I entered the portal in Darya’s room and on the other side, I was blasted with the heat of merciless sun. The air, heated to an oppressive temperature, felt like it was blowing out of a furnace. Before my eyes was an arid wasteland with a jagged line of a formidable canyon cutting through it. Scraggy walls of layered rock in hues of red, orange, and brown cast shadows down the middle.

The silence was broken by the occasional whisper of the dry wind, and the rolling of a tumbleweed. Vultures soared high above, and tiny lizards peeked out from the cracks in the rocks. The place looked dead except for thorny shrubs and cacti.

We came prepared with four waterskins and wide-brimmed straw hats. I had to cut several holes in mine so it’d fit around my damn horns. I also packed away my poncho. I may have complained about my scaled, gray-colored hide, but my last venture on the tropical island didn't leave me sunburned.

This was another [t1] Void Dungeon that Darya had collected over the years from hunting [t1] creatures in the forest and the swamp around the village. It made little sense to run these dungeons unless the party was capable of killing the boss.

“What happened? Why did you stop?” I asked her.

“Well, we used to have a solid team of five. That was until—" she paused, gazing ahead with a vacant look as if revisiting a painful memory. "Until, uh... until we didn't, okay?”

“I’m sorry.”

She sighed. “It's alright. I'm still fuming about what went down. The party leader, that blasted scoundrel, bolted with all the loot.”

“Who was it?”

She waved her hand dismissively. “Don’t worry about it, he won’t be coming back. But if he ever does, I’m going to murder him.”

We took a few gulps from a waterskin and walked ahead at a cautious step. According to Darya, this dungeon was filled with lizards, but finding them was challenging. This was where my [cartography] profession came in handy. It showed a layout of the canyon and its many branching valleys like a tree.

We stopped, and looked down a narrow passage of the canyon’s offshoot. It took a few minutes of staring to notice the lizards toward the end, hidden in the shadows, blending in with the orange terrain. There were five of them, each one as big as a wolf. They had sharp claws on their feet, and thick spikes running down their backs. Their large mouths were no doubt filled with rows of nasty teeth.

Eager to try out my wands, I was ready with the two smaller wands, and the staff-wand sticking out of my backpack. Getting them to fight was simple. Darya shot one, and they all came charging out like wasps out of a burning nest. Unlike the crabs, they moved fast.

At their speed, I didn’t have to wait for them to get closer, or to time the power up of the wands. The Swift wand shot first and the large projectile smashed into them like a bowling ball. The impact hurled them back, knocked them around.

While they reeled from the impact, the follow up shot from the Bolstered wand came flying through. Amplified by [Power Shot] the second shot splattered them on contact, killing three instantly. The remaining two were injured, and slowed by Darya’s [Venomous Sting.] I kept my thumbs on the power crystals to shoot again and within seconds we had dispatched the pack. I had set traps just in case, but they didn’t make it that far.

“Oh, I love this. I was born to wander,” I said.

“Don’t get lost.”

We both chuckled at the corny pun, and went to pick up a couple of minor power crystals that had dropped. Shooting a wand was much easier than retrieving an arrow from the quiver and nocking it. My back and arms didn’t get sore either. While the first initial shots came fast, the follow-up shots were slowed by the 1.5 second cooldowns.

“Are you thinking of switching to using a wand?” I asked her. “We could wander together.”

Darya froze for a second with startled expression. Gears slowly turned in my head as I realized what I said. Oh, crap, I did it again. I kicked myself on the inside.

She regained her composure quickly, glanced fondly at her bow. “Nope, not giving up my bow. We’ve got a long history together. It’s put food to the table and kept me alive ever since I picked it up.”

I had to agree with her. It probably didn’t make a lot of sense for her to switch over to using wands. Her aim was exceptional with the bow, and she could shoot arrow after arrow like a machine gun.

After the first pack of lizards, I felt confident with using wands, and we went on to find other packs. Things were going smooth until we found a pack of nine. This time four of them made it to the traps. Chains with jaws of steel lashed out, latching on to them. Three lizards crashed to the ground.They spun about like dogs on a chain trying to get free. Dust clouds rose up.

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One clambered over the fallen, and I blasted off my Swift wand, but missed. The very angry lizard leapt to the wall, scrambling up before leaping down for us. In an instant, I dropped my wands, shoved Darya aside, and lurched forward.

I felt the spike of adrenaline, and the world focused down into a singular moment. I reached up with my arm despite the vicious teeth and claws coming to meet it. It latched on to my outstretched arm, but I had caught it by the throat. It clawed at me with its hind legs, but couldn’t reach my head.

