Lauri checked Market for non-restricted items he could get on the cheap for his party and found the Flaming Rapier, still for sale for 5 SP, and a Boar Spear near breaking for 20 SP. He knew there were no items for warriors in the library stash so considered this lucky enough. Still, maybe everyone had their own weapons, he might as well ask. "Everyone good for equipment?" They all answered no. "Okay, you first then Ken, what attributes have you focused?"

"As a Rogue I went Charisma first and Agility second."

"Excellent, I have a plushie for you. Next, Sophie, you can borrow my Sexy Leather of Showing Skin. I purchased it for 400k SP but I think most of the price was driven by its cosmetic appeal. It will double the strength of the shields you make. For the tap you'll need to be level 10 and have the Sexy Magic profession. You don't need a weapon do you?"

"I have my starter wand."

"Excellent. Ted, I'll buy you a spear before tomorrow, sound good?"

"Sounds good"

"Billy, you have a starter bow?"

"Yeah but it's beyond worthless."

"Do you know what a gun is?"

"You shitting me? I'd love a gun."

"I'll bring it tomorrow but heads up I know nothing about guns. Maybe you can teach me."

"Sure."

"Hero, what do you have already?"

"Just this crappy bronze short sword."

"Okay, you can borrow my Minotaur Shield that I got from a System quest. It adds 1,000 Toughness so should scale as you level for a while."

"Holy shit."

"I'll try and have a better sword for you as well. Can anyone cook?"

Sophie puts her hand up, "I can."

"Could you come with me shopping for food then?"

"We going to be in there for that long?"

"Only as long as we're doing well, hopefully that's a long time."

"Sure, let's go shopping."

"Let's meet in front of the main dungeon tomorrow just after sun up."

Everyone agreed and the two headed off to buy food. Lauri purchased far more than Sophie thought would be needed. A full days rations fit nicely in each medium bag slot, plus a few extra for utensils and fuel. Once at his old guild Lauri fetched the plushie, Chekhov's Gun, the tape and then looked around some more. There were lots of cool items to see but only one stood out as useful right now, a Wand of Twin Spell that could double spells cast. Not knowing why there were even Mage items here, he grabbed it as well. Outside the library dungeon he purchased Flaming Rapier and Boar Spear and then used potions and Drain Level on Ladybug as he set to fully renewing all the items. With lots of time to spare in the day, Lauri started on his book translation task and added lamp, with oil, to his bag so he could continue within the main dungeon if he had a chance.

When they met up the next day and he saw Sophie in the Sexy Leather, Lauri felt like someone was shoving a pole into his pants. Her breasts were fully bare between the X straps, nipples and all. "Can't you put a shirt over or under that?"

"I tried but apparently not."

"Try putting this tape over your nipples. You don't meet the requirements yet so I'm not sure how it will work."

She put the tape over her nipples and, while she didn't gain it's equipped benefits, there was no interference caused with the Sexy Leather. "Yeah, that works. Do you think I'll reach level 10 during this trip?"

"Might do. I'm hoping to farm for bags of holding and they start dropping from level 15 monsters and above."

"That's too ambitious."

"Oh, found a Wand of Twin Spell that might be good for you?"

"Wow, that's leagues better than my wand. It could scale well if I learnt spells that best utilize it but that's too much an investment if I'm only borrowing it."

"Excluding the Minotaur Shield, that I'll want back eventually, you can all buy the other items off me."

"At 400k I assure you that I will only be wearing this Sexy Leather for so long as it pleases you."

Lauri passed out the other items, that hadn't been on him yesterday, and everyone is soon acting even more like excited children. When asked about prices Lauri suggests using the System Market as their measure. To this end Hero showed that the Market holds a sales price history they can use for best accuracy. The Charming Plushie is worth 800k. The Flaming Rapier is worth 200k. The Boar Spear is worth 2 million thanks to its quick-retrieval ability. Chekhov's Gun is worth 15 million. Sexy Leather of Showing Skin is 400k, just like Lauri had said. Wand of Twin Spell was worth 350k. Finally, Perverted Mage Nipple Tape was worth 2 million. While not for sale, Hero tried looking up the Minotaur Shield but it only had 2 sales in history and they were only 10 SP each because of having almost no durability left, meaning that he couldn't gauge its true value. Seeing all this Lauri considered that he could make a fortune buying near broken items and selling them fixed.

Sophie stuck her tonged out before saying "I don't think any of us are going to be affording this top tier gear any time soon."

Ken shook his head in disbelief. "You know someone could just steal the gear you lent them?"

"I thought the System marked ownership?"

"Oh right. I meant, you know that someone with the Thief profession could steal this gear?"

"I didn't know... but it does explain why so many people hate on the Thief profession."

"Oh. So... Power leveling to 10, right?"

