploded as her attack sliced into it, and even Dale was surprised by the brutality that she was able to bring to bear. “Whoo! That was grizzly.”

Dale shook his head as her words unconsciously mimicked his thoughts. He smirked at the joke in his head and nodded at her. “Nice work! I hope they are all this easy.”

He stepped on to the path for the next area, and as he took a few steps, the path below him vanished. He yelled in shock, but thanks to his higher processing speed, he was able to catch himself in midair. He was now slowly falling to the open chasm that would drop him off of Mountaindale, but with relief, he felt a tendril of water latch on to him and yank him to safety.

“Still haven’t figured out flight?” Minya commented as they looked at the other available paths.

“Not so much,” Dale admitted as she pointed at a series of Runes that had been creating a walkway.

“Look at that!” She traced a few of the Runes and shook her head in wonder. “The path was there, but it was made out of solidified light! After a certain number of footfalls, this was designed to vanish! If you had sprinted down the path, it would have dropped you right about halfway between the platforms! Brilliant!”

“Also, kinda rude.” Dale shook his head. Then his eyes went wide as he made a realization. “Sheesh, that is one of the few traps that could have killed me permanently! Drat, Cal! If you had tossed me outside and I died down there, what would you have done?”

No answer came back to him, so Dale was forced to just stand there and steam. Once all the water had boiled off of him from Minya’s rescue, they took a few cautious steps along the next path and attacked the next platform. This time, things weren’t as easy. The golem in question seemed to be using some form of oscillating sound waves that created audio and visual hallucinations. Dale got punched in the face three times by Minya and twice in the head by the Golem before he was able to shift his Aura to a thick water that absorbed the sounds enough for him to track them to the source and smash the golem.

As that one fell, Dale dropped to the ground, groaning and clutching at his damaged skull. A few minutes of regeneration Aura were needed to progress any further. As he climbed to his feet, he blinked a few times and took a deep breath. “Alright, let’s start taking a look at plans now. We’re three in and so we need to fight two more before we reach the Boss. I’d like to not get punched in the face anymore as well, if at all possible.”

“So sorry about that, Dale!” Minya weakly grinned.

“Eh.” He let the Aura continue to heal him as he thought. “It looks like we’re on a path to the finish that focuses on messing with our minds. I don’t know how much more of that I can take, so I'm planning to go in absolutely ready this time, and I’ll just detonate a sword Aura cluster in all directions.”

“Sounds foolish.” Minya shook her head at his expression. “Here, just let me.”

She raced ahead, hitting the platform with a fwoosh. Water crested and swept across the platform before wrapping around the golem and starting to squeeze. “Got him! Finish this guy off, Dale!”

Dale was across the platform and hitting the stone body in an instant, his hand going through and yanking out the target Core, which he promptly tossed into a bag. “So… what rank are you again?”

“Hee.” Minya giggled and raced to the next platform. “We’re just lucky that this path doesn’t seem to be focused on martial prowess, but I gotta warn you that the Boss will be really hard to fight.”

Another quick and easy kill showed Dale that he had been underestimating Minya to a huge degree, especially as the path to the center area was revealed. “So, you were really letting me go all out while you were holding back?”

“You needed to hit something,” she shrugged as they looked at the golden Golem Boss that was waiting patiently for them while petting a Basher, “but physical combat is my weakest area. That's why I got so torn up on the last floor. I wasn’t faking weakness to let you feel strong. I’m a tamer and a researcher. It just so happens that I am better at combat than the mind-oriented golems we were fighting today. I’m going to be nowhere near as effective against her.”

“Her?” Dale looked at the golden Golem and realized that it did have a rather distinctive shape. “Huh. That's an Elf look-alike? I bet they hate that.”

“No idea!” Minya took a step forward and checked the path for traps. “All I know for sure is that she’s strong, fast, and really good in close combat. I’ve died twice here!”

The cheerful way that she offered up that information startled Dale, but he was glad to have the knowledge that resurrection was something Cal could do for other people. “Any weaknesses?”

“Don’t hurt the Basher,” Minya responded cryptically. “Not worth it.”

“Why?” Dale looked at the mutated rabbit. “Does she get stronger?”

“Kinda.” Minya hummed a low growl. “The Basher forces her to fight you with one hand. If you kill it, she either goes all out on you or curls up and drops through the ground. If she leaves, there’s no keygem for the area, and you have to fight through here again.”

“Oh.” Dale raised his fists and settled into a combat pose. It was time to start combat in a smart manner. He stepped forward cautiously but still far faster than a normal human could run. The Golem suddenly launched at him, and Dale coated the exterior of his arms with sword Aura to block her overhead strike. His crossed arms managed to turn the blow, but he still grunted as he pushed her back.

“I’ll join in if I see you in trouble, but this could be a good time to hone your hand to hand combat!”

“What?” This was not something you announced during combat! That was something that needed to be agreed upon! Dale spun and slammed the side of his booted foot into the golem’s shin, sending it skidding without seeming to cause harm. The golem lifted a finger and sprayed a gaseous attack at him that Dale had no chance to block.

“Ugh!” He clenched at his face, his sensitive nose twitching. “Only Cal would give a creature a fart attack!”

The distraction nearly worked on him, and at the last moment, he jumped back and took a blow to the collarbone that was meant for his neck. Dale started moving as fast as his body could handle, the Moon Elf forms blending into each other, one after another. The Golem was keeping pace with him, and he realized that she was using a similar style, but this style was more heavily focused on defense and probing attacks meant to keep her in working order while taking down multiple targets.

Dale’s style was meant for single-target assassination. It featured heavy blows and strikes to vital areas while keeping him moving at all times. In fact, it almost seemed like these two styles had been created in conjunction as diametric opposites of each other. If Dale had to guess, he would say that this was a High Elf fighting style, and for it to be so perfectly matched against him meant that it was likely a Royal technique. Had there ever been a High Elf Royal in here that might have dropped this combat manual?

They traded blows back and forth, but the fatal weakness of the golem was that it was also forced to defend the Basher. Dale made sure to keep away from hitting the rabbit, but he also pretended he was going to so that he could create openings. To conclude the fight, he feigned at the bunny with a glowing palm, then whirled around and slammed a shadow-wrapped foot into the neck of the golem. The motion caused the golem to fall, and Dale dropped on top of it and tore out its Core.

“I did it!” Dale shouted, holding the golden Core in the air like a great prize.

“Nice work, Dale!” Minya was at his side in an instant, handing him a keygem that had formed. “Let me show you the housing available on the next floor. There are beds that are so soft that you think you’re on a cloud!”

“Why would I need a bed? We don’t sleep.” Dale questioned as he was pulled along. Her mischievous smile wasn't helping his concern.

“I’ll explain soon.”

Chapter Forty-one

<Alright.> I was staring at the Silverwood tree above me. Glaring might actually be a better word. It seemed nervous, for a tree. <Here’s the deal—I know that you can hear me, and I’m hoping that the reason you haven’t been responding is that you simply don’t form words in the same way that other beings do.>

<Maybe you even have been talking to me and think that I’m rude for not responding via scent trails or something,> I allowed this explanation graciously. <However! Now that I know that there is a way to connect to you, by the abyss, you and I are going to become friends!>

Alrighty. The next step after making a personal connection to the tree was to make an energetic connection to said tree. Mmmhmmm. How had this not already happened? Was this guy just a chubby leech that had been mooching on my power for so long that I didn't even think of it anymore? Was it going to reject the connection to me because it had as much as it needed without ever having to let me bond? It was time to find out.

According to Eternium, what I needed to do was… strange. I needed to give Mana to the tree even as I pulled Mana from the tree. This would only work if the tree wanted it to happen, which weirded me out a little. Trees weren’t supposed to want things. I’m a rock—I should know how strange it was to want things. I needed to make a stream of power… done. Connect it to the root system… done. ‘Kay. Now, if the tree wanted a connection to me, it would take the offered power and use it to forge Mana that would come back to me. If this happened, we would create a system similar to the Meridians used while cultivating.

I waited and waited, but nothing seemed to be happening. I kept the power going, but I needed to be doing other things. I took a look at the surface and winced; things were a mess up there. We were slowly flying away from the territory owned by Eternium, but he wasn’t going to let us go all the way out until he was safe from the desolation aimed at him. I thought it was strange that an SSS-ranked dungeon Core was threatened by a rock falling on him, but it made more sense from the perspective of planets colliding.

While Eternium could likely destroy the planet if it tried hard enough, it would take a lot of time and preparation. Also, it had defenses in place, but who prepared for the moon to fall on them? That would be madness! Oh, right, wait. That was the issue here in the first place. Oh, there was a new Mage in the Mage’s Recluse? Let’s take a look at who… Dale? Oh, that was good for him! I should look in on his progress and see– Wow! Dale! My goodness, he and Minya were certainly enthusiastic to have reached this level together. I’ll leave them to… celebrating for now.

I thought back to the long conversation that Eternium and I had been having. There was very little gain from the deal I had been forced to make. He knew everything that I did, and in return, he had given me a method to potentially protect myself. I wasn't pleased that there was so much luck involved to make the protections work, but a chance was a chance. The modifications to the infernal cannons were being prepared right now since I had a feeling someone was going a little power-mad upstairs.

A strange fluctuation brought my attention to The Master, who had warped into the dungeon. Right where I used to be located, actually. He looked around, frowned, took another step, and popped into existence next to me. His voice was a bit too accusatory for my tastes, “You moved.”

<I do that pretty frequently.> When there was no response, I called a Bob into the room and had him translate for me. The conversation was far easier at that point.

“I want a favor,” The Master more demanded than asked.

<Another one?> I quipped, though Bob was too slow to state my words before The Master continued.

“I need you to save my necromancers, the people that were all relying on me. They were enslaved.” The Master was staring at the Silverwood tree, which seemed to be moving in a breeze despite the lack of airflow in this area. “Surely, you understand that following the orders of another, instead of your own, is the height of despair.”

<I get it, I really do, but what am I supposed to do?> I took a look at the newly enslaved people and had Bob shrug for me. <Their own Aura prevents me from absorbing the collars they are wearing right now. If they enter my Soul Space, I suppose I could eat away at them, but what sort of relationship would that leave me with Barry, who might take that opportunity to destroy me for going against him? Are you going to protect me from his wrath, forever?>

“Save them all, and I will destroy him myself,” The Master swore to me.

I ignored the special effects this created and had Bob stare at him. <What if one of them dies? That oath suddenly becomes nullified, and I am all sorts of up poop creek without a paddle.>

“I did everything for this! To save us!” The Master punched a wall and filled the room with rock dust and rubble. “He stole it all away for a power play! He will doom us all for his ego!”

<For now, unless you can explain to me what I can do to help this situation, I need you not to be here.> I had Bob wave at the entrance. <If there is a way that I can think of to save them without truly risking myself, I’ll do what I can. I cannot promise anything, though. I truly hope you understand.>

“Of course, I understand.” The Master slumped against the uneven wall, somehow forming the unbelievably strong stone into a kind of chair. “Centuries of people putting themselves first, no matter how hard I try to keep them seeing the bigger picture and understanding the benefits that working together can actually accomplish. What could we do, what could we make, if we used the millennia of life we can attain… to lift each other up instead of fighting for scraps of ephemeral power.”

<I like your vision, Ter.> I chuckled as he sent a bolt of nothing whizzing past Bob’s ear and left a hole all the way through my dungeon before vanishing from my perception. Bob didn’t laugh along with me. <Got it, no nicknames. Look at things from my perspective. My entire life has been a fight for survival, and I don't see that changing for a long, long time. Even the people I save, I need to be wary of! Since people that are too powerful could pop me from the outside or the inside for no reason beyond wanting to see what happens. Give me a way to protect myself or kill my foes on your own, and I’ll save your people.>

“The only thing that I could give you to defeat him would be me, and you are too weak to create a deal with me with you in charge.” The Master started pacing around the room, his uncontrolled power making the stone warp under him. “Could I give them all memory stones from you? Let them know that they will be resurrected if they die in the area?”

<All I know is that I couldn’t bring them back at their current power.> I started thinking over the offer; it wasn’t a bad deal for me. <Would they submit to that? I think that they could regain their power, but if they were to die, they would come back far weaker.>

The Master could only hold up his hands and shrug. “They would take the deal, and if not… I feel that I could make this choice for them. It is in their best interests.”

<Good, good.> I laughed, making The Master flush with fury. <Nothing says ‘I care about you’ like forcing someone’s mind into a gem and killing them. In fact, I feel like that story is somehow… familiar…>

“I assume you are speaking on your personal experience?” The Master stated the words almost blandly, but I could tell that the situation was getting to him. “I had nothing to do with your other half going through a portal in time and creating you. That is… more confusing than it is realistic.”

<I’d rather not think about it,> I told him, glad that the conversation was moving along. <The unbridled chaos mixing with that portal could have created or done anything. What if we had somehow connected to a potent, untamed creature? Or summoned a meteor that came through from space? It could have ended all of us in an eyeblink, and we’d have never known what happened.>

“So, you won’t agree to attempt to meddle with time?” The Master was… joking, I think?

<Never again,> I firmly announced. <I will never intentionally attempt to change the past. Nothing good comes from that.>

“Fine.” The Master sighed, holding up a hand. “Could I get a bag of about ninety Cores, please? I have some brethren to ‘liberate’.”

<I am really looking forward to it.>

Chapter Forty-two

While I waited for the Silverwood tree to accept me or for The Master to kill off all of his people and deliver them to me, I did have a few other projects in the works. While we were talking, Eternium asked me to save as many Wisps and dungeons as I could. I was really happy that he hadn’t made that request a few months ago; I’m pretty sure I took down most of the dungeons that were connected to the surface of the planet, and that conversation could have gotten awkward. Obviously, he knew that I had done so, but now, there was a swarm of Wisps and Cores being delivered to me via Eternium’s creatures. Apparently, he was a ‘collector’ of sorts. Or the origin of the species. Details were fuzzy.

<Dani, I'm confused.> My words got her attention right away, and she zipped over with Grace in tow. I had Bob toss Mu’s backpack into a chest. <So, wasn’t Eternium supposed to be really dangerous and murder-happy? You were so nervous coming here that I almost feel like my meeting with him was… hmm. Now that time has passed and upon further reflection, my meeting wasn't so bad. Maybe Eternium isn't that homicidal, after all.>

“I was thinking about that, too,” Dani admitted, flying in slow circles. “I think that he originally didn't want to be bothered all that often. He seemed oddly happy to have company, so I think the eons of loneliness might have gotten to him. Otherwise, I think he turned off the fear that we normally should have had. He allowed us to feel fear toward things like the moon falling and a few of his monsters while we could see them, but I couldn't seem to muster fear or outrage while we were focused on him, you know?”

<Huh. Now that I think about it… all I can really remember is slight caution when he wanted to scan my memories. I would have fought that tooth and nail before.> I shuddered, thinking back over the conversation in a new light. Eternium had done some seriously scary things, and I had just taken it all in stride. That was so much more terrifying in retrospect. He could affect my mind with so much ease that I didn't and couldn't notice at the time. It made sense, I suppose. He was apparently the oldest surviving dungeon on the planet, and he had created the Wisp race that guided all the dungeons that could be found. It would be stranger if he didn’t have some sort of hold on me.

“Still. Cal,” Dani stopped moving for a moment and stared at me, “I found the secret of my race! The progenitor of my species! I can finally right misconceptions and tell others what it is that we were missing all these years! I… I don’t know what to feel right now. Who all can I tell? Who will live through this?”

<Dani, we’ll find anyone we can, and I’m sure Eternium has Wisps that he wants us to protect. Listen, I’m going to go check on Aiden, and we should be getting a demand from Barry pretty soon as well. Since the portal is built, I’m sure they are going to be wanting to send people into me as soon as possible.> I started to drift away, but Dani started talking, and I didn't want to be rude.

“Are you ready for that?” Dani had concern in her voice, and she was speaking in hushed tones so as not to get Grace worried. “I’m worried that an influx of people into your brand-new Soul Space might put a lot of strain on you. I don't want you getting hurt because you are trying to help people. It's just so… backward.”

<No fear there,> I promised her. <If at any time I feel like I am in danger, I’ll stop the process right away. Alright, gotta go!>

I zoomed my main focus over to Aiden, taking a look at the changes that had been wrought. He now stood about nine feet tall, was massively muscled, and covered in a thick coat of white fur. I had combined his body with that of a Warg, a powerful, wolf-type Beast that had been sacrificed to me. I was pleased with the result; all of his senses had been enhanced, his body had been enhanced to an amazing degree… all that remained was to see how this impacted his day-to-day life. Would he need more food than normal to keep up with nutrition requirements? How would his cultivation be impacted?

I suddenly realized that I hadn’t intended to make his fur white. That was odd; what had happened there? Looking into his head, I found that his fur was white due to the massive pain and stress that had been placed on his mind and body. Drat. I had been hoping to get away from having to insert a backup, but his mind was ravaged. He was broken beyond repair, so with a sigh, I had a Core brought over and overwrote his mind with a copy from the start of this process. The General went limp and didn't stir for a few minutes. I took that time to fix a few of the issues I was noticing as well as increasing his pain resistance a good amount.

When his eyes opened, there was no Beast looking out. There was a confused intelligence that was seeking answers. <Hello there, Aiden! Congrats on your new form! I hope you like the alterations.>

“What… how long have I been out?” Aiden was gently lowered to the ground, the manacles and chains keeping him in place slipping off and clattering to the floor. “What did you do to me?”

<I made you the monster on the outside that you are on the inside!> I cheerfully explained to him. <You know, most people really frown on hunting their own species. I made you this way so you won’t feel any qualms about doing what you do! Now, you can go out and be a monster to your heart’s content.>

“You are punishing me?” The ex-Northman realized with horror. “I was killing Amazonians to satisfy your hunger!”

<No, no you weren’t.> My voice took on a hard edge. <I pride myself on fairness and a way to succeed, always. You were placing people in traps that there was no escape from, then killing them slowly. The only chance for fairness in that scenario would be if they noticed the trap ahead of time. You made sure that didn't happen, and let's not pretend you weren’t doing this for your own personal vendetta. Now. Run along, and do try to enjoy your new body. I think you will actually like it more than you think once you get a feel for it.>

Aiden held up a massive paw-hand, looking at the thick claws that tipped his fingers. He scratched the razor-sharp edge over a stone, an eyebrow quirking in surprise as the stone gained a deep gouge. He stood up and up… at his full height, he looked around the small room and flexed, feeling incomparably powerful. He looked to the doorway and dashed out of it to test his speed. “Ah-wooo!”

The Wolfman ran along the path, headed for the surface. With each pounding step, he found greater joy in the motion and speed he was able to achieve. By the time he reached the surface, all thoughts of this form being a punishment had vanished… though not naturally.

I watched as the Wolfman ran from my depths, and I worked in real time to alter his emotions and memories. He would soon love me and be incredibly thankful for his new body, no matter what his thoughts originally would have been. All that remained to be seen at this point was the reactions of other people as he– He just died. Who…? Looks like Odin hit him with lightning as he tried to leave. Alright, let’s try this again…

The Wolfman was spawned into the small room, we had a similar conversation, he tried out his claws and body, and raced off to the surface. Alright… this time, he made sure to call out and speak to people before fully showing his body to the population. Good. He took my advice. Let's see how long he lasts this time.

I was chuckling about this development all the way until he vanished from my senses along with Dale’s friend Tom. They stepped through the portal, and… from there, I was uncertain. Likely they went to the Northman homeland? I supposed that I could create him again if needed, but right now, it was more important to focus in on–

“Dungeon!” Barry shouted into my depths, causing dust to fall from the first and second floor ceiling as they reverberated. “It’s time to begin the process! We are going to activate the new portal. Get yourself ready, and send along someone that can translate for you!”

I thought about it, then looked at my small escape portal below me. Should I just leave all this behind? It would be the work of an instant to save myself, Dani, and Grace. Perhaps a few minutes longer to grab all the things that I wanted to come along with me. Should I just make a run for it and leave all these things to their fates?

Should I leave the races, the S-rankers, the dungeon capable of swallowing the world… and run for it? Perhaps if Barry gets too uppity. If he tries anything or attempts to enslave me, I would be out of here, and they could all suffer the consequences. To prepare for that…

<Bob, start bringing along the memory Cores. I think it is time to get everything ready for our miraculous escape.> I looked at everything else going on and decided that, yup, it was time to get moving. Contingency plans didn’t work unless you had time to use them, after all!

“Yes, Great Spirit.”

