My dreams in the night slipped away. I blinked up into the dark, a pervasive sense of wrongness ringing in my ears, and only had the time to register Blake's shouted warning when suddenly the ground rocked beneath me. I gasped in shock and clutched at... but there was nothing to hold on to.

The earth quaked, heaved, and then rolled me over.

For a moment I thought I must be experiencing [Magic Hand] again. I went tumbling end over end, hitting different limbs and various softened surfaces, out of control.

But then something heavy and metallic thudded into me with bruising force, the impact jarring me wide awake. It became painfully obvious this wasn't a Book experience, or a dream, or a disconnected fragment of my overactive imagination. I'd been sleeping, and now I was not, and... I didn't know what was happening.

Neither did my friends, except for... Blake! Bless him, he was somehow well out of it, his mind crystal clear with focused determination. Better yet, he was stationary and steady on his feet, a fixed point rather than swept along with us. I could actually orient myself by his presence, even as he leapt to confront our vicious attackers... monsters intruding upon our sleep...

Wait. Weren't those...?

Amidst my horror and confusion, I could feel my momentum bleeding off, my surroundings and me with them sliding to a stop. Also, the incoming monsters were so terribly familiar and unfamiliar, the same rat minions I'd encountered for months but worked up into a murderous frenzy. And...

"Light!"

That wasn't me. I blinked into the sudden brightness, recognizing -- as though emerging from a dream -- the green interior of the tent and Bessie, her hair a wild mess, starting to her feet with the glowing cantrip raised in one hand. Just then the bloodthirsty swarm reached us despite Blake, causing another violent collision that threw me against the floor.

Bessie kept her balance. "Rena," she said, "A Light!"

Her sense of urgency prodded me as much as her words. "Light," I obliged, watching my friends scramble for their gear. Bessie's spell extinguished as she disappeared out the door clutching only her sword. Tom followed soon after with his shield.

I supposed I could go after them, confront the situation head on. But there were so many monsters, and I could sense them everywhere, and they moved so fast! And...

Hannah was still frantically collecting arrows. I belatedly hurried to help her, turning out the sleeping bag and searching by the walls, before presenting my offerings. As she gratefully accepted, she paused to squeeze my hands, which I realized were shaking. "Hey," she said. "It's just some rats."

I shook my head. "I... I think it's..."

My throat closed up. No, surely I must be mistaken. I might be sensing the wrong thing or making misassumptions. I misunderstood even human emotions all the time; I shouldn't jump to conclusions prematurely.

Hannah looked briefly stricken. "Duni?"

Slowly, I nodded. I almost envied those moments of weightlessness when I was clueless and confused. But all I could think now was: I could sense it. The dungeon was awake, watching, while its minions attacked us. No, while they clamored to kill us.

How else was I to interpret this? Could it have so completely lost control over them? Was it saving its energy before attempting another intervention? Or...

I knew the logical explanation. I just didn't want to believe it.

Hannah's face and feelings hardened. She swung the quiver strap over her head, unslung her bow, and had an arrow notched before she was out the door. "You might want to stay inside."

I hesitated for a long moment, hugging myself. I could sense the ongoing violence just outside the tent's thin walls, and I didn't want anything to do with it. But surely I had a responsibility; I was a Silver-Ranked adventurer now too!

On the other hand, this wasn't just me burying my head in the sand. What if I distracted my friends instead of helping?

Why was this happening?

Tom suddenly flared with pain, and without thinking I burst outside, fearing the worst. But his attacker was a twisted cripple of a rat that had clamped onto an exposed ankle. He brought his shield down and pried it loose just as an arrow pierced through its eye into its skull, ending the sad creature.

I looked over sharply, surprised to see Hannah was killing them. We had said we wouldn't... but then Duni had broken its side of the agreement first. She loosed another arrow, snuffing out the still standing rat nearest me.

I had the urge to duck back inside, but frankly the action was winding down. I... I hadn't even cast a defensive spell, and it seemed redundant now. The few active minions left weren't paying me any mind. My friends were fine. Splattered with blood -- not theirs, hopefully -- but fine.

