Zoe wandered through the districts back to the inn she was staying in, and made her way downstairs to her room. The painting on the wall showed the setting sun, with beautiful streaks of orange and red paints obscuring the nearby buildings. An odd bit of magic that she was excited to investigate some more before she left for her new rental.
Art — any form of it really, was something that Zoe hadn’t paid much attention to in this world. Magic was exciting, even from level one it was exciting and new. She could create water or wind, and do all kinds of incredible feats. Helped in large part from all of her class multipliers and feats, and all of her experience with using them of course, but it was an immediate return for her investment.
On the other hand, painting and cooking, or really anything physical just took time before she saw the same impact. If she levelled her cooking skill, she’d be a better cook. And with it up to a massive one hundred thirty five now, she could even cook some very pleasant meals.
But she couldn’t add a buff to her meals. They were just tasty, very tasty. She knew just how much salt something needed, just how long something should be left on the pan, how to maintain the temperature perfectly for whatever she was cooking.
And that’s fun and convenient, but it lacks excitement. It lacks that pizzazz that magic has. Some of the skills she enjoyed anyway — cooking being one of them. It’s just pleasant to do. Carpentry was another, and it was even almost reaching two hundred with all the renovations they’d done at home recently.
It’s just that she enjoyed the acts themselves, not the skills. And painting, sculpting, music or any other form of art was just never something that she was either passionate about or forced to do for extended periods of time.
And yet, this painting on her wall grabbed her attention. It changed and shifted as the day passed, showing different scenes. Even casting light throughout her room as the depiction of the sun’s rays beamed into her room. It was active, alive almost. Fascinating. How many classes would she need to be capable of such a thing? How many feats would she need? How many different skills went into creating it?
Zoe shook her head. The painting would be fun to examine another time, but for now she had another priority. It would have been nice if her room came with a table and a chair to sit at, but Zoe summoned her map and spread it out over the bed. Four gold coins appeared and floated over to hold the corners down with a little help from her Space skill.
She’d noticed it earlier, but the city was incredible. Hundreds of different districts laid out in the city, with an impeccably designed system of roads tying everything together with the massive castle sat in the centre. It looked almost like depictions of alchemy circles back home — though many cities back home also looked much the same so Zoe didn’t think much of it.
There were far too many dungeons spread throughout the city and the nearby forests to check out each and every one of them. Which made Zoe even more confident that they were created artificially. She still hadn’t quite crossed off her theory of the entire city being a dungeon yet, either.
Zoe summoned a notebook and pencil as she started identifying all of the marks on the map. With such a wide selection, she decided to create a few different lists to note down any dungeons that met various requirements. With each entry she noted down the dungeon’s level, fee, type, name and general location on the map so she could find them later.
The first list would be every challenge dungeon. She’d sort them by level afterwards, and if she ever wanted to try limiting herself to a specific level for some reason she’d be able to find something that fit her need without too much effort.
The second list was every dungeon marked with a trapezoid. These dungeons would be the most effective at getting her closer to her sixth class, finally, and there weren’t too many. Making a list almost felt a little pointless, but remembering where they were on the map would get annoying someday, she imagined.
For her third list, Zoe noted down several lodestone dungeons ranging from about level fifty up to the highest one being at level two hundred seventy. The theory, she hoped, was that if she ever found herself at a very low level again she’d be able to get back up with the help of lodestone dungeons in comfort. Or if nothing else, she could help out any of her friends who wanted to get some more levels under their belt.
And the final list was for any dungeons that interested her for some other reason. A productive dungeon called Injellar’s Rest at level thirty five, a ruin dungeon at level seven. Seven! Zoe couldn’t wait to see what that would end up being.
It took the rest of the night to go through the map, categorizing all of the dungeons that interested her. There ended up being seventeen challenge dungeons ranging from level fourteen to one hundred twenty seven. A smaller range than she expected, but she supposed challenge dungeons would tend to be lower level too. Though the lowest level dungeon was still the odd ruin dungeon at level seven, despite that.
There were five high level dungeons, the lowest being two hundred fifty one and the highest three hundred sixty seven. She wasn’t sure how high she would need to get for her next class, but hoped that would be enough to get her there. She’d recently passed double her previous cap of one forty five, so any moment now she could find herself looking through her options for her sixth class. Zoe tried to avoid thinking about what it would mean if she got a maximum roll and had to get to four hundred thirty five.
Zoe looked through her list of dungeons, but regardless of whether she wanted money or to work towards her next class, she found herself coming back to the highest level dungeon her list. There was a certain degree of risk associated with it of course — a thirty gold fee to enter meant that if the level difference was too high and she couldn’t clear it, she’d be out another massive chunk of gold.
She had one hundred ninety eight gold to her name after all of her recent expenses. Even if she couldn’t clear it, she’d still have enough for eight months of rent. Assuming she didn’t spend more on much else, which at the rate she was going so far didn’t seem likely.
But worst case scenario she could make a quick trip back to Flester’s Might and clear it for free, it just felt like she’d be defeating the purpose of her whole slow journey through the world if she did that. If possible, she’d prefer to make do in the capital, while she was at the capital at least.
And even with that restriction, Zoe found it hard to believe she wouldn’t be able to run one of the lower level dungeons and get some money for a few months rent. Even if she only got ten or twenty gold for a run through of a level two hundred dungeon after all the fees and taxes, that would be more than enough.
