It turned out that dividing the rooms into sections worked even better than he thought it would. The trap, which had already been upgraded, scored a clean hit to the monster and locked it in place. The armor-like scales hadn’t even been able to slow the spears.

The fish might have been strong against someone like Nate, who didn’t even qualify as a cultivator yet. But if he had to guess, the beast had only just stepped onto the path itself.

A few moments later, two glowing orbs were all that had been left behind by the beast as the dungeon ate it. One was the now familiar small rainbow-colored orbs that seemed to always contain energy. The other was white. A color that he had seen twice before when he got his pants and boots. The thought of finally getting a shirt almost had him more excited than the energy.

He had slowly gotten used to how cold it was inside the dungeon, but that didn’t mean he found it comfortable.

Quickly, he ran up to the glowing white orb and touched it. The orb broke apart in a flash of light, leaving behind a leathery, long-sleeve shirt on the stone floor of the dungeon. It didn’t look like the world’s most comfortable shirt, but he knew that just like the pants, it would fit him exactly right.

With that thought in mind, he picked it up and used the menu to equip it. Instantly, he felt a little warmer, as the cold, drafty air no longer had easy access to his skin. Next, he picked up the energy orb and let it sink into his hand.

Content with his new gains, Nate pulled out his kukris and began his training again as he continued his way through the dungeon. There were still a number of rooms that he needed to upgrade.

Hurrying past the portal room, he began the now familiar process of upgrading the traps. It was nothing different than what he had already been doing. The only things that kept it from feeling like a chore were the small differences and the training he was able to do while inside the dungeon.

Unfortunately, outside of his avatar, the dungeon was currently empty. There had been another monster earlier that had managed to escape with some minor injuries. That happened occasionally, especially when the traps near the exit hadn’t been upgraded yet. As long as the monster was sufficiently lucky and skilled, or its cultivation was high enough to escape everything, getting away wasn’t an issue.

Nate kept an eye on the ever-dwindling resource counter as he proceeded to upgrade one room after another. What had originally been more than enough energy to upgrade the core had now fallen below what he needed. All he could do was sigh and continue on with the work.

It was more important to get the dungeon back up and running in peak condition than worrying about something he had no control over. All he could do was hope that next time he would be able to do the upgrade instead of wasting time and resources rebuilding everything.

That, more than anything else, was beginning to annoy him.

Hours later, when it was time for him to wake up, he had managed to upgrade every trap in the dungeon. He had also fought another beast, receiving a second energy orb at the end for his efforts.

All in all, when he woke up, he was feeling as though it had been a productive night.

Nate opened his eyes and slowly rolled out of bed. While he was inside the dungeon, his body was asleep, but his mind was still active. It hadn’t been so bad in the past when he was kicked out early and still got some regular sleep. This time, however, he had been active the entire time.

As a result, he was feeling kind of drained and had to drag himself into a freezing shower to fully wake up.

“Are you doing alright this morning?” His mother asked when he finally dragged himself downstairs a few minutes later. His eyes still had that slightly glazed, tired quality to them that spoke of a poor night’s sleep.

He grunted tiredly and began mechanically eating his breakfast. “Just tired is all.” He said once his plate was empty. “What do you and dad have scheduled for today?”

“We’ll be going outside the city for a quick expedition to finish certifying our company. It’s the final item needed to prove that we are qualified to operate out there. After that, there is just a little bit more paperwork and we’ll be good to go. The entire process has been a lot more painless than it might have otherwise been.” She stared at him over the lip of her steaming mug. “Be sure to thank Angie’s family and George for us. I’m sure they had something to do with that.”

He nodded and leaned back, closing his eyes for a second. “I will. You want to bring me to school on your way out?”

“Do you need it?” She returned with a grin.

“Don’t I?” He asked uncertainly. He hadn’t made any plans with Angie or Lindsay the day before to have them come pick him up again.

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She shrugged and shook her head. “Angie’s driver called a few minutes ago to let me know they were on their way.”

“Oh, I wasn’t expecting them to keep doing that. Last week was sort of a special occasion, you know? We had things to talk about…” He trailed off, realizing that wasn’t entirely true. They had never really used their time inside the car for that.

He glanced at the clock and hurriedly finished his breakfast before going to grab his bag. “Stay safe outside the walls and don’t do anything stupid just to impress the examiner person,” Nate shouted to his parents, rushing to the door as he heard a car pull up outside. “I’ll see you both when you get back.”

Angie had only barely opened her door when he burst out of his house and ran towards the car.

“Excited for school today?” She asked in amusement.

“Hardly, but I figured if you were going to be nice enough to pick me up I shouldn’t make you wait.” He replied, climbing in beside her. “Hey, Lindsay.”

