At Zack's insistence, Archie remained behind in the core room while Alex and Zack went to go check on the strange source of power. Zack, naturally, was able to get there much faster. He zipped his awareness into the lobby, and what he saw sent a shiver of fear rippling through his core.

There was an elf standing in the lobby, looking around curiously. He had his left hand in his pocket while the other held a phone up. He was snapping pictures of the lobby and hub, a sinister grin tugging at the corner of his lips. He had long silver-blond hair tied up in a ponytail, toxi green eyes, and a knife sheathed at his hip.

"Do you have an appointment, sir?" Chandra asked, stepping up beside the strange man.

As the elf turned his gaze upon her, Zack took the opportunity to quickly peer at his status information.

[Salazar Gonzalez]

[Bright Elf]

[Level: 27]

[Health: 235/235]

[Mana: 55/55]

[Stamina: 160/200]

[Would you like to see a more detailed statistic breakdown? Yes or no?]

The moment Zack's vision passed over him, Salazar's gaze snapped up to the disembodied dungeon's awareness. Zack quickly cringed back, banishing the elf's loaded stat sheet. The man blinked those toxic green eyes before narrowing them dangerously, then turned back to Chandra.

"I'm afraid I don't. Can't say I've ever heard of this place before, either. Dungeon Inc? What's that?" Salazar asked, quickly pocketing his phone.

Zack wanted to shout at Chandra not to tell him, but it was already too late. She immediately jumped into the canned response that Alex designed for precisely this question.

"Dungeon Inc offers the opportunity for people without magic, or perhaps with weaker magical abilities, to have the experience of adventuring in a safe, controlled environment," Chandra explained. "Our rooms are designed for specific levels in mind, from level one to level fifteen. There are healers on site to ensure nobody gets hurt, and we even supply equipment to people who might otherwise not have any."

If Zack had blood, it would have just gone cold. He could practically feel the way that sinister grin stretched on Salazar's face, as though he were a cat that just found a mouse to play with.

"Fascinating. And you're not affiliated with any of the adventuring companies in the city, are you?"

Chandra blanched, her ears flattening against her head. "Pardon?"

Salazar chuckled and extracted his hand from his pocket, revealing both a silver shield in a leather badge holder, as well as the intricate tattoo on the back of his hand. It looked a lot like Alex's, but there was a symbol within it that Zack didn't recognize. It looked like a pentagon formed out of five triangles, sitting next to the number twenty-seven within a large circle.

"I am Salazar Gonzalez, silver-tier adventurer with the Toronto guild," Salazar explained. "And it sounds to me like you're participating in illegal adventure activity."

Time seemed to slow. Zack could feel Chandra's heartbeat hammering against her ribs. She looked like she might jump away, already a foot was inching back to prepare to bolt. Salazar never stopped smiling as he showed off the badge to the two groups of people awaiting their turn in the dungeon.

"You may want to vacate the premises for now," he suggested, raising a shining eyebrow at the groups. The people didn't hesitate to obey, scrambling to avoid the elf's eyes. When they were gone, he turned that false, friendly smile on Chandra once again. "Now, am I going to need to detain you, or are you going to cooperate?"

Zack didn't have a chance to warn her before Chandra bolted. Salazar sighed in frustration and shook his head. A quick snap of his fingers sent a jolt of invasive emerald aether shooting through Zack's floor. Chandra had barely made it a dozen steps before the ground beneath her turned soupy and swallowed her feet. The werewolf howled in surprise as she abruptly sank up to her shins, vainly struggling to extract herself from pit. Zack wanted to help, but when he reached out to touch the magic burrowing through his floor it bit back at him. He couldn't touch this aether.

Salazar swaggered up and knelt next to Chandra, just out of range of her claws. "I really hate this part of the job. I signed up with an adventuring company to hunt monsters, not people." When Chandra continued to growl at him, he snapped his fingers again. The churning earth beneath her parted ever so slightly, and she sank deeper. "Wait here, I'll come collect you in a moment."

As the elf rose back to his feet, Greg came running around the corner from the dungeon hub. He slid to a stop on the polished floors as he came face to face with Salazar, then noticed Chandra buried up to her waist in quicksand.

"What's going on here?" Greg demanded, his fists already half-raised in a boxing stance.

"Ah, you must be one Greg Greene, yes?" Salazar asked, cocking his eyebrow.

"You have me at a disadvantage. I don't know you," Greg grunted.

"You wouldn't. I'm the adventurer assigned to investigate your little escapade at the toy store."

At the mention of the toy store, Greg's eyes widened with a flash of recognition. Zack didn't need to ask what Salazar was talking about to have a good idea of what he meant. After all, he still had the patterns for the undead stuffed animals stored away. He hadn't found a use for them yet, but he had a pretty good idea.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Greg said.

"Really? You're going to play dumb?" Salazar seemed more annoyed than frustrated. He rolled his eyes and strode right up into Greg's range. "Look, you're already in trouble. Why not make this easier for both of us and just cooperate?"