"I'm going to keep wearing my Necklace of Greed until I have a plan but the rest of you should if you don't have reason not to."

"A plan? There's literally no cost in leveling. You can save up your attribute points until you're ready to decide."

Lauri doesn't want to give Ken the full explanation so tells him just enough, "Tutorial Dungeon will lock me out once past level 5 and there's a floor that has 44 ankhegs."

"Oh wow, yeah, stick to level 4."

They headed over to the main dungeon and saw it's name floating over its entrance. 'Village Dungeon'. Lauri asked the man stationed there "if this is a city then why's it called Village Dungeon?"

"Because this city was settled around this dungeon and became a village before it grew into a town and then a city. You'll still hear some people refer to here as 'the town' but for dungeons it's even harder to change their name. Just call it the main dungeon."

"How much is entrance?"

"250 gold each." At this everyone but Lauri winces.

"1,500 gold for a party of 6?" He casually asks for confirmation. After the cost for Horses Trot this wasn't enough to shock him.

"Yep."

"Anyone in the party want to pay their own entrance?"

Hero gets a bit angry at this, "if we could, you think we'd have been sitting around on our arses?"

"I can pay for everyone but that means you only get to keep your EXP, no loot rights."

"Like we have a choice. Once I'm level 20 it'll be much easier to party up. Being low level sucks."

Lauri handed over the gold and once it had been weighed the man said "it's just a smidge light, some of the coins might be shaved." Lauri put another coin in and it shifted clearly to his favour. "Okay, you're all good." The group entered the dungeon to find the first room empty. Ken peeked the next room and reported 10 goblins. Sophie raised a shield of 400 over everyone and commented "it really did double the shield." Lauri couldn't help feeling a little disappointed but reminded himself she was level 1 and at level 1 his own shield was only 620, after being doubled. Also he'd worked out that his shield had a 5 minute cooldown so asked Sophie "what's your shields cooldown?"

"I have 2 shields, one for a group and one for a single target. They each have a 5 minute cooldown."

"Ah, but your single target one can target two thanks to the wand?"

"It's actually not a spell."

"Seriously? Well, not until level 10 then, got it."

"Good point, once the nipple tape can be equipped it will count as a spell. I'd have to go Sexy Magic though and it would stop working next profession change."

"What's after Sexy Magic, that you'd want to accept the change?"

"Immortality Magic, Risqué Magic, Dark Magic, any specialties unlocked by quests or any unlocked by items."

"That profession progression makes no sense to me."

"You stop being sexy if you don't stop aging."

"Okay, I sort of get that one then."

Ken added, "you keep your prior professions and can still equip their items."

They were interrupted by Billy. "How are we going to kill the goblins?"

Lauri considered it would be easy to just put them to sleep but practical experience is as important as EXP, so he'd hold back if he could. "Hero goes in first, naturally. Then everyone but me attacks from range."

"And you?"

"I have no ranged weapons, unless someone wants to give me back one they're borrowing from me. I'll step in if I'm needed."

"You're needed from the get-go," Hero claimed.

"Well, I have this Chitin Cracker Warhammer and my chains. What do you reckon Hero, shall I stand at your side?"

Hero shook his head, "we'd be in each others way. Why don't you have a weapon to go with your shield?"

"That's... a very good question. One I don't have an answer for. Let's go."

Everyone but Lauri charged in and Hero struggled to keep the goblins back. Lauri gave an order, "everyone come to this side of the doorway except Hero. Hero, stand in the centre of the doorway." Falling back into position Hero held them back at the choke point and started swinging his rapier at them to little effect. Lauri shook his head, "you need to thrust with a rapier, swinging it is no good." However it turned out that the goblins piling onto Hero were too close to him to be stabbed with such a long weapon. Thankfully Ted was able to take a step backwards and started spearing one goblin then another, killing each with a single hit. Billy was having trouble trying to get his gun to fire. Sophie wasn't doing anything so Lauri asked, "is there nothing you can do, Sophie?"

"I made the shield."

"Everyone starts with 3 skills so what's your third?"

"It's a spell called 'Get Away From Me' but all it does is push enemies 2 meters back from me for 6 seconds, with a 30 second cooldown."

"Only enemies?"

"Yeah..."

"Position yourself so that you push them back the correct distance to allow Hero to thrust his rapier at them."

"Good idea." Sophie judges the distance and then casts her push. The goblins are pushed too far away but Hero didn't hesitate to take a step forward as he started stabbing goblins, setting them ablaze as they died. Lauri looks down at his necklace as he wonders about it and sees it glow each time a goblin is killed. Even though he wasn't personally killing them it seemed to be doing something and 2 coins were dropping when each disappeared. With Ted also stepping forward to thrust his spear, and the very loud sound of a gun firing, the last goblins were killed. Lauri collected the coins while asking "does the gun need to be that loud?"

Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.

