Astrid strained her senses, listening for any potential dangers hiding in the darkness. The candlelight only allowed her to see a few feet in every direction, and there was nothing but air inside the small, illuminated area.

Once she was sure she couldn’t hear anything, she began exploring the room, using her abilities to ensure there were no traps in her path. Her first priority was to figure out where the exit was and if it was locked. She assumed it was, but just in case it wasn't, there was no reason to spend time in this room. She had had enough of this dungeon and just wanted to get out as soon as possible.

She reached the wall on the opposite side of the room without incident and searched for a while without finding anything resembling a door. She double-checked, but nothing indicated that there was an exit here. Then she checked the other walls. She made it all the way around the room without finding an exit.

Then she went around again, examining every inch of the walls from the ground to as high as she could reach, looking for any clue that could help her, yet she still found nothing. Fear rose inside Astrid. What if she could find a way out? She pushed the thoughts away before they could affect her spirit negatively and forced herself to check everything one more time. The exit had to be somewhere, right? After all, dungeons weren’t supposed to be impossible to clear.

She completed the third round with no luck and sank to the ground miserably, not knowing what to do next. Her head pounded from the effort of concentrating, and she just wanted to sleep until the pain went away. However, she didn’t dare rest here. Who knew what would happen if she let her guards down? Besides, her concussion wouldn’t get better until she got medical attention, so she had to keep looking for an exit. If it wasn’t by the walls, it had to be elsewhere in the room. Maybe there was a staircase hidden in the darkness. If she was going to find it, she had to start looking immediately. Every second, the candle burned away, and in a few hours, she would have no light left.

She forced herself back up and began searching the room. With nothing but the small candle, it was difficult to make any sense of her surroundings. Even after walking through the whole thing, she had found nothing of interest. She decided to search one more time. After all, it would have been easy to miss something.

Suddenly, the ground under her foot no longer felt like the cave floor. Instead of being rocky, it was smooth. She bent down, moving the candle closer so she could get a good view of the ground. It looked like she was standing on large tiles with blue lines and curves that didn’t form anything she recognized, though one of the tiles in the middle seemed to be missing. Was she supposed to find it? Was that how she got out?

Since she didn’t know what to do with it, she went to look for more clues. Now that she was looking for it, she found a few other tiled areas, but these clearly depicted a flower. It was odd that it was just that one that was different from the others, so she went back to examine it some more.

There were eight in total, with a gap where the ninth should have been. She found that the tiles could be slid along the ground into the spot of the missing one with ease. Maybe she had to rearrange them so they made a flower pattern like the rest. It seemed plausible, and she had no better plan, so she began working on it.

It wasn’t as easy as she had hoped to get all the tiles into the right place, as she could only move one at a time. She tried to lift them up, but they would budge. The process was only made harder by her concussion, which made her unable to recover focus. It was quickly going down, getting dangerously low. She had to solve this puzzle before her focus ran out completely, or she would be stuck with no way of escaping.

For a moment, she worried that rearranging the tiles wouldn’t amount to anything. In that case, she would have used up her last focus on nothing. She doubted she would get a chance to try something else.

Eventually, she got the last piece slid into place and heard a loud click. A green light flashed out from one of the walls, and a door appeared. She rushed towards it, ecstatic that she would finally get to leave the room. Just before opening the door, she ensured that he was still invisible. She had no idea what she would find on the other side, so she had to be careful.

The newly formed exit led into another tunnel where the moss-covered walls provided a bit of lighting, even if it was a bit creepy. With dismay, she noticed that monsters crowded the tunnel more tightly here than they had in the previous one. She wasn’t fond of crowds, and it didn’t matter if they were people or monsters. Still, she had to get through here to escape the dungeon, so she steeled herself and began walking.

Every nerve in her body was on edge as she carefully made her way through the tunnel. The monsters were snarling and snapping at each other. Sometimes fights broke out between the monsters, and it was a miracle that Astrid didn’t get caught up in one.

She worried that since so many monsters roamed this dungeon, more of them would soon escape to the outside world, causing more havoc for the people living in and near Lagon. Soon, the city wouldn’t be able to take in any more refugees.

Part of Astrid felt like she should do something about the monster while she was in here, but she would stand a chance against all of them coming at her simultaneously.

Eventually she got through the door, and as she had learned to expect, it disappeared behind her. It bothered her less this time, as she was just glad to be out of the monster-infested tunnel. Still, she doubted she would ever get fully used to it. She scanned the room, trying to figure out what she was dealing with. Light streamed in from an opening in the opposite wall, illuminating the room. Stalagmites and stalactites covered large parts of the room, and in a few places, they had grown together, forming a pillar from floor to ceiling.

