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Corvayne yawned and stretched, greeting the brightening yellow sky above their campsite. Outside the guard tower, he could see village ruins and lines of oddly colored pine trees. The third floor as always was cooler then the other floors they explored, but miles safer to rest at. He walked down the stairs where Mister I was sitting with Dave, a bald headed older man who was sharing coffee the monk had made. Corvayne took a seat by Mister I, who handed him a cup of chai tea.

Dave was sitting calmly. He had added a cloak to his camo gear, the homespun fabric of it an odd juxposition with his cap. Corvayne was glad the older man was doing better: Mister I had been applying a prayer for mending and that had helped the man deal with his anxiety. Mister I also was leading him through meditation and quiet talks at the start and end of their day. It probably didn't hurt they were camping away from the first two floors where packs of monsters were extremely common. Nor did it hurt that the large furry slugs on the third floor were absurdly weak. Corvayne wasn't sure how why they hunted. He figured they probably ate moss off the bottom of the forest floor or bugs if it was based on a real animal.

He looked at the group putting their gear on. He had gone to town to outfit their new... friends... in equipment after the first day. Dealing with the group wasn't that bad aside from Seru. Wick had, after laughing at him, warned him that he had made a critical error with throwing her phone off into the abyss. His objective had been to remove both their likenesses from her inevitable info dump. He had no questions that the four 'normies' would talk, with Dave being the only one who might not want to speak about this place. Corvayne wasn't a psychopath so he rejected the idea of not helping them. It would probably be the same as personally cutting their throats when they slept. In doing so he had to accept they would tell tall tales about him and Wick. The problem with throwing the phone away was that it had caused some damaged part of Seru that wanted attention to make her pick fights with Corvayne then moments later hit on him even more brazenly.

Gary, the guy Wick dubbed 'missing fedora', had a lot to say about why treating Seru like garbage would just make him 'hotter' to her. The entire thing sounded to him totally unhinged, as he was never lacking in attractive tormenters and the thought of seeing them again made him ill. He had started ordering Gary to do pushups whenever he got onto the subject of women. Between that and Gary's fanatical attempts to follow Corvayne's own warmup and emulate it meant that Mister I had to call for mending every day to deal with Gary hurting himself.

That left him dealing with Seru still, who's alternating between vague threats that he 'owed her', and bumping into him on 'accident' left him confused. She also had picked, of all things, a pair of spiked brass knuckles as her weapons. That was probably a calculated move to get hand to hand training from him. She especially wanted help with learning throws. He did have a moment of sublime satisfaction from her response to getting completely splattered by goblin blood when she got her first kill. It wasn't unusual for a person to have a melt down after the first time they ended something's life. Of course, it wasn't remorse that she killed a living creature, it was that she had done so in the grossest way possible. Then she flipped and demanded Corvayne help her bathe.

The entire weird display made him miss Hari more, as at least the elf could act like a normal person in public. He owed the elf a better effort, and hoped she was okay. He wasn't as worried about her party now. They had killed enough goblins on the first floor that even if she had lost her memory and wandered back in, there wouldn't be an army to distract them. He had to trust they could keep each other safe if he somehow didn't spot them.

On the opposite side from Seru was Jake. Jake had maybe dialed back to thinking there was a fifty-fifty shot he should be calling the shots rather then second-guessing every decision Corvayne made. Corvayne had used some of the spare gold they had found in chests on the first floors to outfit Jake with a blade, wood shield, and leather armor including helmet, shoulder pads, chest piece, gloves, and boots. That was at Jake's request and made sense to Corvayne: Jake wanted to take charge, and in order to sway the three people who he came in with it meant putting his blade where his mouth was. Despite not liking the man at first Corvayne had to admit he at least was willing to spar every day to try to get better with his sword and shield. It also seemed that fighting Corvayne in a fair fight with training weapons had reinforced why Corvayne had told them over and over if they tried to escape on their own they'd die to the strong monsters that were blocking the exit.