Chapter Forty-three

“My people! It is time to gather ourselves for the exodus!” Barry was speaking into the air, and even though he didn’t seem to be shouting, he was clearly heard by the entire population of Mountaindale. “As we speak, we are activating the legendary Soul Gate! With a single step, each person will be able to enter a new realm! The realm of the dungeon’s soul! Fear not, my people! We have removed the teeth of this dungeon, and created a set of rules that it is bound by! Please gather to witness history in the making!”

Wow. That was sure a special speech, wasn’t it? Barry was preening like a peacock, and I made a note to make an actual bird with his face. Not many people would understand the reference; they would just think that they were ugly peacocks… but this is one of those things I planned to do for me, not for understanding. There was a team of Mages standing around the gate, and after a nod from Barry, they started feeding Mana into the intricate structure. It began to slowly shift through multiple colorations, going from a jewel-encrusted pure white to a hot red in mere moments.

I looked on for a few seconds, waiting until the time was right. As the color shifted from red to blue-tinged yellow, I focused my willpower on the gate. As I did so, the color changes faltered, and the entire structure rapidly became a dark charcoal color. I also felt a change within myself as something began to happen. A point of light appeared in my Soul Space which began to rapidly stretch and wiggle. It. Abyssal. Hurt!

<Ow, feces! What in the abyss is this garbage? I wasn’t told that this would hurt. What is this farce of a magical gate?> I vented my pain and rage on anyone that could hear me, and with the corner of my attention, I could see Barry smile a vicious smile. He knew this would hurt! Had The Master known? I’d eat them all!

“It seems that the dungeon is actually following through on this process!” Barry announced as the gate shifted to a darker and darker coloration. No… it wasn’t changing color anymore; it was simply absorbing all the light that reached its surface! I can’t really explain the difference, but it was a strange thing to see a brightly-colored masterpiece turn into a pit of utter darkness. The entire time, a tunnel was being carved into my interior. That was the only way I could describe what was happening. A chunk of my soul was being torn open and fed into the gate to power it.

For some reason, I had kinda been expecting that I would lose a chunk of my soul to this thing, but I had honestly been expecting that Dale would need to be sacrificed to it to power the portal. Obviously, I hadn’t been intending on informing him of that fact, but good for him that he wouldn't need to be fed to something to save a bunch of people he didn't know. He would have done it, too. I’m just sure of it; he is that much of an altruist. Bleh. Good, making fun of Dale was having the intended effect of making me feel better about what was going on.

“Inform our allies,” the monster in Elven skin announced. “It is time for them to begin the march. Ensure that they bring plenty of tribute as they arrive as well.”

I perked up when I heard the word tribute. Ah yes, that would make my wounds hurt less. Getting fed some shiny and new objects and knowledge. I would glut myself on all of the things coming into me; I would take it all and use it to make sure that I could build powerful defenses throughout my soul. Never again would I allow such a miserable thing to happen to me, this much I swore to myself in a non-magically binding way. Frankly, I didn't know what I had been expecting, and it made sense that this process hurt. I sighed as I resigned myself to the pain; there was a hole in me from an outside source. This was no different from a sword wound or a claw in the side; it was simply the location of the wound that was so grievous.

One thing that made me laugh a little was that Dale was on the floor writhing in pain. He had no idea why he was in pain suddenly and was thinking that he was poisoned or something. Silly Dale, not realizing that we were linked. Pain in my soul was pain in his as well, after all! Alright, it wasn't funny, but I found myself feeling better after I saw it. I assured Minya that he would be fine, even though I was still feeling like someone was pouring bees made of fire into me.

Soon, the process began to slow, though the pain remained. There was a hole in me, and I didn't really expect that it would feel pleasant anytime soon. I was sure that I either needed to last long enough to heal up around the sore spot or, preferably, just remove the portal and heal the jagged edges. While this was going on, I suddenly began to gain large amounts of infernal Essence and Mana. I looked toward the source, finding that The Master was using the distraction of the opening portal to collect his people into easily transportable Cores. The bodies were left where they fell, but my influence started working on them, their gear, and the slave collars that they wore. Now there was a design I had no interest in replicating.

Barry noticed that something was off but could only scowl since he noticed too late. He sent along a command to the slaves to die, but The Master had already secured their minds. I could see the nervousness on Barry’s face, but I was certain that The Master wouldn't get involved in the affairs of the area anymore. He had no personal stake in anything, and people had been letting him down far too frequently.

The Master arrived next to me, and in an instant, eighty-seven Cores were offered to me. I absorbed them all, and soon, I had the sentient inhabitants of my Soul Space. I sent along a booming voice into their area, making them flinch, <Welcome! Haven’t named this area yet, but you are in my world now! Please make sure to let me know how things are, give me feedback on things like temperature and air quality… really everything. Thanks!>

Now, I could have simply created anyone who I had the mind of in my inner world, but that required a level of trust that I hadn't really seen much of. Not only did someone need to give me a copy of their most personal object—their minds—but they also needed to provide all the energy for their body to be reborn. Otherwise, I just wouldn’t do it. Now, the reason this was difficult was that the person needed to die. Most people were really banking on the portal being opened, for some reason.

Speaking of the opening portal, why was it taking so long? It felt like there was someone stretching the pain out intentionally… then I noticed that it was opening in an area where time was still acting funky. Time moved a lot faster in this area, and the discrepancy meant that I was unintentionally dragging out my own agony. Well, that was an easy fix. I shifted the landscape around, and suddenly, the portal was in a standard time zone. In moments, the portal stabilized. I felt a cold wind blow into me as the air pressure differential caused the portal to start sucking in great gouts of fresh air from the outside.

I wasn't going to complain, but it felt a little strange to go from pure air to this mix of chemicals and what tasted like the cumulative exhalation of ten thousand people. Sighs of relief? Bleh. Tasted like stale cookies. The pain leveled off to a dull throbbing, and I heard Barry start speaking.

“Let’s get started!” he roared to the cheering crowd. “The faster we get everyone in here, the faster you can become stronger and wealthy in this new land!”

“We can just… go in?” someone near the front asked in a shocked tone.

“Everyone here has been working for this moment!” Barry graciously waved at the dark stain on the world that showed a land of twilight they had never before witnessed. “Go on, find the reward you have been seeking! Those that come after will be the ones to pay tribute and tolls. Just remember, going through means that you accept the rules of the dungeon, and you will be magically bound to the agreement.”

People looked up at the sky where a gigantic, white expanse could be seen looming closer. With that final assurance that this was the best hope for survival, the first refugee stepped through and into my world. I felt something odd, like waking up at night and seeing an object that looked like a nightmare visage. It shook me but didn't impact me. People started to pour through the air-sucking portal, and I began to think that this would be a lot harder than I had first imagined.

In the depths of my dungeon, I saw Dale’s eyes pop open and look into Minya’s concerned ones. “What just happened?”

Minya smiled at him and brushed his brown hair out of his eyes. “Progress.”

Chapter Forty-four

“Progress?” Dale winced as he stood up. “Why does progress hurt so much? The worst of it is gone, but it's just kind of throbbing continuously now.”

“Cal popped in and mentioned that they opened the portal up there,” Minya explained with a smile. “Would you like to go check it out, or would you like to… stay here a little longer?”

“Stay here longer,” Dale responded so fast that he nearly shouted at her. “Uh, that is…”

“Good to know that I haven’t lost my touch!” Minya grabbed Dale by the arm and started pulling him to the villa they had picked, but Dale felt a sudden phantom pain and clutched at his gut.

“Ugh.” He spat out a glob of blood and stared at the substance until it was absorbed by the dungeon. “Oh, that can’t be good.”

“Blood? From what?” Minya paled. “Oh no. I used too much force and–”

“No, no. This is from whatever Cal is doing.” Dale didn't miss the look of excitement on her face and internally sighed at the thought that this lady might like his other half more than him. Oh well. “It's not stopping is the issue. Maybe we can run upstairs and see what’s going on?”

“Hmm.” Minya looked him over and smiled. “Well. I know that you wouldn’t be leaving unless you felt it was really important at this point, so alright. I guess you’ll just have to make it up to me later.”

Dale smiled nervously. It was a fun thought, but he also knew that he needed to see what could affect him from such a distance. They walked toward the portal on this level, standing ready for combat but also physically closer than they ever had before. Leaving the dungeon, they were slightly put out over the huge line that had formed. Minya tapped on the shoulders of a man to get his attention and asked what was going on.

“What’re ya even talking about? This is the line to get into the new world!” The man glared at them up and down. “No line jumpin’!”

“So… if we want to get close enough to see what’s going on. We are going to have to wait in line?” Dale looked at the snaking river of people, wincing when he found that he could see neither the front or back. “At least it is moving pretty quick?”

“Dale!” Minya pinched him on the side and pointed at the air. “We’re Mages. Come on!”

With that exclamation, she grabbed his hand and surged into the air on a geyser of frothing water. The ground dropped away from Dale, and he watched with awe as the entire landscape below him was revealed. As the last rays of light that would reach this area for the day began to fade, the aurora also appeared in the sky, and the world lit up. Dale looked around with a wide smile as they began descending to Mountaindale, and the smile slowly fell away as he took in the view.

There was a dark scar on the ground, and as they got closer, he could feel a pull. He thought it was in his mind at first, but when his clothes started fluttering in the direction of the blemish, he knew that it was an actual effect of the portal. This seemed to have a benefit and a detriment to the line of people waiting. The detriment was that people were hesitant to approach, the benefit was that as they got close, they were pulled through the portal. Instant mitigation of choice.

Dale and Minya landed and walked toward the portal amid an outcry from the people in line. It petered off quickly since Barry had actually encouraged the entire population to allow higher-ranked people to go through first, though he was keeping a small population to provide security and keep things running smoothly during the transition. Dale and Minya took a look at the procession, and this close, they could even see through the portal to the people within. Obviously, they were surviving the transition, which eased Dale’s concern greatly. Still, each time someone stepped through, he felt a small phantom pain.

“I see…” Dale watched the next few people who walked—or were yanked—through the portal. “Their rank directly determines how much pain I feel when they step through.”

“Does it hurt all the time after they are through?” Minya inquired, eyes still on the line of moving people.

Dale considered the question while a few more people made their way through. “I don't think so? It is more like they are moving through a raw wound, and the size and density of their Aura is rubbing at the sore spot. If the Mages were going through first, it makes sense that the most pain was right away.”

“Sure.” Minya looked over at him. “I’m looking forward to getting in there, but I can certainly wait around for a while.”

Dale sent a coy smile her way. “I like the sound of that.”

“Hey!” A Guild Mage landed next to them. “Mages are supposed to have gone in already! Get moving or find somewhere else to be! You’re drawing far too much attention, and people are getting nervous. That guy in line just asked someone if you hadn't gone in because you didn’t trust the process!”

“Sorry, we’ll get out of the way!” Minya gripped Dale’s arm before he could say anything, and in a moment, they were both airborne. “Let’s go find somewhere comfy to watch the end of the world.”

They landed on the top of one of the Academy spires and lay back on the slight incline to watch the moon getting ever closer. Between the colors in the night sky, the enormous shards of the moon in the sky, and the noise coming from the people and monsters in the area, the night was alive and vibrant. Minya rolled toward Dale and stared at him, after a few long moments finally asking a question, “Dale, why did you fight getting together with me for so long?”

The young Mage shifted uncomfortably on the stone surface of the building. “Listen, Minya. I have a complicated history with Cal, and you jumped right into working with him with such enthusiasm that I figured that you were going to do something to intentionally hurt all of us.”

He sighed and lay as flat as possible, watching the moon loom ever closer in the sky. “Just a few… how long has it been? It feels like days… but it's been so much longer. Just yesterday, I was helping the Guild to build a wall to keep in the monsters that were spawning in the dungeon. I was a sheepherder who found a magical cave of wonders. I was seeing my Center for the first time. I was dodging the attacks of an abomination! All of this, all of the bad things in my life seemed to stem from interaction with a single person.”

“All of the good things too, I suppose.” Dale petered off, continuing only after his mind was clear. “It's just been so much, Minya. Every day was me waking up to see who was trying to kill me that day. Then a beautiful woman walks out of the dungeon and starts telling everyone that something we all know is a predator… is actually a nice and friendly creature. Then she comes over to me and wants to be friendly, without having ever known me or interacted with me? I was concerned. Do you know that Cal once made a tunnel to my clothes chest and had a Goblin with a knife pop out at me?”

“Ha!” Minya started laughing, and Dale stared at her before suddenly joining in. They continued beyond what was reasonable, only slowly quieting. “I needed that. Thanks, Dale. Now, as to the other stuff… you know that I only wanted to know about you because Cal talks about you all the time? Whenever he is watching someone fight, it is always a comparison to your own fighting ability. When an interesting technique is used, he mutters about how he could make it better and wants you to test it for him.”

“Huh.”

“That’s all you have to say?” Minya laughed at him. “I really hate to say it, but you guys have really similar qualities. You always seem to be thinking of the other person, and even though you both grumble about it… you always work really hard to protect each other. Such manly best friends.”

“He’s not my best friend,” Dale grumbled, spurring on another laugh from Minya. “Ugh.”

“Of course, he’s not.” Minya patted him on the arm, then snuggled up to him. “So… do you think that you are going to go through that portal?”

“That’s the million-gold question, isn’t it?” Dale waved at the moon. “Look at that thing. I don't want to be stuck out here while that lands on my head, but… when I was looking at the portal… I felt like it was home. Like if I went in there, I would either cease to be or become something more. I think… I think that if I go in there, I’ll go back to being part of Cal.”

Minya looked horrified. “Dale! No, you’ll be fine! There’s no way that could–”

“There’s no way to tell, though. Is there?” Dale smiled at her. “I’m sorry to worry you, but I am kind of glad that you are worried.”

“Well… I do kinda like you,” Minya announced with a languorous grin. “Hey. If Cal did somehow absorb you, wouldn’t he just remake you as soon as possible so that he didn’t have to deal with you in his mind at all times?”

“That… is a very good question.” Dale looked up at the shifting night sky and went silent while he enjoyed the body heat rolling off of Minya. Sometimes, it was nice to just enjoy your evening. “I just don't ever want to stop existing. I’m going to wait as long as I can and enjoy life as much as possible before I need to do this. I hope… I hope you understand.”

“Of course.”

Chapter Forty-five

Dale and Minya spent a few hours watching nearly the entire population of Mountaindale vanishing into the air, and for a short while, the sound of silence reigned supreme. Then there was a deep groan from the mountain as a few sections of stone shifted around, and there was a constantly increasing amount of ruckus from the dungeon as new monsters continued to spawn without anyone in the area to cull them. Dale listened to the noise level increase, then frowned as he realized that there couldn’t be this much noise from the dungeon alone.

He crawled to the edge of the roof and looked over. He recoiled in shock at the rows of metal-clad warriors standing in perfect formation. They must have been moving with perfect precision and control to have only alerted them when they were this close! He watched as the men stood aside as a much taller… person? Walked to the front and spoke into the dungeon.

“Great Spirit!” the voice was raspy and strange. “My people, The People, ask to receive your blessing as we enter this new land! I have taken the place of my elder brother, and am now the Warchief of our nation!”

<You’ve got to be kidding me.> Dale heard the words, even though they weren’t directed at him. <You convinced everyone that your punishment is the life they should choose?>

“The blessing of might has proven its worth, Great Spirit.” Aiden smiled, showing silvery-white incisors. “They have all decided that they would like to join me on this path to power.”

<All of them?>

Aiden frowned. “There are a few squads that have refused to transform, but as of now, they are outcasts. They will arrive separately.”

<Well… alright.> Dale shook his head at their eagerness in Cal’s thoughts, though Aiden likely couldn’t catch it. <You’ll owe me for this.>

“I don't mind at all.” Aiden grinned darkly.

<Alrighty then, Aiden Silverfang, progenitor of the Wolfman race.> The Warchief’s smile only broadened. <Bring your people along, and welcome.>

Aiden turned to his people and shouted, “I have secured special favor with the dungeon! We will be the first race to properly accept the gifts it will offer, and we have earned much! Onward, to our new lands!”

There was a sound of thunder as the collective group slammed a fist into their chest and began marching forward. This procession was much larger than what had been on Mountaindale, as an entire nation of people, but still moved through faster than the unorganized rabble had managed. Dale took calming and soothing breaths constantly, doing his best to calm the ragged edges of his soul. “This is fine, I’m fine…”

<If it helps, being able to feel your soul and interact with it has increased your rank,> Cal interrupted Dale’s inner monologue. <B-rank… two? The very leading edge of it?>

“When did I get B-rank one?” Dale was shocked by the shift.

<Not my job to monitor you all the time,> Cal grumbled and moved away. Dale smiled, seeing the interaction in a different light after the conversation with Minya.

“Aww, he does care!” Dale chuckled along with Minya as they watched the last of the silver-metal-clad warriors pass below. He rubbed his chest, wincing as his mind returned to the pain that he was feeling in his soul. “Feels like the worst heartburn of my life mixed with an infected claw wound.”

<Hey, Dale,> the dungeon interrupted Dale’s grumbling in a sudden reversal of situation. <Can I eat those buildings if no one is in them?>

Dale looked around at the empty structures and shrugged. “I see no reason not to do so. Go for it.”

In an instant, the buildings furthest away from the portal began to tremble, then sank into the ground over the next few minutes. The wall that had been built around the city crumbled inward, and soon, all that was left behind was open land with grass quickly growing over it. Closer and closer the destruction crept until all that remained were the Academy, a few buildings directly around the portal, and the Guild’s building that still swarmed with people. It was fun to watch ‘nature’ reclaim in an hour what should have taken hundreds of years.

The young Mage felt a pang in his heart as the city that he had played a crucial role in creating underwent such rapid destruction. He put a smile on his face and motioned for Minya to join him in another area; Cal wanted to get started on this building next. As they tumbled through the air, they saw a glimmer of gold appear from the portal area. Before they hit the ground, there was a swarm of High Elves in the area. The Elves glanced at the humans, sniffed disdainfully, and strolled to the Soul Portal.

Not a single one of them failed to bow to Barry as they passed through, though the S-ranker only acknowledged a single one of them—the Elder who paid the tribute. As the procession started, Dale’s pain levels shot up. Not a single one of these people were under the B-ranks, and the only saving grace was that there was only a few thousand total that came through. More humans started arriving then, and as the day wore on, the line to escape the incumbent doom only grew.

Barry had the Guild members who policed the area begin to force everyone to run through the portal, and soon, the entire sea of species began to follow suit. For the vast majority of the people, only a slight shuffling jog was needed, but as the pace continued, there was significant progress made. The moon was looming ever closer, and if they didn’t make it through, they would all die. Only three days remained until the worst began to arrive, but there were smaller chunks arriving daily.

At one point, a huge detachment of Wood Elves arrived, though all that were able to go through the portal were the children and otherwise young members of their race. Each group of five was clustered around a sapling, and they transported it with utmost care. Whenever they went through, they would always ensure that the tree would fit through the portal. For reasons unknown, if the tree wouldn’t fit, the group would leave. Dale wondered why they didn't just put the tree in a spatial storage device, but there was no response coming, and the Wood Elves he got close to would vanish like morning dew under the sun.

Dale and Minya spent the entire day watching various groups and factions pass through, and as the hour got late, the people started becoming more ragged, singed, or seemed to be injured or in shock. At one point, people coming through the main ‘on to Mountaindale’ portal were screaming, and moments later, a massive gout of flame raced out of the portal after them. The operator cut the link and questioned those that had made it through. It seemed a moon stone had landed near the city, and the population center had apparently been obliterated.

Nodding, the portal operator simply opened the gate to the next location and told them to hurry. Dwarves started rumbling through, carrying very little in the way of physical wealth. Barry stopped them and informed them that their toll had not been paid. They explained that they had broken from their tribes in an attempt to survive and most of their gear had been taken before they were allowed to escape. Barry stared at them, seeking any hint of deception, then noticed a few wearing Guild badges. With a sigh, he motioned for them to hurry, and the full group started coming through.

Dale stared after the group as they moved through and wondered if they had enough of a population to stay viable over time. Then again, the High Elves had only arrived with seventy-five hundred people as well, and the Dwarves numbered at least ten thousand. The human shrugged and wished the best for them, returning to his comfortable spot to watch everyone passing. He smirked as the Dwarves finished; Barry had stepped away to go to a meeting, and hundreds of Dark Elves chose that moment to erupt out of their embassy and through the portal, carrying everything they could possibly get their hands on.