Gripping tight, my clawed fingers dug into its soft flesh. I turned and slammed it hard against the stone wall. Then again and again until I heard a solid crunch. It finally went limp, and a moment later, the lizard vanished into a puff of dust, granting me experience points. I picked up my wands and finished off the lizards stuck in my traps.

“Holy-” I said between shallow breaths and the sound of my heart beating loud in my ears. Fearful of life-threatening cuts, I quickly examined myself only to find nothing but shredded pants and shallow scratches down the front of my scaled abs and thighs. To the side and down on the dusty ground, Darya was looking up at me with wide eyes and furrowed brows.

I winced. “Ooh, sorry for pushing you.”

“No, th-that's... that was—” She stood up, brushing herself off. “Thank you is what I meant to say. That could have gone south real quick.”

“Yeah, those claws were-” I looked down at my barely visible scratches, and then at the menacing claws of my own hand. “I didn’t think I would ever say it, but they’re nothing compared to mine, huh.”

She snorted, looking excited. “You went at it like an animal.”

That hit me in the gut harder than I was willing to admit. I know what she meant, but was that how she actually saw me? There was nothing that I could do about it. Hell, I might as well make it worse by getting some evolution upgrades.

“I’ll need a new pair of pants,” I said and turned to leave to find the next pack of lizards to kill.

She had started to say something but I didn’t hear it. We finished off the remaining couple of packs without speaking much, and only the boss remained. This [t1] dungeon wasn’t supposed to be difficult. It wasn’t the monsters, but the climate that was kicking my ass. In the process I had gained another two levels and reached level nine. With the skill points, I upgraded the [Power Shot] damage by another tier, and placed all ten attributes into agility, planning to increase it to 400 just like strength. Though both [Power Shot] and [Steel Trap] were affected by strength, I didn’t want to put all my eggs into the same basket by only increasing one attribute. I had also considered upgrading Telekinesis or Illusion, but they didn’t seem as vital for combat and survival as my other two skills.

“Wait, let me check something,” I said.

Despite the oppressive heat, I wanted to take a minute to look into a spot shown on the mini-map. An empty area beyond a low wall, tucked away at the back of an offshoot. I had to clamber up a steep hill, and then do a bit of climbing to peek over the rim. At first the place looked much the same, but then I spotted it.

Before going further, I scanned for any lizards that might be laying in wait. I didn’t want to drop in and get surrounded. Seeing none, I climbed all the way up and dropped down on the other side.

It was half buried, hidden among the thorny bushes that I had to hack away with my machete before I could get close. I had seen the glint of it, but now as I examined it close, it didn’t look the least bit shiny. The weathered wood and rusted iron looked completely dull. Perhaps [Keen Eye] had something to do with it? Whatever the case, I was eager to crack open the lid of this treasure chest, except it was locked tight.

I groaned, and dug around to free it. Maybe Darya knew how to open it. I shook it like a christmas present trying to guess what could be inside, but it didn’t make a sound. It was light, so maybe it was empty? That’d be disappointing. I climbed back over and dropped down on the other side.

Darya beamed. “You found one!”

“Sure did, but the damn thing is locked.”

She extended her arms, grabbing at the air with her hand. “Let me see it.”

I handed her the small treasure chest. She raised it up high as if trying to read something on the bottom of it, then without warning, she smashed it down to the ground, startling me. The chest crumbled into pieces, and a beam of light burst up from the remains.

“That’s … subtle.”

“If it works, it works.”

She picked up a dungeon orb off the ground, except this one looked different. Instead of bronze, it looked to be made of steel.

She whistled. “Wouldja look at that.”

“What is it?” I asked.

“Are the gods trying to say something?” she mused and chucked the small orb to me.

[3v3] Void Battleground: Forgotten Pass

* Team minimum: 3

* Portal uses: 3

* Duration: 30 minutes

“So, is this kind of like a gladiator arena fight? To the death?”

“Sorta, but nobody really dies in a battleground, you just simply get kicked back out, fully healed and alive.”

“Huh. Why do it?”

“You rake in a ton of experience and a sweet reward for snagging the win. There's a ranking and a ladder, but we need to sniff out a third teammate.”

“I don’t know anyone.”

“I know a few folks in the village who might be game. Let's catch up with them later, yeah?”

“What sort of opponents would we face?”

“It all hinges on the team's rank, and we'd be kicking off from the bottom." She grinned. “But with you on board, oh boy, I pity the other team.”