"It's been weeks since we left the border, Nerok. Don't you think we're far enough away?"

Nerok was the System-approved leader of a group of runaway slaves. The elves thought of themselves as superior to other species due to their long lives even before tiering up. Beastkin on the other hand only had an average base lifespan of 40 years. Which compared to an elf's average base lifespan of 500 years truly is short. To make up for it, the system had made it so leveling up was easier for the short-lived species. Faster leveling meant you would tier up faster. And every time a beastkin tiered up they would receive an additional 10 years of life, where an elf would only get one year more. Still, a beastkin could never come even close to the elven lifespan. The elves used this as an excuse to make any beastkin they could into a slave.

They just wanted to use us to get easier access to BO's. The short lifespan making us animals is just an excuse. Nerok often thought to himself.

The Breakthrough Orbs - often referred to as BO's - existed in tiers and were needed for three things:

Its main purpose was to make someone break through to the next tier - hence its name. This only worked if you crushed a BO with the appropriate tier which was also bound to you. At level 9+ one would need to break a 1st tier BO, at level 19+ it would be a 2nd tier BO and so on. Each time a Dungeon creature was killed there's a 5% chance a BO with a tier matching the Floor tier would appear with the loot. The BO would then bind itself to the first person to touch it.

The most common use of BO's was to power the light in one's house, keep one's fridge and freezer cold and the like. One would have to change the BO’s occasionally, and higher tiers had a higher life expectancy, but everyone could use any BO's for that. A BO you were bound to would be more effective, but only by 10%.

The 3rd use was only done by the nobility. They liked to buy thousands of a specific tier of BO's and merge them into 1 unbound BO using a ritual. The unbound BO would then go to the noble's son or daughter so they could tier up without ever entering a Dungeon. While the nobles of most species simply bought the BO's from Dungeon miners, the elves used slaves for it. The elves saw this as a brilliant strategy as the chance of a tier one BO dropping goes from 5% to 10% when there is a person on level 9+ in the party. Likewise, for 2nd tier BO's and level 19+ and so on. And normal Dungeon miners would tier up immediately, when they get a BO drop at a + level, instead of grinding for BO's. So, the slaves have a much higher BO drop rate. A much stronger and faster supervisor will then be nearby picking up all BO's before any slave can get to them.

Nerok thought for a bit before answering his fellow ursakin. "Yes, we're far enough away that I doubt the elves will ever find us. But last I checked we couldn't agree on what action was best: Do we keep going till we reach Mammalia, which is three times the distance we've already walked away? Or do we look for a good location to settle down in?"

"I remember…" Morghar said with a frustrated sigh. Morghar was an ursakin in his prime: His skin had no wrinkles, his curved bear ears were still bright brown and he was full of energy compared to Nerok. Nerok was more than 25 years Morghar's senior and as such roughly 3 generations older due to their species' short lifespan. The older ursakin looked older than his age - even for beastkin - as the constant fighting without tiering up more than once took its toll on his body. "My cubs are just getting tired of walking all day every day. And you know I would do anything to make them happy."

Nerok knew the feeling. Ursakin had a stronger sense of family and a bigger need to help, protect and stay with their family than any other species or beastkin race. Lupinekin came in a close second but they couldn't quite match the overprotectiveness of a bear. And if the elves had had the family instincts of a ursakin they probably would have noticed their slowly shrinking numbers by now. Something their beastkin slaves had noticed but refrained from pointing out. "It's been a week since we last voted on the topic and then we were still too close to the elves for comfort. It might be a good idea to see how everyone stands on the topic now. Maybe all this walking made someone change their minds…" Nerok gave Morghar a small smile. "It's about time for a lunch break anyway. We can vote afterwards."

Morghar gave a huge smile. "Thanks Chief! You're the best!" Then he started going around spreading the news of lunch break and voting.