Not only the things that they were bringing to offer, but they also made sure to rob the treasury that Barry was collecting tribute in. There was a roar that crossed the entire mountain, and the last Elf lost a leg as he dove through the portal. Barry tried to go after him but passed through the portal and into the wall of the building. Dale dropped to his knees and wheezed from the pain of the man brushing his soul, but it seemed that the S-ranker couldn’t enter the portal even if he tried. The Dark Elves were safe from him—for now. A few of the Mages were set as guards to the treasury, and the constant flow continued.

Chapter Forty-six

My soul felt swollen. I was aching and in pain, and Barry hadn’t helped matters by touching the portal. The wound in my soul felt feverish and infected now, and I was thinking about closing it whether or not people were ready to see it happen. But… there was a benefit that I was seeing right away.

People had been fighting almost since the second person made it through the portal. When the Mages got going, throwing power every which way, I started seeing benefits from it that I hadn’t even been able to achieve in the deepest layers of my dungeon. Every bit of the used Mana was absorbed into the surroundings or air, just like in the world, but in here that, meant that it was absorbed by me. So as more and more people joined in fighting over territory, fighting the monsters outside of the portal area, or just using their power for day-to-day things, my power would grow at the same rate as their usage.

I liked that enough to force myself to keep the portal open. Plus, all of the free air was really helpful in keeping everyone breathing. I had thought that I was doing well in my creation of atmosphere, but I forgot that humans breathe so much! And just constantly! Lungs. Pah. So inefficient. I had also forgotten that the plants in my world needed another catalyst in order to produce air constantly, and it came from people breathing the clean air and soiling it. Now that there was so much soil in the air from them, the air production had started to ramp up. Still, they would have been in trouble if the portal hadn’t brought in a few days’ worth of usable air already.

I was also getting all sorts of useful items from the people that had been entering this place. For some reason, they seemed not to understand that they weren’t allowed to have things. They were only allowed to have what they had earned from me. So, this translated to armor falling to pieces, weapons melting out of hands, food turning to ashes, liquids vaporizing, and wealth pouring out of pockets and into the soil. By the time anyone took five steps through into my world, they were all wearing what I was calling ‘starting gear’. Simple clothes, no weapons, no money. No food either, but I would do for them what I had done for my Goblins way back when. Big table of food for a few days while they got all set up.

It was a good plan, in my opinion. As time wore on, fewer and fewer people came through the portal, though it remained open for the stragglers. I looked around for familiar faces and saw that Aiden and King Henry were talking and planning on setting up in the same area. They discussed the location and ran off to scout the area together. As both of them had been altered by me, they moved quickly and started having fun, finally getting to test their bodies to the fullest.

Aiden had a body powerful beyond his ranking, and Henry had a higher tier as a Mage. They moved through their enemies, talked, and seemed to just have fun. It was nice to see my people bonding. Others were not so pleased to be in each other’s company. There were dozens of assassinations, murders, brawls, and terrible injuries. I stored the minds of anyone killed, telling myself that I’d bring them back later. When things weren’t so hectic, perhaps. Then I felt a new connection and wrenched my mind out of my Soul Space and into the real world.

There was a single flower blooming on the Silverwood tree that loomed above me. I had left open a small channel of Mana flowing into its roots, and it had seemingly accepted the connection! A root started wiggling around and eventually started extending to me along the open-air path of Mana I had created. It touched the surface of my Core and passed through it! I followed the ethereal root as it wound down and into my soul, and I directed it to the seventh continent that I had sketched out. I had devoted a significant amount of my resources to creating a small oasis, the only portion of this continent that had a physical presence.

The ghostly root touched down into the perfect soil, and a pulse of life raced down and into the dirt. A small seed formed and sprouted roots that reached almost to the edge of the oasis I had formed. A single inch of the plant appeared above ground with a tiny, silver leaf showing. Neat. Then I felt the tree speaking to me. Not… words but desires and instructions. The Soul Silverwood Tree began pulling in Mana, Mana, and more Mana. Then it grew. When it reached the same size as the tree in the world above, small buds began to grow. I could peek through the petals and saw small clusters of gems clutched within.

<I see that you have succeeded,> Eternium’s voice flipped my entire mountain twice before I could get back into control, and I had to count to keep my fury at the—unintentional—assault. <How ripe are the Cores the tree has grown?>

<I don’t even understand the question enough to formulate a response to that,> I sent back, a little of my frustration slipping through.

<It matters not. Allow me to…> I felt the invasion of a mind and power so far beyond my comprehension that it was like an ant staring at an Inscribed weapon. Pure power raced into my Silverwood tree, and by using that as a filter, Eternium sent Soul Energy into the tree inside of me. I was terrified. I had an injection of power, and now a huge amount of it, that would corrupt and destroy me in an instant if I came in contact with it. The Soul Silverwood tree bloomed and grew even as the one in real life began to wither and blister.

A new blossom formed after the tree had reached ten feet tall, and a bud formed that was supported by three branches. I looked at the gem it contained and saw that it was as transparent as the finest glass, though I was sure it would be entirely unbreakable to me. <Good, my new Core has been formed.>

<What… Is this how natural Cores are made?> I was intrigued, horrified, and excited to have this information.

<Not normally, no,> Eternium dashed my hopes. <The World Tree can be used to form nearly any sentient creature and is entirely influenced by the one it connects with. Right now, you can allow any Core-based being into your tree, which will blossom and release them when enough power has been gathered to sustain them. I’m sure you saw how these trees in the wild drop orb-like seeds that contain other trees, yes? This is the same process. Now, instead of letting the tree grow a mind within that new Core, I will simply begin the process with my own mind.>

<And other Cores?> I questioned quickly. <How will I save them?>

<If they have a Silverwood connection, they can request aid from you and be transported via the roots of their tree into this one. Eventually, their hibernation will end and they will be reborn.> Eternium paused and seemed to consider something. <The tree will also produce Wisps, but their coloration will be based off of the Mana fed to them. Have your Wisp manage that. Now that a connection has formed, she will instinctively understand the process.>

<That’s… disconcerting.> I was oddly disturbed that a tree could give birth to multiple races at once. <Oh… what about the Wisps that are currently bound to the Cores?>

<The binding will pull them as well, and they will undergo a similar process,> Eternium explained not-very-patiently. <I need to begin this, Cal. It is not a short process. As I do, I highly recommend that you leave this area at once. Everything held in check by me will slowly begin to wander, and they will likely be hungry.>

<Good enough for me!> It was finally time to get out of this creepy location that I never should have come near, and frankly, it was going to take me a couple days to clear the edge of the territory Eternium had claimed. At least Dani was happy that we had done as she wished, and I gained a new ally—hopefully—in this powerful dungeon. I really liked the dungeon, and its advice might be really helpful… Maybe I would name something after it as thanks? I glanced at the new Core on the Soul Silverwood tree that was starting to glow. He had started the transfer! I was going to have a much more powerful soul contained in my soul! We did it!

…yay.

Chapter Forty-seven

There had been so many people! I felt so swollen and bleh! Ugh, was this what Hans felt like after eating cheese? Now I understood his groaning in the middle of the night after gorging upon fondue. How much more did I need to go through? I turned my attention upward, moving my mind slowly to avoid hurting myself. When I arrived, I got some great news.

“That’s everyone,” Barry announced to the group after the portal on to Mountaindale had been unused for a few hours. “The A-ranker’s crates were a success, so you are truly the last that will ever cross inward! If there is anyone else out there, then they are unable to make it through the portal at this time, which means ever. The rest of you, get through to the new world. I’ll see you all soon, and if not… celestial’s speed the way for you all! Get moving!”

The Mages surrounding the area saluted with tears in their eyes, knowing that it was impossible that Barry would ever be able to fit through the portal. He was far too powerful, and they had already had an example of him failing to escape the oncoming desolation. Reluctantly, the last few guards and all of the remaining members of the Guild took their turn and marched through the portal.

Barry watched them go, nodding at each of them as they vanished. When the last had passed, he looked around carefully and examined his surroundings. Seeing and sensing no one in the immediate area, a smile began to grow on his lips. “Three hundred seventy-four thousand, four hundred seventy-three people have gone through the portal… plus or minus a few extra sneaky Dark Elves. I’m so glad we able to save so many.”

This was a side I hadn’t expected to see from Barry… was he acting? Did he think there was someone watching that was going to act against him somehow? I decided that this was a better use of my time than watching Dale and Minya struggle against the Golems in my depths again.

Barry looked up at the sky, which was almost entirely covered by the moon. There was a small filter of blue that could be seen through the varied shards, but it was obvious that time was nearly up. The S-ranked man looked around at the frozen abyss-scape below him, noticing that the monsters and creatures in the area were becoming agitated. They were even… fighting? They were fighting for dominance! Whatever had been keeping them in check had obviously begun to fail, and the power fluctuations were causing massive turbulence in the area.

“It seems that we are moving again, hmm? The dungeon must have caught on that things are getting worse here.” Barry sat down and looked around, then pulled out a pendant and passed some energy into it. The jeweled surface darkened and warped, releasing a scream like a tortured soul. The air seemed to resonate, then the ground… then the sound vanished. Barry waited a moment, then looked around in annoyance. His eyes locked with a hypnotic pair of orbs that were inches from his own face, and he cursed and jumped back. Barry was not used to being snuck up on.

“Oh, well, it seems that you did as requested!” A body began to materialize around the eyes that had seemed to be hanging in the air. In a flash, Xenocide was standing before Barry in the flesh.

“It was simple after using the technique that you passed on to me, Master.” Barry bowed to the man, but Xenocide had already pressed against a building and was fondling the door. “The Wisp never even knew that it was me forcing the impulse to turn to the northern lights.”

That sneaky son of a–

“Such high-quality construction! Feel this wood. It's Inscribed so beautifully!” Xenocide moaned as he pressed himself against the frame of the door, which started to crackle and splinter from the pressure, Inscription or no. “Why? Why have people bound their power like this for a door? Why would they do this to themselves or force their wants on the world like this? Don't worry, little door… soon all shall be cleansed!”

“Master…?” Barry softly called, wanting to gain attention but not wrath. “Your teachings? The guiding technique worked just as you said it would! Placing a seed of Madness to guide the Wisp to her homeland was even easier than you had said it would be!”

Xenocide tore across the distance and hoisted Barry into the air by his neck. His breath hissed out as he demanded, “Are you calling me a liar?”

“N-no—gack—Master, I would never!” Barry didn’t need to breathe, but the grip on his neck was tight enough to warp Orichalcum. “I was trying to pay my respects for your guidance!”

“Ah.” Xenocide held up a finger and waved it in Barry’s face. “Do you know the difference between a brown-noser and a feces face? Depth perception! Learn when you are going too far, Barry! That’s always been your weakness!”

“Too far…?” Barry looked up at the falling moon. “Yes… master.

“You didn’t capitalize my title that time!” Xenocide’s eyes bulged. “Am I not worthy of the honor anymore?”

“I…” Barry was at a loss. Had he been less than respectful? “I don't understand.”

“You wouldn't.” Xenocide looked over the edge of the flying dungeon and stared at the melee of monsters mashing below. “After all these years, I have a chance of attaining what I have been working for! All that remains now is to make my way past all the guardians in my path! Good work, Barry. You exceeded my expectations, but my expectation was that you would exceed my expectations. Therefore, you have only met my expectations. Keep up the expected level of work! Also… feel free to go and collect your reward!”

Barry stared at the spot Xenocide had vacated; the insane SSS-rank man had swan-dived off of the cliff and was approaching the unstable dungeon below. All Barry could do at this time was shake his head and walk away, hoping that he had made the correct choice. He took a few steps and was crushed into the ground by The Master, who was now standing above him with shaking fists.

“You would work with Xenocide?” The Master punched Barry in the chest, forcing golden-red blood to dribble from his mouth. “You would work with the man who killed us all?”

“Where do you think you got the rarest of those materials from?” Barry sat up and glared at The Master. “Do you think that the S-rank rib bones just arrived out of the blue? Do you think that the knowledge we needed was free? That every nation joined together as one and worked to save more than themselves?”

“No!” Barry stood and punched The Master in the face, sending him reeling more in shock than in pain. “How naive are you? I made the darkest of deals to place the races in a position of strength, to bring them all together into one location, a place where they have a chance at surviving! I know that I can’t go through that portal! I know that you can’t either, and yet you still worked at it to place your people within! Why is it that I must let everyone die for no reason, just so that my hands stay clean? Don’t you dare lecture me!”

The Master stared at Barry for a moment longer, then blinked out of existence. The leader of the Guild took a deep breath and walked away toward the entrance of the dungeon, muttering darkly to himself. He glanced around one last time before taking a step on to the first floor of the dungeon. “Almost, ‘The Master’. You continue to weaken, and I’m going to end you before that moon destroys us. I want the satisfaction of being the one to finish you off after the humiliation that you’ve heaped upon me.”

Frankly, I was shocked. This entire situation had not played out at all as expected. Now Barry was going through the dungeon to… what? Experience what I had to offer? Try to wrestle Raile? Maybe he was…

“No one is going to come through here, and even the dungeon is going to be gone soon,” I heard Barry muttering. “No need to let all this go to waste!”

A moment later, a thick green fog roiled out of his mouth. In a matter of moments, the entire floor was covered. Then my vision of the area went dark. Son of the abyss! That hurt! That maniac was going to eat my dungeon because he was bored and no one else would be bothered by it? I was bothered by it!

<Listen up everyone, I need you all to retreat to the maintenance areas!> I sounded the alarm to all the sentient creatures in my depths. <Barry the Devourer is coming, and I think he is going to eat the majority of the dungeon! If you want to escape, get ready, and I’ll have you all run to the surface! From there, I need you all to get through the black portal and into my Soul Space!>

I took manual control of the gyroscope, freeing Navigation Bob to run. I stopped the Mana and Essence sinks that were creating monsters and rewards, taking that all back into myself. No need to leave it behind for Barry to chew up. The only positive of this situation was that Barry didn't seem to be in a rush, or perhaps, he was digesting his meal.

Even as I had that thought, Barry arrived on the second level and walked to the center, where his deadly fog arrived once more. Again, a floor vanished from my view, and I worked harder to pull back all power and influence from the area. <Hurry up, everyone! He’s coming to floor three!>

Chapter Forty-eight

Dale and Minya were stunned as the words reached them. They were being told to run? Then the words sank in, and they realized the danger. Dale’s eyes went wide, and he kicked the golem, destroying it and not even noticing that it had gone limp even before he had attacked. Without Cal’s influence urging the automatons to fight, they tended to stay in a statue-like state.

“We need to run,” Dale reaffirmed Cal’s order. “Barry has been known to eat people that were in his way, and I don't think he would do anything but smile if he realized that he had the option to chew on my Mana.”

“I’m with you, Dale.” Minya pointed at a door that was sliding open for them nearby. “Let’s run. I don't think Cal wants to keep that open any longer than needed.”

Indeed, the door was already starting to slide down the wall. They raced along the pathways and dove in, letting the corrupted stone walls provide them with safety. Now in the maintenance area, Dale could feel Cal’s mind brushing his again and knew that his influence remained here. “Cal, is he just eating the main things on each floor?”

<Just?> The reply was scathing. <Oh. Wait, I see what you’re asking. Yes, he doesn't seem to realize that there is more behind everything. Most people didn’t know about it, so I'm not surprised. Plus, he would need to eat so much basic stone to get at these areas, and I don’t think he’s gonna bother. Run, you two. Get to the surface and find somewhere to hide. Xenocide is in the area, so… good luck on everything. I'm going to get out through my portal when he gets close, just to be on the safe side.>

Dale winced as the connection cut off and scrambled back as an orb of some kind rolled past him. It was throwing so much Mana off that Dale knew it was at least in the A-ranks. “What is that? Is that from the lower levels of the dungeon?”

“It sure is.” Minya looked at the creature with great interest. “Wow. That’s an Elemental! I had no idea that he had been able to create such advanced Mobs! Stabilizing Mana to the point that it forms a will of its own is impressive! Did you know that those can be naturally occurring under the correct circumstances? A lot of people theorize that they are actually just Cores that specialized too heavily with their affinities and lost the power to create influence. They might have been dungeon Cores at one point, but–”

“Minya, you have a lovely voice, but we really need to get moving,” Dale informed her calmly, though he had been trying to pull her out of harm’s way as another Elemental came rolling past. “I don’t think those things are tame, and I can feel that Cal has his mind elsewhere. Please?”

“Right! Sorry, dungeons have always been my passion!” Minya blushed as they started moving again. “I just keep getting so caught up in the amazing things that I get to learn firsthand that I forget to be safe, you know?”

“I sure do understand,” Dale wryly replied. “I’ve seen you examine the Manticore’s stinger when he was sleeping just because you thought he was sick. Because he wasn't producing enough poison!”

“Oh, Manny is the best!” Minya didn't seem to be talking about the same murder-monster that Dale was, so he opened his mouth to correct her, but Minya spoke first, “He’s just a bigger version of Snowball! He might be scaled and able to taunt people with words, but Manny is still just a big softie!”

“What, he just doesn’t like all that many people?” Dale snorted as they chose a smaller side tunnel that the Elementals were avoiding. “I never was a cat person.”

“Of course not!” Minya poked him in the nose. “You’re a human person!”

Dale groaned, which only seemed to make her more pleased with herself. “Now I see why you get along so well with Cal; to think I had been attributing maliciousness where only terrible jokes could be found.”

“Well, at least now you know better!” Minya danced ahead, showing off her powerful—yet graceful—body. “Terrible jokes are good for the soul!”

Dale couldn’t think of a response to this non sequitur, so he pretended not to hear her and simply went quiet. They were approaching a group of people that Dale didn’t recognize, and he wasn’t sure what to think of the intermixing of Goblins and various races. They looked at him and nodded, keeping their eyes on him in preparation for trouble. Apparently, being with Minya was enough to allow them to get close enough to talk but not enough to guarantee safety.

“Hello, everyone!” Minya waved at the group and seemed to undergo a sudden personality shift. “We are gathered here because there is an S-classed disaster striking the dungeon currently. Our mission, granted to us by the Great Spirit himself, is to escape and go through the portal above us. This portal will allow us to truly become a part of the dungeon, no longer trapped on the outside as we have always been. Prepare yourselves. This will be an all-out sprint across open ground with a hostile force possibly awaiting us.”

Dale looked at Minya, impressed by the pure force behind her words. She was inspiring! He felt aggrieved and embarrassed that he had never given her a chance for the simple reasoning that her allies had been distasteful. Ah, well. Nothing to do now but learn from his mistakes and move forward with his eyes open the possibilities in front of him. The group approached the surface and found that all the buildings were gone except the one protecting the entrance to the dungeon.

Since there were no other structures remaining, it was easy to see the destination—the black portal. The group was about to make a break for it when Dale called out, “Wait! Something is… wrong.”

A few of the members looked at him condescendingly, but Dale was still able to feel that there was something out there. He reached out through the influence that Cal had in the area, latching on with his mind and looking for things out of the ordinary. His eyes snapped open. “We need Bashers—as many as possible and have them scatter as much as they can.”

There were plenty of the bunny-Mobs in the area, but they were standing calmly and waiting for their Goblin overlords to give them the command to move. Annoyed by the human giving orders, the Goblins almost ignored the warning. Minya took command, putting her foot down and kicking a Basher out into the open. As it landed, creatures swarmed out of the air and started fighting for the succulent meat that the bunny offered. The Goblins looked at Dale with new respect and sent their creatures running ahead, knowingly sacrificing them so that the group of sentients would stand a fighting chance.

The flying creatures swooped and screeched, snapping up the fleeing creatures no matter how they worked to twist or avoid the conflict. A steady stream of Bashers sprinted out of the hole in Mountaindale, and soon, they were spreading out and drawing away attention. Dale kept a mystical eye out, and everyone was watching him with bated breath. His jaw popped open, and a word tore out, “Go!”

The group ran, the longer-legged humans and Elven attendants outpacing the shorter Goblins. Only Bob-type Goblins were Mages, so the majority of this group was under the Mage ranks. This made them comparatively slow, and without the distraction of the Bashers, they would have assuredly been annihilated. As it was, the group started taking losses not even a quarter of the way across what was now an open field.

Dale and Minya devoted their time to fighting off a few of the creatures that were attacking, but most of the flyers were upper C-rank at the lowest. The others were easily Mage ranks, and the best the humans could manage was to drive them away. If they took the time to kill each monster they came across, the others they were trying to protect would be slaughtered. All of the people present were fine with whatever fate awaited them, knowing that even if they didn’t make it into the portal, they would only need to wait a short while to be returned to life. Still, they appreciated not being attacked.

