Not even a few hours later after crossing the river, I climbed up a tree and set out John above me to take a better look. To my surprise, the ‘mysterious’ structure was already visible from where I was.

Odd. Hadn’t it taken me a whole day to get to the city dungeon from when I’d first reached the river?

Ah, right. I had grown more since then because of the blessing, so my pace was probably faster now.

Actually, did being sick for the vast majority of that stunt my growth somehow…? Or had the blessing somehow made up for that? How did it even work?

I shook my head.

Not important. If I grew up to be a midget, I would deal with it then. There would probably be all sorts of magical items that would make me taller anyway, from the ads we’d seen so far.

I jumped down from my perch on the tree and recalled John before continuing my journey.

As I walked, I continued to talk to everyone in the stream chat. I was getting pretty good at holding multiple conversations at once, actually. I also figured out a system that allowed me to still talk to everyone without constantly changing what I was talking about by having my forks only ping me when they happened to be having a conversation about something related to what I was already talking about out loud.

Well, okay, it still probably sounded like I was constantly getting distracted, but honestly? I didn’t think I could really help that anymore. This was just my life now.

One of the conversations I was having included deciding what to do with my leftover skill points. I still had seven of them and could get a bunch of different stuff. However, most people in the fighting group chat agreed that it would be for the best if I got the upgrade Dual Wield for my Soulbound Item skill and then created the ultimate weapon to go along with my armor.

The only problem was that the weapon I would have soulbound for that would have probably been the naginata… or the unfused sword. I didn’t want to soulbind the mace since it was so crappy and I wanted to have the option to unfuse the pan for when I inevitably needed to get my egg back. Not to mention, having a pan as my main weapon would be… pretty silly. And as funny as that would be, I had already decided to take this seriously.

So in short, I either needed to wait till I went back to the city dungeon and somehow got my stuff back, or I needed to get a new decent-ish weapon I could use as the base for my Ultimate Fusion.

And for that, I probably needed to raid a dungeon again. Unless I tried to learn blacksmithing myself. Which… sounded pretty cool, actually. But in no way practical, since I would have to not only get the metals from somewhere, I would also need to create tools for everything first.

A couple more hours later and I began to get close enough to the mysterious structure to be able to sort of tell what it was.

“...It’s… an office building?” I said as I stared incredulously at John’s feed.

Block-shaped, many stories high, featuring large windows on every floor… Yep, that was an office building. And it felt incredibly out of place. Especially since it didn’t seem worn down or decrepit at all.

I grimaced and made John come back down to look at me. I stared at the invisible camera for a second, looking put out.

“...The water park was in perfect condition, too. Why do I get the feeling that that thing’s a Tempor dungeon?” I sighed as various comments of agreement and disagreement streamed through chat. “Or some other type of dungeon, yeah. But I doubt it’s an actual office building.” I snorted and rolled my eyes. “Ah, yes. You’re right. Not even an apocalypse could destroy the demon that is overtime office work.”

I continued talking to chat for a bit longer before a comment from someone caught my attention and I focused on it with my main thought process.

FouxMoux: there’s something shiny

FouxMoux: blue

FouxMoux: to your left

“Shiny?” I murmured and directed John to turn.

Sure enough, there really was something cyan visible beyond the trees that stood out from its surroundings. A large field of it. There were also some large spike-shaped structures jutting diagonally out of it. Half of them black, the other half deep blue. It was hard to see since it was pretty far away, though.

“Uh, what the heck is that?” I asked, but part of me began to feel excited. “It looks kinda weird and… both natural and unnatural at the same time…?”

It was new stuff and that was what really mattered here. After having experienced hours of boring walking, I couldn’t help but grin in anticipation.

“Another dungeon, you think? But this one looks completely different… Yeah, the others were ruins or buildings. This… Hmm. I know I said I wouldn’t make any detours, buuutt it’s basically on the way, so I might as well check it out, right?”

Most people in chat were in favor, even if some of them called me lazy and a quitter.

“I’m not giving up on getting to the building! I just wanna check this out!” I huffed. “Yeah yeah, silly distractible Vcuber wants to check out the shiny thing. Shut it!”

I recalled John, jumped down from my perch on the tree to continue walking, marked a nearby tree again, and then set off toward where the strange new structure lay.

Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

I soon began to see something deep blue behind the trees and as I got closer and closer, chat began to recognize it as a… gemstone. An absolutely giant piece of gemstone. Kinda reminiscent of a sapphire, but not quite, according to them. Maybe some kind of sapphire equivalent of this world, just like the infused emerald.

A few minutes later and I was gaping at the giant piece of not-sapphire spike jutting out of the ground, surrounded by the cyan crystals all around the place. One step to the side to look beyond the spike and I couldn’t help but stand there with eyes wide open.

There was a… crater of sorts. The ground inside it was covered in these cyan crystals, forming wild structures in places. The entire crater was surrounded by these sapphire spikes on one side, and the black spikes – that kind of looked like flames frozen in time – on the other side. There were also a handful of lava lakes all over the massive crater and straight in the middle, a hole.

“...Well… This is… different,” I managed to say, still gaping at the view.

Since a lot of people were suggesting it, I looked back at the sapphire spike and shot Appraisal at it.

Sapphire spire

An object frozen by a Sapphire Gorgon.