That lead him to thinking about an observation Wick made the previous night. All four of them were getting better at an absurd rate with their chosen weapons. They were not stopping nearly as many times for breaks, and they were getting better at marching between floors. Seru had converted Gary to the Gygaxian thought process that they were getting stronger because they were 'leveling up'. They were crazy but it meant he had two people totally fine with roaming the first floor killing goblins. Jake and Dave were both ready to leave but had yet to try to up and leave on their own. He figured the first floor was safe enough now they could travel to the top floor, unload everyone, then walk out and back in to wait for their friends.

Jake's last sore point, shared in various degrees by the others, were accusations of hording magic items. Which, to be fair, he was. He knew where the chests were, and was going to use the gear to both to pull them out of the dungeon and for a long time into the future.

He, Wick, and Mister I agreed not to share any loot pulled from the ghosts and stolen from under a dragon's nose. Some of it he earmarked for Hari again, the book especially. The previous day he had taken Wick and Mister I across the bridge to the creepy ruined castle, leaving the four alone at camp. The first challenge in the ruins, a city square full of ghosts, he emulated his original fight where he gathered them up and used [Light Cut] and [Cross Skill: Soul Reaper] to repeat the interaction that caused [Combo: Soul Nova] to go off. For getting the second chest, he roamed the streets and fought a dozen of the weird tent-wearing corpse guards. The boots of running made things so much simpler as he could bait them into coming after him to a safe spot using [Cross Skill: Whirling Axe]. On the first one he fought he tried to activate the combo again but it didn't stick. Perhaps it needed something weak to [Soul Reaper] for the interaction to work? Wick's [Disrupt] and Mister I learning [Double shot] were a huge help in picking the guards off. The monk was pretty happy about his new skill as well. He was overjoyed he could kill twice as many animals with the same number of arrows! He might have been in a better mood because he got the chess board without having to negotiate with Mosh.

Sneaking the items out of the dead dragon's treasure chest was the most dangerous part, but with boots of running on and the cleaver in hand he was pretty sure he could fight the dragon again and win. It was moot as the thing didn't wake up, so he now had the magma knife and his wood-looking chain mail shirt out of there. The armor was nice, but the knife he had earmarked earlier. It essentially summoned a volcano inside whatever it stuck so he was going to save that for the monk that had killed him. One thing that he noted when looting those chests was the force shield was missing. Did the monk destroying it have some sort of weird time ripple effect? Annoying.

Anyway, they hadn't left their charges completely without loot. The undead tent monsters had a wicked looking spear that Corvayne gave to Gary, a serrated blade for Jake, and a large mace that Seru took. Letting them take some gold and silver just meant that Corvayne wouldn't have to carry as much stuff as him, Wick, and Mister I were already overburdened from guard gear. The rest of the loot including 2 huge swords, another cleaver, a mace, a battle axe and three nasty looking polearms. That he didn't have to make more than one trip with over two hundred pounds of weapons bound in a bundle on his back made him realize he was stronger than even a few years ago when they made him run around the wall with a hundred and fifty pounds of stones in his pack. In typical Watcher style, everyone else on that run was given a normal backpack.

Corvayne had told the newbies anything they wanted to carry from the pile of weapons was their loot, and he'd haul the rest down to floor one later. He was left with a glaive that was possibly too big for him, a battle axe, and a two handed sword. At least, until Seru handed him her spare weapon back, as did Gary with a billhook. Even the allure of possibly magical items faded when you had to haul them all over.

Breakfeast pulled him back to attention. It was eggs, cheese, slug steaks, and bread. The good food helped everyone's mood. Even the ever-sour Jake had changed his tune on monster meals, praising on Mister I while also slyly asking the Monk if he could get a course in butchering and cooking monsters.

Wick looked at him, and he nodded. The loot was a pretty good token of goodwill, and they had secured all the stuff they needed from earlier floors. It was time to move on.

Corvayne danced around another barrage of steel cables, the stray branches lashing the floor with sparks as he activated [Juxtapose] than switched to the freezing short sword as he leapt onto the bark back of the vine-tree. The monster could still hit him, but the vines were weaker if he was too close, and it's sensory organs, embedded in the bark, were at the front of the monster. Each [Backstab] froze sap in the monster, cracking parts of it until finally it died. Corvayne stepped back, a few minor cuts marking the group clearing the last of the guardians of the stairway out. In a few moments, he would deliver the four to the exit and could explore in peace.