The frontrunners started diving through the portal, and Dale found that they didn't cause pain in his system like any other had. He briefly wondered if the reason for that was the fact that they were dungeon born and therefore attuned to his soul. The only reason his pondering was brief was that as the last of this group ran through the portal, the shifting curtain of energy suddenly narrowed and sliced the man in half. Dale and Minya skidded to a stop, and Dale fell to his knees.

He started to scream, clutching at his chest and head so hard that blood began to pour from wherever his grip had landed.

Chapter Forty-nine

Barry stepped on to the third floor, and I watched him cautiously. Only a tiny tendril of my influence remained in the area, ready to be retracted at the first sign of the gaseous green fog that came out of him. The High-Elf looked around and began speaking to himself, “So much effort has gone into getting everyone to this point, and yet here I stand, alone. Everyone else is either dead, dying, or deserted, but what about me?”

The man seemed to be rambling, going on about various faction disputes he had been in, lamenting his time in the Guild. “But now I have a new trick! Ah, Xenocide, how did I not see this aspect of my power before now?”

The conversation was just getting interesting, but the green fog was rolling out once more. I pulled back and felt a huge swath of my power vanish once more. Ouch. <Dani, Grace, it's time to go!>

“Are you sure, Cal? Shouldn’t we just go through the portal down here and stay with you in the physical world?” Dani was fretting, and I knew where her nerves stemmed from.

<But this way you will be in the physi-Cal world!> I chuckled at her exasperation. <This is why I tested things with Mu, Dregs, and Xan. A Core absorbs you, but going through the portal will let you be with me. Do you really want to be trapped in an Inscribed tungsten ball, surrounded by feces, for however long it takes for the world to settle? Even then, I’ll need to rebuild my dungeon around myself! The boredom, Dani. Think of the boredom!>

“If you’re sure about this…” She was still hesitating, so I sent along all my feelings in a stream of consciousness, then linked with her as they raced to the surface.

Barry had just entered the room with Manny and seemed to be having fun letting the Manticore try to kill him. Stinger? Broken against Barry’s skin. Teeth? Ineffective. Body slam? Manny stopped like he had flown into the side of Mountaindale. Eventually, Barry seemed to grow sick of the game and slapped the Manticore into a paste that covered the rear wall. Then the green fog rolled out once more, and my view vanished with a painful lurch. Ugh.

Good, Dani was getting close to the surface. Now, I could drop through the portal below me and–

Boom!

<What in the abyss?> I looked at what was happening in the dungeon, and it seemed that Barry had taken a page out of Xenocide’s book and decided to go through the floor instead of across it! What was happening? This made no sense! Barry came out from the ceiling of the Elemental Pit, dropping down the center of it and only taking note of the increased gravity as a method of falling faster. What did he hope to accomplish? I snuck a look at Dani and Grace; they were almost to the portal! Only a few more seconds!

Barry landed on my spider Boss, using it to break his fall and then blatantly ignoring it. He walked over to the first of the challenge areas and smashed through the wall. Then the second… third… fourth… Dani and Grace vanished through the portal above me just ahead of some fleeing Goblins, and I released the catch to drop into the emergency escape portal just below me. C’ya in a few eons, planet!

In the second and a half that I was in the air, Barry appeared above me and caught my falling Core. He was moving so far above Mage speed that it appeared to be instantaneous teleportation. I was in absolute shock, my carefully planned escape had just failed, and I was being held in the palm of the second-most-dangerous man in the world. My contingency plan…! I didn’t have enough time to use it! Barry lifted me up and stared into the colors of me. He was still moving surreally swift, and I could just barely understand the words he was speaking.

“Three hundred seventy-four thousand, four hundred and seventy-three people have gone through the portal. I’m so glad we were able to save so many.” Barry’s smile was dark and filled with malicious intent. “After all, what sort of reward would my time with Xenocide have been if there were only a mere handful of delicious souls or such varied Mana types weren’t included?”

“Well, little Core with pure Mana.” Barry’s lips were twitching, he was smiling so hard. “Thank you for being the filter that I use to siphon all the power of the multiple races into myself. And… goodbye to all of my faithful followers. Your sacrifice will not be in vain.”

The S-ranker let a cloud of green gas pour out of his mouth, surround the Core in his hand, and began to squeeze. I could only force myself to get a single sentence out, and I directed it at Dani. <Get out! Barry–>

Then the pressure became too much, and my Core began to crumble. I watched from multiple facets as Barry squeezed harder and harder. Just as it became too much, I saw The Master appear beside Barry and beginning to swing at him. Too slow.

Crack!

Just like that, my Core shattered, and I died.

The Master’s voice shook the ground, but at that point, I was past caring. “I knew it, you twisted–”

My soul and all the energy I had accrued began to float away from my demolished body but was stopped by the cloud of green that surrounded me. I could feel the energy trying to eat away at me, I could feel the end trying to come, but instead of either of those outcomes… I collapsed inward, into my Soul Space. The fear vanished, the green energy no longer surrounded me, and then I was suddenly elsewhere. I was suddenly suppressed, a small part of something much greater.

I started to scream, clutching at my chest and head so hard that blood began to pour from wherever my grip had landed.

“Ow, ow!” I shouted downward at where I knew Barry stood. “Barry, you traitorous snake!”

“Dale, what’s the matter?” Minya was already on edge from the screaming; it was attracting attention from the creatures.

“I’m fine, it's… Barry just shattered Cal’s… my Core and tried to absorb everyone that had gone through the portal already,” I whimpered and tried to deal with what was happening to me right now. “I feel like I’m on fire. Who… am I?”

“Cal is… dead?” Minya gasped, her eyes flickering to the still-stable portal. “What… Dale, what’s happening to you?”

I groaned and fell back to the ground as my body worked to contain and control the power roiling through it. “I’m fully me again. I was always only a half of a soul, if even that. I’m gaining new insight on myself right now—in the worst way I can imagine. Me, as Cal, was able to keep my mind separate when we rejoined. I, as Dale, couldn't do that. Can’t do it. I am once more a single being and mind.”

Spitting blood on to the ground and convulsing a few times forced me to stop speaking, but when I could manage it again, I continued, “Minya, when I died and went into Cal’s Core, I could remain separate and distinct. A human cannot maintain that separation. I’m an A-ranked Mage, a dungeon, a human, and a B-ranked Mage right now. The power discrepancy, the irregular flow, is tearing me apart. I have… an hour at best until I explode or burn out. My body is not built for this! I’m not ready for this!”

“What can I do, Dale?” Minya desperately fretted. She placed her hands on my body to help me up but yelped and pulled back as her skin began to blister.

“I need you to come with me to my Core room.” I laughed as blood flecked out of my lips. “So strange to say. I have another Core there that I was using as a mimicry of me, built to be an absolute perfect match. It was a decoy, set higher in the area where I resided. It was supposed to be part of my defenses, but I don't think I could fool Barry. Well, obviously not.”

Minya shrieked as I clutched at my head and the blood vessels in my eyes began to rupture. “We… we need to hurry. Brains are an imperfect storage device. I need to preserve as much as possible.”

“Let’s go, Dale!” Minya started running to the dungeon, and I did what I could to keep up. She smacked flyers away from me, and soon, we were at the entrance to the dungeon. I had never appreciated it like this before. Now, with both the eye of an outsider as well as the creator, I could really and truly appreciate the beauty of this place like never before.

“Just gotta get to the bottom…” I coughed a spray of blood, and I simply hoped that I could make it to the Core room in time. The actual travel wouldn’t be an issue, but there were currently two powerful people slamming each other around. “Ready to go, Minya?”

“Always, Dale.” Minya gave me a thumbs-up and smiled.

“Great!” I passed a command to the wall beside me, and it slid upward just high enough to let me duck in. I was all of me, and I had all the power, knowledge, and experience of both my selves. “Get to the portal, Minya. There’s no way for you to help me against S-rankers.”

Minya squawked indignantly, catching the stone as it sank and trying to force it upward. I shook my head and took a few steps. “Thank you, Minya. This time with you was… just get to the portal, and I’ll see you again soon, okay?”

“Dale! Dale!” Minya shouted as I forced the stone to the ground. I crawled a few more feet and let myself slide into an air tunnel. This one connected to the large one, and that would bring me straight down to the Mage’s Recluse.

My face was grim as I reached free-fall. I really… really hoped that the information Eternium had given me would prove itself. There was only one way to know for sure. I created a blast of air with my Mana and sped down into the deepest depths of my old self.

Chapter Fifty

I looked at my internal self as I fell the last few feet, inspecting myself as only a dungeon could. Or a being with the mind of a dungeon, I guess. I was bleeding out from various locations, but with a directed burst of Mana, I healed those areas. Of course, the overabundance of Mana was the issue in the first place. Healing the vital areas disrupted smaller patches, which started to bleed as the flesh was shredded. I had to ignore that for now; there was only so much I could do when healing did an equal amount of damage.

I was approaching the bottom… Here we go! I dropped the last dozen feet with nothing around me, splashing into an ornamental pond by one of the villas. The water scattered as I landed, but the water that rushed to cover me hissed and popped. In moments, I had a huge cloud of steam forming around me, and I was actually feeling relief. Maybe what I needed was a coolant system to be in place around me? I checked over my cells and decided not to bother. Though I felt a slight respite, the damage to critical systems was slowed an insignificant amount.

I got out of the water and started jogging toward the next floor. I was regretting not setting easy paths down, and… I paused and turned, altering my course to bring me to the dungeon portal system. Not having a keygem shouldn’t be an issue for me! I held up my hand and let a lasso of Mana settle on to the portal, then wrangled the controls to bring me to the deepest portal—the Elemental pit. I stepped through, then looked at the trial that awaited me. I cursed my past self as I looked over the edge of the pit.

This area wasn’t spawning monsters anymore, but there were still Elementals populating the ramps. They didn’t listen to me when I was in control of the area, and I didn’t expect much as a human. Then there were the massive gravity spikes, where the only way to deactivate the Runes was to be at the base of the pit. I had built that protection into the system to prevent exactly what I needed to do, never expecting that the only person who needed it—or even could do it—was me. Oh, paranoia… you really messed me up here.

I needed to make it through my own traps, and I was… concerned about my ability to do so. It had to happen. I took my first step on to the ramp and began descending, on the lookout for my traps. Most of them were triggered traps, but a few were on timers or could be set off by the Mobs in this area. The first really dangerous portion was the first curve. This armed all the moving traps, and there was simply no way to avoid setting them off unless I could survive jumping across the open area. Frankly, I had made this. I knew that wasn’t going to happen.

That meant that the floor tinged a light red as I strolled across it, and I stopped a hairsbreadth before the end of the section. An instant later, I had a block of stone brush my nose as it passed. Woo. Never realized my nose was so large. Or did I lean forward as I walked? Hmm. The block retracted, and I dashed forward. Again, the arrangement moved, and I took a single step back. The benefits of knowing the design couldn’t be overlooked, and I grinned as the space I had been in had an explosive Elemental pop out of the wall. The blocks shifted, and I booted the Elemental hard. It flew through the suddenly open space and down the ramp, exploding between the wall and another Elemental that was then knocked over the edge.

I ran, and the blocks started moving faster in response to my own speed. Gah! Why was I so amazing at trap design? A wall appeared on either side of me, and I pushed off the ground to hold my palms against the wall and my feet on the one behind me just as the floor dropped away. Whew! Almost got myself there! Luckily, I had been working with the Moon Elves to perfect my bodily motions for so long, and this was nearly second nature. The walls retracted, and I rolled forward and pushed up, fighting gravity to get me over the ledge. I passed the scorch mark on the wall where the Elemental had exploded and pressed myself against the floor.

There was a whining, grinding noise, and a blade of force whizzed along a long section of the wall at waist height. It was designed to knock people into the pit, as most of the traps were, but it would severely damage my body if I allowed it to touch me. Couldn’t have that! In fact, since I needed to wait a full two seconds, I reinforced an artery that was getting close to rupturing and replaced some muscle that I had just torn with my acrobatics.

I had a moment of ‘why didn’t I just make a new Core and use it’, but I had to shake that thought off. I knew that the Core below was a perfect replica of myself before my Core was demolished. Anything that I made on the fly would simply be subpar and likely to be destroyed by the forces I would need to bring to bear on it. I couldn't trust my shaky hands and human frailty to design a container for my mind and soul. Too dangerous, and I really wasn't trying to disparage myself.

The Core that I had in my body was good for when I was just a human, but it couldn’t contain the massive surge in energy that I was bringing upon it. Already the Core was flaking, losing pieces that I needed it to have. I didn’t want to need to remake myself because that went back to the prior issue of ‘I can’t maintain the power and focus as a human’.

I pulled myself forward, sliding down the ramp and using my momentum to get to my feet at a running pace. I was past the first layer of traps and now just needed to get past the A-ranked creatures in my path. Fun! The only thing I could think to do was use their natural tendency of territorial war to distract them. I started focusing on the Mana that was pouring off of me and began guiding it into a ball in front of my hands. I couldn’t stop losing Mana, but this would work for now. My experience with my Shaman and my own ability at directing power in the air really came into play here.

Now, I had no idea what monster I would find first. They changed positions far too frequently. What I did have was really pure Mana that could be used for nearly any purpose. As I moved forward, I found a corrupted mudman. It was a lump of mud that had tinges of infernal Mana throughout, and it really didn’t like celestial fire. Guess what, buddy? Scorching flames burst forward from the ball of Mana, and I left it in the air as the mudman focused on it. When I was past the Elemental, I pulled the ball of Mana to me along a tether. The fire continued to rage for a long moment but ran out of power quickly when the power source was removed.

I was on to the next one, and I repeated my actions each time. I could—possibly—defeat these things, but avoidance was a much better plan for my deteriorating body. My plan worked a few times, but then it suddenly didn’t. I was tempting an Elemental, and it seemed to be hooked, but as I skirted around it… the water-based Mob changed directions and lunged for me. In a panic, I converted the ball of Mana into a shaped explosion and blasted my attacker away and over the edge.

“Drat, I must have gotten to the point where their intelligence is reaching apex predators,” I muttered aloud as I took a few extra breaths. “Okay, they are trying to set traps for me now—gotta be ready for that.”

I looked over the edge and nodded approvingly. “Halfway… go me!”

I continued onward, working hard to keep my cool and counter every Elemental that I came across. On the plus side, since no more were spawning, all I needed to fight were the Elementals that had won in their individual territory disputes. Normally, this place was crawling with the Mobs. The next time I took a break was after I had to convert my Mana into Aqua Regalia, the most potent acid I could make. I had set the liquid spinning, surrounded it with a thin coat of ice, and used that to penetrate the outer layer and dissolve the meaty area around an Elemental’s Core.

That had taken a lot of focus to pull off, and I was suffering for it. My control of Mana was beyond what a human could dream of achieving, but that single spell had nearly cost me the use of my arm. My flesh was blistered and bleeding, also slightly smoking. Time was running out.

I moved deeper along the ramp, and soon, I was staring down at the golden-Aura-infernal-spider. It seemed slightly damaged. How did that happen? I really doubted I could sneak past, but I would give this my best shot. I turned invisible, condensed my Mana around me, removed all scents, and took a single step on to the floor.

The eyes of the Elemental Boss snapped open.

Chapter Fifty-one

The spider Elemental unfurled, and the golden water orbiting around it began to move at high speed. I knew I was in trouble, but I had a plan for this. Gathering my courage, I ran as fast as I could toward the exit to the room.

The spider scuttled after me, and I zigzagged so that the droplets mostly missed me. Whatever did hit me was slowed by my armor, but I had never taken my own advice and gotten solid coverings for what amounted to awesome chainmail. The water went right through the holes, tearing into my skin and opening small wounds that I couldn’t afford to heal right now. I kept running, but the spider spun through the air and blocked my exit.

I spun up a spell and sent a near-crystal shard of Mana at the Beast. This thing had every basic type of Essence in it. Shooting a fireball would do nothing, and really, any Elemental spell was out of the running. While the shard was hitting and digging into the main body, I followed it up with a field of force that I projected on to the trailing end, then spun in the air and kicked as hard as I could. The force transferred perfectly, driving the shard deeper before it detonated. As the smoke cleared, the counterattack came hard.

The scythe-like end of the spider leg caught my waist and would have cut me in half if my armor hadn't slowed it. As it stood, the Mithril armor tore and left my now-bleeding midriff exposed. That alone was shocking; I had not known of anything that could so easily demolish the resistant metal. It made sense; this creature was far beyond the rules of mere mortals, and I had been relying on something that a seasoned adventurer would wear. Well, seasoned adventurers still got messed up all the time.

A wave of water pelted toward me, seeking the weak section for maximum damage. I created a barrier of air to divert the water, using the slight shift to dodge fully. The huge barrage should have been able to catch me no matter where I turned, but the spider hadn’t waited to find out if it would succeed. Three more blades were coming at me as I spun, and the only option was up. I got into the air just long enough to move over the blades, but then I was caught by the gravity and slammed to the ground.

I had seen an option though, and I was going to make sure to use it. As the next attacks came swirling and swinging at me, I dove toward the Elemental and focused a massive rush of sword Aura. I powered my attack with Mana and drove my fist upward. I might have been able to get away from taking any damage, but my fighting style demanded that I attack vital areas and use devastating blows to end fights as fast as possible. An ‘X’-shape of the sharpest Mana I had ever created raced upward, through the Elemental, continuing all the way up to the ceiling. Debris rained down, the enhanced gravity making every pebble have the force equivalent of a C-ranker’s fist.

I rolled under the huge body and ran toward the door, looking back to see if my attack had the intended effect. The spider started racing after me, and I realized that all I had gained was a head start! I pumped my legs and got to the door just as I heard a loud crack. I fell to my knees, looking back just in time to see a soft pink jewel fall to the floor as four shards. I had been on target, it seemed.

As the Core fell out, the two diametrically opposed Elementals that had been a single floor Boss began to fight for dominance. Instead of focusing in on me, they wailed on each other, tearing out huge chunks of power that steamed away and into oblivion. I threw open the door, slamming it closed behind me and lay there for three seconds to catch my breath and heal the worst of the damage being done to my organs.

I stood and moved to the next trial—control of Mana. This would be difficult since I had Mana steaming off of me. I grasped at it, twisting and twining it into a pseudo-Aura that surrounded my actual Aura and ran to the first test. When I got there, I looked up and paused. Right. Barry had smashed his way through here, and without me fixing it, the area was still open. Happy coincidence. I went through the five rooms and looked into the mess that was the Core room.

The Silverwood tree was demolished, reduced to splinters of wood with only a single, sad leaf remaining on the stone floor. The walls had taken so much damage that light was peeking through, and there were odd shadows being cast, as though the world out there was being set ablaze. Not having any clue what that meant allowed me to be far more terrified about what was happening in the room.

“I win.”

Barry crowed his victory over The Master, his eyes shining a bright and fiery green. “All these years of being defeated by you at every turn, all this disparagement from the rankers of the Guild, all the agony of not being able to find the capabilities of my own power… and now! Now! I have you at my mercy, I am the Guild, and Xenocide has taught me my true power!”

“All you are is another pest that is about to die with the rest of the planet,” The Master responded tiredly. He was being held on his knees, surrounded by a pool of blood. “Not only that, but you killed the seed that we had designed to grow into a new civilization. There is no point to anything anymore. End this, Barry the Devourer.”

“With pleasure.” Barry opened his mouth, and a thin cloud of gas poured out and surrounded The Master. I could see The Master’s form begin to flake away, his spirit somehow being dissolved and taken into Barry’s. As The Master took more damage, Barry released more of his gas cloud until all of his green power was surrounding The Master and Barry’s body stood slack.

It was time to intervene. I reached out with my Mana, and the room lit up with potent Runescript. Every floor had a section devoted to this process, as I never knew when or where I would get my chance to strike back against this madman. I poured out my power, and the tip of my infernal cannons poked out from hidden sections of the floor, ceiling, and walls. Some had been demolished, so I needed to hope that this was enough. Wards sprung up around the room, waiting to contain the terrible power I was about to unleash.

A dark wind seemed to blow through the area, and I converted all of the pure Mana into something else. Something dark, heavy, and infernal. With one last push, I collapsed and had to hope that I had given enough. Any more, and I would burn out. Already, the stone I fell on was melting from the heat of my body, and burning fissures ran alongside my veins as my blood literally boiled

The Infernal cannons reacted, and the built-in Cores powered them all with perfect control. The power I had given was evenly applied, and spinning circles of darkness appeared in front of each cannon. With the firing of the cannons, all sound stopped, and the world went silent. The blood flowing from my ears told me that it was due to my eardrums bursting, and that by itself let me know that the actual volume must have been on another level. After all, I was still a Mage. The cannons had released black bars of power, so condensed and destructive that I had never been able to properly test their capabilities on any material before.

