The Moon Sky Dungeon was the farthest dungeon from their makeshift camp. They had to scale a small mountain to get to it. Not wanting to waste any time, Xavier had sent the others back to camp through the Portal Stone, then climbed the mountain on his own.

The entrance was at the mountain’s peak. The entire time he’d been climbing the jagged rock face, he’d kept an eye on the mini-map, following the yellow dot. A part of him wondered if it would have been faster to send Justin up here—the kid could fly, after all. But whenever Xavier reached a small ledge on the climb, he was able to leap farther up the mountain.

He made good time.

It had taken him a little while to find the entrance, mostly because he hadn’t been looking in the right place. The peak had a heavy layer of snow, his boots crunching and sinking on each step as he stalked around, trying to find some kind of door.

The door had been in the sky.

Moon Sky Dungeon.

At first, he’d thought what he was looking at was the actual moon, that it was simply visible during the day. Then he’d truly stared at it, and found that it couldn’t be the moon—it didn’t have the right markings, ones he’d come to recognise from staring at the moon all his life.

Unless the System changed it.

But no—this was no moon. This was a small silver sphere hanging in the sky.

“How is anyone supposed to reach that?” Xavier muttered.

Well, he could technically reach it with a jump. Justin would be able to fly up there. Hell, Siobhan might even be able to teleport Howard to the entrance—but opening a portal inside a dungeon to get Siobhan in there?

That wouldn’t work. They had to leave a dungeon the old fashioned way. Though the door.

He tapped his foot in the snow, which wasn’t a terribly satisfying sound, and sighed. He cocked his head. Looked up at the Moon Sky Dungeon once more. When he was very young, he would sometimes try and pluck the moon right out of the sky. His mother had always laughed when he did, for some reason finding his childish impulse hilarious—which only made him do it all the more.

That made him frown. It had been a long time since he’d made his mother laugh. He hardly thought of her enough, considering what was going on…

He turned his attention back to the moon. That childish impulse had suddenly returned. He couldn’t tell how far away the silver sphere was. Gazing up, he raised a hand, feeling foolish. He angled his fingers so he could see the moon between his thumb and index, then he pinched.

{The Moon Sky Dungeon}

Level Restriction: None

Level Recommendation: 30+

Active instances possible: 1

Only 1-4 Denizens are allowed to enter this dungeon at once.

Dungeon Record Holder: None

Dungeon Repeats: Unlimited

Would you like to enter The Moon Sky Dungeon?

Xavier blinked. Had that… actually worked?

Instead of second guessing or pondering how that was possible, Xavier just shrugged. He tossed the Portal Stone onto the ground and summoned the portal. Howard, Siobhan, and Justin stepped through, weapons in hand, eager to push forward.

“How was the camp?” Xavier asked. They were only there for maybe fifteen minutes, but he was interested to know what morale was like. The survivors had been through a lot since the integration of the System, forced to be slaves by the invaders for the entire time since they’d chosen their classes.

“Surprisingly good,” Siobhan said. “John has them training.”

Xavier raised an eyebrow. “Training?”

“Apparently the invaders who’d arrived here had all been Level 2 at the start,” Justin said. “The entire time that John was serving as their slave, he was listening in on their conversations.”

Xavier frowned. “How?”

He still didn’t understand how that worked. When he’d faced the goblins back on his university campus after choosing his first class, he hadn’t been able to understand what they said. Since then, he could understand all Denizens—he thought it was through the magic of the tower, but he’d understood the invasion leader…

Siobhan shrugged. “The System must be translating somehow, or maybe these invaders had a skill that let them be understood.” She nodded. “That would track. Their ‘slaves’ would need to understand their wishes, and they wouldn’t bother switching it off because who cares what a slave hears?”

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

Justin piped up again, “John heard them complaining about how they’d been forced to practice skills and not been allowed to level up for years in preparation for this mission, so he’s got half of the survivors doing sword cuts and spear thrusts, while the other half are practising their spells or upping their physical and magical resistances.”

“Quite forward-thinking, that one.” Howard scratched his beard with the end of his axe’s haft. “Makes me wonder where he’d be now if not for those invaders.”

Xavier inclined his head, rage bubbling up in his chest. “We’ll wipe all the invaders off the Earth. We’ll stop this from happening again.”

Determination pushing him forward, Xavier showed the others how to access The Moon Sky Dungeon. They each looked sceptical when he described the process of pinching the moon, so he did it right in front of them and entered the dungeon.

In a flash, he was transported. He stood on a beach. Waves lapped a few inches from his boots and he sunk slightly into the sand underfoot. A large, full moon hung high in the sky, its silver light illuminating the island he found himself on.

Xavier stared up at that moon. The other two dungeons had been underground. He tried to spot a ceiling, but he couldn’t—the moon looked real, even though it was about three times the size as what he was used to, and at least as many times as bright.

