"Alright what do we have here…" I whispered to myself.

The entry path into the floor transitioned from natural stone formations to cut stone. This eventually transitioned again into a massive open cavern.

"Wow…" Lluvia whispered.

The awe was due to the size of the cavern, it was down right massive. We could see many many buildings between us and the 'North' side of the space. Which my path ability told me was where we could find the exit.

The buildings themselves appeared slender and graceful, some made of stone others made of some sort of wood. The buildings instead of being painted had magical illusions placed on them to make them glow with dim colors and patterns. Imitations of spider webs could be found everywhere connecting building to building and stalagmite to stalactite.

"I didn't expect this to be beautiful." Lluvia added after regaining her composure.

"Tiny bit of good news, Drow aren't as intelligent as Mind Flayers. I don't expect full meta like we had a little while ago." I said as quietly as I could.

"Expect sneaky and fast strikes, also more dodging than head on contests." I added.

The first 15 minutes or so was relatively uneventful; we dodged some patrols and Lluvia even had to take out a standing sentry. Things got a bit more tense when a larger band of 10 passed by our hidden group. The eerie part was the absolute silence they all moved in. The entire space was too quiet as well, so quiet I could hear my friends breathing.

"How much more of this?" Orlo asked quietly.

"I think we are almost at the halfway point. 20 more minutes of sneaking I think." I replied as quietly as I could.

That was the worst thing we could have done apparently. As soon as I finished talking, a small crossbow bolt just barely missed me.

"Fuck… we've been seen!" I nearly shouted.

I then pulled out half size mana grenades and readied to throw them.

Orbs of impenetrable darkness appeared before us and beside us.

"Run through" I shouted.

As I did I also tossed out one of my small mana grenade and once I felt it was 30 or 40 feet away I detonated it.

I wasn't aiming for anything in particular just to injure and slow.

When I came out of the darkness I wasn't expecting the Drow woman slicing at my throat. I managed to bring my armed forearm up just before the hit and it took the majority of the blow. I still felt the sting of the blade impact. Then I remembered most Drow fought with two blades and felt a sting across my ribs.

My new leather armor took the impact but it still managed to leave a shallow cut. I attempted to disengage with the Drow woman but I could not slip past her. Luckily I didn't have to as Orlo had struck from behind leaving nasty deep gouges with their talons into the Drow's back.

"Keep moving." They said, I did.

Every once in a while I could toss out a mana grenade into an ally. The only reason I knew it worked was due to the shouts of anger and pain that came from two separate occasions.

I could feel the amulet occasionally buzzing as someone left the range of the network but it only ever lasted a few seconds.

Our tactic of high mobility assault force was not as effective as I had hoped. I could only keep up with the rest of the group by infusing my legs with mana to move faster. Second, the Drow were nearly as fast as Lluvia. She ended up getting a few minor cuts due to being outnumbered generally three to one but she walked away every time.

The rest of the group fared a bit worse taking minor cuts every once in a while just due to the lighting speed of the Drow.

Eventually our entire group made it to the other end and we all clambered into the exit tunnel breathing hard and whipping away minor blood stains.

"Fuck… that was… relentless." Orlo said, trying to catch their breath.

"Nicole, how are you holding up? You took a few hits." I checked my stats.

Health: 83/120

Stamina: 48/120

Mana: 25/125

"Down about 40 points of health, 70 of stamina, and 100 of mana." I said between breaths.

The next most injured was Turnip, her head on style did not work as well with the darting Drow.

"I'm down 40 health but well… I have a lot more than she does." She said.

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"What's your max?" I asked.

"220" she said.

"Damn… and higher resistance." I commented.

"And higher recovery, I'll be back up to full health in an hour." She said.

Root began to probe the wound gently.

"Armor is keeping pressure on the injury, we'll see a bit more bleeding once it's off but it shouldn't be too bad. Can you retract the armor while you're laying down?" He asked thoughtfully.

"No idea, I can lay down and try?" I asked.

"I'd rather we not experiment while you are injured. Just retract it then lay down." He said, so I did.

I did as he asked then immediately felt light headed and sort of just collapsed.

"Fuck, need a blood potion in her now." He said.

I'm not sure who caught me but I then realized I was laying on my back with Root kneeling over me.