Nerok gave an amused shake of the head. He was the oldest of the 98 ex-slaves - soon to be 104 as 6 had been pregnant at the time of their escape - and as such he had been named Chief of their group of refugees. Though his Charisma Class probably helped too. The System had shown its approval by then bestowing him the Achievement 'Nomadic Chief' to him. The Achievement gave a bonus to Toughness to the whole Tribe due to being Nomadic and a personal Charisma bonus to Nerok as the Chief. Nerok didn't feel like he deserved that honor, but he understood the importance of having someone in charge.

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"Look! Look! A Dungeon! We found a Dungeon!" Two lupinekin siblings came running towards the crowd of adult beastkin discussing their options before the vote. The younger one was the one shouting while her older brother simply nodded with wide eyes. Riska and Tuzzik had been sent away to play in the nearby area while the adults were talking. They had been told to stay in hearing range, both so they could hear their parents call them back and so the Tribe could hear them call for help. The lupine siblings, though, had found a love of bending - but not yet daring to outright break - the rules after a lifetime of being a slave, and so had decided to walk just a bit further away than they were allowed.

"A Dungeon?! Show us to it!" Nerok demanded. A Dungeon would be Systemsent. The loot from even just the 1st Floor of a Dungeon would be fantastic for the refugees but the real blessing would be from the access to Breakthrough Orbs. BO's they could finally bind, break and tier up from which would improve their chances of survival and make keeping their freedom much easier.

The siblings turned around, with Riska immediately starting to run back to the Dungeon Portal. Tuzzik being older was able to contain his excitement to a fast walk so the elder ursakin and the rest of the Tribe could keep up. The other children had heard Riska's shout too and ran after her, not wanting to wait for the adults. No one was worried they might try to enter the Dungeon as they all knew you could only do so after the System declared you an adult.

While walking, Tuzzik told the adults what happened. "We were just exploring the forest when we saw a light appear to the left of us. We stopped to observe as we've been taught to do when you don't know if the enemy has noticed you. The light was from a Dungeon Portal! You know, one that just appeared!"

"Good job Tuzzik! And you too Riska!" Nerok praised the siblings. The adults had caught up to the children and saw them surround the Dungeon Portal. The lupine siblings wore bright smiles, and their tails were wagging.

The Portal looked like a stone doorway with a curved top. The middle of one side was reflective, not like a mirror but more like the reflection of dirty water. The greenish reflection told the beastkin that the first tier of the Dungeon was jungle or forest themed. While they couldn't tell its monster theme from the outside, they could narrow it down some. No undead Dungeon could have forest as its first tier theme.

"Anyone against staying here, building a village around the Portal?!" Morghar asked in a loud voice. The main argument for going all the way to Mammalia was the guarantee that they would be allowed into a Dungeon to get their tier ups.

Naturally, no one had any reason to want to walk all the way there anymore.

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The following discussion took longer than it should have. Nerok had started it by touching the stone part of the Dungeon to trigger the System message informing any potential Dungeon miners how many may enter at a time.

When Nerok announced that 6 adults would enter the Dungeon while the others set up camp, everyone started to argue why they should be one of the 6. Nerok quickly realized it would be night before a Party got decided on, if he didn't interrupt them.

"QUIET!" Silence followed. "Firstly, the best Party is a balanced Party! As such the Party will have one member of each race!" People nodded in agreement. It was well known that each beastkin race started out better at one Ability Score specific to the race. "Secondly, the best Parties have members that trust each other! That have each other's backs!" Nerok waited a moment. Letting it sink in. It might keep people from getting angry. "We need to be mining this Dungeon as soon as possible! I am your chosen chief, so I will design the first Party to enter the Dungeon. This will give the rest of us time to make camp and decide who's in a Party with who. Is this acceptable to you?!" Nods and agreements came from all around.

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Nerok took a moment to consider which 6 would best fit the requirements. "I will name the Party in order of their natural Ability Score. As such the first named will be the ursakin of Strength! The ursakin will be Morghar!" A mixture of grumbles and approval appeared. Morghar straightened his back, gave a bright smile, and walked proudly up next to Nerok.

"As he is a trusted friend of Morghar, the felinekin of Dexterity shall be Nalir!" A different mix of grumbles and approval happened. Nalir simply nodded and stepped up beside Morghar. Morghar gave him a bright smile and a high-five as he approached.