The beach stretched on for miles to his left and right, but the way through the dungeon was clear. The sand terminated onto a rocky, switchback path that crisscrossed up the side of the mountain.

At the mountain’s highest peak, a building made of solid stone stood. It looked like some sort of pyramid or temple, like what he’d encountered at the end of his very first tower floor.

Something howled in the distance, and Xavier could imagine it was howling at the moon.

The others arrived after about a minute of him standing there, just long enough for him to take in his surroundings.

He halted the chatter he knew would start at their arrival. They had been dallying too much in the other dungeons, and he didn’t want to do that this time around.

Xavier led the way up the path. He could clearly make out the auras, hundreds of them, like far-off lanterns in the night, dotting the mountainside. They appeared as red dots on his mini-map—a map that was draped in shadow but for where they stood.

He made the others move at as swift a pace as they could manage, using his Willpower Infusion spell to take control of the dungeon inhabitants before he could even see them hiding along the path. No undead to worry about here. The enemies had been been poised, ready to ambush whoever walked by, hiding in caves that looked like they’d been hand carved—or maybe claw-carved—into the mountain.

How they expected to ambush anyone with their auras visible, Xavier didn’t know.

He used Identify on the first of the enemies he saw.

{Werewolf - Level 30}

Werewolves are Denizens suffering from a disease that heavily alters their cores, causing them to turn into wild beasts during the full moon, or sometimes at will if the Denizen is powerful enough.

Some say the first werewolf was created by accident, as a Denizen schooled in the art of transmogrification made an alteration to themselves that they could not revert. Others say it is a curse inflicted upon them by the very gods themselves.

Perhaps only the System knows the truth.

Identify has reached Rank 29!

The beast certainly looked like a werewolf. It walked on two legs and had a wolf-like head with a long snout. It’s maw was open, lips pulled back, jagged teeth on full display. It had thick brown fur than glowed silver at the moon’s touch. Its claws looked deadly sharp, and Xavier imagined this beast had been in many a human’s nightmare before they’d ever been integrated into the System.

Xavier had the others kill it, and then they moved swiftly onward.

Though he was curious, as the amount of information the System had given him was much more than usual when he’d used his Identify skill, including a history of how werewolves might have come about.

There was one line in the description that had him a little worried: Some say the first werewolf was created by accident, as a Denizen schooled in the art of transmogrification made an alteration to themselves that they could not revert.

A denizen schooled in the art of transmogrification… Howard’s axe slammed into the beast’s shoulder, killing the werewolf in a single blow as Xavier contemplated the words. Transmogrification, as far as he was aware, was the process of changing one’s form or shape. A process that he’d begun to undergo when he’d been assimilating different materials into his body to grow strong enough to take on the Lord of the Endless Horde.

One that had put a great big question mark right beside his race whenever he looked at his status screen. One that had even given him claws and silver-tinged skin—though the claws had diminished when he’d advanced to E Grade, and were now no more than eerily sharp fingernails.

Xavier stared at the corpse of the first slain werewolf, a gaping wound in its shoulder where Howard’s double-bearded axe had cleaved through it.

If I’m not careful, am I going to accidentally turn myself into a werewolf? Or something worse?

The very thought sent a shiver down his spine.

The dungeon didn’t turn out to be anything special. The werewolves hunted in small packs, but Xavier never gave them a chance. His party gained levels as they climbed the switchback mountain path all the way to the peak.

The structure at the top of the mountain looked vaguely like a ziggurat—a pyramidal stepped temple—but it didn’t look thousands of years old. It looked new. Like it had been built sometime in the last few years.

There was an entrance up a small set of steps in the centre, leading to the inside of the temple. Xavier couldn’t sense the aura of whatever was inside, but he knew it must be the dungeon boss.

Some sort of mega werewolf, no doubt.

Xavier was about to enter the dungeon when Howard tapped his shoulder from behind. He turned and looked at the man with a raised eyebrow. “What is it?”

Howard glanced at the entrance. “We’ve gained a fair few levels in these dungeons, along with the titles. Do you think we could try and take this boss on our own? Without you controlling it.”

Justin nodded. “We should be able to take it.”

Xavier glanced at Siobhan.

“It’s about time we move out of your shadow and show you we can take care of ourselves.” She smirked.

“All right.” Xavier motioned toward the ziggurat’s entrance. “Have at it.” He deposited Charon’s Scythe into his Storage Ring and crossed his arms. “I won’t interfere,” he said, thinking, unless you’re in danger. “I suppose I’ve been a little too protective of you guys.”

“We like that you’ve been protective,” Siobhan said. “But other than you, we’re probably the strongest Denizens on Earth. It’s about time we prove that.”

Justin grinned at the entrance. Howard hefted his battle-axe.

“Oh, they grow up so fast.” Xavier chuckled.

The other members of his party entered the ziggurat.