“A…Sapphire Gorgon,” I said, my eyes widening at the implications. “O-kaaay… Gorgons are Medusas, right? Or Medusa was a Gorgon. Stone gaze lady. Yeah. Is this telling me that a Sapphire Gorgon turned something into–” I waved my hand at the giant spike. “–this?!”

Or rather, the implications here were quite clear, weren't they?

“So this place is an aftermath of some epic battle, basically. Right, yeah. Gotcha. Is it a dungeon then?” I asked out loud as I stepped closer.

The moment my foot touched the cyan crystal that covered the ground here, I felt the familiar chill go down my spine, and backed off again.

“Ah, yup. A dungeon,” I announced with a nod. “But this one doesn’t feel as bad as the city. I think it’s the same level as the water park…?”

It had been a few days since I’d been there so it was hard to compare, but it felt about right.

“Right, so probably a D-rank dungeon… Yeah, if I’m going to have to clear more dungeons, I’ll probably start with this one, unless there’s an easier one somewhere nearby.”

I was tempted to just jump right in, even if the place looked dangerous and quite alien. But no, I still needed to find out what the office building was about.

Also, I had no idea what monsters might lurk inside that hole. What if one had a gaze that turned me into sapphire? How would I even defend against that? It was like the damn poison all over again.

“Nope, not gonna go in right away. I still gotta go to the office building.”

So for like the first time in forever, I managed to resist the temptation to dive right in when faced with a shiny new thing and turned back.

uptonMIKE: good choice

KaiEbikoOfficial: you’re finally learning!

“Don’t say it like that! I can learn!” I said back, feeling a little insulted.

Naturally, a wave of comments pointing out all the instances where I screwed up even though I should have known better by then flooded the chat right after I said that.

I huffed.

“No bullying the streamer, chat! It’s not fair when you gang up on me!” I let out a very childish whine. “Stop babying me! I’m an adult even if I look and sound like this now!”

And like that, I continued toward the office building as I bickered with chat. Being bullied by chat was nothing new, after all. It was part of the Vcuber experience, more or less. And it did lift my mood just a little.

Well, except for the few people who kept taking it too far and I had to ban them when telling them to stop it didn’t work.

Either way, after another hour, I made it all the way to the office building.

It stood there all menacingly and I already felt a bit of trepidation. I did not like remembering my time in the office and sincerely hoped that if this was a dungeon, it wouldn’t make me sit behind a computer all day to beat it.

The whole building seemed to have a whopping thirty-one floors plus the ground floor. People were already arguing in the chat whether we could call it a skyscraper or not. Good to know they had their priorities straight.

“Okay… Let’s see, then.”

I marched up to what had to be the front entrance with its fancy glass walls and an automatic door. To my surprise, the door actually opened for me, inviting me inside.

I didn’t trust it one bit, but figured that so far, every dungeon had warned me well in advance with the chilling feeling before any actual danger jumped out at me.

So I took a step inside.

The moment I did, I felt the absolute worst chill go down my spine alongside an overwhelming feeling of stress, exhaustion, depression, and nihilism.

I immediately threw myself backwards out of the building and gasped for breath.

All the chats immediately exploded, but I let my forks deal with it all while my main thought process focused on recovering from that, because what the fuck?!

A full minute later, I finally picked myself up from the ground while continuing to slowly breathe in and out…

“...It’s a dungeon, chat,” I said, probably completely unnecessarily. “Probably an even harder dungeon than the spaceship, chat. And if I were to guess, it’s the same type as the city. I felt… ugh. So much stress.”

I shook my head.

It reminded me of being in the office. Was that the joke? Did this type of dungeon – Intra, I assumed – just overwhelm you with whatever feelings people had in there? The city had flooded me with pride and unity… which I could definitely see if the city had been a tight community. Meanwhile, this stupid place flooded me with feelings I already associated with an office.

GeorgeDoshington: rip quest?

I opened the quest menu and saw that the main objective of travelling to the mysterious structure was already complete. Then I eyed the ‘explore the mysterious building’ side objective, deciding whether or not it would be worth it.

It probably wouldn’t.

“...Yeah, I think I’ll leave this place for later, chat.”

I sighed, feeling disappointed. I had really been hoping that this place would be something more than just another dungeon. And now I was faced with probably the hardest dungeon I had come across yet.

I shook my head.

“Okay. Well, that sucks, but whatever.”

I mentally clicked on the quest to complete it.

‘Mysterious structure’ Side quest complete!

Main objective:

   Travel to the mysterious structure in the distance. [ACHIEVED]

Side objectives:

   Explore the mysterious structure. [FAILED]

Reward:

   +1 SP

“Right, so… We have three dungeons in the general area… kinda. If my instincts are correct, the sapphire place is the easiest, the city is a bit harder, and this thing–” I pointed at the office building. “–is like way beyond me and I should stay the heck away. So! Plan of action. Go back to the sapphire place, set up a shelter nearby like last time, and then try to clear that place, since it’s probably the easiest dungeon I have access to.”

There was general agreement in chat; some people argued to go and get my stuff back from the city, and others goaded me to go explore the office building anyway.

I banned the last group.

Then I squinted up at the sky and found that I still had a couple of hours before the sun set. Probably just enough to get back to the other dungeon and set up a base.

“Well, let’s get going then.”

I turned my back on the terrifying dungeon posing as an office building and left it behind.