Yet everything was not fine. The wrongness I'd felt since awakening could be felt from the rats still struggling to lash out while incapacitated, to the ones who couldn't due to a terminal case of arrow in the head, to their numbers far exceeding any I'd seen in one place, to my friends' disheveled appearances with no armor in sight, to my own uselessness, to Duni...

Oh Duni, Duni, Duni.

So much wrongness, but at least Blake was there, same as always in his dark cloak, the benefits of sleeping fully dressed, armed, and sitting up. (I would never sigh over his paranoid habits again.) He stepped back after finishing up, twirling a knife, and said, "We're killing them now?"

"What just happened?" Bessie looked around at the remains of the battlefield, her sword still at the ready. "Did the warding fail?"

"The cheese?" Tom suggested, inspecting his foot. I glimpsed a bleeding puncture wound and looked away, glad he had [Self-Healing]. And that none of these Constructs should carry diseases.

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"It didn't fail," Hannah snapped. "I said it wouldn't work against the dungeon."

"Wait. This was Duni?" Bessie said. "Er... It couldn't seriously think we'd die that easily?"

"Why not? Adventurers die to dumb mistakes all the time."

"But... well, now I feel dumb."

For once their banter failed to lift my mood or distract me. "Sorry," I said.

"For what?" Bessie asked. I just looked down and shook my head. "Well I'm sorry for doubting your amazing tent, Hannah. Look, it even landed right side up."

"It's a design feature..."

Did they seriously not care we'd just been betrayed and ambushed in our sleep? Was this normal adventurer behavior, or was I the only sane one here?

But no, when I stopped wallowing in my own feelings and that ever-nagging awareness Duni was still watching, I could sense only Blake felt genuinely unconcerned. Tom was sombre as he was silent, while Bessie and Hannah were worried... for me.

I was dragged up from my sinking thoughts when Bessie addressed me directly. "What do you want to do, Rena?"

Her tone was deceptively light, but simmering fury lurked underneath. By contrast, I couldn't muster up any righteous outrage. I just felt hurt, tired, and... deeply sad.

"Leave," I admitted in a small voice.

"Are you sure?" she pressed. "Do you plan to ever come back?"

Of course not. Not unless I had a change of heart and stopped feeling as I currently did. But I took her point: if we left now, I might forever wonder why tonight had happened, what Duni might've said. I would most likely regret never seeing Duni one last time, even if the thought of meeting filled me with dread.

How I wished I was wrong. How I wished tonight had never happened.

"Hey." Bessie's hand landed on my shoulder, and I looked up into her warm blue eyes. "We're here with you."

I nodded, lips quivering. By silent agreement, we packed up the tent and carried it with us, leaving nothing behind.

We proceeded through the floor without a single encounter. As expected, every single minion had joined in their ambush. It should've made the dungeon feel safer, knowing we wouldn't be attacked, but the hallways that had become sweetly familiar now seemed darkly oppressive.

This wasn't anyone's happy place. It was a murder den. I had wished and believed otherwise, but dungeons would be dungeons.

During the whole miserably long, miserably short walk, I was aware of Duni's attention, but not until we'd reached near the end did I sense its intense agitation. Then I stepped into the Core room and my sense of it intensified. I gritted my teeth, committed. Approaching despite its alarm, I laid my hand on the Core.

Instantly, I was blasted by the full depth of its feelings: anger, mostly, mixed with fear, malice, resentment, and defensiveness, but also a sort of sickly satisfaction, a hateful desire to hurt, and this tiny bit of remorse. I didn't think I had sensed such overwhelming emotions from it since we'd first connected. Back then it had hated its captors and chain, a sentiment with which I'd sympathized, but now its upset was directed at me, no, us. It wanted to punish all of us intruders and relished our evident unhappiness.

The tiny irrational hope inside me died. But I still didn't understand. Hadn't we been getting along? , I sent, and: This last I loaded with my heart full of betrayal.

It returned with its own measure of betrayal.

What did that mean? Would it ever stop throwing my messages back at me? I wanted to pick up the Core and shake it until sense came out. I wanted...