She grunted in acknowledgment and leaned against the seat with her eyes closed.

“Apparently, she didn’t sleep well last night,” Angie whispered.

“I can sympathize with that myself. What did your parents have to say about Jace, anything?”

Her eyes went cold as she shook her head. “They told me to just put up with his presence for now, but not to allow him to touch me or do anything I don’t want. Since they broke the agreement, there is no reason for me to interact with him, so I’m simply going to ignore him as much as possible.”

Lindsay snorted and rolled her eyes. “As if it’s going to be that easy. He approached you for a reason, and I doubt he’ll just let whatever it is go.” She hesitated, seeming unsure of how much to say before deciding to go for it and continuing. “Angie, you know I love you, but the way he is acting is strange.”

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Her friend nodded. “I know. I mentioned the same thing to my parents, and that was all they could suggest still.”

“Well, I can’t say that hanging out with you two isn’t interesting at least,” Nate told them.

“And here we thought you would be the one causing us problems, not the other way around,” Angie said with a fake sigh.

“Yeah right, like I would ever be the problem child among the three of us. I’m a straight A student.”

“Teacher’s pet,” Lindsay muttered, poking him in the side.

He scoffed. “Who’s ever heard of a teacher’s pet that sleeps through half their classes?”

“Are you still doing that?” Angie had heard about how much he used to sleep when he first transferred to their school.

“Not quite as much since George started healing me, but it’s still a couple of periods worth each day.”

“And yet you are still acing their classes. I bet the teachers don’t know what to do with you.” Lindsay chuckled.

“Yeah, it frustrates a few of them, for sure. Though to be honest, I’m not actually a straight A student, I’m not doing that great in PE for obvious reasons.” He grinned.

Both girls rolled their eyes, not impressed with his admission.

“By the way, when are you going to form your cores and become cultivators?” Nate asked them suddenly, thinking about his own situation.

“I was waiting for Lindsay to catch up, so I’ve actually been ready for a couple of weeks now.”

The other girl stuck her tongue out at them. “I’m almost there. I should be finished either tonight or tomorrow. After a couple of days to finish solidifying my foundations, I should be ready to go.”

“Next week then?” Angie was getting visibly excited at the thought of finally forming her core after weeks of putting it off.

“Yup, sorry for making you wait so long.”

“Humph, just don’t let it happen again.”

“The two of you are weird,” Nate told them with a smirk.

They blushed and looked away in embarrassment.

“Oh, right before I forget. Dad said your medicine should be arriving sometime tonight. The caravan carrying it apparently made excellent time and will be arriving a little earlier than expected.”

In this case, a little earlier meant anywhere between two and five days early, depending on the conditions and beasts they encountered. They must have gotten lucky this time and only run into a couple of groups on the way.

Nate’s eyes lit up at the news. The thought that he would finally be healed was a very appealing one to him. “Did he happen to say when it would be arriving? I can come by and pick it up tonight.”

“He didn’t, no, but I’ll have someone send it to your house as soon as it arrives. I know how important it is to you.” Angie smiled at him. “I expect that this time tomorrow, you’ll be fully healed, with your core and meridians intact once more.”

“It would be nice,” He said softly, feeling as though he had suddenly entered a dream. He had been living in pain for months, and then George had stepped in to heal his knee. After that, everything had begun to move forward, giving him hope where before there had been none.

He would need to spend some more time cultivating and collecting energy as his avatar if he wanted to catch up to everyone.

Nate relaxed against the car seat, his eyes closed in thought. It might be time to give his future some serious thought and define his goals. Was he trying to become a top cultivator, or was he going to focus on the creation of the dungeons? At least in a small part, the two went hand in hand. He needed strength to stay safe, but that was it.

He didn’t want to abandon the dungeons and what they represented. Yet at the same time, this was his life. Sure, he could say that by encasing all the dimensional zones in dungeons he was saving humanity. But was that really the case?

The people here had adapted, as had the economy, and while there were monsters, was that really any worse than the alternative? People were pretty awful just on their own, at least with the beasts and monsters there, they had somewhere to let out their aggression.

“What’s got you looking so serious?” Lindsay asked him as the car rolled to a stop outside the school.

“My mind just went down some weird rabbit holes is all.” He replied, stepping out into the cool morning air. “What do think of the dimensional zones? Would it be better if they suddenly disappeared, or would that be the absolute worst thing possible?”

“You’re talking about the structure that surrounded the portal?” Angie asked, guessing at his thought process.

He nodded.

“It would be bad if they disappeared entirely, but I don’t think that’s what the structure is doing. At least not yet.”