Corvayne had lead them up through the river and into the weird steel jelly floor. His reasoning was that they had a rifle this time and could attack and lure trees out, whereas the other route they took had a much more dangerous fourth floor. In practice, the monsters were huge walking walls of wood. [Disrupt] and rifle shots could take one down with five minutes of combined fire, but they needed someone to hack the monsters apart if they were not going to run circles around everything. With his boots of running Corvayne was able to pull close to the trees and mangle them with enchanted weapons. Some very firm herding prevented any trap related injuries. To be honest, Corvayne was pleased they had reached the dragon with their entire team alive. Corvayne walked up the stairs into the waiting room. This time, ghostly images of a woman adventurer with a crossbow stood addressing a group of knights. The dreary office space was a little different this time: there were lots and lots of the same potted plant all over the place, and a window to an outside that looking like an endless rainy city could be seen, the streets entirely underwater under the dark grey skies. He looked at the group that Wick kept calling 'the normies' and tried to stay positive.

“All right, one more time. This area lead to a dragon last time. We have a rooftop to run around on. There's two areas where the roof is higher, everyone but me is going to clump by them. If the dragon comes after you, just play keep away until I can get it back to fighting me. When you see the dragon get up on the roof, you want to be out of sight of it, the thing can fan fire impossibly far and wide. I gave Wick a weapon that can help ward it. If you're caught out, try to get behind her. Any questions?”

“How did you know all this stuff, like where this place was, and the dragon?” Seru asked while chewing gum.

“Because we've been here before. Weeks ago.” Corvayne shrugged. “Next?”

Jake raised his hand as he was already speaking. “What if you die?”

Corvayne smiled. “Well, then keep the dragon busy and hope Wick can kill it before it burns you to death.”

Gary shot his hand up. “Can I help you?”

Corvayne smiled harder. “Help me by keeping the dragon away from your group with your spear.”

Dave raised a shaking hand. “How big is the dragon? Is there something else we can fight?”

Corvayne felt his smile strain. “Like I said... It's way more dangerous than it's size suggests. It's like a very large dog sized flamethrower.”

Seru raised a hand while bumping her chest out. “Can we have a quickie in the bathroom since we might die?”

Corvayne bit his lip. Don't give her attention. “Let's kill this thing then you guys can use the restrooms at the park to do whatever you want. Without me. Sky's the limit.”

He walked into the double doors, the drab office in a ruined city giving way to the vertigo lights of not-Cascadia. Corvayne stretched a little as he walked forward, then made sure everyone was inside as the dragon jumped up and roared.

Seru pointed at the dragon. “Ahahah he's so tiny!”

Corvayne lept forward as the dragon landed on the ground. He immediately used [Flow-Like-Water] when the dragon started moving to land a few glancing blows but switched to his cleaver as the monster overshot where he was, spewing fire into empty air. Corvayne then activated [Butchery], the blue metal cleaver slamming down into the dragon's back trailing a phantom wake of blood.

Sometimes, Corvayne reflected as he lopped the dragon's back leg off, a plan fell apart in a good way. That's what he was thinking when he heard a second roar from the rooftop they came into.

Corvayne frowned. Why were there two dragons? “Uh oh.”

Gary yelled as a yellow dragon, also the side of a large dog, landed on the ground with a cloud of dust right by him. The first thing the dragon did was tail-slap the poor man into the side of the building.

Wick ran forward and pivoted, blasting the monster with [Disrupt]. Corvayne couldn't pay attention to the other one just yet: he had to leap over an tail sweep then use [Butchery] on the monster when it started spreading it's wings.

If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

“Oh no you DONT!”

The dragon snaked it's neck back and seared his arm as he used [Cross skill: Flows-Like-Water] to hit it with the back of the cleaver as he moved away from the crippled monster to rush to Jake's aid. The yellow dragon had a bowling ball sized bone orb stuck on it's tail, and charged the man's shield with it's horns then knocked him over with a tail strike. Dave in a panic had tripped running from it. Seru actually ran in and punched it in the side of the face, and the monster staggered for a moment. Corvayne was there and sank his cleaver deep into the back of the monster with [Butchery] before he had to pull it out and roll to avoid being brained by the club. The monster squared up with Seru and Dave then opened it's mouth.