These were cannons designed to knock a soul out of a body, and the weaker versions had done exactly that. This version was supposed to do the same, but it also turned anything in its path into particles smaller than water molecules. All of these bars of energy converged upon a single point—right where the green gas of Barry’s soul left his physical body through his mouth.

I could see that there was an effect happening, but I wasn’t sure what it was. I decided against waiting to see if the surging green triumphed, and I moved over to a compartment under the remains of the Silverwood tree. Thankfully, the S-rankers hadn’t dug during their fight, or I wasn’t sure what would have happened. I pulled out the perfect Core that would be my new body and started transferring me into it. All my time as a dungeon had done well for me. I debated—I really did—separating myself into two once more, but as my mind and power drained from my brain and into the Core, I knew that being only a part of me had made me weak in areas that I couldn’t understand.

This process wasn’t fast, however. As I stood there with my new Core in hand, I watched the black bars suddenly lance through the green energy, continuing onward to tear huge holes out of the dungeon around us. Barry fell backward, toppling to the floor and no longer moving. The green cloud started to condense, and the severed soul mindlessly drifted toward the prone body of Barry only to be intercepted by the black bars. The motion and power of the bar caught the adrift soul and whisked it down and away—out of my dungeon entirely.

“Looks like ghost type is weak to darkness!” As the power waned, I saw that The Master was also on the floor, his body mutilated almost beyond recognition. Then his eyes popped open, and I almost screamed.

“You’re alive!” I called out. His eyes rested on me, and The Master raised a shaky hand and pointed it at me.

“Dale, I swear myself to your service and the rules you have in place.” That was all he could manage before collapsing to the ground.

I opened my mouth and said ‘I accept’, but an instant before I did so, Barry’s lips moved. He only said two words, but I felt horror as I realized what the phlegmy sounds were.

“Me too.”

Chapter Fifty-two

Two swirls of power lifted into the air, and the bodies that had once been renowned and terrifying S-rankers or higher… withered into nothing. All that remained of the two were their souls, minds, and the barest modicum of their power.

The two streams vanished upward, and after a moment, Dale felt the portal into his Soul Space widen to the absolute limit and permit these two access. He collapsed to the floor and wrapped his frame around the Core in his hand. “Gotta get outta here.”

Dale’s mind was filtering into the Core much faster, and the world started to go dark right around the halfway mark. By then, half of his mind and soul was in the new Core, and the process was fighting him less. To his chagrin, this also meant that he no longer had control over his body and his Mana. The rampaging power started to dissolve his organs, and though he was no longer in control, he was still aware enough to feel all the pain. Luckily, he was vacating the body for a much better one, but until then he was trapped in agony.

The last quarter of his mind and soul was sucked into the Core as his body was fully destroyed, turning to ash around him and leaving behind a suit of clothes and two Cores. One was perfect in every detail, and one was falling apart by the second. <There we go.>

It was interesting to be integrated into my Core again, in perfect sync with my mental faculties. I was also way more powerful; I could feel it. As all the sympathetic links to my ley lines transferred to me once more, the power was far more easily captured and maintained. <And now all I need is a way to get back into my staging area and through my escape tunnel.>

I reconnected to the dungeon, surprised that we were somehow still in the air. The Bobs had been having me add in integrated backup systems; it seemed that they were far more effective than I had expected. I checked in on Dani—it seemed that she was in my Soul Space and doing just fine. Whew!

Dani hadn’t been able to get out of the portal, it seemed, and she was steaming mad about the lack of communication. I’ll handle that later. Heh. I’ll never tell her that that was my first thought on the subject. I’d have to do some research on making that portal omnidirectional. For now, it was getting real bright out there, and I didn't think I was seeing sunlight. I had my influence extend rapidly, easily done through my creation, and swallowed the gate whole.

As the full design was implanted in my mind, the wound in my soul began to close. This meant that people started panicking of course, but their view had been showing giant chunks of flaming moon approaching, so I hoped they’d get over it soon. There was an odd phenomenon that occurred as the portal closed, something that I really hadn’t expected. As the portal vanished, every single person at the Mage ranks that wasn't bound to me staggered at the same time. Strange. To the escape hatch!

I lifted the ground and had it roll me along to the hole. I tipped over and mentally smiled as I dropped to the portal.

So long world!

“Not so fast, you silly goose!” Fingers clamped around me once more before I could make my escape, and I was pulled into the air to see Xenocide’s mad smile. “Leaving without saying goodbye?”

<Oh, come on!> I shouted as loudly as possible. He couldn't hear… oh right, he could hear me somehow!

“Where would I go?” Xenocide queried happily. “No escape for such as me! I’m actually surprised that you got a good chunk of those A-rankers! Whoever came up with the idea of sealing them in glorified shipping crates was brilliant! Of course, they are trapped in stasis for who knows how long, but smart!”

<Right, thanks, big guy.> I tried to think of anything that I could say to have him release me. <Um. Goodbye? Good luck out there?>

“Now you’re catching on!” Xenocide cackled madly. “I just wanted to say thank you for helping me get an empty SSS-ranked dungeon Core!”

Now that I was thinking about it, I could see that the man in front of me was bleeding. It wasn’t actually blood but some kind of Soul Energy that flowed from his body instead of the liquid of life. <I’m happy that you got what you wanted, but I really need to get going…>

“Oh, well, of course.” Xenocide nodded and started to put me down, only to yank me back at the last second. “Hey! Hey, now! I almost did it! Ha! You… oh, you’re a sneaky one! Now, see, what I need is a power source that can fuel my transition into this Core, and as it turns out… you are a treasure trove of Madness! Thank you in advance, now hold still…”

Xenocide let a spark of something appear on his finger, and the energy turned into a golden chain that wrapped around me. As soon as the chain landed on me, I was trapped in one small spot. There was no more influence for me to see out of; there was no more reach to my grasp. I could only feel what was coming to me—I could no longer grasp it. <What did you do to me?>

There was no sign that the man had heard me, and he continued doing… whatever it was until he glanced at a small paper he had with him. “Got the Core, got the sacrifices, reached the pinnacle of SSS, wrapped the power source in chains of chaos… I guess we just start!”

He lifted me up, positioning the much larger Core on his chest, and began to chant. I didn't feel anything, but I was at least faintly concerned. I was wrapped in chains of chaos? Where had I seen that before…? Rose. She had used that to hold a monster in place. The effect… was… the target couldn't affect anything around them, move, but was still aware. The spell would last for… a chaos determined amount of time. It could be one second. It could be forever.

The chanting was reaching a crescendo, and Xenocide started to shift the muscles in his hand. Suddenly, I was falling. I bounced off the floor and rolled back and forth until I came to a stop just in time to see a strange scene playing out. “This chase has gone on long enough.”

Xenocide was standing still, his hand cut off and a sword through his chest. Kere, The Slayer of Shades, stood behind his father. Xenocide smiled, looked down at the sword, and leaned back. “Oh, I have missed this father-son bonding time! Want to go play catch? There’s a giant ball coming at us right now!”

Kere lifted his sword, attempting to take the blade up the body and through Xenocide’s skull… and Xenocide didn't bother resisting. As the sword cleaved through his skull, the man simply reformed the damaged areas and calmly turned around. “You know what really hurts me about you stabbing me like this?”

“I cannot imagine,” Kere replied, holding his sword aloft.

“Being stabbed, you little brat!” Xenocide was suddenly behind Kere and knocked him to the floor with a slap. “You just stay there and watch me ascend, twerp!”

“How do you plan to ascend?” Kere groaned in reply, trying to stand and failing thanks to his now-warped spine.

“I’m going to fuel my transition to an energy being by transferring my soul through a Core!” Xenocide obligingly informed him.

“Huh.” Kere winced. “Seems like you’re gonna need a lot of power for that.”

“I already destabilized the continent below.” Xenocide managed to speak around his wide grin. “All of the power of an SSS-rank dungeon is going to detonate upward, and the destruction of the falling moon will generate Essence on a scale unimagined in this world!”

“So… thanks to you the world is both ending and being saved.” Kere shook his head. “So glad you didn't need this then. My quest is complete. I shall happily die to take you with me.”

With a flick of Kere’s fingers, my Core was tossed down the hole and through my little escape portal. I heard a scream of rage, then agony, just before the portal winked out of existence and left me floating in a huge sphere of liquid Essence. My… my safe sphere on the main continent! Thousands of miles away from Xenocide! My mind was buzzing, and as I tried to process everything that had happened… the world seemed to shudder. Huge streams of Essence raced along the ley lines as Xenocide’s plans came to fruition, and all I could hope was that I was the only beneficiary.

Trapped by the chains of chaos, I could do nothing to affect the world around me, and so I turned my thoughts inward. This couldn’t last forever, right? Or… could it? Could something last forever? An eternity? Was that where Dungeon Eternium got his name from?

Wait, in that case, did this make me Dungeon Eternium?

Epilogue

I had gathered all the leaders of the races and the people that had been my council. I hadn't put out a call or anything; I simply whisked them over and dropped them on the ground. Even the people that had been sealed away into the specially-prepared crates—like Madame Chandra—were able to project a semblance of themselves to interact with the world, which I thought was just nifty.

I created a body for myself and stepped onto the ‘ground’. The first thing I did was pull Dani and Grace over and let them get used to my new form. Dani was understandably concerned but swiftly came to terms with the change. Grace was delighted to have her ‘daddy’ be able to play with her in person, and we took a few minutes to get to know each other again.

I might have blown Grace’s mind when I chased her through the ground. For me, it was as easy as swimming, as I had far more control over this space than I had even in my old dungeon. When we were all finally comfortable, Grace landed on my head, and Dani started lazily orbiting me. It was time to get to work, time to sort out the mess that had been made by dropping everyone into the same space.

<Hello, everyone!> I projected into all of their minds, making them wince. I whisked the leaders of each group, as well as people I knew personally, over to where I was standing. A few of the people looked at my body, Dale, in confusion, not realizing who I was. I thought it would be easier to give them someone to talk to when I was speaking, but I also found that this form really restricted my sight of the surrounding area. Not something I would use often if possible. Dani suddenly zipped around, catching their attention and stopping the stares.

“As you all know, we are inside my soul right now,” I, from my mouth as Dale, informed them. “I want to know what you all want to happen and what you would like to do about a little situation we find ourselves in.”

“Hi, Dale!” Hans called from the crowd I had gathered. “Nice place, buddy! Sorry for looking at you so strangely when you told all of us that you wanted us inside you! Ow!”

“Why, Hans?” Rose scolded him, red-faced. “Why?”

“Dale, please continue,” Queen Marie ordered, her arm around King Henry.

When I told them that the world was all messed up, they nodded, bu~u~ut when I told them that I had been wrapped in chaos and there was no escape, they got a little testy and tried to kill me. Obviously, that wouldn’t work here. I simply locked them in position and let them struggle. “My house, my rules, folks. You all agreed to my terms when you came here. Your Mana lets me do whatever I want, and I don't have to do anything for you except bring you back after you die. Now, let’s try again.”

“I want you to let me hunt the Wolfmen,” Odin demanded, glaring at Aiden Silverfang, who offered a rude gesture in return. “When I arrived, he was hunting and killing Amazonians! They have all made a commitment to me, to serve as my Valkyries until both our people are restored!”

“Brother… how could you?” Tom was staring at Aiden in total shock, his worldview shattered.

“The Dark Elves must die!” the High Elf elder demanded, pointing at Princess Brianna. “They came here through trickery and deceit!”

“You tried to murder us all by not granting access to the portal!” Brianna scoffed, twirling her dagger. “It’s almost like you don't like me or something.”

I cut into the outbreak with a thunderous clap. “So instead of a paradise for all of you, you want to kill each other and hold ancient grudges so that only a few of you survive?”

The instant ‘Yes’ still took me by surprise somehow. “Great, well… I guess I’ll split you all up and let you get at it then.”

I raised my hand to send them back from where they came when a voice cut me off, “Wait! I cannot seem to use my Mana properly!”

I looked around, and by all the nods, this seemed to be a common problem. I took a look at someone, gestured him forward, and had him cast a spell. I watched the Mana use, how it dispersed, and most importantly, how his Mana was lessened.

“Interesting.” I followed his Mana back to its source, finding that being surrounded by my soul caused his link to the node in the tower of ascension to be cut off. “I guess… I’ll need to create a method to get you Mana again. Good thing we have forever! Until then I guess… use your Mana conservatively? It isn’t coming back.”

The looks of horror were priceless. When they ran out of Mana, they would essentially be regular people again or possibly worse off than before. Perhaps they would suffer horrible mana deprivation pains, and die over and over and over as I brought them back?

Happy eternity!

A man stepped forward with a sunny smile and raised a hand in greeting. Artorian was a bundle of enthusiastic pleasantry as he spoke to me directly and with warm familiarity. The headmaster—unlike a good majority of the crowd—had no issue with the experience that his disciple and oath-holder were now truly one and the same.

“Hello there, Great Spirit, my boy! I’d love to help you figure this mess out, maybe work off some of my debt to you right away? I fluffed around a bit to have a look and had a few ideas about improvements we could put in place!”

“Sounds good, Artorian. Welcome aboard!” Dale had done a few things right for Mountaindale, namely pushing for Artorian to be hired, and the acquisition of a good administrator was certainly going to be helpful.

The projection of Madame Chandra also spoke out. “I have no interest in fighting an unceasing war. Is there something I can do to help you spruce this place up?”

“I’m sure we could find something.” I banished the rest of the crowd, then reached out into my soul and pulled The Master to us. “How about you, big guy? Want to help out?”

He looked around, then felt at his new body. “So… weak…”

“You sure are, The Master!”

“No, please, I am so sick of that title. Would you believe that it was given to me as an anagram of my real name? Can I leave it behind and take a new name?” When I nodded, he gave a sigh of relief and smiled. “Many thanks. I wanted to leave all of that life behind me. I have so much information to give, and I'm sure we will find more that was hidden or forbidden on our old plane of existence.”

“Let’s call you ‘Occultatum’, then,” I offered easily. “It means ‘holder of hidden and forbidden knowledge’. Work for you?”

“Perfectly,” the newly-christened Occultatum replied. “Ah, that reminds me! We had been discussing what we would title you as when you reached a high enough rank, and I think that we settled on a proper homage to how you use your abilities.”

“What do you mean?”

Madame Chandra chimed in, “You know how I am Madame Chandra? He was ‘The Master’, and Barry was ‘The Devourer’?”

“Yes?” I smiled politely as she rambled.

“This might not be the best time for this, but we may as well do it now. Dale, Cal, we have settled on a title for you as well. No matter who you are or choose to be, Cal or Dale or some amalgamation of the two… from now on, you are…” Madame Chandra and Occultatum both rested a hand on my back and pulled me in for a combined hug. Chandra finished her statement, a tear dripping down her face.

“The savior of all of our peoples, you have truly earned the title:”

“The Divine Dungeon.”

Afterword

I hope you loved this series! Thank you so much for finishing it, and I hope that you will go on to read all my other works as well. If you would be so kind as to leave me a great review, it would be super helpful to my series and would mean so much to me. Thank you for your unfailing support!

The Divine Dungeon Complete Series

Want to take a look at the humble beginnings of the Master? Read on for a short story!

About Dakota Krout

I live in a 'pretty much Canada' Minnesota city with my wife and daughter. I started writing The Divine Dungeon series because I enjoy reading and wanted to create a world all my own. To my surprise and great pleasure, I found like-minded people who enjoy the contents of my mind. Publishing my stories has been an incredible blessing thus far, and I hope to keep you entertained for years to come!

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About Mountaindale Press

Dakota and Danielle Krout, a husband and wife team, strive to create as well as publish excellent fantasy and science fiction novels. Self-publishing The Divine Dungeon: Dungeon Born in 2016 transformed their careers from Dakota’s military and programming background and Danielle’s Ph.D. in pharmacology to President and CEO, respectively, of a small press. Their goal is to share their success with other authors and provide captivating fiction to readers with the purpose of solidifying Mountaindale Press as the place ‘Where Fantasy Transforms Reality’.

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Mountaindale Press Titles

GameLit and LitRPG

The Divine Dungeon by Dakota Krout

The Completionist Chronicles by Dakota Krout

A Touch of Power by Jay Boyce

Red Mage: Advent by Xander Boyce

Ether Collapse by Ryan DeBruyn

Bloodgames: Season One by Christian J. Gilliland

Wolfman Warlock: Bibliomancer by James Hunter and Dakota Krout

Axe Druid by Christopher Johns

Skeleton in Space by Andries Louws

Chronicles of Ethan by John L. Monk

Pixel Dust by David Petrie

Artorian’s Archives by Dennis Vanderkerken and Dakota Krout

BUTCHER BOY

Written by Dakota Krout

Table of Contents

Prologue

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Appendix

Prologue

“Are you kidding me? Really?” As these words entered Ramset’s ears, his heart sank. His body felt numb, the blood draining from his face as he slowly turned toward the source of the accusing words.

Ramset looked at the girl standing with her hands on her hips, ample for a street urchin of the underslums. Ramset’s hands clutched at the full loaf of bread that he had found on the street. It was only a little muddy, and if he had a chance to eat it… this would mark the first food he had eaten in three days. He had a sinking feeling that he wouldn’t be getting that chance.

“You know abyss well that stealing from my territory is a death sentence, boy.” The girl started walking toward him, a feather hanging from a bandanna showing her gang affiliation. The ‘Phoenix Feathers’. Drat. Today had started out so well.

Ramset shook his head empathetically. “I’d never steal from you! Or your area! I found this on the street, I swear!”

“And where were you going with it?” Her eyes blazed with hate as she looked over his skeletally thin form. “You think that you deserve that whole loaf of bread? Or any of it, for that matter?”

Other children were gathering around them, their bandanna and feathers marking them as more people that would participate in his impending humiliation. “You’re just a male, after all.”

“No! I… I was… there was no one around! I couldn’t see anyone from the gang to give it to!” Ramset pleaded desperately.

She held out a hand. “Hand it over right now, and we won’t leave you dead from the beating you are about to get.”

Ramset instantly obeyed, placing the loaf in her hand. His trembling hand betrayed him though, and he released the bread before her hand had fully grasped it. The loaf *plopped* to the ground… and the group went silent. Ramset dived for the bread, catching it on the first bounce and handing it to the gang’s leader. She took it from him with her left hand while the right fist connected solidly with his cheek, knocking him to the ground. He sprang back up, knowing better than to stay on the ground where people could easily kick him.

“So disrespectful,” she stage whispered, shaking her head. “Well, I tried to be merciful. Kill the male.”

Ramset had started sprinting away as soon as he saw the set of her jaw. The others were surprised by his initiative, which was the only reason he made it out of the closing ring of bodies.

“Hey!”

He didn’t bother reacting to the yelling voice, making for the main streets. He would have made a clean escape, but a stone from a sling caught him on the spine, making him stiffen and stagger. The people giving chase gained enough ground to begin pummeling him. Some used their fists, but most had at least a board, brick, or eye-poking stick. The leader had a length of chain on her and landed a solid blow to Ramset’s side as he regained his feet and continued running.

The filthy mob of screaming children spilled out on to the poorly-maintained streets, chasing Ramset as he freely bled from multiple welts and cuts. He poured on the speed, ignoring subtlety in his need for distance. He sprinted straight down the street, passing into the next district. The screaming began to draw guards, but even they simply giggled at the sight of a filthy child being chased by more of the same. The guards only gained serious looks as the mob approached the next city district, nearly ten minutes of continuous running later.

Ramset kept running even as guard whistles started shrilling. The other children dispersed as guards moved to block them, but Ramset’s mind was clouded by exhaustion; he ignored the warnings.

Simple words drifted to his ears, “You’re dead the next time we see you!”

He kept running, ignoring all cries and curses, losing himself in unfamiliar streets. A scant ten minutes later, he stumbled and fell on to a patch of grass. His mind fled, and he was unconscious as soon as he landed.

Chapter One

Ramset woke up with a groan as he huddled away from the hobnailed boot that had just impacted his side. His dry eyes cracked open, and he looked up at a powdered, well-dressed man.

“If I ever catch you on this property again, I will not bother to wake you myself. I will leave you to the Lady’s guards. This is your only warning.” A snooty, cultured tone reached Ramset’s ears. The tonation of the voice made it obvious that he didn’t mean the Lady’s personal property but the level of the city he was laying in.