But I would settle for any answers. I realized I needed to stop thinking of it like a person, not that people couldn't be just as violent, horrible, or treacherous, but at this stage Duni should be closer to a wild animal. Breathing in and out, I tried again, more neutrally:

I feared we'd suffer through another repetition, but it sent: . For once I didn't think it was referring to its own. .

This second was accompanied by a burst of petulance. We had killed its minions, increased its workload. It was terribly inconvenienced, and also, we hadn't kept our word.

I realized its own murder attempt barely registered as an afterthought.

So that was it. Duni was a dungeon, and we were its invaders, oppressors, and favorite food. Then we'd carelessly made ourselves seem vulnerable; what had we expected would happen?

Had I really believed it wouldn't take the first glimmer of an opportunity to try eating us?

Enough. I stepped back and away, more than ready to leave. Better to know, I supposed, though this knowing fairly broke my heart.

I wished for a quick exit after, but it wasn't a night for granting wishes -- just the opposite -- and we had to gather together then wait out the long casting time. I avoided looking at the brightly glowing Core in its bindings and cast.

The pressure began building again, coupled with that foreign resistance, though this time it didn't feel insurmountable. I continued casting.

Duni stirred.

I ignored its query. After a long pause, it sent: And another:

Another time I might've noted the dungeon's strange show of emotion, but it was too little, too late. This was goodbye.

, I sent, and we teleported out.

We arrived in the same teleportation room in the Adventurer's Guildhall we'd used mere hours earlier. The mana was lighter, Duni's presence no longer looming over me, but I still felt a hard weight pressing down on my chest. I couldn't believe so much had changed so suddenly. I had left here feeling hopeful, happy, and now...

"Are you all right?" Bessie asked. I shook my head wordlessly. "The sun isn't up yet, and I don't think you should be alone right now. Come join us in our tent?"

So I could feel their constant worry for me? The reminder of how I'd led them nearly astray? "No," I said. "I want to go. To the library," I added, which worked. Same old Rena, their instant relief seemed to say.

But as I walked the dark streets, I didn't feel the same. I no longer had a super-intelligent dungeon to visit. Nor a goal on which to focus my research. Nor an unshaken belief monsters could be every bit as deserving as people.

Speaking of monsters, I hadn't said goodbye to King Rat. No, why was this bothering me? The boss hadn't even pretended to care; it had been clear from the start it was devoted solely to its 'Great Creator.' Yet I couldn't help a twinge of guilt also over the minions we'd killed. (They'd only obeyed orders, poor sad Constructs.)

Such one-sided consideration might've been the death of me... and worse, my friends. I knew this. But I couldn't imagine wanting to become the sort of person who didn't care.

I reached the library and waved my thanks to Blake, who'd been 'secretly' tailing me. In truth, I was grateful for his discreet company, very aware I was carrying my ultra-expensive Scroll through empty streets in the dead of night. Plus... I just didn't feel so safe anymore.

I intended to occupy the next hours reading up on respawning, remembering how the first-floor minions seemed static until we'd stopped killing them. But instead, I found myself sitting in the Archives with a book open and little else happening. The pages might as well have been blank, or maybe it was my mind that kept blanking. I shook my head, reread a passage... and what had I been reading again? What did it matter what it said?

It was worse than not sleeping. Clearing out thoughts could be difficult for anyone, but reading was what I did.

Despite the hour, the Archives weren't completely empty: I could sense a few Scholars diligently or distractedly studying and another dozing at their table. They weren't paying any attention to me, but I couldn't escape awareness of their presences. Their productivity or rest seemed to mock me.

After another minute ticked past I realized, despite what Bessie thought, I wanted to be alone. Really alone.

I returned my book and walked at an unhurried pace. Entering Senior Rubrik's home, I sensed him sleeping, went into my room, and closed the door. I moved to sit on the bed.

The events of the night came creeping back. Waking to wrongness, rats everywhere, the deaths, Duni.

But we had survived. We were all safe!

I took one moment to breathe and feel relieved. Then, I collapsed and started sobbing my heart out.