Corvayne used [Cross Skill: Shield bash] and slammed into the monster's face, diverting what looked like a mouthful of steaming mud that started eating through the floor. Seru started screaming as part of it got on her arm.

The other dragon meanwhile was starting to take deep breaths. Corvayne willed his shadow hand to give him a two handed blade off his bundle, and passing it to his hands while grabbing the cleaver. Holding the huge sword at his side, Corvayne used [Cross Skill: Draw], feeling something awaken as he brought the blade to bear, swinging and scoring a wound on the yellow dragon's side. He then used [Cross Skill: Shadow step] onto the green dragon, feral desire to fight and destroy fighting with a sort of frantic control he needed to use [Cross Skill: Shield bash] on the monster's cheek, spinning it to unleash a lethal fan into the building rather than Corvayne, then using [Cross Skill: Sheath the Blade] as he put the huge weapon back to his side, the hunger to fight like a beast requiring him to bite his lip as he gasped for breath then pulled out his spear. There was a click and the green dragon started spraying blood and screetching. No time to gloat, the Yellow dragon had gored Jake and was now lining up Wick to try to bath her in acid. Wick ran behind a corner of the building and the dragon started running after her, barfing a trail of sticky brown acid. Corvayne ran the other way and as Wick came around the little building he used [Juxtapose] with her, pushing her a few feet away as the monster, still dribbling acid, skidded to a halt and breathed in.

Corvayne had a choice. He could move easily off to the side, but Dave was directly behind him. He put his arms in front of his face and got punched by what felt like a bag of wet laundry fired out of a cannon. Then it started to burn. Corvayne knew he was screaming but he dug his feet in, acid splattering down his body and leaving a trail of pure pain.

The monster had started to move past him, perhaps figuring that Corvayne was as good as dead. He felt the pain lessen as something like water ran down his body, taking most of his clothing from his chest down with it, but cleaning away the acid.

The pain was maddening, and he was still screaming, but Corvayne had a lifetime of pain. His shadow hand handed him his cleaver, and he activated [Butchery] first on the monster's tail, the swift blue blade chopping right through it. The monster let out a horrible whine, and turned to him. He didn't wait for another gout of acid as he grabbed the severed tail and whipped it up and into the monster's face. Then with his cleaver, he swung down again. [Butchery] Sliced through a horn and part of the monster's cheek. It started to spew acid but he used his other hand to bring the morning-star like tail down, slamming the things head into the ground where it started choking on it's own acid vomit.

Corvayne didn't stop, slamming the tail down on it's head over, and over, and over, and over, each impact jarring his arm, sending waves of pain down his body. It was only when he was sure it's skull was totally destroyed did he stop. The other dragon was still as well, his massive use of stamina proving worth it. Wick let her wand fall. She had been blasting it too. Seru was alive, holding her arm and crying. Dave was pushing himself away from Corvayne, looking terrified. Jake was clutching his chest, and Mister I was helping him with Mending. Gary was looking at him in awe, arm danging uselessly at his side. He looked down at himself, covered in dragon blood, skin peeling and melted. His backpack would need new straps for his waist. Oh. He needed everything aside from new boots. Somehow the boots of running were unharmed.

Wick smirked. “Your dicks hanging out.”

Corvayne smirked back at her then passed out.

He woke in the same storm-scoured hill covered in thorns that seemed to call him whenever he killed an exit guardian. Pillars towering over him, this time he didn't immediately sit up. He didn't feel pain here, and wanted to just take a moment before he had to deal with his body trying to heal being melted by acid. That and he wasn't wearing pants.

The weird lightning wraith, in the same tone, spoke then. “NOT READY.” then blasted off. Yeah yeah. Cool. From now on, the tall lightning monster was dubbed Sparky until it told him something besides that he wasn't ready.

