"Just rest here for a moment, generally the room entrance is not too dangerous." Fin said.

In the meantime I started planning our next course. I was spending most of my mana but it was coming back more quickly as well.

"Good news, I can upgrade my path ability… bad news it's going to cost 2 points." I said.

"That's going to be up to you." Fin said.

"What's the next rank provide?" Turnip asked.

Wondering Pather

Rank C - 100%

Your awareness of new paths is second to none. You can expend mana to open up once overlooked options.

I read to the group what the prompt said.

Root and Orlo both looked at me with hope in their eyes.

"Alright I'll do it… I was going to say you owe me but honestly you have all been supporting me amazingly and I'm unsure how I can ever repay that." I said.

I then accepted the new skill. It took me a moment to steady my spinning senses, or well my spinning body. I was immediately bombarded by any number of paths we could take. I was also reevaluating possible options as well.

"You ok?" Lluvia asked.

"I… yeah… just a bit of information overload for a second." I said, I then took a moment to reorient and focus.

"Alright no idea where the exit for this floor is but I can see about 30 feet out in a sphere. I also have much more detail of what's around us." I said.

"Wait didn't you say it was out to like what 60 feet?" Orlo said.

"That was with an active pulse of mana, this is just passive." I said.

"Oh great, more crazy and weird skills from Nicole." Orlo said.

I chose a path that I knew would be difficult for everyone do to the size. I then pushed half my remaining mana about 40 points worth into the path skill. The stone corridor started to shift in odd ways, pulling in to provide more room.

"Umm let's go through quickly as something in the back of my head says it's temporary." I said.

We moved through the small passage, it was still a bit of a squeeze but compared to it being impossible before.

After a short period of time the passages unfolded from itself and was back to normal.

"I mean I know teleportation exists but that's just weird." Root said.

"Alright now that we are moving please everyone be ok your guard we are more likely to run into ambushers now." Fin said.

We began to follow the twisting path I had selected in a somewhat North and East direction. The natural stone around us was much like the first 'floor' making us climb more than walk. It was about 15 minutes in when all of our amulets started going off.

We were unevenly spaced in a line about 40 feet long. At first we all paused and looked back figuring the last person in the line had tripped or something.

What we instead were greeted with was a group of three creatures currently dragging Lluvia away or well trying to. While we could see them all struggling we could not hear anything from any of them.

In a burst of instinct I pulled out my dagger in a reverse hold then folded and reshaped the space between myself and the attackers.

I felt myself move past Orlo who was right next to me then Root who was behind the two of us and then under Iser to reach Lluvia maybe 20 feet back from where I had been.

The folding of space must have caught the creatures off guard as I was able to stab and skewer one of the assailants in the back. I even accidentally triggered the conversation from dagger to longsword and cut another across the shoulder with a shallow cut.

When I got into range all sound had stopped, I was trapped in a bubble of silence. Seeing as my current weapon was now stuck I aligned my vambrace to the target I had given a small slash across the shoulder to and fired a force projection. I was a bit off as I had been aiming for the center of mass and instead hit the same shoulder. The shoulder then exploded into bits of leather, metal, and creature.

Lluvia throughout all of this had managed to wrap a leg around the last assailant's neck and was stuck grappling with it. After a second she switched up tactics, pulled a knife out of her boot and stabbed it in the chest repeatedly.

The one I had impaled with my dagger sword was in its death throws but the other I had hit in the shoulder was still alive but with a useless and dangling right arm.

Before I had a chance to try and strike Lluvia sort of just appeared behind it then sliced its throat in one swift movement.

At that point the area of silence stopped and a wall of sound rushed in to hit the two of us. I then felt a force impact me in the back and swing me around with incredible speed.

I found myself on my ass as Root had interposed himself between me and the dead or dying attackers. After a moment of looking around and taking stock of the situation.

"What the fuck was that Nicole…" Root said roughly.

"Sorry seeing Lluvia in trouble I sort of panicked I guess." I said.

"And threw yourself into a fight? Lluvia's a big girl she can easily handle herself against all three of those." Root said still roughly.

Root then grabbed my arm and pulled me back up to my feet.

"I need to give you a crash course in discipline. You need to learn when you should stay back. Did you even check the level of these?" Root was basically shouting at me at this point.

I pulled up my notifications. The three notifications said two were level 16 and the last was level 17. That was double my current level.

"Ah… opps…" I said.

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"Yes oops, you won on the first one because you appeared out of fucking nowhere." He said much more quietly now.

"Alright Root that's enough, we can have this discussion outside of the dungeon or at least at the or at the entry room." Turnip said with a solid glare.

"Right everyone… sorry." I said a bit sheepishly. I did however attach a mana thread to my dagger sword and trigger its switch. I then used that same mana thread to 'pull' the dagger out of the creatures back and into my waiting hand.

That actually made Root sign and even chuckle a little. He was certainly not wrong about my lack of discipline but my skills were unusual.

"Any of them drop anything?" Fin asked.

Lluvia looked but didn't find anything.

"Damn… it's rare to kill all of them and even rarer on top of that for their drop but they have valuable armor due to its versatility." He said.

"Also excellent work on the amulets, this was by far one of the most dangerous creatures in the dungeon due to the separation tactic." Fin said.

I asked but he won't go into detail as to how many have died from that particular attack. But based on his expression it was many.

We continued to press through the second floor and came across a larger cavern that gave us all some space to stretch.

"Alright be prepared this area might be empty or it could have a stone creature attack us. Well… it looks like stone anyway." Fin said.