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
The best decision would be to start with those lower level dungeons of course, Zoe knew that. She could run through each and every single dungeon on her list, working her way up through the levels as she saved enough to pay for a year or even two.
That just wasn’t fun. The Ruins of Abyllan was the highest level dungeon she’d ever seen, and the best chance by far she’d have of getting to her sixth class. It was exciting, and perhaps in its own way also defeated the purpose of her arbitrary slow paced life she’d given herself. But she made the rules, and they didn’t have to make sense as long as she was enjoying it.
The dungeon itself was located outside of the city, in or perhaps near a lake a ways outside of the city. If the scale was consistent on the map, then Zoe estimated it to be about ten or twenty kilometers to the north east of the capital. Which was quite unfortunate, considering Zoe entered through the south western most gate. At a normal walking pace, that would be probably most of, if not the entire day spent just walking through the city.
It was a nice city, and seeing all of the districts was very interesting. But she’d see all of that in time anyway, so she began to wonder how people got around the city normally. Did they just stay in their districts, not leaving very often? Or were there taxis that took people around, from district to district? A train network below the surface, out of Zoe’s sight, perhaps? Or even teleporters set in key locations throughout the city?
Zoe walked up to the bar and sat down on one of the stools. The older man who told Zoe about the dungeoneering guild smiled at her from behind the bar.
“Good morning to ya.” He said.
“Good morning. How do you get around the city?" Zoe asked. ”I want to head to The Ruins of Abyllan to the north east, but walking there would probably take a day, maybe even two. Feels like there would be a better way to do it, to me.“
The man nodded. “Ah, yes. Well if you head up to the-”
Zoe interrupted him before he could finish speaking. “The royal district? Seems like all I’ve done since coming here is go back and forth.”
The man chuckled. “Yup. Head up there, stop in at the royal office and they’ll get you where you need to go.”
“For a fee?” Zoe asked.
The man smirked. “For a fee. Not too bad though, to get to the north east I’d say you’ll be out a few silver.”
“Ah that’s not bad. Between the rental agreement and dungeoneering license, I was beginning to think I’d need to be a millionaire to live here.” Zoe laughed.
The man laughed. “No, no. Not everything is expensive. I didn’t think that dungeoneering licenses were that expensive either, to be honest.”
“Two gold per level, apparently.” Zoe said.
The man’s eyes wandered to above Zoe’s head for a moment before he inhaled through his teeth. “Ouch.”
Zoe snorted. “Yeah. Tell me about it. Anyway, thanks a bunch. I’ll go try out this royal office transportation thing now. This walk’s getting mighty familiar now.”
The man laughed. “You have fun. Best of luck with your dungeon.”
“Thanks.” Zoe said as she walked out of the inn. She wandered down the road, through the alley, past the pink library and several district until she arrived outside the royal office once more.
Zoe walked in and up to the first person who gestured her over to their little segment of the large counter. “Hello,” they said. “How can I help you today.”
“I was told you can help with transportation? I need to go to the north east of the city, if that’s possible?" Zoe asked.
“Of course.” The woman waved her hand to one of the rooms in the back. “Third room, please.”
“I just walk around?” Zoe gestured to the opening at the far left of the counter.
“Yup. Thank you.” The woman smiled.
“Okay. Thanks.” Zoe said, as she walked around and into the glass room. The man inside looked up from the pile of paperwork on his desk when Zoe entered, his tiny glasses falling down to the tip of his nose.
“Greetings. Do you have your paperwork ready?” He asked.
“Paperwork?” Zoe asked.
“Oh deary me, yes. Please, have a seat.” He gestured at the seat opposite him at the desk as he tidied up the messy pile of papers.
Zoe sat down. “I uh, wanna go to the north east of the city. The ruins of abyllan?”
The man nodded. Frederick, if the nameplate on his desk was anything to go by. “Yes, yes. I’m sure you’re in quite a rush. I’m terribly sorry, but Jane should have handed you a sheet to fill out before you come here. I’m sure it’s somewhere here…” He rummaged through the several stacks of papers before he pulled one out and handed it to Zoe, along with a pencil.
“Here you are, please fill this out to the best of your ability and give it to me when you’re done. Then you can be on your merry way.” Frederick smiled.
“Okay, thanks.” Zoe took the paper and read through it. There were several lines for her to fill out where she needed to go, whether or not she needed a return trip scheduled, what the purpose of her trip was, as well as to confirm she didn’t have any items on her that would react dangerously to teleportation.
She took a few minutes to fill it out and handed it back to Frederick. He looked over it for a moment and then back to Zoe. “Transportation will be six silver, paid prior to transportation. Is that acceptable?"
Zoe summoned two silver coins and handed them over. “Yup. Thank you very much.”
Frederick smiled. “Then have a lovely time, and best of luck to you.”
A massive surge of mana rushed out of Frederick — as well as his clothes and desk, coating Zoe in a thick film of what seemed like solid space. Reality twisted and warped like a paper being folded into an intricate origami figure, leaving Zoe in absolute darkness for a moment.
“Dungeon tours!” Zoe heard faintly as reality twisted back and she began to see her surroundings again. “Get your dungeon tours here!” A man called out from a window in one of many wooden buildings that surrounded the white stone platform Zoe found herself standing on. “Seventy gold and we guarantee one safe clear for you by the end of the day!”