There's mention of gun mufflers and Lauri steps out of the dungeon for a moment to check the System Market. There's actually a lot of them and the only restrictions are the types of guns they pair with. Checking a cheap gun it has restrictions of its own but he can't keep everyone waiting forever. Limiting items to those appropriate for his rifle, Lauri really wanted a 200,000 SP model but even with the SP collected just now, he only had 6,474 available. There's a 5k model called '+2 Magic Rifle Silencer' which claims to reduce the noise to 60 dB and a note says this will prevent permanent hearing damage. Lauri feels like that's a far shot from the 20k '+3 Whisper Silent Rifle' model which claims to be 'movie silent', which sounded very impressive even if he didn't know what a movie was.

[Purchased 1x +2 Magic Rifle Silencer for 5,000SP]

Wanting a one handed weapon for himself Lauri removed some of his item filters and even set it to include items not currently available. He found Skeleton Bane Mace for 500,000 SP. Currently with only 1,474 SP he put a buy order for 1,000SP on one and didn't specify a durability range. Seeing his available SP drop to 474 Lauri considers that this is an interesting way to hide SP but perhaps not the best. He was about to return to the dungeon when his purchase order was filled and a mace appeared in his hand with 104/5,000 durability. Also a friend request from Lauren Blight, the seller, popped up. Accepting it Lauri then received a message. ["Make sure to specify a durability range. Though I doubt you'd have gotten a hit if you had, so maybe this is what you wanted?"]

["Thanks, this will give me a good chance to test it out before I go spending 500k. Maybe I should have specified at least 100 durability as I suppose a mace that would break with one hit would not make for much of a trial."] Then he entered the dungeon again with the silencer and mace.

They easily installed the muffler to the rifle end and Hero informed Lauri "that sound must have attracted every goblin on this floor. We fought 4 waves before you got back. I know there's not many coins but we just got unlucky. They really did only drop 1 coin each."

Ken had a guilty look, "it's true."

Lauri nodded. "My necklace amps up loot drops. 1 coin each is the normal rate." They walk through 4 more rooms to reach the end of the floor. Finding stairs downwards and no other goblins. "Well done everyone."

"Seems like we only need you for your money," Hero more than just jested.

Lauri might have responded but suddenly the plushie moved and Ken exclaimed "I got it!"

Heading down to floor 2, Ken went scouting and Lauri hit the mace with a few Renew Items while nobody was looking his way. Ken reported back "the whole second floor is one big room with no choke points and 100 goblins, give or take."

"That's 250 SP give or take. Do we have to fight them all?"

"We could sneak around and bypass the fights altogether."

"What levels are they?"

"Mostly level 2 but there's 4 that are level 4."

"Anyone here not level 4?" Sophie and Ted report that they've reached level 3 and Billy mentions now being level 4. "We'll try sneaking around." They tried but unfortunately Hero had the grace and agility of a gorilla and kept shifting rocks around until it finally got them overheard by a patrol of 10 goblins. Goblins piled onto Hero while others got past him. With no choke points, at all, this was unavoidable. Again Hero failed to make good use of the rapier and he complained "this weapon is useless," before dropping it and resorting to his short sword. Ted tried to keep them at a distance with his spear but failed due to their numbers. Billy was too scared to shoot the gun in case it drew every goblin, so resorted to his supposedly useless bow. Useless it was, as arrows failed to even pierce through the goblins leather armour. Finally Sophie got her spell cast and as they were pushed back everyone but Lauri took it as a race to kill all the goblins, with Hero swinging his short sword like he was wielding a machete until it got too bent and disappeared. Ted finished off the last two while Hero swore under his breath and picked back up the rapier.

Having finished repairing the mace Lauri asked Hero "are you a Strength build?"

"Duh. Why?"

Lauri shrugged, he'd meant the mace for himself but did have max agility. "I got this mace after you pointed out that I didn't have a one handed weapon. Want to borrow it instead of the rapier?"

"Thank the heavens, this weapon is shite. How much is the mace worth?" Hero asked as they swapped weapons.

"Skeleton Bane Mace, worth 500k."

"Then I no longer have the cheapest weapon here."

Ken pointed out "they're all very top tier weapons."

"Yeah? Well the rapier really didn't suit me. Can't swing it? I don't even know what to do with it then."

Lauri nodded, "hope the mace serves you well. Since I'm not at the front maybe I'll make better use of the rapier. Also I can made good use of an agility based weapon since I have so many Potions of Agility."

"For real?"

"Yeah, have a look." Lauri opened his bag and showed them all the potions. "My agility is maxed, even though I don't use it for my build."

"Speaking of your build, what..." A horn sounded and the group looked ahead to see all the goblins mobilizing.

"Charge them, don't give them the chance to group up or get into a formation."