For a moment, Zack was worried Greg might take a swing at Salazar's head. Salazar clearly meant to give him the chance to do it, too. The orc's jaw was clenched tight, his tusks digging into the flesh around his upper lips. Then, he lowered his arms and looked away, sneering at the empty space off to his right.

"Good choice," Salazar purred. "Now, there should be one member of your little trio left. Alexander, where are you hiding?"

As if on cue, Alex came running out of the manor room and around the corner. Like Greg, he slid to a stop on the polished floors when he spotted Salazar. His eyes bugged in his head as he stared from the trapped Chandra to the dejected Greg and finally the smirking Salazar.

"Greg? Chandra? What's going on?" Alex demanded. "What are you doing here, Sal?"

"You know this bastard, Alex?" Chandra snarled, her words churned through a gravelly lupine growl.

"I met him at the mall. He helped hook me up with," Alex lifted his hand to show off his new status tattoo, only to falter as the ink started to fade. "What?"

"Sorry about that," Salazar sighed. He reached into his pocket and extracted a rolled up wad of bills held together with a rubber band, tossing them on the ground at Alex's feet. "Fake tattoo with a tracking spell in the ink. I've been observing you three for a couple weeks now, but it was incredibly difficult to get all three of you together. I figured if I could get a tracker on one of you, you'd lead me to the others."

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

Alex paled as the brand on his hand completely vanished. Zack felt the ink dry up, the aether within expended. He wanted to say something, to tell Alex everything would be okay. He had yet to conjure a wisp, worried about how things would go. This was his first real encounter with an adventurer, and the last thing he wanted to do was give Salazar and excuse to attack him.

"Why?" Alex finally asked, lowering his now bare hand back to his side.

"Why what? Give you a fake tattoo? Follow you out here?" Salazar sighed and combed his hair with his fingers. "For starters, I'm here under orders to investigate you three for illegal adventuring and public endangerment."

"We've never—"

"The toy store," Greg interrupted, before Alex had a chance to finish the sentence.

Alex's already pale face turned a shake whiter, his knuckles tightening. A vein in his neck started to hammer as his heartrate spiked. "A kid lost control of his powers, do you really expect us to just stand around and let undead toys run wild?"

Salazar licked his lips and strode over to Alex. "I don't make the rules. I don't even like enforcing them. But there are rules for a very good reason. You can't just go around throwing magic at anything you want. Out of control toys is one thing, but what do you think would have happened if you hadn't been able to control your flames?"

"But I can control them."

"It doesn't matter. As you grow stronger, so will your powers. Some day you may lose control, and people can get hurt," Salazar emphasized. "Adventurers exist to protect people, and the rules exist to hold us accountable. What you did not only put people in danger, but undermined our entire effort to uphold this system."

Alex hung his head in shame, pointedly looking away from Salazar. A small voice in Zack's head told him that his friends should fight back, that they might be able to take Salazar if they teamed up against him.

Except they couldn't. Salazar was twenty levels over them, and in posession of magic that Zack didn't fully understand. To make matters worse, he seemed to represent an organization Zack knew very little about. Even if he reacted with hostility, there was no guarantee such behaviour would be met well.

But he couldn't just let his friends get arrested, could he? Did adventurers even arrest people?

Zack decided he didn't want to find out. When he first woke up, Alex warned him that he was considered illegal magic. If he gave Salazar something juicier than illegal adventurers, maybe he'd leave the others alone? It was worth a shot.

Bracing himself, Zack conjured a wisp behind Salazar and made a sound like clearly his throat. "Hello."

The elf froze in place, his entire body tense like a spring. In a fluid motion, he wheeled in place and drew his dagger, only to come face to face with a hovering ball of blue-green light.

"I'd appreciate it if you didn't arrest my friends, thanks," Zack said, making his wisp glow a bit brighter while he spoke. He wanted to make sure Salazar understood that the wisp was the origin of Zack's voice, in case the elf got any ideas to the contrary.

Salazar stared at the wisp for several seconds, before glancing to Chandra and Greg. "Neither of you could pull this off, your files clearly state that neither of you have illusion abilities. Alex, are you doing this?"

Zack allowed a ripple of laughter to roll out of his wisp. "They have no power over me."

Salazar glanced over his shoulder at Alex with one raised eyebrow. Alex shook his head and shrugged. The elf didn't sheathe his dagger, and turned once more to face the wisp. "So this is some kind of monster?"

"Ow, harsh. I'm not a monster, I'm the dungeon."

The elf's only response was a rapid series of blinks.

"As in Dungeon Inc. You're literally inside me."

This time, the elf leapt back and looked around, as though worried he might see a tongue and throat if he looked hard enough.

"I'm not going to eat you," Zack assured him, following him with his wisp. "Although I'd be lying if I said the thought didn't cross my mind." The idea of unleashing the horde of spiders in his sealed room flashed through Zack's mind, but he quickly banished it. That would be a cruel act, even by his standards.

"What sort of trick is this?" Salazar demanded, once again turning to Alex.