The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

Astrid focused on the light. She couldn’t make out what was on the other side, but it had to be the exit. She wanted to go there immediately, but a monster in the middle of the room was blocking her way. It looked like a giant bear with frizzy brown fur and daggerlike claws.

She stood frozen in place, staring at the monster, but it didn’t move except for its chest slowly rising and falling. If the monster was sleeping, this would be an easy kill. She pulled out her dagger and slowly moved closer, careful not to make a sound. However, as she neared it, something felt off. Her low focus and pounding headage made it hard to think, but for some reason she felt like she was in imminent danger, and the only thing dangerous in here was the sleeping bear.

She stopped and looked at it some more, trying to figure out why it made her feel so uneasy. This was just a single monster, and she had fought countless of them in the past, so what made this one different? Sure, it was bigger than others she had seen, but it was sleeping, and she had a powerful surprise attack. No matter how long she looked at the monster, all she could see was a sleeping bear.

Then she realized that was the problem. Looking at the monster didn’t give her any information about it. Ever since she unlocked her monster fighting skill, she had been able to tell what kind of monster she was encountering and what level it was at through an ability she had gained with the skill. That ability didn’t activate when she looked at the bear, which was something she had never experienced before. She knew this was a monster, but that was because no natural bear would grow this large.

She thought about how her ability worked and realized it could only get information about monsters up to a single level above her own monster-slaying skill, which was currently level one. If she was unable to identify this monster, it was because it was level three or above. She stood no chance in a fight against that monster, even if she took it by surprise. Even level two monsters were more than she could handle in a direct fight.

If this monster woke up while she was still in the room, it would kill her in one strike. This was not a fight she could win.

She carefully walked away from the sleeping monster again and around it towards the exit. She feared her heartbeat was loud enough to wake the bear, and she hardly dared to breathe as she used all her stealth skill to make it around the bear.

The monster shifted, and she froze in place, then chided herself. If the bear was waking up, she had to hurry. She began walking again, faster now, while still doing everything she could to be quiet. The bear behind her grunted, but she did not waste time looking back to see what it was doing. Instead, she bolted for the exit. The noise behind her got louder, and the cavern shook as the bear let out a powerful roar. Stalactites rattled and broke off the cave ceiling, crashing to the ground and splintering, sending countless sharp rocks in every direction. Avoiding them all was as impossible as avoiding hail, and Astrid was quickly losing health to cuts and bruises. Luckily, she wasn’t crushed under a falling stalactite. However, she lost valuable time dodging, and when the cavern stopped shaking, she was lying on the ground, still several feet from the exit.

She watched in horror as the bear got to its feet and began walking towards her. As she scrambled to her feet, she had no idea if she was still invisible or if the bear could see her, but she knew she couldn’t risk waiting around to find out. She ran towards the exit as fast as she could. Behind her, the sound of rocks shattering reverberated, and since she didn’t dare look back, she could only assume the bear was pursuing her. Any moment, she feared that its teeth and claws would sink into her body and tear her apart.

Astrid threw herself through the exit, and it vanished behind her before she hit the ground.

She lay gasping as relief flooded through her. That could have gotten horribly wrong. Figuring that she might still not be out of danger, she took in her surroundings. She could see a cave opening just a few feet away, with light streaming in from it.

If this isn’t the exit, I don’t know what I’ll do, she thought as she got to her feet. She was about to walk to it when she noticed something. Treasure chests lined one side of the room. She counted six in total, but only two of them were unlocked.

She went to the first and opened it. Its bright glow blinded her for a moment, but it quickly dimmed enough for her to see the content. Five potions that she took up.

You have found a heath replenishment potion

You have found a stamina replenishment potion

You have found a mana replenishment potion

You have found a focus replenishment potion

You have found a spirit replenishment potion

She still had plenty of healing potions in her first aid kit, but she also knew how fast she could go through her supplies when she found herself in dire situations, so she put them in her bag with the rest.

She moved on to the next chest and opened it, this time shielding her eyes from the glow while taking out the content.

You have found ten large copper coins

She looked at the other chests, especially paying attention to the locks. She was sure she could break one or two of them. She debated whether or not to try picking them until she realized what she was thinking. She was horrified that she would even consider doing so. It would be like stealing. Those chests clearly weren’t meant for her, or else they would have already been unlocked like the others.

It scared her how quickly she had come to consider using the abilities she had gained from reading the divine book of deception. She tried to convince herself that it was because of the concussion and the massive headache that she pondered such things, but she knew it was a lie. This wasn’t the first time the abilities she gained from her skills tried to convince her to do something wrong.

She decided to ignore the remaining chests and headed for the exit. She ended up in the same place she had entered the dungeon, but luckily the monsters that had chased her inside were long gone.

The sun was setting, which was less lucky. Soon the city gates would close, and spending the night in the forest after everything she had just been through was the last thing she wanted. She began running, hoping she would make it back in time.