After we took a moment to stretch we started to move forward. Then I stopped the entire group.

"Umm I have a sense of any 'static' things in the room… but that spot comes back empty." I said and pointed to two stalagmites.

The stalagmites looked back at us.

"Fuck me Ropers." I said before I felt a tentacle grasp around my arms and torso and pull me up.

Before I even had a chance to react I felt a weight on the back of me then I was falling. I crashed down into the ground in a heap as a featherly bird creature stood over me with talons ready, deftly cutting through more tendrils.

I managed to untangle myself from the now body-less tentacle and get to my feet. Looking around, the group was being attacked by three other creatures. No one else seemed tangled up but the tenderals were definitely a pain in the ass.

I pulled out my small crossbow aimed up, dumped as much mana into the bolt as I felt was safe then fired into the creature that originally tried to grab me. The bolt hit it right in the side, when it hit it exploded into a shower of splints. It absolutely pissed the creature off but didn't do much more than annoy it.

"O fuck me." I said out loud in panic.

Another explosion occurred to the furthest away leaving a sizable chunk missing. That apparently came from Iser who I just realized I had never really seen cast any serious combat magic before.

"Help keep these tentacles off us and I can do something to the body." Orlo said to me.

"O right sorry." I said, then pulled out my dagger sword and another knife. I wrapped both in threads of mana then turned them to sort of whips. They didn't have the weight behind a normal strike but I could get them moving fast. Against the main body I didn't think they would be useful but the tentacles were another story.

As I sliced through the remaining tentacle Orlo took a moment to focus then jumped into the air. Then they brought their talons around and started to slash at the creature with incredible speed.

Chunks of monster started to fall down around me as Orlo slashed into the thing. unfortunately while it was hurting it the creature was tough.

"Orlo danger close!" I shouted and pulled out a clay-more. I then used a mana tendril to shove the thing into the open wound. Orlo at the last second understood what I was about to do and kicked back from the creature gliding backwards.

I used what little mana I had left and triggered my bomb. Gobbits of monster flew everywhere across the cavern. My friends were not going to be happy with the mess… opps.

The rest of our party took care of the other three. Lluvia moving around with her short bow taking shots at eyes that appeared. Turnip and Root both running interference and taking out tentacles. Iser blasting with lines of fire, and Fin also taking aimed shots with a short bow.

The other creatures were removed in short order.

"Why am I covered in monster guts?" Turnip said, looking at me.

"Umm Orlo and I needed to kill ours? And I might have aimed poorly?" I said embarrassed.

"Root, maybe you are right about discipline." She said in annoyance.

"In fairness, she struck the killing blow on the first." Iser said.

"Alright then ask her how much mana she has left." Turnip said.

"Ok… how much mana do you have left Nicole?" Iser asked me.

"Umm like 12 points…" I said.

"Nevermind I see your points." He said.

"Has she always been all over the place like this?" Fin asked?

"Hey I'm right here." I said indignantly.

"Alright then… have you always been all over the place like this?" Fin asked me.

"Yes…" I said embarrassed.

"I mean honestly we've only known her for like 2 weeks but I would say yes this seems to be her normal. I will also note that I absolutely do not endorse anything she has been doing." Lluvia said.

"Oh like hell you almost egg her on half the time." Turnip said with a smile.

"Alright… let's stay focused and get to the next floor." Root said and Fin seemed to agree seeing all the possible ways this could devolve into a 'family' squabble.

We did take a moment to check for any drops but found none. There apparently was a chance one could drop a high quality fishing pole of all things.

We didn't encounter anything else on the second floor in terms of monsters but it was pointed out to me that we were being stalked by some large creatures.

"Is that a cat-like creature?" I asked.

"Yes, it can appear on any floor but the 'city'. You said they are from your world?" Fin asked.

"No, they appear in some of our fiction… the creature is called a Displacer Beast." I said.

"That sounds far more ominous than 'Whip Kitty'... more appropriate as well I feel like." Fin said.

I had a good bit of my mana back after the cavern fight so I threw out an Identify at the creature.

Stalking Displacer Beast (level ? 18)

"Hey, do you have some sort of identify or insight ability correct?" I asked Fin.

"Yes?" He asked more than said.

"What does that creature return when you use it?" I asked.

"Stalking Whip Kitty levels 8 and 18. Why you?" He asked.

"Stalking Displacer Beast" I said.

"That is… well that's interesting." He said.

"It is… I'll need some time to investigate but my immediate suspicion is this is tied to my ability to translate and not really a difference in what we are seeing." I said.

"Wait translate?" He asked.

"O umm… crap… well for some reason I have the ability to speak and understand any language I've encountered so far, I'm assuming it's tied to being a Riftwalker but no way to analyze that." I said.

"Wait? Really?" He asked in shock.

"Yeah… I didn't even know it was happening at first." I said with some embarrassment.

"The more I learn about you the crazier things get… no wonder this group is so fascinated with you." Fin said.

"Oh you have no idea the half of it. They aren't wrong about my risk taking and over extension however." I said.

"So that creature on the ceiling was you. Umm how did you do that… your level 8…" He said in confusion.

I pulled out my 'clay more' and I was still kicking myself at the name.

"I can infuse and release large amounts of energy in an explosive manor. This is just clay with like 40 points of mana dumped into it. When I trigger it it throws hundreds of iron scrap pieces all over the place at stupid high speed." I said

"Oh that's… wow something… and you can prep them ahead of time?" He asked.

"Yep, I think this is an offshoot of enchantment honestly." I said.

"And it killed something double your level… you are terrifying." He said with a huge grin.