Hero charged forward while everyone else moved a bit slower. Ted was able to throw his spear for the first time and hit a goblin. Opening and closing his hands a few times Ted soon figured out the quick-retrieval as his spear teleported back into his hand. Hero reached the closest group and started swinging his mace like a madman. Unlike his previous weapons, the mace was quite proficient at being used like this and Hero was able to split open up to 3 goblin heads with a good swing. He started laughing at how easy killing goblins now was, which was a little unnerving to the others. He stopped laughing when he found himself surrounded but took a breath of relief as Sophie cast her push and they were shoved past him. Hero was strong enough not to be knocked over as the goblins bumped him on their way and was almost too gleefully as he went back to smashing heads in. There were probably around 20 but by the time Lauri arrived they were all dead and he simply started picking up coins.

"Just how lazy are you, Lauri?"

"Huh?"

"You didn't even do anything."

"Billy, use the gun again, they're all alerted now and your bow isn't nearly as effective. Hero, they seem to be grouping at the left and right, which side?"

"I'll take left, you take right."

"We'll all move left then, we have nothing to gain by splitting up."

"They could flank us."

"Same effect as splitting up. Quickly now, they're trying to work out a formation."

Hero saw little choice so charged the group to the left, guessing there to be 30 or so. This time he was supported by gun fire and a plushie as Hero raises his shield against them and crushed the skulls of any which tried to move towards his right. Hero started strafing right to make it harder for the goblins to circle around him in either direction, so doesn't end up needing Sophie's help this time. This leaves Sophie with nothing to do, just standing there on backup the same way Lauri was. This eventually brought Hero to the other side of all the goblins and the ones at the back decided to instead go after the ranged members of the party. Ted retrieved his spear and moved into a defensive stance then attacked as soon as any were in range. Billy freaked out and dropped his gun. The plushie kept supporting Hero as Ken was afraid Hero would be killed if its aid was withdrawn right now. Sophie watched and timed her push spell, sending the goblins backwards as soon as she felt that Ted was being overwhelmed. Outranging them, Ted could then attack with impunity. Lauri walked up and killed a few with his rapier. "They're coming from the right, finish the last off quickly," Lauri instructed.

Hero teased "oh wow, Lauri is capable of doing something."

Their party succeeded in killing the last of this group before the 4 level 4 goblins joined the over 30 to the right and took charge. "I'm thinking this floors total is exceeding 100, Ken."

"If so then not by much. Estimates are estimates," Ken defended his scouting.

"Everyone back into formation. This time we're fighting a group which managed to coordinate, so don't try that strafing tactic against them."

"Why not? It worked well."

"It won't work well if you tried it this time. Stay near to Sophie."

"My spell hasn't cooled down yet."

"It will have when we need it. They've formed a crescent formation, they mean to encircle us."

"What do we do?"

"We're going to push right through. Everyone form a wedge with Hero at the front, Sophie in the middle and me at the back."

Hero snarked "you coward."

"Oh, my bad, I'm at the front then. Hero, take the back."

Taking the back Hero was a bit indignant but he'd asked for it, in a way, so went along. Holding his shield out Lauri lead the wedge, each side slowly advancing on each other. "When I charge... Ted, kill the level 4 one towards my right. Billy I want you to kill the level 4 one towards my left. I'll kill the one directly in front of me. We'll all charge through together so don't fall behind. Sophie, you decide when." The two sides slowly drew closer together with the edges of the goblins crescent moving faster and closing around. Then Lauri charged and as he thrust his rapier through the goblin in front the other two were cut down. Everyone charged through and escaped to the other side of the goblin formation. Sophie commented "we didn't even need my spell."

"Hero's going to need it still. About-face everyone, it's not over." Everyone turning around, including the goblins, to all be facing each other again.

Hero grumbled "you did this on purpose, you dick."

"No, Dick's my friend, I'm Lauri. Charge the remnants on your right."

With an angry sound that Lauri didn't understand, Hero charged in and started smashing skulls. "He called his profession Barbarian right? Is this how they usually fight?"

Ted gave a single "Ha! Yeah, this is about what you should expect from any barbarian but usually they use two handed weapons."

"Should I lend him my hammer instead?"

"I think he's having fun with the mace."

"Oh, Hero's SP ran out, Sophie can you use your other shield ability?"

"Everyone else loses their shield if I do."

"He's getting surrounded and we're not getting much attention."

"Okay." Sophie puts up a shield of 2,400 on Hero.

"Oh wow, that's a huge improvement."

"Thanks."

Lauri and Sophie watched as Hero and the plushie killed the rest of the goblins, with support from Billy and Ted. For efficiency, Lauri had started picking up coins before the battle was even over. As the last enemy fell Hero huffed and puffed, wiping some blood from his face. Lauri thought praise was deserved. "Well done everyone! Leave the boring task of picking up coins to me while you take a breather."