The letter was hand delivered by a butler with silver hair, neatly combed back, wearing a crisply pressed uniform. He stood with a dignified posture, his weathered face remaining stoic and composed. He had waited for an hour at the inn for my arrival.

The invitation was short and simple, and I already had a good guess who it was from before cracking open the fancy wax seal. It was for an afternoon meal at the Governor's Mansion. I considered crumpling up the letter and throwing it back at his feet, but decided against it. We’d be here another couple of days, and needed to buy supplies. I didn’t want to jeopardize that, or put our group in danger while we stayed here. If the governor controlled the market and the merchants guild, maybe I could take advantage of him to get better prices in town. Also, it was a good opportunity to look around and use [Keen Eye] to see what I could be up against before stirring up any trouble.

I put on my most cordial smile. “It’d be a pleasure.”

“The carriage shall pick you up after the bell tolls once,” he replied, then turned and left.

Darya eyed the exchange with narrowed eyes and pursed lips. “I’d watch what you eat there.”

“I don’t fault your distrust,” I whispered to her. “I’m suspicious of the governor myself.”

The inn was busier than before. Curious glances and outright staring continued unabated. Did they come here to gawk at me? What did they think I was, some kind of a freak show at a circus? They got on my nerves, so I sat facing away from them so I wouldn’t have to see them.

The price of a meal and a drink wasn’t too bad, though not as cheap as at Rosedale. However, the selection was much better. Darker, stronger ale, and a generous helping of a pork knuckle with mashed potatoes and bread. I dug in with a voracious appetite, then returned for a second. Darya picked at her food, finishing half at best. I ate what remained on her plate and thanked her for it.

By the time I finished eating, the rest of the crew had already gone to bed. Five of them piled into one of the two rooms, leaving the second one for me and Darya. After a third tankard of strong ale, the shy notion of spending a night in the same room with a gorgeous woman quit pestering me. Maybe she thought something of it, but I put it out of my mind. Darya and I had plans for this night’s [Measured Savagery], all laid out in a neat row. The room had a single large bed. Not bothering to remove my gear, I crashed on the bed and was out in an instant.

A moment later, I bolted upright, gasping for air.

An orange glow illuminated the room. Darya stirred next to me, tugging at my fur cloak, pulling it to her. It took a moment for me to process what happened. The light was coming right over my head, from my horns. I checked the time. It was exactly midnight.

I nudged Draya. “Come on, wake up, we have work to do.”

Instead she curled up tighter, muttering a response that sounded a lot like a curse. I shoved her harder and this time it worked. Her eyes peeled open, then ballooned out. She jumped up like a startled cat, scrambled off the side of the bed and crashed with a yelp.

“Are you alright?” I asked her.

She peeked up over the side of the bed, then stood up with an angry look on her face. “Your- your, bloody horns scared the living shit out me!”

I sighed. “Yeah, well … I’m not apologizing for that. I can’t help it.”

She massaged the side of her hip, wincing in pain. “Is it midnight?”

“Yeah, so let’s not waste a minute. We’re on the clock here.”

Darya groaned, but got ready quickly. She picked up the first dungeon orb in the row and opened the portal to a [t1] Flooded Lair.

Thanks to all the bugs I’d killed, I had fifteen [t1] dungeon orbs. Three Tropical Islands, four Arid Canyons, two Whispering Bogs, and six Flooded Lairs. Each tier of void dungeons had only four variations, and this would be the fourth variation I hadn’t seen yet. Darya didn’t mind which one we did, as long as it wasn’t the [t2] Jungle with the damned snakes.

Darya followed me as I stepped through the portal into a dark, cavernous scene. Murky water filled the chambers, yet passages were left to get through and around without having to get wet. In their depths, shadows lurked, concealing unseen dangers. Echoes of distant currents and sloshing water reverberated against the rough, slate walls.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

Despite any obvious sources of light, the terrain was lit by moonlight, casting ethereal beams. The place was a lot like a maze, but thankfully I had Cartography to rely on. Which, coincidentally, ranked up as soon as I entered this new dungeon for the first time.

[Cartographer profession has been upgraded. Resource layer added to the global map.]