"For the rhinokin of Toughness we have the best friend of Nalir's significant other, Thenac!" Thenac gave a small smile before walking up to the others. She had become overly cautious and shy after she lost half her nose-horn to a new trap appearing in a Dungeon room where none had been before. The Dungeon in question had been tamed and so no new traps could have appeared without permission from the elf that tamed it. As such Thenac hadn't been looking out for traps and lost half her horn for the slavers’ amusement.

"The other friend of Thenac, the muskin of Intelligence, Zaktak!" The muskin had been 1 out of 8 siblings, each one she had loved dearly, each one had been murdered by the elves for some small real or imagined mistake or killed their first time in a Dungeon due to a lack of proper weapons and armor. The loss of her family had made her tough, pessimistic, and quick to anger. Zaktak gave a cocky smirk as she walked up and placed herself in front of the other ones chosen. Her short stature was obvious when she was standing this close to the others. With a height of 1.44 meter, she would have been diagnosed with dwarfism in any other beastkin race but Zaktak was actually quite tall for a muskin.

“We have her mate, we have her friends, the lupinekin of Awareness, Begdar!” At this point Nerok had gotten the crowd excited for each picked member. Having seen the other chosen ones, most people had realized how well they fit together and didn't think they would fit in just as well with the Party. The rest was due to Nerok's System-given authority and Charisma.

Begdar skipped up to the others giving them a big smile. Her gray wolf tail was wagging as she took her mate Nalir's hand. Nalir had been standing quite stoically with the others before then, but now his - small - smile had returned to his face. They truly are a sweet couple those two, Nerok thought as he watched them.

Looking back at the Tribe he announced the last member of the Party. “To balance the others out we have Taozcec, the vulpinekin of Charisma!” Loving the attention Taozcec took a couple of steps forward before he twirled around and took a bow, mixing his naturally higher Charisma with the Chief's to make the crowd go wild.

As beastkins became adults at age 8, the Party’s ages ranging between 13 to 16 years meant they were in their prime. And with the Tribe knowing how well 5 out of the 6 fit together - with Taozcec being the one from outside the friend group - no one was able to disagree with the Chief’s decision.

“This first Party will prepare themselves quickly before entering the Dungeon! The rest will make camp and talk calmly amongst themselves. I do not intend to make any other Parties!" Nerok knew he was partly repeating himself but thought it better to do so. No one actually wanted to do chores after all and this way, they at least couldn't say that they forgot.

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The 6 chosen beastkin walked cautiously into the Portal with each one prepared for monsters to ambush them as they entered. They only relaxed a tiny bit when nothing immediately happened, and they could see the first Dungeon Room. It was a standard 10×10×5 meters and had the forest theme, though this room only had one tree in it. The walls and ceiling were covered in climbing plants and the floor was covered in a short layer of grass and wildflowers. Three of the corners had bushes, while in the far-left corner a big tree stood. Said tree was behind a fast-running stream wide enough that no tier 1 could jump over it without getting wet.

"There! In the tree" Thenac pointed to the tree and shouted. In the tree branches there were 4 tiny green dragons looking at them curiously. The Party walked closer with raised weapons, keeping a close eye on the dragons.

"Why aren't they attacking us?" Begdar couldn't understand. They were Dungeon monsters. It was in their nature to attack anyone they saw.

The Party stopped moving as they came to the stream. "I know they're Dungeon monsters, but I don't feel comfortable attacking first." Morghar admitted. "It just seems like something an elf would do to us. And I don't want to act like an elf."

The others nodded.

"What do we do then?" Taozcec asked. The vulpine was acquainted with the others but wasn't close enough to be considered their friend. As such he wanted to take some time getting to know them better, so he didn't end up stepping on someone's toes.

"Well, we have three choices." Begdar stated. "One: we can walk back out and report this phenomenon to the Chief. As a consequence, we might not be allowed to enter the Dungeon again the next couple of days, as some will claim we have already had our turn." No one liked the sound of that. "Two: We could kill the peaceful dragon monsters anyway. Or three: We ignore them and check out the next room. Potentially we could come back and kill them on the way back."