Someone opened my mouth and poured a potion down my throat. I started to cough but I managed to keep it down.

The lightheadedness receded a bit and I felt a bit better.

"Alright got the cut closed and the potions doing it's work. Nicole, what's your health at now." He asked.

I checked.

Health: 33/120

"Umm… 30." I said.

"Damn you lost more blood than I would have liked but being down an additional 30 points is not great." He said.

"No, I'm at 30… so I'm down 50 from where I was at previously." I said tiredly.

"Fuck we might need to call this a bust." He said.

"Give me an hour and check again. Also can we check what the next floor is? If it's the city I might agree, if it's the caves, well we've been more successful there." I said.

"I… ok we can at least do that much. Also you are good to redeploy your armor that helped keep the slash closed for sure. That armor might have minor healing properties which will only help." He said and I followed Roots instructions.

I could feel the armor press on the wound and at first it hurt but then sort of dulled and numbed a bit.

"Add numbing to that list as well I think." I said.

"That is valuable for sure. Lone scouts would pay a pretty gold for armor like that." Root said.

After about 20 minutes Lluvia went out with Orlo to scout the initial floor. While that was happening I was sitting against the wall next to the fire pit just trying to warm up my body. I knew that in itself was a very bad sign.

Iser came and sat next to me at first then after a minute pulled me into his lap. He was certainly warm and way more comfortable than the stone wall.

"For someone that is more related to a Lizard you are very warm." I said.

"It is an oddity that has been pointed out by others." He said.

"Well I'm finding it quite nice right now. By the way if you don't mind I'm going to close my eyes for a little bit." I said.

"Go-ahead I'll make sure you don't fall asleep." He said.

I just really felt the need to rest my eyes was all.

For some reason I had this memory of Lluvia feeding me something and it tasted horrible. She told me it would make me feel better and to not spit it out.

The next thing I remember was opening my eyes after what felt like only a few seconds. I was laying with Iser and I could feel his incredibly warm body on my back, and a scaly arm wrapped around my waist.

It seemed I had fallen asleep and been out for so long everyone else went to bed as well. I took a moment to rearrange myself with Iser and let myself relax again into unconsciousness.

The next time I woke up I expected to still have Iser's warm body next to mine but I was disappointed. Instead I found everyone quietly chatting and eating what I hoped was breakfast.

"Morning" I croaked out.

"Feeling any better?" Root asked.

"Minus the hangover, yes I do feel better." I said and even looked at my health and found it to be at max.

"How long was I out for?" I asked.

"Maybe 18 hours? We examined one of the blades and figured out it was poisoned as well." Root said.

"Ah… makes sense… Need water…" I said and was promptly handed a canteen.

"Thanks" and took a big pill before coughing half of it back up.

"Oops… I think I have a drinking problem." I said, then took a much smaller sip. I just got a confused look from Root.

I took the next hour getting more food and water into me. Even with all the magical stuff feeding an unconscious person is still quite difficult. The hangover feeling went away and I felt like I could do stuff again.

"Fucking hell, recovery with magic is amazing." I said.

"Feels normal to us… how long would someone take to recover from that?" Root asked

"The cut on the abdomen would be 6 to 8 weeks and so would the underlying damage stitching together the abdomen wall… So yeah 2 months at a minimum and probably 6 more months of physical therapy to train the body to avoid using the damaged areas safely." I said.

"The better part of a year!?" A shocked Orlo said.

"I mean I have no doubt using magic to stitch up a wound helps recovery. Hmm now I wonder what's happening at the cellular level." I said.

"Ok no more thinking from you for now… you feel ready to complete this dungeon?" Root asked.

"Yeah I think so, oh what was the next floor?" I asked.

"More natural caves." Lluvia said.

"Alright more Underdark wild life… kind of hope we get to see an Umber Hulks in real life…" I said.

"Oh and what makes you think that?" Orlo asked.

"It's the one thing we really have not handled yet, I mean sure the Ropers but that's about it." I said.

"Nicole I just warned you about using your brain…" Root said.

"Yes Dad" I said in a mocking tone.

That got a chuckle out of everyone in the group and embarrassment from Root.

"Well someone has to manage this dysfunctional group." Root said.

We pushed our way into the seventh floor and were greeted by the natural style of cave we had grown accustomed to.