"No trick. His humour leaves a lot to be desired, but he is as he says. He's the dungeon," Alex said. "Zack, are you sure you should be doing this?"

"No, but I can't just let him take you guys away," Zack said. "I can't operate without you guys."

At this, Salazar's expression turned curious. "Operate? What do you mean?"

"Well, you already heard Chandra's spiel, right? People can delve into my depths to fight monsters and train in a safe, controlled environment," Zack explained. "I've got a few rooms they can run, though one is off-limits right now. It gives people the chance to train and practice their magic without worrying about endangering anyone."

Salazar's curiosity turned into a pensive frown. "That was genuine?"

"What did you think she meant when she said that?"

"I was under the impression your group was capturing monsters and releasing them into arenas for blood sport," Salazar confessed.

"That explains why you thought we were running an illegal adventuring ring," Greg grumbled.

"Is this not the case?" Salazar asked.

"Where did you get that idea?" Chandra demanded. She stopped struggling against the quicksand holding her and stood in the pit with her arms crossed.

Salazar blinked, as though it should have been obvious. "How else could you get monsters for people to fight?"

In answer, Zack spawned a horned rabbit on the floor in front of Salazar. He made sure to conjure it piece by piece, like a series of tiny magical blocks snapping together to form the finished monster. The elf stared down at the bunny as it wiggled its nose up at him.

"Zack can make monsters and control them to a lesser degree," Alex explained. "He's limited by materials and patterns he absorbs, but other than that, there's almost nothing he can't create."

Salazar licked his lips as he stared down at the dire rabbit. Curiously, he knelt down before it and reached out with his fingers. The bunny sniffed him once, then leaned into the touch, eager for some head pats.

"Sal?" Alex asked, drawing the elf's attention again.

"I've never heard of anything like this before," the elf admitted, rising once more to his feet as he realized he was petting a bunny. Cautiously, he slipped his dagger back into its holster, and forced his attention on the wisp. "This is something new."

Zack preened at the attention, his wisp bobbing up and down happily. "I'm quite proud of that, thank you."

Tapping his chin, the elf turned back to Alex. "The dungeon claims you are its friends, yes? What exactly does that?"

Before Alex had a chance to reveal more information, Zack zipped his wisp in between the two men and grabbed hold of the conversation again. "It means I rely on them to remain operational," Zack explained quickly. "I need their help to attract delvers, and in exchange I let them commodify me. They get to turn a profit and make a living, while I get a steady flow of people training within my walls. It's a very positive relationship."

"We have healers in every room to make sure nobody gets hurt," Alex added quickly. "We even give away free health potions with every run. We're taking every precaution to make sure our customers are as safe as possible while they train."

At the mention of healers and health potions, Salazar's eyes widened. "Show me," he ordered.

Zack quickly checked his mana and found he was running uncomfortably low. The aether used to keep Chandra trapped in the ground had finally settled, though, so he was able to slurp it up and recharge his values. He flicked a spawner from the meadow to spawn a Medibold and ordered them into the lobby, then conjured a topical healing potion in the air above Salazar's head.

The plastic pod bounced off the elf and splattered on the ground just as the healer shuffled up beside Alex. The elf stared down at the potion in bewilderment before noticing the newcomer. Curiously, he reached for his dagger and quickly sliced his palm. When he held the wound out to the Medibold, it acted automatically. Golden light flowed from the kobold's fingers to Salazar's wound, sealing it shut.

Salazar flexed his hand. There was a faint scar where the cut used to be, but otherwise he was completely unharmed. He chewed on his lower lip as he sheathed his dagger, then turned to face Greg and Chandra. "I'm going to let you all off with a warning this time, okay?" he said quickly.

"This time?" Greg grunted.

"None of you have a record of repeat adventuring offenses—except for Alex, but I will overlook it this time. If I'd brought you in to the guild, they probably would have let you go with a minor fine. This way, I don't have to deal with the paperwork. But you," Salazar added, turning and pointing at Zack. "I need to report you to my superiors right away. You're something very new, and we don't have protocol on how to handle you."

Zack let his wisp turn pink to simulate a blush. "Aw, flattery will get you everywhere."

"I don't suppose you can come with me to the guild, can you?" Salazar asked. "It would make explaining matters much easier if they could hear it from you."

Zack considered that a moment. He left his wisp in place and quickly tested how far he could fling his awareness in any given direction. To his chagrin, he was still limited to twenty-five feet away from his immediate influence.

"I'm afraid I can't go with you," he lamented, returning to his wisp.

Salazar nodded. "That's fine," he said, combing his hair with his fingers again. "I will return once I've made appropriate arrangements."

"Are we still allowed to run our business?" Chandra asked. She finally noticed that the quicksand wasn't soupy anymore and was finally pulling herself out of its grip.

Salazar looked from Chandra and then up at Zack. "I'm not sure I could stop you. But understand that if any harm befalls people while they're in your dungeon, it will be your responsibility. I cannot protect you from the consequences—nor will I want to."

"I already assumed as much," Zack chuckled.