An extended, “Daaaammmmnnnnn,” slowly escaped Matthew, while Rebecca looked around wide-eyed and quietly whispered, “Wha… What the heck happened here?” In the short time they’d been gone from the school, everything had changed. Dense, thick vines and leaves snaked up the halls and ceiling in a blanket of cascading patterns, and a thick layer of green moss had spread from wall to wall along the floor. Instead of looking like a place they’d abandoned just a day or so ago, the school now looked like it’d been deserted and overgrown for years.
“It’s the gibberlings,” Matthew whispered softly. “They’re creatures of the fay – fairy kin who live in the deep forests and wild places. Their presence here has changed this place. There’s definitely a heart in this school somewhere. I’m certain of it.”
“What exactly is a ‘dungeon heart’ anyway?” Rebecca whispered back softly, as Matthew slowly unwrapped his arm from around her and stared back and forth up and down the overran hallway.
Pulling the sword back out from the black hole that was still hovering above his ring, Matthew handed it out towards Rebecca. “See if you can use this. Grip it tight in your fist and then swing it at me. If it’s not too heavy, see if you can attack me with it.”
Hesitant, Rebecca slowly took the sword and then gingerly pulled it free from the scabbard. Swinging it a few times experimentally, she looked slightly shocked. “It’s not as heavy as I would have imagined it to be,” she told Matthew after a moment’s hesitation.
“From my experience, once you gain a class, you change. A gamer is naturally stronger, faster, and more durable than an NPC. Even at level one, you should probably be able to beat any NPC at just about anything – unless they’re just exceptionally skilled. Chances are you could outshoot a hunter who’s hunted for sport most of his life, but you probably couldn’t outshoot a professional snipe who was trained and used his skills to preserve his life. But,” Matthew whispered, a small smirk flickering at the corner of his lips, “if you were to put a little time and effort into it, you’d be able to do things that an army sniper could only dream of. We’re not bound by the normal limits of humanity anymore. We’re gamers.”
Nodding, even though she wasn’t certain that she could do such things as outshoot a hunter – she’d never even held a gun in her entire life – Rebecca hesitantly pointed the tip of the blade at Matthew. “Sure you want me to try this? What if I hit you?”
“If you hit me with the difference in our levels,” Matthew laughed, “I’ll just have to give up and go to Hel, or something.”
“Fine.” Taking a deep breath, Rebecca stepped forward and then swung the blade several times at Matthew, frowning as he gracefully bobbed and moved away from each attack. After a half dozen swings, he suddenly stepped forward, caught her wrist in his iron clad grip, and tugged her up to kiss her. “Looks like you’ll be fine with that,” he told her, smirking wildly once he finally released her arm and stepped back again.
“So I’m supposed to fight with this?” Rebecca asked, frowning slightly to herself. “I thought my job was to toss magic at things, hence the name spelldancer.”
“To be honest,” Matthew shrugged, “I’m not sure how the hell a spelldancer normally fights. I’d imagine a wizard would stay back and toss magic, but a dancer seems like it might be a class to bob and weave between opponents while dancing gracefully. Yours might be one of those hybrid type classes that can do a little of both, but not do either as well as the pure class. I honestly don’t know,” Matthew admitted. “That’s why you’re going to deal with things here in the school all by yourself.”
“By myself?!” Rebecca’s mouth gaped open and a blank look of pure disbelief surrounded her. “No way in hell! What are you going to be doing?”
“I’m going to be staying back, watching over you, and healing,” Matthew told her in a solid, firm voice. “You have to get some fighting experience in under your belt, and this seems like a place where there would be a good number of low danger opponents for you to practice against. If your health starts dropping too low, I’ll heal you, and if you seem to get in over your head, I’ll save you. Otherwise, you’re going to be the one to deal with whatever pops up.”
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“Fine,” Rebecca mumbled, not at all sounding like she truly thought it was fine. “You still haven’t told me what the hell a heart is,” she muttered moodily.
“A dungeon heart,” Matthew corrected. “Monsters, like people, tend to try and find places thy can call home. They often congregate together in packs, tribes, herds, or some other collective group. In this new world, once enough monsters have settled into an area, and been allowed to stay there long enough, the place changes and a dungeon heart is born.
“That heart,” Matthew continued, “warps space around itself, much like my ring does, and it creates a dungeon lair where the creatures can live, grow, and thrive. If it’s not destroyed, the monsters will continue to spawn and get more numerous and the lair will expand and grow with them. As the dungeon evolves, so do the creatures in it, being slowly influenced by its ever growing power, they start to became more powerful and more dangerous over time. More warriors are born, more wizards, or shamans, or other such specialty types.
“The only way to stop the spread and evolution of creatures, is to find the dungeon, go into it, and destroy the crystal which is the source of it all,” Matthew warned grimly. “I was thinking with the number of gibberlings which were around, that it’d be enough to form a dungeon heart. I just didn’t think it’d get to this point, this fast,” he admitted.
“During the beta phase, I never encountered any dungeons growing or evolving at this rate. Maybe that was because of the limited player participation, or maybe it’s a temporary bonus to help change the world into a more suitable ‘game state’, but whatever the reason, I can’t say I like it.”
“Then, are you certain it’s safe to make me deal with this on my own?” Worried, Rebecca was once again chewing on her lower lip, concern obvious in her eyes.
“You’re not going to be alone,” Matthew promised her. “You’re just going to have the chance to practice your talents while I watch over you from behind. Consider it a form of power-leveling. I’ve got magic to heal, and I’ll keep you healthy. If you do bounce into a group too large for you to deal with, I’ll wipe them out for you. I’m not going to let anything happen to you,” he assured her.
Frowning worriedly, Rebecca nonetheless nodded and swallowed back her concerns. “Then where do we start?” She asked, barely whispering loud enough for him to hear her. “Where do we look for this dungeon heart at?”
Matthew thought for a moment and then simply shrugged slightly. “It can be anywhere. I wouldn’t think it’s be up on this floor since I killed the gibberlings off that was up here earlier.” Pointing his finger down the hall, he pointed to where the pile of corpses had been earlier, and which now seemed to be nothing more than a large mossy knoll in the middle of the hallway. “The others will probably avoid this hall, so I don’t think the heart would’ve formed here. We’ll just have to wander and keep our eyes open, until we run across it – and the best way to do that would be to just stick to our original plan.”
“Which was what again exactly?” Rebecca asked.
“First, to do a quick sweep of this floor again, just to be certain it was clear,” Matthew said, holding up one finger. “Then,” holding up a second finger, “we work our way downstairs and to the auditorium to see if there’s any other suitable clothes in there you can wear. And finally,” he held up a third finger, “we work our way over towards the gym and see if there’s any clue about whether Kristy lived or died. If she got away or not.
“And, while we’re doing this,” Matthew added with a harsh twinkle in the corner of his eyes, “if we come across the dungeon anywhere, we go and crush it!” Bringing his fingers back together, he made them into a fist and held it upright for emphasis. “Nothing complicated at all to any of that, now is it?” He asked, a slight smirk twitching at the corner of his lips.
“No… No, I don’t guess so.” Biting her lower lip so hard she got a damage notification and it started to bleed, Rebecca slowly turned her back on Matthew. Gripping the sword, she carried so tightly that her knuckles started to turn white from the effort, she slowly worked her way back to the classroom which had started it all.