“Well, well, well. Look who’s finally decided to join us,” a certain magical little fairy spoke to a random shrub.

That shrub, it turned out, wasn’t so random after all. As soon as it finished speaking, two familiar Sipalians stumbled out of it. Prshky and Dittillapp.

The two looked around, immediately spotting Faellen, as it was right in front of their faces, and bit further away Ram and her makeshift camp. If it could even be called that much. The camp was really just a bunch of stick.

Ram herself was once again meditating. Not that that was doing her much good, as all the commotion quickly threw her out of it.

“Oh, uh, hi you two,” Prshky awkwardly greeted. Ditti only gave a nod in greeting.

“Well, since all of us are finally here already, we might as well get to work,” Faellen announced. “You two, it’s time start learning how to be efficient and non-wasteful in your mana usage. Then we’ll be working on your blessings. Chop chop, Ram already has a head-start of the two of you!”

Prshky just shrugged while Ditti was as unperturbed as (almost) always. They got to work.

The trio, under the tutelage of Faellen, would mix periods of meditation with combat exercises. During the occasional rest time they’d do their best to somewhat improve the little camp they had established. Food was, fortunately, not a problem. There were plenty of animals around, and even if there weren’t Faellen could simply release a monster from the nearby mini-Dungeon.

Like so, the four of them spent the next little while.

While that was happening, other things were also happening.

The agents of the Sipalian empire continued searching for out trio of adventurers. The Dungeon Seeds, following their instructions, continued digging tunnels. And high up on the moon that was actually a huge Dungeon, both Sipalians and Sipaloons were going through class selection.

Even though the Dungeon Core was in the Level-Up sleep, Faellen continued to use its blessing and status as a System Anchor to teleport people to and from the moon. It took roughly a week for one group of three Sipalians to finish what Faellen considered basic training.

But that wasn’t everyone going through it. With the Dungeon’s advancement to an [Eldritch god], even the Sipaloons needed to go through it.

Sure, they may have been already granted the blessing that reduced the otherworldly pressure of the Dungeon. But the access to the System that provided was almost useless without a class to go along with it.

Which meant that at all times of the day, and even at night, the class trials were full without one person or another attempting them. Not everyone was so eager to rush into one though.

Some people, like the ‘mayor’ of the little moon village, refused to even so much as glance at any of the trials. Why?

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Well, because there were only three trials for three classes. Knight, rogue, and wizard.

The true fanatics among the Sipaloons refused to take a class like that. What they wanted was instead a class like priest.

This then resulted in this group of Sipaloons to hold almost daily hours long prayers to their god. What they did not know was that said god was asleep and no matter how much they beseeched it, an answer would not come.

Except… except for one thing.

These prayer sessions became an almost meditative exercise. And all of the Sipaloons had been granted the Dungeon’s blessing.

Perhaps it wouldn’t then be unexpected that they would be the ones to first discover the deeper uses of it. It was, after all, a blessing and they were religious fanatics.

So we have three groups advancing. The Sipalians were advancing on their targets. The adventurers were advancing in their skills. And the Sipaloons were advancing in their blessings.

But there were still more beings (some more easily categorized as people, some less) that weren’t simply idle during this time.

Yes, there were the groups of Sipalian explorers in search of the meteors released from the Light. But with the System lock on the mini-Dungeons’ entrances, they wouldn’t be able to do much.

Yes, there was Zemis trapped in the time chamber of the Dungeon moon. But for this deity, time was passing at such speeds that not much had happened yet.

And yes, there were the various monsters within both the Dungeon moon as well as the Dungeon network. But these were all part of the Dungeons, barely considered individual entities.

Well, all except for one.

Thistleskin, the Undying Progenitor of the Wyld Purge Treants.

The Boss monster had been granted a rather powerful boon by the System, one that allowed it to hold onto most of its power and progress should it die. This also gave it some measure of a mind. Not a powerful one, but one nonetheless.

Until now, the Boss had spent much of its time simply wandering its home, the Dungeon.

Even if it had some idea about the world, courtesy of being a Dungeon monster, it was still new to everything and unfamiliar with anything.

It had spent much time just wandering around and searching for new experiences. Feeling the various textures of the materials around it, breathing in the air (and mana) of the Dungeon, listening to the sounds the other monsters made.

It especially liked the tinkling of the crystal environment.

And one day, it wandered deep into the Dungeon and found a rather peculiar room. The room had many strange and geometric patterns carved into its walls. It was all quite fascinating for the Boss monster.

Thistleskin reached out a branch-limb towards one of the inscriptions.

As soon as contact was made, a little bit of its mana leaked out into the carving. Frightened, TUP retracted its branch.

But nothing had actually harmed it, so it tried again. Another limb reached out and touched the carving and this time stayed in contact.

Mana slowly drained out of the Boss and the ridges in the stone wall began to glow. After just a few more minutes, the entire section of the wall was lit up. The inscription stopped draining mana out of Thistleskin, who stood there confused.

That confusion multiplies many times over in the next moments, as the portal enchantment finally activated. With a flash of light, the monster vanished…

…and reappeared in the Dungeon network down on Lapis.

Thistleskin the Undying Progenitor became the first true monster on Lapis, and a Boss at that.