Corvayne stood up, and looked. Something new this time: in the middle of his landing hill was a red floating orb. Oh yeah, it had crawled its way into his skin before. Odd. He pushed himself up and went over to it. Touching it, he felt a weird warm feeling, like something alive. It felt friendly though, so he decided not to get too worried. He wished he had a clue what any of the stuff in here was. He still hadn't figured out what the last gate he stepped through did for him. Or if it did anything. He reviewed the gates. Ah, the wood one was back, with a magnifying glass. Maybe a set of investigation skills? Or he could wrestle with thorns and get the power to zoom his vision in. Then again, there was the stone gate with a man running... if it was something that made him run faster, he could give Wick the boots.

An idle thought crossed his mind: what happened if he just walked through one of the already open gates? It was worth a shot. Maybe he'd make his shadowy hands stronger? He didn't have a coin to flip, so he took his spear (which was there, even though the rest of his pack wasn't) and stood it up on it's point. He noticed he was wearing pants, which then flicked into damaged gear when he thought about it. Was he half naked or not here? Make up your mind! Anyway, he spun the spear like a top. For a half second it twirled in the dirt, then wobbled and fell over. The back of the spear pointed to the somewhat imposing obsidian door with a billion thorns around it, while the front pointed at the open door swirling with shadows.

He stepped through the already open door, and woke up in searing pain. He fumbled for his pack and drank a healing potion, then looked around. Mister I was tending to injuries. The only person totally fine was Wick. Mister I had put a floral print button up shirt over him. He reached into his pack and pulled out a spare pair of pants. It seemed his pack would need some new straps, boots were fine, his cloak was totally fine which surprised him a little. His shirt was ruined but she was going to drag him shopping anyway after they got out.

Wick looked around. “I'm going to go ahead and grab the cooler before they get ideas.”

“Deal.”

She headed through the doors. Corvayne stood. “Mister I, can we get everyone out of here?”

“Soon. I fixed Gary's arm but he needs to lay off it a while. Seru's arm was really badly burnt by acid, I gave her some medicine for pain. Dave was shaken and a little hurt but he'll be okay once we are out of here. I took one of our potions for Jake... the monster partially disemboweled him. I had to push guts in then apply some topically... somehow he says he feels fine. I still told him to go to his doctor and get an X-ray.”

“You're a real Doctor Icarriii.”

The man laughed, a hint of pain in his eyes. “Sadly Corvayne, I lack the most important part of being a real doctor, as you'd say.”

Corvayne looked at Mister I. “What don't you have?”

“A large bank account!” The pain was mirth. Oh.

“Do no harm, unless it would taste good smoked?”

Mister I laughed and elbowed Corvayne, which caused him to spasm in pain due to the fact his skin was still a mangled mess of acid seared flesh.

Jake walked over, still rubbing his ribs. He looked, tired? “Hey Corvayne... I gotta apologize. You're a damn good fighter and now I get why you took all the stuff.”

“It's fine. If I was a better leader, I might have expected the tower to throw something new at me. Tell you what, there's something you can do to make us square.”

Jake nodded. “What's that?”

“Help drag these dragon bodies out of here and into Mister I's truck.”

With Gary helping and Dave looking sick at the idea of touching either blood soaked body, Corvayne tugged the dragon bodies into the next area, the same camp ground with a pair of coolers. Wick was sitting at a picnic bench looking through them.

Corvayne's second pack had made it through the acid bath he took. He set down a bunch of the weapons he'd been hauling around to the newbies to take to the truck or steal, keeping only the two handed sword and battle axe. Wick was making stacks of cash as well.

Corvayne glanced into the cooler. “Did it give us money this time too?”

“We'll go over the loot later.” Wick waved him away and started pushing wads of cash into hands.

Mister I got Gary, Jake, and Dave made a stretcher for the dragons using spare polearms and Mister I's tarp. After the finished he gestured to the path out. “Good news! This leads out to the parking lot.”

As they dragged the tarp down the gravel path and vanished, Seru walked up to Corvayne and Wick.

“Hey like... you like still owe me for a phone.”

Wick handed her a wad of cash. Corvayne gave her a handful of gold coins.

“That should do it. Have a great life Seru.” Corvayne waved.

“Uh nice try. This is the story of a life time! I wanna interview you two!”