I opened the larger map to take a look, but nothing new had showed up. I figured it would be useful outside the Void. Maybe it would show locations of valuable herbs, ores or gems? I was eager to find out, but first I had dungeon bosses to kill.

The regular monsters looked just like the lizards I had killed in the swamp. They sat in clumps by the subterranean pools, clacking their jaws and hissing.

* [t1] Merman [Gray]

For a change, I decided to spare a minute to kill some regular monsters to gather a few power crystals for my wands. I flexed my right hand to test my forearm, and was happy to find that it was as good as new.

“Follow me and shoot down into the chambers at the sides to draw them after us,” I told Darya. “We’ll gather up a crowd of em.”

Darya furrowed her brows. “Are you sure about that?”

“Oh yeah, won’t be a problem.”

Darya hesitated for a moment, but did as I asked. We dashed ahead, only stopping for a moment so she could shoot. The Merman growled and bolted after us, and soon we had a crowd chasing us, shoving each other as they ran.

We reached a chamber just before the boss, and I turned to face the oncoming mob. Some thirty mermen were screeching, and hollering. With a grin, I unsheathed my newfound longsword and [Leaped] into the midst. I sliced down, cleaving two mermen in a single strike. At the same time I crushed an unlucky merman under my feet. I slashed in a wide arc, slicing through their thick hides and bone. In return, their wild attacks left scratches on my scales. In less than a minute I turned the mermen to sushi, and their remains vanished taking their stench with them.

We collected nine minor power crystals and moved on to tackle the boss. In the large chamber toward the back of the dungeon was a deep pool of water. Bulbous eyes peered above the water's surface like curious orbs. They moved, silently advancing, and soon a colossal toad emerged from the murky pond. Its warty skin glistened with a slimy sheen. The creature's throat expanded as it let out a low croak that reverberated through the cavern.

* [t2] War Toad [Green]

“Let me try it myself,” Darya said.

“Are you sure about that?” I asked.

“No, but I always wanted to.”

“Alright, but run to me if you need help, I’ll drop some traps.”

Sword in hand, I was ready to [Leap] into action if things went bad. The War Toad chamber was spacious, and had room to run circles around it, however, Darya decided to shoot the toad in the face, and we retreated back the way we came in. The toad came bounding after us and we kept moving back. Darya treated the boss like a pin cushion, sending arrow after arrow into it.

I didn’t mind that we were spending a little extra time to kill this boss if it meant that Darya would gain confidence and experience in putting down tougher opponents. And she didn’t disappoint. Within half a minute, the toad had slowed from all the venomous shots she had put into it. It crawled after her like a lethargic slug, and I felt sorry for it.

While watching Darya with one eye, I had my status screen open. I had gotten a taste for [Leap] and felt that it needed an upgrade.

* [t1] Leap [Movement]

* Upgrades:

* (1 SP) Mana cost: -20% mana

* (1 SP) Distance: +1 meter

* (1 SP) Cooldown: -0.3 seconds

I had six skill points to use and decided to upgrade its distance twice by another two meters, and on top of that I reduced the cooldown two times to bring it down from 3.0 seconds to 2.4. The skill had proved to be incredible not only in moving rapidly so as to flee, or to close the distance, but also offensively to crush things under my feet.

***

The 65,536th iteration of The Keeper of the Void peered into the Void, puzzled at what it was seeing. An anomaly. It wasn’t often that its attention was brought down to such a low tier instance -- the lowest in fact.

It wasn’t the peculiar timing right at 0:00 -- it’d seen that many times before, nor was it the tactic of only killing the boss that caught its notice. Such a tactic was a bothersome thing which it tried to ignore. He frowned upon such wasteful behavior. It took a great deal of energy to condense the void into the constructs, to manifest intelligence, and give it will. It was a shame to discard all that after it had come to existence for mere minutes, seconds even.

But what could it do? Quite a bit actually -- if it wanted to.

It had seen many lifeforms come and go in its domain, but this one was new to it. The sheer amalgamation of this .. creature. He wasn’t born this way, was he? No, in fact he wasn’t born at all. But made outside the Void?

How?!

Curiosity got the best of this Keeper.