His mind caught up, and Ram realized he was being spoken to by the personal coachman to the undercity Lady. Ramset began shaking, breaking into a nervous sweat as he realized where he was laying. He tried to leap to his feet, but the bruises and malnourishment combined to ensure that he could only get up at a speed an old, dying man could outpace.

Ram tried hard to remember the male version of ‘My Lady’. He almost couldn’t remember, but it flew to his tongue as he spoke. “M-my Lord, please forgive this one. This one regrets his impertinence. He had not realized he had fallen on the property of the esteemed Lady.”

Ramset tried not to panic as the coachman obviously wavered between calling the guard or simply getting on with his day. It seemed the subservient bowing was all that was required, for the coachman grunted and shooed him away. Ramset took the opportunity to scramble away as fast and far as he could go.

Living at the lowest caste of society—and a male to boot—Ramset could easily be killed and his body dumped into the trash without a person breaking a single law. He hurried into familiar territory, slipping from the undercity into the overslums when the guards were looking away. As he left the whitewashed walls behind, he cast a wary gaze back into the richer part of the city. Ramset cringed and even his dreams of a mythical ‘someday’ withered as he saw a troop of burly, curvy guards walking along the street.

As a male in the Tigress Queendom, Ramset’s options were exceedingly limited. He didn’t even have the option of military service to allow him to escape the slums, and he was too weak and slow to be a good thief. He also couldn’t leave the city without written authorization, so there was no way for him to escape into the countryside and find a way to work for food. He began to see red as tears threatened, but he held them back as per usual. Water was a precious resource to him, as he wasn’t allowed direct access to the city wells without a female’s permission.

Ramset thought about his destination—or lack thereof—and started to slow down. What was the point? If he made it back to the area of the underslums he came from, some group would likely kill him. The week before, he had tried to beg for food near merchants without permission from the local gang, and when they caught him, they had beat him mercilessly. Add on the ‘theft’ of bread yesterday, and his options were simply gone.

Thanks to malnutrition, Ramset was small for his ten years of life and too weak and slow to be a messenger for even the worst gang. They had threatened him in a way similar to the coachman, warning him about showing his face in the area. He thought about what he should do, scoffing at his overreaching daydreams.

The underslums were the territory of the gangs and formed a ring around the extreme outer edge of the city. The only thing between them and the countryside was a twenty-foot-thick, forty-foot-high, smooth, stone wall. He could try to stay in the overslums, but the Slumlady’s guards would eventually catch him and toss him back into the lower level.

If they didn’t just outright kill him for inconveniencing them, that is. The undercity had just tossed him out, and going back there was a death sentence. The middle city—or merchant sector—was beyond the undercity and was the most amazing place in the known world. It was stuffed with trinkets, wonders, and artifacts that boggled the mind and enhanced lives. So they said, anyway.

The upper city was the home of minor nobility and temples to the Goddess, also known as the religious sector. The numerous and lauded blessings of the Goddess—such as healing and powerful miracles performed by her clerics—never reached down to affect the people in the slums.

The city center, home of the City Lady—the Queen—and her high-class nobility, was so well-guarded and walled off that no rumor about it could be trusted. There was simply no way to validate any information. There was talk of beautiful gardens and magical occurrences, visiting Elves and various races. Even male dignitaries, as far-fetched as that sounded. He sighed; Ramset would never know the truth for sure if his life stayed as it was.

Ramset was interrupted from his reverie and self-rumination as the squadron of upperslum guardswomen came around the corner. Trying very hard not to panic, he tucked himself into a doorway and tried to look as meek and innocent as possible. The squad passed by, but the very last woman in the column sneered at him and took a swing at him with the butt of her spear. He didn’t try to avoid it or even mitigate the damage. That was a sure-fire way to get a far worse beating. Instead, he tried to appear thankful to her for letting him off with a single blow instead of breaking parts off him. She scoffed and walked away when he bowed, falling into step with the others.

Ramset released a shaking sigh of relief and continued on his way. Now he was meandering and thinking about trying to find a different way into the underslums. They circled the entire city after all, and one gang couldn’t have control over the entire area! He walked as fast as he could over the rough gravel roads; his shoeless feet were tough, but sharp rocks still hurt. He was passing a small market area when he spotted it.

A… rat! A huge, meat-filled rat was sneaking away from the market with a gnawed-on apple core. Ramset’s eyes followed the rat’s path hungrily, and he reached down and slowly grabbed a chunk of rock from the ground. He threw the rock as hard as he could, and… success! The rock hit the rat, who gave a squeal of surprise and stumbled.

Ramset was excited for a moment until the rat turned its beady eyes on him and hissed. The large, fat rat scrambled toward him, and Ramset tried to back away. Sadly, the loose rock under him didn’t cooperate, and he slipped. The rat was nearly upon him, so he grabbed a fist-sized stone in his hand and swung with as much power as he could muster. The blow stunned the rat for a moment—all Ramset needed as he grabbed the animal and wrenched its neck, snapping it with a wet *pop*. He stared at the corpse, and a rush of energy filled him with excitement. He was going to eat today!

A cheer startled him as a few onlookers congratulated him on his kill. One or two even exchanged small, copper coins. They had bet on his chances of killing the rat? Or… getting killed by the rat? Ramset felt somehow more dirty than usual upon realizing this fact.

“Boy!” A voice behind him made Ramset jump, swinging around with the dead rat dangling from his hand. He pulled it closer protectively; the rat was his.

Ramset looked up to see the largest, meatiest, most muscular man he had ever had the misfortune of being this close to. “Y-yes, milord?”

The man frowned down at him, crossing his arms. “Hmph. You did well there with that rat. You have quick hands, and the creature didn’t suffer overly. Why did you attack it though? Do you just hate rats?”

Ramset looked at the carcass he was cradling, then to the ground. “This one is… hungry, Lord. This lowly one has nothing against rats.”

“You must be from the underslums with that sort of speech. Should a’ guessed from your… clothes.” He glanced at the tied-together burlap that formed Ramset’s barely important-bit-covering clothes. The man made a face. “Why are you in the upperslums?”

Ramset began to feel very nervous. Everyone else had moved on, and this man was interrogating him. Did he work for the guard? Could a man do that? He started to try to back away, but the man made a noise in the back of his throat and shook his head. “Look, kid, I don’t plan to hurt ya. Y’er scrawny, and normally I wouldn’t ‘ave bothered to talk to a rat-eatin’, little brat. However! The way you killed that rat intrigued me, and it looks like you don’t exactly have better things to do today. So, we talk.”

The man took in Ramset’s wary gaze and sighed. “Here’s the thing. The father of one of my apprentice butcher boys pissed off the wrong woman, and his whole family got themselves executed. He was always a little too squeamish to kill anything directly, so the poor beasts he worked on had to go through a lot of unnecessary pain. He wasn’t trying to hurt ‘em. He was just… inefficient. You though, I’m bettin’ you have no qualms about killin’ a beast or two and cutting ‘em up? Say, if there is food and a place to sleep in it for you?”

Ramset’s eyes widened. “My Lord… are you offering this unworthy one… a job?”

“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. I’m offering you a place to sleep and one meal a day to start with. You don’t know the proper way to cut a beast up for meat or the cuts or grade of meat either. Abyss, you’ve probably never had a chance at eatin’ good meat before if y’er planning on eatin’ rat.”

The butcher glanced at Ramset’s thin form. “It’s dirty, tiring, stinky work. If you can learn what I have to teach ya, you’ll go from cleanin’ up blood, scat, and innards to killin’ and cutting up animals in a month or so. Then you’ll get two meals a day and a set of clothes twice a year. Standard apprentice rate for the Butchers. Guild.”

Ramset nearly swooned at the thought, “This one could get into a guild?”

The butcher chuckled. “You sure like gettin’ ahead of yourself, lad. You’ll get an introduction, but it’ll hafta be your own hard work that’ll get you in. You’ll need to know how to strip down every standard animal we use, separate every usable bit out, and package everything up in a certain time frame. Do that, and you’ll be a Junior Journeyman. Butchering is a science, not an art, and we have serious rules about progression. It is possible, though. I take it you’ll come and work for me, then?”

“This one is unworthy of this–”

“Yeah, you can stop that right now, too. I can’t have a timid, little underslum brat working for me. We work on a time limit. Meat spoils. No beatin’ around the bush, nothing but answers as directly as you can answer them! Do you want the job?” The butcher glared down at him.

“This one– yes! I mean, yes, milord!” Ramset added belatedly. He was now staring at his torn-up feet, sure the butcher would move on.

“Good! Well, boy, from now on, you can call me ‘sir’ or ‘Master Dylan’. What’s your name, butcher boy?” Dylan quizzed the scrawny lad.

“This one’s… that is, my name is Ramset.” He told Master Dylan with a wince as he tried to suppress his habits.

“Eh, too long to yell in a hurry. You’ll go by ‘Ram’. That sound doable?” Ram wasn’t going to do anything to upset the man, so he kept his mouth shut and briskly nodded. “Good, you’re learning. Remember, Ram, a man learns and stays alive by keeping his mouth shut and listening. Making the laws and discussing important things are best left to Women, and if we forget our place for a moment… well. I’m sure you’ve seen the bodies. I listen to them; you listen to me and them. Got it?”

Ram nodded hurriedly. They started walking, Ram cutting his feet on the sharp stones to keep pace. As they got near an alley, Dylan grabbed his rat and tossed it into the darkness. It was caught before it hit the ground, and the sounds of a weak scuffle started as the people hidden by shadows fought for the treat. Ram looked noticeably down about losing his rat, so Dylan told him that as soon as he had a bath, he could have his daily allotted meal.

As they walked further, a foul odor reached out and smacked Ram right in the sense of smell. His face scrunched up as they continued, and he hoped they would soon be past whatever was releasing that foulness. Even with all of the benefits in mind, he began doubting his decision to become a butcher boy when they walked right into the building that was stinking up the entire block.

Dylan took a deep inhale and released a satisfied sigh. “Ahh, that’s the stuff. Nothing like the smell of coming home to make you feel right. Here we go, lad. You go into that room and strip, get into the water, and scrub until all of your skin is raw. Throw your… clothes… into the fire heating the water. I’ll find something that’ll fit ya.”

Ram stepped into the smallish room, uncertainly removing his clothes. Should he really throw them in the fire? What if this was all an elaborate prank by the butcher? He looked at the scraps of cloth in his hands, dirty and falling apart. He strengthened his resolve. He had a chance here! Even if it meant the worst conditions possible, smells that would make a skunk gag, or daily beatings… it would still be better than the assured death that awaited him in the underslums. The rags went into the fire, the oily material blazing high in the flames.

He stepped into the tub and sighed as the near-boiling water soothed his many aches and pains. The bruises stopped screaming along his nerves, and muscles sore from malnutrition and yet another night on the ground relaxed minutely. It was all he could do to tiredly begin rubbing at the accumulated filth on his body. He got to his tangled mess of hair, wincing as bugs tried to burrow into his scalp as the water washed over them.

After staying underwater as long as he could to try and drown the lice, he sighed and stepped out of the now-murky water. The air was cold enough that even with the fire next to him, he began shivering. Ram looked around for the promised clothing but didn’t want to open the door and expose himself to whoever may be nearby. Just as he was starting to panic, the door opened, and the butcher stepped in.

“Alright, time to get out of there… oh. Good, I thought you might have been taking your sweet time lazing about.” He watched as Ram scratched his scalp. “Oh, right. Hmm. No point putting on clothes yet if you’re just gonna be getting them all nasty with bugs. Sit on that stool. We’re gonna shave ya.”

Ram sat down, nervousness running through him as master Dylan pulled several cleavers from his belt. “Not that thi– I mean to question you, sir, but… are those the, um, best tools for the job?”

“Hmph.” Dylan moved close, pulling at Ram’s thin yet shaggy hair. “Haven’t even started working as a novice yet and you are asking questions more befitting a seasoned apprentice. You would typically be correct that a cleaver isn't that great for having a pretty hairstyle, but we are taking it all off… and I am an Expert.”

He spun the blade in place, then lashed out and began hacking at the hair he was holding. Ram didn’t flinch, his body too tired and apathetic to attempt panicking. His hair fell off quickly, each lock carefully tossed into the fire. Dylan then pulled out a smaller cleaver and ran it over Ram’s head, shaving it clean with razor precision. All of the hair and—more importantly—the bugs burned. The smell of burning hair on top of the horrid stench of the slaughterhouse sent Ram’s head spinning, and he nearly passed out.

“Easy there, boy-o. My, but you are thin, aren’t you? And what an impressive series of scars and bruises you have collected. Piss off a guardswoman lately? That one looks a lot like the butt-end of a spear…”

“Just… too close to their patrol on a narrow street,” Ram managed to cough out around his gritted teeth.

“Sounds about right. Wash again, then put on these clothes. They may be a bit big, but you’ll grow into ‘em.” Dylan shook his head, waiting as Ramset scrubbed and put on the clothes. They hung off Ramset’s shoulders like a tapestry on a wall.

“Dressed? Let’s get some food in you. Today you’ll have beef broth and bread, hmm… maybe noodle soup? We’ll see how well your body accepts that. After that, I’ll make some introductions, and you’ll get to work. Until you can manage more, we’ll set you up mucking out the holding stalls in the morning and evening. Midday, you’ll work the squeegee and focus on getting all the blood into the drains. I won’t make you haul the water for cleaning yet, but you will be mopping the floors with the apprentices.”

Ram knew better than to question, so simply nodded his head and muttered, “Thank you, sir.”

Dylan nodded and gently patted him on his now-clothed back. “It’s hard work, boy. Do well and work hard, and someday, people may even come to get their cuts of meat from your shop. If you somehow get a wife who can afford it, of course. Who knows?”

Chapter Two

Ram was led around like a sheep, being taught the layout of the building and meeting people in a whirl. Luckily, there were only five total employees, or Ram would have had a lot of trouble. There were two journeyman, Erik and John, as well as two apprentices, Chase and Hunter. Of course, there was the Master Butcher, Dylan. Ram was starting as a Novice, someone who had not yet been granted an apprenticeship.

Ram was being led to the stables by Chase when something tickled his senses. “Excuse me, Chase? Where are the women?”

The large, husky, yet muscle-bound, young, blond man glanced at him. “Why in the world would a woman bother to work here? They have far better prospects that don’t force them to deal with blood and poop all day.”

“I thought that a man couldn’t be a business owner in the city…?” Ram mumbled, remembering too late that he should just be quiet.

“Well, Master Dylan’s wife owns the shop, of course. She still isn’t going to come here and work all day.”

Ram paused a moment. “Oh. That makes sense, I guess.”

“Stupid kid,” Chase muttered. “Here is the shovel. Here is the pitchfork. Crap goes into the wheelbarrow, hay goes into the trough, there. Please don’t mix that up.”

“When the wheelbarrow is full,” Chase paused and looked at Ram’s thin arms, “or I guess when it is almost too heavy for you, wheel it to the opening to the sewers and dump or shovel it off. Make sure there is water running down there before you dump it, or it might come back up, and you’ll have to clean it.”

“How do I get water to run?” Ram nervously questioned.

Chase looked at him as if he were a moron. “You look in and make sure it isn’t clogged? The river should wash everything away, but sometimes, it gets stuffed with scat. If that happens, you use that stick over there to poke at the clog until it floats away.”

They walked back to the stable, and Chase gave him some more instructions. “Don’t feed any animals in these stalls. We like to have as little to clean as possible, so we don’t feed animals the day before we butcher them. Also, cleanliness is a big deal to Master Dylan for some reason. He says that if he can show that something he is doing is a better way of doing things, he could be promoted in the guild and become a supplier for minor nobles in the undercity instead of the overslums.”

“He thinks being clean will make us have better meat, for some reason.” Chase snorted and chuckled. “It’s odd, but whatever Master Dylan wants, he gets. The boss is the boss. You need to bathe daily and wash your clothes. Someone can show you how to do that later, but I need to get to work. So do you.”

Ram was left alone in the stable, his young and tired mind frantically trying to remember everything. He decided to get to work and began laboriously loading the wheelbarrow from the huge piles of feces. The first time he got it full, he started trying to move it to the sewer, only to realize that he couldn’t budge the contraption. After straining with all of his might, he had to concede that the poo had won this round.

He had to unload nearly half of the excrement before he could get the wheels to begin rolling, and when he got it to the hole of the open sewer, he couldn’t lift his handles high enough to tip the stuff out. Ram had to shovel half of it out again before he could lift the wheelbarrow at an appropriate angle to release its contents. They slumped out of the cart, plopping down into the water below.

He was already exhausted, but stubbornness and hope won out; he got back to work. Ram only put in enough to fill the small cart a quarter before wheeling it to the sewer. This went a little faster and allowed him to take small breaks from shoveling. Already, his hands were scraped, and blisters were forming from the unfamiliar work, but he powered onward. After the first few hours, he was moving so slowly and shaking so hard that he could barely lift the shovel. Master Dylan showed up just as Ram lost his hold on his shovel and it fell to the floor.

“Lazing about?” Dylan joked with crossed arms as he looked around the room.

Ram barely had the energy to defend himself. “No, sir, I’ve–”

Dylan held up a hand. “I’m sorry. I forgot that you don’t have a sense of humor yet. I’ve been checking up on you. I know you’ve been working hard. I’m here because I forgot to feed you before you were set to work, and your meal is ready right now. Follow me.”

Ram stumbled after him, body numb and tingling. With his deep bruises and long-term lack of proper food, he was barely able to force his tired muscles to obey him. Dylan made him wash his hands with a bar that smelled like smoke; then they walked again. Stepping into the office area of the building, his nose twitched as he smelled something non-foul for the first time in hours.

At the table was a steaming bowl of soup, filled with hearty broth and thick noodles. There were even small chunks of meat in there! He took a step closer to the food, then stopped, looking at Master Dylan. “Um. That’s all for me?”

Dylan nodded, a touch of softness in his eyes. “Aye, lad. Don’t rush to finish it though. No one is going to take it from you, so eat slowly. You might hurt yourself otherwise.”

Ram limped the last few steps, then almost fell on the food. Only the fact that Dylan was watching him allowed Ram to maintain even a pretense of self-discipline. He had only gotten halfway through the meal when he couldn’t eat any more. He stared at the food, urging his body to digest what he had taken in.

“Boy, don’t get so worried. Stay there until you finish. There will be plenty of work when you are done, and you don’t exactly need a lot of light to shovel that pile.” Dylan patted Ram on the back, his massive hand able to rest on both of Ram’s shoulders at the same time. “You only get one meal a day right now, so make sure to always eat it all. You will need the energy.”

Ram nodded appreciatively. He gauged the fullness of his stomach. Surely he could get more in now, right?

“Another thing, if you finish your work, you are allowed to do whatever you want in your free time. There won’t be a lot of free time, but we close the shop at the nineteenth bell or the onset of darkness, whichever comes first. If you want to be a successful butcher, you’ll spend free time in that room when your work is finished.” He pointed at a closed door.

“What’s in there?” Ram eagerly hoped to repay the Master Butcher’s kindness.

Dylan smirked. “It’s a study room. In there, you will be taught how to read, write, and do your numbers.”

A serious look appeared on his face. “The teachers are my daughters, and on a very rare occasion, my wife. I cannot stress this enough. If you want to remain here, do not piss off my wife.”

Ram gulped and nodded. “I will try really hard not to.”

“Good. I don’t need to get whipped because she doesn’t approve of my choice in a new apprentice. Add on the fact that I didn’t ask her before bringing you here, and I am already on dangerous ground.” Dylan patted Ram on the head. “Hurry and eat up, get strong, smart, and most importantly…”

Ram leaned in, paying rapt attention.

“…get back to work!”

Ram nodded furiously and started eating as fast as his body would allow.

Chapter Three

Ram was back in the cattle holding pen, shoveling again. The food had done wonders for his flagging spirit, but it would be quite a while before his body had energy to spare again. His arms and back were burning as he lifted another load of scat on to the wheelbarrow. Ram lifted the handles, making sure it was still light enough to move before loading more on.

The light had begun to fade an hour ago, and no matter how much he felt the need to prove himself, this would have to be his last load of the night. Lifting the wheelbarrow with a grunt, he began maneuvering it into place over the hole. With a slurping *plop*, the excrement slid into the drain, flowing toward… wherever it went.