Quickly agreeing on the third option they walked to the next room. As they entered the short corridor between the rooms, they each got the same System message:

Due to the Dungeon Rule 'Experiencing Peace' your Party has been rewarded double the amount of EXP and loot you would have gotten if you killed all the creatures in the room you just left.

Experiencing Peace rewards you 5 EXP.

The whole Party was first stunned as double the loot appeared in front of them. The shock then gave way to outburst. Though with everyone talking loudly, over the absurdity of a Dungeon rewarding you for not killing their monsters, it was impossible to actually hear what was said.

A couple of minutes later they had calmed down enough to look at what loot they had gotten. Two 1st tier Breakthrough Orbs, 4 pieces of magic wrapped meat, 6 blue-purple apple sized plum looking fruits and 14 small aluminum cubes was a big haul for the first room of a Dungeon. Even bigger when considering that they simply walked through the room.

"5 EXP?" Thenac questioned. "We gain half EXP 'cause we're capped at 9+ and double due to this 'Dungeon Rule'. Each level 1 monster killed gains 1 EXP and as Riska and Tuzzik just saw the Dungeon Portal appear it can only have level 1 monsters right now." The rhinokin looked really annoyed with herself at the end of her speech. "That means we didn't notice the 5th dragon. It could have been behind us and we didn't know! We’ll never know…" While a monologue coming from Thenac was certainly unusual, she was also well known for being overly cautious and a monster slipping past her notice would surely irk her.

"Who takes the BO's?" Taozcec asked.

"Does it matter?" Zaktak asked back. The muskin was eager to get back to mining. "We'll get more in a moment. Even faster if we can get loot this way in each room." Zaktak started packing the small aluminum cubes in Morghar's backpack while being careful not to touch a BO. With the ursakin being the strongest of the group, an unspoken rule stated that he should be the one to carry the aluminum cubes, which had given Dungeon mining its name. No one had been mining common metals in mines since Dungeons appeared. Instead mining happened in Dungeons.

"Maybe not, but we should think it through anyway." Begdar thought on it for a bit before starting to twist her hands around each other. "Since the monsters don't attack us, traps might be the biggest problem here…" The lupinekin let the rest be unsaid.

After a moment the others nodded, agreeing with her conclusion. Taozcec even gave a dramatic bow and said, "After you, my lady!" making the others laugh.

Begdar didn't move though. "What is it, hon?" Nalir asked his mate.

"Though most do, not all 2nd tier lupinkin get the Awareness Class. So…" She looked around at the others. "Please don't be mad if I get something else." Her Party agreed. It was widely known that the System would give you the Class you were best suited to whether you knew it at the time or not.

Relieved Begdar picked up a BO and crushed it with both hands. Energy flowed into her starting from her hands.

You have tiered up! You have gotten the Class Intelligence! You have gotten the passive Class Skill ‘Increased Memory’. You are now level 14!

Your level ups gained you:

+1 Dexterity

+1 Toughness

+4 Intelligence

+2 Awareness

+2 Charisma

"Intelligence." She announced surprised. "I'm level 14 now." She added. The saved but halved EXP she had earned over the years had been enough to earn her several levels at once.

Unlike her previous fears, the announcement was met with congratulations from the entire Party and a public kiss from her mate. The felinekin wasn't normally one for public displays of affections but his mate's very belated first tier up was special enough for an exception. Afterwards Begdar's tail was wagging like crazy, and her face was one big smile. Nalir couldn't help but give a slight smirk back.

"Well if you two lovebirds are done…" Morghar began. "I think we should give the other one to Thenac. She has the best chance of getting Awareness of the rest of us." He then shrugged. "And as Zaktak said we'll likely get more in a moment."

No one argued and so the shy rhinokin got the second BO. "You were right, Morghar. I did get Awareness." With the Awareness Class came the passive Class Skill ‘Enhanced Senses’ which would make it more likely for Thenac to notice any traps before they were triggered. Or more hidden dragons…