Wick looked at her. “I thought you just posted pictures of expensive stuff you bought online.”

“Yes. But I really wanted to be an investigative reporter! And this is the most interesting thing I've ever seen!”

Wick sighed. “No deal. Go home, maybe show off that you can use [Judo Throw].” Wick put the second cooler down on a table and opened it up. She pulled out... a cell phone covered in pink stickers. Seru was fast enough to grab it right out of Wick's hands.

“It's mine? Oh it's mine! Cool! Haha!”

Wick stood up. “You idiot! If you post a bunch of stuff about this, you might literally kill all of us!”

Seru stuck her tongue out. “Ha! That's like, a little kid threat! I like you guys, and the whole world will too.” Corvayne walked over to pluck the phone out of her hands. Seru put it in her purse and smiled at him. He summoned all his diplomacy.

“Seru, listen, Wick's not lying. If you want to post about this, fine, but you have to scrub us out of your story.”

“It's not fine!” Wick fumed.

“Ok. I will not post a thing... if you dump her and be my boyfriend.” Seru folded her arms.

Corvayne sighed. “Is there something that we can actually do that will convince you to not publish?” He glanced back at Wick, who looked furious. Was she mad at him for not just playing along? Or at her for suggesting it?

Seru started laughing. “Even the tower gave the phone back! It's like the church of Gygax says: The Dungeon provides. How funny, all those hours wasted on Sundays and it was all real! Ok, give me all your gold and cash, and I'll not publish anything related to you.”

Wick's eye was twitching. “You venomous little shit!” she hissed.

Seru held up a finger and did a little head bob. “Excuse me bitch! You were totally looking down on us the entire time! I can tell.”

Corvanye folded his arms. De-escalate. “Would you agree to not publish if we did something for you like, save your life?”

Seru turned to him. “But you would have done that anyway.”

“Yes. You are correct. Instead of just screwing you over, we chose to help you four survive.”

“But you HAVE to help people who are like, in trouble!” Seru's shoulders moved up a little as she held her hands up. “And you can't do something good and then say 'you owe me' and have it still be good!”

Corvayne ignored whatever Wick was trying to signal at him, focusing on staying calm. “Okay. So we are asking for you to help us, and you're demanding money so you don't publish and we don't die. What does that say about you Seru?”

“You guys are making that up, like, cmon!”

Corvayne took a deep breath. He noted that Wick was inching closer and willed her to stop. If Wick attacked Seru, what was the endgame there? Her only crime was being, well, a little stupid and a little greedy. Corvayne wouldn't murder her, and if Wick tried to... He had to trust she wouldn't. He had to make sure she wasn't put in a place where they had to hurt an innocent person. Mostly innocent.

“You know what? We'll give you the rest of the money and gold, for the phone.” He pulled out a wad of cash.

Seru started to reach for the money and stopped. “You know what dude? Let's not do any trading. It's my phone! It's like my arm. Uh... okay, I know you're not happy with that, but look, I need this, okay?” He wasn't doing anything, but she had started stepping back away from him. “Look, we are all adults here...”

Wick dove for her, and managed to bowl the larger girl over. Seru still had her knuckles on but Wick was, somehow, strong enough to pin her down.

“Corvayne! FUCK Corvayne! Grab the damn phone!”

“World's oldest profession...” he reached into Seru's bag and got the phone. Then Seru somehow pushed Wick off hard enough to send her flying, her robe activating and slowing her enough to land safely, if not gracefully.

Seru turned and ran down a gravel path out of the clearing. Wick spat out grass. “That fucking little snitch is going to have a dozen kill-monks ramming staves through our guts in a week!”

Corvayne ran up to her and picked up the purse. “Wick, We can't...”

Her arm shot out and grabbed his. “We are NOT killing that dipshit. No matter how much you want to.”

He smiled at her and helped her up as he shook his head. “I really love that we're on the same page. No, I mean, I really hate that I'm going to save her ass. Can I get some potions out of the cooler, and one of the fire breathing daggers if they packed them?”

Wick looked confused. “What do you mean?”

He gestured at the trail Seru ran down. Next to the gap in the woods a nice brown wood sign with yellow letters that read 'Floors 6-10'.