He sat down against the nearest wall, watching a small river of blood flow down a gentle incline from the slaughterhouse to the drain. Ram could not believe how much this place still stunk. Sitting down may have been a bad idea because he started to drift off almost instantly. As his eyes closed, a headache came on suddenly, and he started to see… odd things in the air. Attributing the odd lights to a tired mind, he barely noted the anthracite-black color that dominated the area drifting nearer to him at a constant pace.

“Well, good morning!” Ram’s eyes flew open in alarm; the gangs had found him! No, wait. That voice belonged to… Master Dylan? It wasn’t all a dream?

Ram looked up, seeing the hulking form of the butcher. He scrambled to his feet, “G-good morning, sir! I tried to keep going, but it got too dark to–”

“Stop all that chattering. You slept here all night? Abyss take me, I forgot to show you where to sleep, didn’t I? Come with me.” Dylan had an odd look on his face as he turned and began walking away.

Ram started to follow, but his muscles locked up and he fell with a startled yelp. Dylan looked back and grunted as Ram got to his feet. “Sleeping on stone after having been beaten and working your first day of hard labor? I’m not surprised. You’ll take the morning off. You can work your mind in the meantime. Come clean up, and you’ll start to learn the skills you need to be an apprentice butcher. Having the morning off won’t be a common occurrence, but it was my fault this time. Dratted day one, and I messed up twice.”

After showing Ram where he would be sleeping from now on—an actual straw-filled mat—Dylan made him take a bath before delivering him to the study room. Dylan paused before opening the door. “My daughter is in there. Mind how you speak. My wife is sure to hear about anything you do wrong. Treat her as an adult, even if your ages are similar. Remember that you are just a male, and as the daughter of a shop owner, she can have you whipped or worse without requiring permission from anyone. Even me.”

“I understand, sir. I’m used to it at this point.” Ram braced himself to deal with yet another woman who had the power of life and death over him, wondering how terrible of a person she must be for Dylan to feel the need to warn him about her.

Dylan opened the door, allowing a smell of lavender to pour out of the small office and mix with the scents of butchery. Poop, blood, and flowers. Yum. Fun times on the olfactory organs.

“Daddy!” A blur of golden hair slammed into the hulking butcher.

Dylan laughed. “Sunshine! I have a new student for you! Want to teach another boy how to help me out?”

“Boys are stinky! Why can’t you find a girl who wants to learn from me?” the small girl pouted up at her father.

“I made him take a bath before we came here, just for you!”

“…Well, that might help a little. Bring him to me, then.” She finished with an over-exaggerated exhalation of air.

Dylan's hand descended on Ram, pushing him into the room. “Ram, this is my daughter, Chandra. Make sure to listen to what she has to teach you. She is a wonderful instructor.”

“You aren’t even as tall as I am!” Chandra announced accusingly. “Look at you! No muscle, either!”

She looked at Dylan with a glare. “Did you ask mommy before bringing him here?”

Dylan coughed loudly and strode out of the room. “Good luck, boy!”

Ram stared incredulously at the man who had just thrown him to the wolves.

“Hey! I have to teach you, so let’s get on with it!” Chandra snapped her fingers in front of his face.

“What do you know how to do? Multiplication? Sums? Writing? …Can you read?” Her voice was getting more desperate with every head shake ‘no’. Ram was flushed and embarrassed at his lack of knowledge.

“Well… at least you won’t have any bad habits?” Chandra took a deep breath and looked for the silver lining in the situation. “I’ve never had to teach down to this level of basics before. Maybe it will be good for me? Make me a better teacher?”

She motioned to a chair and sat down on the other side of the small desk.

“I’m… sorry,” Ram mumbled. “I’d like to know how to do those things, though.”

“Oh, really?” Chandra looked at his serious face. “Interesting. Daddy brought me a butcher boy who actually wants to learn what I have to teach him, not just someone who wants to beat meat all day?”

“I really do want to learn,” Ram promised earnestly.

“Why don’t you just leave learning to whatever woman decides to keep you?” Chandra prodded with an unfriendly tone.

Ram was taken aback. He had heard this statement in various forms his whole life. “I just…”

Then he did something he hadn’t since meeting master Dylan. He lied a little. “I only want to know so that I can do whatever job your father wants me to do. He has been so kind. I will do anything to repay him. He asked me to learn.”

“That’s… reasonable.” Chandra thought it over for a moment. “Daddy is pretty great, isn’t he? Fine then, I’ll teach you. Here. This is a slate. We use chalk to write on it. This way, we can erase it and reuse the slate a lot. Letters are arranged in something called an ‘alphabet’…”

Three hours later, Dylan came back, opening the door to Chandra shouting at Ram and slapping him across the face. “No, you idiot! ‘C’ is for ‘cat’! ‘G’ is for ‘goat’!”

“I’m sorry!” Ram apologized for the hundredth time since they had started. “I don’t know why it matters! They look the same to me!”

“The ‘G’ has that little line! Look! If you can’t see a little line, how can you make a precise cut along rib meat worth two silver!” Chandra bellowed at her cowering pupil as she raised her hand again.

*Ahem* Dylan coughed to announce his presence. Chandra looked over with burning eyes, which brightened as she saw him.

“Daddy!”

“Hello, Princess. How did he do?” Dylan chuckled as Ram looked at the open door desperately.

“Not… too bad, I guess,” Chandra stated after thinking a moment. “He learned most of the alphabet correctly, and we started in on small words and sounding things out.”

“I see the difference in those two now! I’ll remember!” Ram promised, wild-eyed.

“You’d better,” Chandra growled at him darkly.

Dylan took charge of the situation. “Ram, are you ready? I have soup for you, and there is a growing pile of offal that needs to find its way to the sewer.”

“Yes, sir!” Ram tried bolting to the door, only to be caught and looked at by Dylan.

“You weren’t going to leave without thanking your teacher for taking the time to instruct you… correct?” The Master’s eyebrow twitched.

“Of course not! My mind was only on completing the next task!” Ram sputtered. He spun around and bowed at the golden-haired girl who had just been screaming at him. “Thank you for teaching me how to be an asset to your father.”

“Come back anytime!” she called sweetly as the door swung closed.

The men were walking to the dining area quickly, and as Ram began eating… Dylan began laughing. “So, *ha ha*, how was your first, *ha*, learning experience?”

“Um,” Ram sucked down a noodle quickly, “…terrifying?”

His answer made Dylan laugh even harder. “Ah, that’s the good stuff.”

Dylan wiped at his eyes. “I know it isn’t fun, lad, but if you want to better your station in life, knowledge is the only way. How can you fill an order if you can’t read it? How do you know if you are getting the correct coin for your goods? Only by learning before you need to know it.”

Ram thought about these words as he slurped down a noodle. “Well, as scary as she is… I… I’d like to go back again soon then. If that is okay, of course.”

“Good.” Dylan grunted and rolled his eyes. “I need someone who has an interest in these things. The other apprentices suffer through their lessons, but I don’t know if they are actually learning.”

He glanced around. “I’ll let you in on a secret, Ram. Only if you promise not to let others know, and I’ll only tell you because you want to go back.”

“…Sir?”

“One of the tests to become a journeyman in the Butchers’ Guild is a written exam. You need to do calculations and read through contracts to find where you would be swindled if you signed.” Dylan sighed mightily. “You only get two attempts to make journeyman, and you need to make those attempts within a month of each other if you fail the first one. Fail twice, and you can never get a higher position in the guild than an apprentice. Technically, you aren’t allowed to tell apprentices about this requirement, which means that at least one of the boys working in my shop is bound to fail. Chase hates reading.”

“Why are you telling me then?” Ram asked with great curiosity.

“Well, you aren’t an apprentice, are you?” Dylan grinned slyly. “Seriously, you cannot tell the others. It would mean instant disqualification for them and a fine for me. This is for you to know, and that is it. Full stop.”

“I understand.”

“Good. You finished? Lots of work to do.”

Chapter Four

Ram grunted as he made another quick motion with the squeegee. Watered-down blood collected in a wave as he pushed it away, though his foot still splashed in the knuckle-deep fluids.

“That’s pretty good, Ram. Keep it up,” Hunter assured him as he wielded his own squeegee.

“Quit coddling him, Hunt. He’s barely affecting the puddle.” Chase glowered at Ram as he worked to get the bloody water flowing toward the sewer hole. “Ask could have been done by now.”

“Yeah, well, Ask is dead. How about you stop bringing him up?” Hunter snapped at his fellow apprentice.

Chase quieted for a while as they tried to clean out the room before all light faded. “He still shouldn’t be here. He hasn’t paid the fees.”

Ram went still. “Fees?”

“Knock it off, Chase,” Hunter growled warningly. “You know he doesn’t have money. At least he is a hard worker. I haven’t had to shovel crap in two days now. If you want to go do that instead of actually working with meat, you can make a complaint to the guild.”

“It just isn’t fair that he gets to be here for free while…”

Master Dylan poked his head in to look at them. “Life isn’t fair, Apprentice Chase. If you have a problem with my decisions, feel free to come let me know about it.”

The ominous phrasing and way Dylan seemed to appear and vanish randomly had Chase shivering as he returned to work quietly. It took another ten minutes, but the blood and meat scraps too small to save had finally been washed out of the stone room. Chase worked at guiding the fluid to the drain, while Hunter showed Ram how to add just enough soapleaf to the water they had boiling for it to lather correctly.

“Too much soapleaf and it’ll take forever to clean the suds out of here, too little and the floor won’t clean properly. Either way, Master will have us do it again,” Hunter explained as he crushed the dried herb into the roiling water. As the water began to sud, they stepped out of the way and poured the huge pot out on to the floor. Soapy water sloshed against the walls, and some even poured down the slope without help. Hunter yelped as the water—luckily only hot after washing across the floor—flowed on to his feet.

“Heh. Always funny.” Hunter chuckled as he handed Ram a mop. “Now, we scrub until the floor is clean, and then we squeegee it out again. It’ll be dry by the time we start work tomorrow.”

They got to it, and even Chase only glared a little as he rejoined them and began scrubbing. It was fully dark by the time the remaining water was out of the room, and an exhausted Ram was barely standing. Dylan came into the room and took a sniff. “You think it is clean?”

Hunter nodded respectfully, and Dylan harrumphed. “Well, I’ll believe you, but if we need to redo it in the morning, you are going to have to do that instead of working on the chop-block. You okay with that?”

Chase spoke almost ritualistically, “Yes, sir. We have faith that you will find our work satisfactory.”

Dylan nodded once. “Good then. Dismissed. Head to bed, or to study after cleaning up.”

He walked away but hesitated for a moment. “Chandra is doing lessons tonight if that factors into your decision.”

Chase and Hunter grimaced and started making their way directly to their beds above the cattle pens. Ram, though he was almost asleep on his feet, felt the need to improve his standing. “I’ll go… if I’m allowed?”

“Hmph. Well, aren’t you a glutton for punishment? It isn’t like she won’t have the free time to train you; the others tend to avoid lessons when she is around. She can work with you one-on-one, and you’ll improve faster that way.”

“I’ll clean up and go over,” Ram grimly promised.

Dylan laughed at his stony face. “She isn’t that bad! Chandra is just a fan of corporal punishment for any failure. She really does know her stuff, though, and you will certainly learn very fast with her as your teacher.”

Ram agreed with his words and went to clean up. He walked to the door of the study room, took a deep breath, and entered.

Chandra had her eyes half-closed and was staring at a glowing, purple flower. She didn’t take her eyes off of it but was scribbling away at her slate the entire time. Ram coughed lightly, and she whirled around so fast that she almost knocked the flower over.

“What are you doing here?” she demanded, shocked to see another person in the lessons room.

“Um. I was told you would keep teaching me if I came tonight?” Ram edged back toward the door, just in case she got too violent.

“No one ever comes to my lesson nights.” Chandra looked suspicious, then thoughtful. She glanced at the flower once more before setting her slate down.

“If you don’t mind me asking, what were you doing?” Ram asked her cautiously.

“Hmm? Oh. I’m trying to find a use for this flower,” Chandra responded offhandedly.

“What do you mean?”

“I’ll tell you if you keep it between us?” She glanced at him. Ram quickly nodded. “I really like to… cook.”

Ram stared at her, exceedingly confused. Women didn’t cook unless they had no other choice.

“Don’t stare at me like that!” Chandra demanded heatedly. “I don’t like coming to this smelly building every day. I like things that smell good or are tasty! As a matter of fact, I want to open a restaurant someday.”

Ram relaxed a bit. “Oh, well, I see, if you–”

“I want to be the cook, too!” Chandra finished triumphantly. Ram nearly choked as he thought about the idea of a woman working to make someone else a meal. Straight. Up. Outlandish. “Enough about me. Let’s get to lessons.”

They worked on his ability to read, Chandra making Ram read every word she wrote on her slate. It was slow going, and after an hour, Ram was swaying in his seat.

“Tired? Good, get out. I need to cultivate anyway.” Chandra shoved Ram toward the door. He turned and bowed, thanking her, then paused.

“Cultivate?”

“Yes. I see you have graduated to three-syllable words,” Chandra sneered at him.

“What is cultivating?”

Chandra paused, thinking a moment. “Oh, why not? It isn’t like I’m going to break the law and show you how to do it. Cultivating is a way to draw energy from the world into you. It makes you stronger, smarter, and healthier. Also, only women can do it. That’s the law.”

“Oh. Well, thank you for telling me,” Ram muttered, turning to leave.

“You want to see me do it?” Chandra smirked at him.

“No thanks.”

Chandra glared at him. “Sit down! It’s super boring, so stay here and talk to me when I need a break!”

Ram looked at her with pleading eyes, but she simply pointed at the seat and glared. He sat down heavily, grumbling softly.

“Be quiet. There aren’t many plants in here, so I really need to concentrate,” Chandra growled, adjusting her seating position.

The room went quiet as Chandra scrunched up her forehead in concentration. Ram sat around, waiting for her to finish. His head started to bob as the work of the day, and the warm fire next to him conspired to push him ever closer toward sleep. He blinked his tired eyes, and for a moment, he thought he saw a green haze moving from the plants into Chandra.

“Pretty,” Ram muttered softly. Half-asleep, he looked around and saw multiple colors in the room, including a deep black that was leaking in from the cracks of the doorframe. He frowned, stood up, and weaved on sleep-laden feet toward the enticing darkness. His face moved closer until a wisp of the shadow entered his nose.

“Bleh!” He almost gagged as the scent of the butcher shop entered his nostrils. It had been well hidden by the plants, but he had taken a large nose-full somehow. He felt very awake now.

Chandra’s eyes snapped open. “Hey! Are you trying to sneak out?”

“No, there was just…” He trailed off as he looked around, only seeing the normal colors of the room.

“You may as well just go.” Chandra turned away, voice soft. “No one wants to be in here with me anyway.”

“Sounds good, sleep well!” Ram started opening the door, but a feral-sounding growl from Chandra made him turn back.

“Don’t you know that you are supposed to comfort a sad woman?” Chandra’s eyes were blazing.

“I literally did not.” Ram reluctantly closed the door, seeing his chances at sleep vanishing. “Why are you sad?”

“No one wants to visit me or learn from me,” Chandra stated bluntly.

Ram rolled his eyes. “Do you mind if I speak freely? I don’t want to get in trouble or get kicked out of here. Or whipped. If I’m gonna make you mad, I’ll just be quiet.”

She looked at him with cold eyes. “So long as you aren’t intentionally insulting… go ahead.”

“When your dad found me three days ago, I had just been brutally beaten by a street gang. They were going to kill me because I didn’t run to them and turn in a loaf of bread I found on the street. I hadn’t eaten for three days before that. I had no home, no work, no food, or friends. If I hadn’t been taken in, I’d likely be dead right now.” Ram raised his shirt to show the intense bruising that was blooming into beautiful, painful coloration.

Chandra’s eyes were even larger than usual after being told this information. “Whoa. That’s too bad, but I don’t really see how it relates to this situation. You don’t seem sad about it.”

Ram looked at her incredulously. “I was trying to show you that you shouldn’t be sad? You are upset because no one wants to learn from you? No one wants to learn from you because you scream and hit them for the most minor mistakes. I, on the other hand, have an actual reason to be upset, and I am instead working to better my position in life and doing everything I can to repay your father for his kindness.”

Chandra looked confused. “I don’t get it. You’re just a boy. You are supposed to take screaming and beatings stoically and without complaining. Stop saying stupid things. Your situation isn’t even comparable to mine. I am glad you realize that Daddy is great, though.”

He looked at her, mouth open. He shook his head, unable to articulate how much her words upset him. “Um. Goodnight. Thank you for… teaching me.”

Ram slipped out the door before she could say anything else, hurrying to find his bed. He lay on his pallet a short while later, unable to sleep though his body was aching. What was cultivating? It looked boring at first, but after he saw the colors in the air… he was mesmerized. It was beautiful. Why weren’t males allowed to learn how to do it? Was that why women were so much stronger and smarter? Why they ruled men with an iron fist?

He sat up, frowning. Chandra had said that cultivating made women stronger and smarter. It was well known that a grown man could never defeat a woman in a contest of strength or skill, even though they were so much smaller than their male counterparts. Was this the secret? Cultivation? Ram had to find out!

Chapter Five

A hand shaking him woke Ram with a start. His eyes flew open as he swung his fist wildly in an attempt to hold off whoever was attacking him… Oh, it was just Chase.

“Wow. I am making Hunter wake you up from now on, you little psycho,” Chase muttered as he rubbed his smarting cheek. “Get up. Daylight is about to reach us, and Master Dylan will be inspecting how clean we left the butcher room.”

Ram nodded and hopped out of bed, quickly pulling on his clothes. Chase’s nostrils flared, and he coughed. “Tonight, make sure that someone shows you where to wash your clothes. Master Dylan told us that if we don’t wash them regularly, we will get sick.”

Ram scoffed at the old husband’s tale. “That’s just a myth! An extra layer of dirt helps you stay warm.”

Chase nodded wisely. “That’s what I said, but he told me that women wash all the time, and we never see them get sick.”

Ram considered his words, but he thought that he knew the real reason women didn’t get sick.

“It doesn’t matter, though. You need to wash properly, or he’ll kick you out.” Chase walked down the stairs, vanishing from sight. Ram hurried after him, nearly tripping as he walked down. They got into the butcher room just before Dylan and had to wait while he walked around inspecting every surface.

“Passable,” he finally asserted, drawing a sigh of relief from the three waiting boys. He arched a brow and grinned. “Here is what you can do better tonight.”

He launched into an explanation of the issues he had found, moving from wall to wall and pointing out nearly imperceptible streaks on the floor. “Angle your squeegee more carefully, so you avoid leaving behind blood or soap as you did here. You are going to have to scrub this spot tonight to get this dried blood off.”

He pointed out a few other areas, then finally turned to face them.

“What is our goal? How do we become Masters of our profession?” he demanded with crossed arms.

The two boys next to Ram responded in unison, surprising him, “By perfecting our skills and using our tools to their maximum potential.”

Dylan nodded sharply. “This does not mean only our skills with the blade. What use are you to me if you are unable to fulfill the jobs I give to you? Ram, you are new here, but you have much to learn. You need to pace yourself better to ensure that you are building muscle and are still able to clean the stables each day before coming here for cleanup.”

Ram nodded hurriedly, eyes wide as he waited for punishment, but instead of beating him, Dylan just turned to the others. “Chase. You told me that your work was satisfactory. I have found it to be only passable. Your word is your bond, lad. You need to ensure that you are able to assess your work and find faults correctly. Perfecting your skills applies to every aspect of yourself.”

“Hunter, you left blood on your cleaver.” The boy turned pale as Dylan continued, “Not only that, but I was informed this morning that you haven’t been to a lesson in two full weeks. If your blade rusts, you will need to replace it yourself. A dull blade is a danger to yourself and those you work with. A dull mind is the same. Fix these issues, or prepare a new apprenticeship.”

Dylan addressed the group as a whole, “Now, get to work!”

He turned and started walking toward the stables. “Ram, we brought in a few more cows today. They should be arriving soon. I am going to start teaching you how to look for signs of injury or illness that might spoil the meat. You don’t need to worry about feeding them. We let them go hungry for a day before slaughtering them. That way, they have less weight to clean out.”

Ram half-jogged as he tried to keep up with the long legs of his Master. “Yes, sir!”

“Chandra told me that you came to lessons last night.” Dylan glanced at the glistening, bald head of the child next to him. “She says that you were able to learn the entire alphabet and begin on words already. That you seem to have a natural talent for learning and discussion.”

Ramset didn’t know where this conversation was going. “I’m just trying to do well, sir.”

There was silence for a moment. “You seem to have a talent for thought, boy. If you want… I could likely get you a position as a scribe in a few months. It would be an easier life, and it can even pay well if you show a talent.”

“Thank you, sir… but…” Ram hesitated. He didn’t want to anger his new boss. “I’d rather stay here. If… if you are okay with that.”

“Good, good.” A large nod accompanied these words. “I am glad that we didn’t scare you off too early. A loyal man is a trustworthy man. I feel that you will do well here, in time.”

They stopped talking as a farmer slowly herded a few cows to the door. He looked up from under the brim of his straw hat. “You the butcher?”

“I am. Got some cows for me, then?” Dylan grinned at the slow-speaking farmer.

“Nah, these are chickens. Just fed ‘em too much.”

Dylan started laughing. “Ah, I walked into that one, didn’t I? Mind if I look em over?”

“I’d be offended if you didn’t! You need to see how much higher quality my beef is than the average farmer!” the man stated proudly.

“What do you do differently?” Dylan asked after looking over a few cows and shaking his head in admiration. “They really do look good, and from what I can tell, the meat seems fairly tender.”

“Ah, right, come ‘ere, lad. What we are looking for is bleeding or inflamed areas, loss of teeth…” Dylan talked for a few moments as he showed Ram how to guide his hands on the flanks of the cows.

The farmer waited patiently while Dylan talked before answering his question when he had his attention again. “New apprentice? Lucky boy. Now, my cows are fed from hay like the others, but I make sure that they don’t drink from the river, only my wells.”

“That, and each one gets a measure of grain each week. Helps fatten ‘em up and keeps ‘em lazy. Tender, tasty meat.” He grinned a gap-tooth smile.

“Well, I can’t argue with the results. The price though…” Dylan started haggling, trying to drive down the price, but was soon defeated by the farmer, who made only a small concession.

As the cows were led into the stable, Dylan and the farmer shook hands and planned on more business in the future. Ram waited until the man was gone, then asked, “Why were you so happy to pay that price? That was a lot of silver, wasn’t it?”

“Good beef is worth it, and this is great beef. One of the other important things to look for to judge the quality of the meat is to see how willing the owner is to part with it for less than the price they wanted. If they go too low, there are only two reasons. They are a fool, or the meat is not worth the price they asked. Fools don’t stay in business, and cheats could ruin my business,” Dylan explained cheerfully. A *splat* announced the arrival of a steaming cow pat.

“Oh, looks like your workday has begun.” Dylan chuckled with a smile. He walked to a different portion of the stable and led away a different cow. “See you at midday.”

Ram got to work, scooping up the fresh turds and tossing them into his reeking cart. He worked quickly to empty out the individual stalls, then moved on to scraping out the room the pigs were kept in.

“Careful, lad.” Ram looked up to see one of the journeyman butchers in the room. “Only go in the empty rooms. Those hogs haven’t eaten in a day, and if you get into the midst of them, they will tear you apart.” Ram looked over the chest-level fencing to see a sounder of hogs silently staring in his direction. He shivered as he realized he had almost opened the gate holding them in.

“Th-thank you!” Ram stepped back and bowed as low as he would to a woman.

“Hey, stop that! I work for a living. Don’t bow to me.” The man chuckled. “I’m John. You must be the new boy.”

John had thick, curly hair and a beard so poofy that it hid his mouth entirely. “I specialize in pork meat, so I’ve had a long time to get used to how they act.”

“All the same, thank you. I like not being eaten.” Ram nodded once, then returned to work.

John watched him for a bit. “I can see why Dylan likes you. You’re a hard worker. I appreciate you cleaning out the stalls. I’ve been doing it since the last new boy… left.”

“Only doing what I can, sir.”

“Hmm.” John watched him for a moment longer, then started to help. “I’ve noticed the others avoiding this job now that you are on it. Fools… they could get so much more done if you were there to help them. They’re neglecting strength training now as well.”

“I don't mind the work.” Ram actually felt more energized when he was working, something he had never expected.

“Well… just keep at it. Things will get better.” They worked until the stall was empty. Ram continued working until mealtime, then kept going. He remembered Dylan's words and took smaller but more numerous trips to the sewer entrance. As evening approached, he helped clean the butcher room again.

The others left for lessons or bed after that, but Ramset had one more load of feces to dump. He got to the edge of the sewer and looked down, noticing that there was a large mass that wasn't moving. Ram grabbed the poop-poking stick and started stabbing down, but on the second poke, the lump spoke.

“Stop that!”

Chapter Six

Ram was pulled off his feet and into the sewer entrance. How? He had no idea. One second he was looking down; the next he was standing in front of a wild-eyed man with white hair. “You? That’s not supposed to happen for hundreds of… oh wait, you’re a child. Is this where we meet? Have we met yet?”

“I…!” Ram was floating above the surface of the moving sludge. “I have no idea who you are! Please don’t–”

“Blah, blah. Nice to meet you, little Ramset! I’m Egil.” The man stuck out a hand, and Ram took it even though there was literal crap on it. “I’m going to be the one you credit with rescuing you! Oh… look at that empty center. Mmhmm…”

“What are you…?” Ram tried to pull away, but moving at all was as difficult as lifting a dozen cows.

“I’m going to be running a little experiment on you, Ramset.” Egil smiled brightly, in no way showing bad intent. “I’ve been playing around with Cores, memory stones, and dungeons recently. You’ll make a nice distraction for me while I hang out in the sewer for a while. That silly organization is still trying to capture me, and I can't let that happen for…”

The man looked away. “I think it is thirty-two years? Sounds right. Anyhoo, you’ve been able to pull Essence to your eyes already… so let’s set this to your vision. Sorry if this hurts!”

A… blade? Some kind of knife-shaped something appeared in Egil’s hand, and he sliced open the front of Ram’s left eye. Ram tried to scream, but a foreign pressure forced his lungs to refuse. Egil was muttering, but Ram wasn't able to hear what he was saying. Finally, a spark of something rushed into Ram’s eye, and the pain vanished. In fact, the whole experience was somewhat hazy.

Ram blinked and sat up. He was on his mat? Hunter was about to shake him awake but nodded as he saw that Ram was up. They got to work, and Ram tried to figure out what that dream had been about. It was strange… Did everyone have dreams when they were well-fed?

He blinked as a cloud drifted over the sun. The entire area was filled with purple-tinged, black smoke. Ram rubbed his eyes and looked around. Nothing. Whew. He stopped rubbing his left eye and opened it again… The smoke was back. He could see all sorts of colors, but black was the most prolific for certain.

It was everywhere, but especially around the blood and poo that he needed to clean up. He was going to go talk to Master Dylan about it when a huge wall of black exploded out of the butcher room he was about to enter. In a panic, he ran in to see the butcher standing above a freshly-slain cow. “Ram? You need something?”

Ramset had no idea what to say. ‘I can see death’ would likely not be the right thing to announce. “Oh, I heard a sound and wasn't sure what it was.”

“Cow mooing as it bled out, most likely.” Dylan got to work. “You should get moving. I want half that pile gone before eating today.”

“Yes… sir.” Ram walked back to the pile and tried to ignore the smoke that he saw everywhere. He tried to avoid breathing it in, but it seemed drawn to him for some reason. Just before lunch, another odd thing happened.

Minimum threshold of Essence acquired. Initiating ‘Seed’. Corruption purge has begun.

Hello, Ramset. Welcome to ‘Cultivation Revamped’. Egil Noslen has created a cultivation method for you specifically, and it is time to begin. First, your meridians will be mapped to the Core fragment in your left eye, and the best methodology for progression will be determined. You are currently in a comatose state as corruption is ripped out of you.

There are two rules that you will follow at all times.

1)                 You will grow as strong as possible in the shortest amount of time.

2)                 You will never tell another soul about the Core fragment in your eye. If you do, your death will be more painful than anyone else can possibly threaten you with.

It is time for you to learn how to cultivate.

Want more short stories set in this universe?

Check out Essence today!

Appendix

Adam – A mid-D-ranked cleric who joined Dale’s group. He was corrupted by a massive influx of celestial Essence which may have given him powerful abilities.

Adventurers’ Guild – A group from every non-hostile race that actively seeks treasure and cultivates to become stronger. They act as a mercenary group for Kingdoms that come under attack from monsters and other non-kingdom forces.

Affinity – A person’s affinity denotes what element they need to cultivate Essence from. If they have multiple affinities, they need to cultivate all of those elements at the same time.

Affinity Channel – The pathway along the meridians that Essence flows through. Having multiple major affinities will open more pathways, allowing more Essence to flow into a person’s center at one time.

Aiden Silverfang – The new leader of the Northmen, this Barbarian turned Wolfman has a deep grudge against Amazonians.

Amber – The Mage in charge of the portal-making group near the dungeon. She is in the upper A-rankings, which allows her to tap vast amounts of Mana.

Artorian – The new Headmaster of the Academy. He made a deal with the dungeon to swiftly advance to the Mage ranks.

Assassin – A stealthy killer who tries to make kills without being detected by his victim.

Assimilator – A cross between a jellyfish and a Wisp, the Assimilator can float around and collect vast amounts of Essence. It releases this Essence as powerful elemental bursts. A pseudo-Mage, if you will.

Aura – The flows of Essence generated by living creatures which surround them and hold their pattern.

Barry the Devourer – A powerful S-ranked High Elf with the ability to turn all matter within a certain range into pure Essence and absorb it.

Basher – An evolved rabbit that attacks by head-butting enemies. Each has a small horn on its head that it can use to “bash” enemies.

Beast Core – A small gem that contains the Essence of Beasts.

Flawed: An extremely weak crystallization of Essence that barely allows a Beast to cultivate, comparable to low F-rank.

Weak: A weak crystallization of Essence that allows a Beast to cultivate, comparable to an upper F-rank.

Standard: A crystallization of Essence that allows a Beast to cultivate well, comparable to the D-rankings.

Strong: A crystallization of Essence that allows a Beast to cultivate very well, comparable to the lower C-rankings.

Beastly: A crystallization of Essence that allows a Beast to cultivate exceedingly well, comparable to the upper C-rankings.

Immaculate: An amalgamation of crystallized of Essence and Mana that allows a Beast to cultivate exceedingly well. Any Beast in the B-rankings or A-rankings will have this Core.

Luminous: A Core of pure spiritual Essence that is indestructible by normal means. A Beast with this core will be in at least the S-rankings, up to SSS-rank.

Radiant: A Core of Heavenly or Godly energies. A Beast with this Core is able to adjust reality on a whim.

Brianna – A Dark Elf Queen that intends to build a city around the dungeon. She is a member of the council and knows that the dungeon is alive and sentient.

Cal – The heart of the Dungeon, Cal was a human murdered by necromancers. After being forced into a soul gem, his identity was stripped as time passed. Now accompanied by Dani, he works to become stronger without attracting too much attention to himself. Too late.

Cats, dungeon – There are several types:

Snowball: A Boss Mob, Snowball uses steam Essence to fuel his devastating attacks.

Cloud Cat: A Mob that glides along the air, attacking from positions of stealth.

Coiled Cat: A heavy Cat that uses metal Essence. It has a reinforced skeleton and can launch itself forward at high speeds.

Flesh Cat: This Cat uses flesh Essence to tear apart tissue from a short distance. The abilities of this Cat only work on flesh and veins and will not affect bone or harder materials.

Wither Cat: A Cat full of infernal Essence, the Wither Cat can induce a restriction of Essence flow with its attacks. Cutting off the flow of Essence or Mana will quickly leave the victim in a helpless state. The process is quite painful.

Celestial – The Essence of Heaven, the embodiment of life and considered the ultimate good.

Center – The very center of a person’s soul. This is the area Essence accumulates (in creatures that do not have a Core) before it binds to the Life Force.

Chandra – Owner of an extremely well-appointed restaurant, this A-ranked Mage is the grandmother of Rose. She has an unknown history with The Master.

Chi spiral – A person’s Chi spiral is a vast amount of intricately knotted Essence. The more complex and complete the pattern woven into it, the more Essence it can hold and the finer the Essence would be refined.

Cleric – A Cultivator of Celestial Essence, a cleric tends to be support for a group, rarely fighting directly. Their main purpose in the lower rankings is to heal and comfort others.

Corruption – Corruption is the remnant of the matter that pure Essence was formed into. It taints Essence but allows beings to absorb it through open affinity channels. This taint has been argued about for centuries; is it the source of life or a nasty side effect?

Craig – A powerful C-ranked monk, Craig has dedicated his life to finding the secrets of Essence and passing on knowledge.

Currency values:

Copper: one hundred copper coins are worth a silver coin

Silver: one hundred silver coins are worth a Gold coin

Gold: one hundred Gold coins are worth a Platinum coin

Platinum: the highest coin currency in the Human Kingdoms

Cultivate – Cultivating is the process of refining Essence by removing corruption then cycling the purified Essence into the center of the soul.

Cultivator – A cultivator is one who cultivates. See above. Seriously, it is the entry right before this one. I’m being all alphabetical here. Mostly.

Dale – Owner of the mountain the dungeon was found on, Dale is now a cultivator who attempts to not die on a regular basis. As a dungeon born person, he has a connection to the dungeon that he can never be rid of.

Dani – A pink dungeon Wisp – Is that important? – Dani is the soul bound companion of Cal and acts as his moral compass and helper.

Distortion Cat – An upper C-ranked Beast that can bend light and create artificial darkness. In its home territory, it is attacked and bound by tentacle like parasites that form a symbiotic relationship with it.

Dregs – A dungeon Core that has limited intelligence. It was installed into Cal’s dungeon to control floors 1-4 so Cal could focus on other things.

Dungeon Born – Being dungeon born means that the dungeon did not create the creature but gave it life. This gives the creature the ability to function autonomously without fear that the dungeon will be able to take direct control of its mind.

Dwarves – Stocky humanoids that like to work with stone, metal, and alcohol. Good miners.

Egil Nolsen – Known to the world as ‘Xenocide’, this man is of unknown ranking and fully insane.

Elves – A race of willowy humanoids with pointy ears. There are five main types:

High Elves: The largest nation of Elvenkind, they spend most of their time as merchants, artists, or thinkers. Rich beyond any need to actually work, their King is an S-ranked expert, and their cities shine with light and wealth. They like to think of themselves as ‘above’ other Elves, thus ‘High’ Elves.

Wood Elves: Wood Elves live more simply than High Elves, but have greater connection to the earth and the elements. They are ruled by a counsel of S-ranked elders and rarely leave their woods. Though seen less often, they have great power. They grow and collect food and animal products for themselves and other Elven nations.

Wild: Wild Elves are the outcasts of their societies, basically feral, they scorn society, civilization, and the rules of others. They have the worst reputation of any of the races of Elves, practicing dark arts and infernal summoning. They have no homeland, living only where they can get away with their dark deeds.

Dark: The Drow are known as Dark Elves. No one knows where they live, only where they can go to get in contact with them. Dark Elves also have a dark reputation as Assassins and mercenaries for the other races. The worst of their lot are ‘Moon Elves’, the best-known Assassins of any race. These are the Elves that Dale made a deal with for land and protection.

Sea: The Sea Elves live on boats their entire lives. They facilitate trade between all the races of Elves and man, trying not to take sides in conflicts. They work for themselves and are considered rather mysterious.

Essence – Essence is the fundamental energy of the universe, the pure power of heavens and earth that is used by the basic elements to become all forms of matter.

Father Richard – An A-ranked Cleric that has made his living hunting demons and heretics. Tends to play fast and loose with rules and money.

Fighter – A generic archetype of a being that uses melee weapons to fight.

Frank – Was the Guild Leader of the Adventurers’ Guild. He had his Mana bound to the concept of kinetic energy and could stop the use of it, slowing or stopping others in place.

Grace – A purple dungeon Wisp – Is that important? – Grace is the offspring of Dani and Cal.

Hans – A cheeky assassin that has been with Dale since he began cultivating. He was a thief in his youth but changed lifestyles after his street guild was wiped out. He is deadly with a knife and is Dale’s best friend. Now Rose’s husband.

Incantation – Essentially a spell, an incantation is created from words and gestures. It releases all of the power of an enchantment in a single burst.

Infected – A person or creature that has been infected with a rage-inducing mushroom growth. These people have no control of their bodies and attack any non-infected on sight.

Infernal – The Essence of death and demonic beings, considered to be always evil.

Inscription – A permanent pattern made of Essence that creates an effect on the universe. Try not to get the pattern wrong as it could have… unintended consequences. This is another name for an incomplete or unknown Rune.

Mages’ Guild – A secretive sub-sect of the Adventurers’ Guild only Mage level cultivators are allowed to join.

Mana – A higher stage of Essence only able to be cultivated by those who have broken into at least the B-rankings and found the true name of something in the universe.

Meridians – Meridians are energy channels that transport life energy (Chi/Essence) throughout the body.

Mob – A shortened version of “dungeon monster”.

Necromancer – An Infernal Essence cultivator who can raise and control the dead and demons.

Noble rankings:

King/Queen – Ruler of their country. (Addressed as ‘Your Majesty’)

Crown Prince/Princess – Next in line to the throne, has the same political power as a Grand Duke. (Addressed as ‘Your Royal Highness’)

Prince/Princess – Child of the King/Queen, has the same political power as a Duke. (Addressed as ‘Your Highness’)

Grand Duke – Ruler of a grand duchy and is senior to a Duke. (Addressed as ‘Your Grace’)

Duke – Is senior to a Marquis or Marquess. (Addressed as ‘Your Grace’)

Marquis/Marquess – Is senior to an Earl and has at least three Earls in their domain. (Addressed as ‘Honorable’)

Earl – Is senior to a Baron. Each Earl has three barons under their power. (Addressed as ‘My Lord/Lady’)

Baron – Senior to knights, they control a minimum of ten knights and therefore their land. (Addressed as ‘My Lord/Lady’)

Knights – Sub rulers of plots of land and peasants. (Addressed as ‘Sir’)

Pattern – A pattern is the intricate design that makes everything in the universe. An inanimate object has a far less complex pattern that a living being.

Raile – A massive, granite covered Boss Basher that attacks by ramming and attempting to squish its opponents.

Ranger – Typically an adventurer archetype that is able to attack from long range, usually with a bow.

Ranking System – The ranking system is a way to classify how powerful a creature has become through fighting and cultivation.

G – At the lowest ranking is mostly non-organic matter such as rocks and ash. Mid-G contains small plants such as moss and mushrooms while the upper ranks form most of the other flora in the world.

F – The F-ranks are where beings are becoming actually sentient, able to gather their own food and make short-term plans. The mid-F ranks are where most humans reach before adulthood without cultivating. This is known as the fishy or “failure” rank.

E – The E-rank is known as the “echo” rank and is used to prepare a body for intense cultivation.

D – This is the rank where a cultivator starts to become actually dangerous. A D-ranked individual can usually fight off ten F-ranked beings without issue. They are characterized by a “fractal” in their Chi spiral.

C – The highest-ranked Essence cultivators, those in the C-rank usually have opened all of their meridians. A C-ranked cultivator can usually fight off ten D-ranked and one hundred F-ranked beings without being overwhelmed.

B – This is the first rank of Mana cultivators, known as Mages. They convert Essence into Mana through a nuanced refining process and release it through a true name of the universe.

A – Usually several hundred years are needed to attain this rank, known as High-Mage or High-Magous. They are the most powerful rank of Mages.

S – Very mysterious Spiritual Essence cultivators. Not much is known about the requirements for this rank or those above it.

SS – Pronounced ‘Double S’. Not much is known about the requirements for this rank or those above it.

SSS – Pronounced ‘Triple S’. Not much is known about the requirements for this rank or those above it.

Heavenly – Not much is known about the requirements for this rank or those above it.

Godly – Not much is known about the requirements for this rank or those above it.

Rose – A Half Elf ranger that joined Dale’s team. She has opposing affinities for celestial and infernal Essence, making her a chaos cultivator.

Rune – A permanent pattern made of Essence that creates an effect on the universe. Try not to get the pattern wrong as it could have… unintended consequences. This is another name for a completed Inscription.

Silverwood tree – A mysterious tree that has silver wood and leaves. Some say that it helps cultivators move into the B-rankings.

Soul Stone – A highly refined Beast Core that is capable of containing a human soul.

Tank – An adventurer archetype that is built to defend his team from the worst of the attacks that come their way. Heavily armored and usually carrying a large shield, these powerful people are needed if a group plans on surviving more than one attack.

Tom – A huge red-haired barbarian prince from the northern wastes, he wields a powerful warhammer and has joined Dale’s team. He is only half as handy to have around right now.

Xan – A green dungeon Wisp that Xan is the Wisp bonded to Dregs.

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