"I say we go downstairs," Em said. "Onward to the unexplored area to find new loots."

I resummoned Mr. Linty and saw that he had the little flame icon next to his name on my Party health display. "Just a sec. I want to make sure of something." And I clicked on the flame icon. Mr. Linty burst into flames.

"Damn you. You killed Mr. Linty. Randy, you are a bastard."

"But. There was a flame button next to his name."

"Randy. If you ever see a flame button next to my name, don't press it," Sid said.

"No promises. Depends on how ticked off I am at you." I said, resummoning Mr. Linty.

We headed down to the Basement, Mr. Linty at point.

The basement was the typical suburban cliche of forgotten boxes of Christmas ornaments, tools, spare snow tires, extra blankets, and body parts hanging from hooks attached to the ceiling. The musty smell of mold, dust, and blood was omnipresent. In the corner of the room was a small altar to some dark god in which a humanoid figure in a robe stood, knife in hand, about to sacrifice a terrified and squirming naked teenage girl strapped to an alter.

Mr. Linty attacked immediately, and Em taunted. And I kept to the back.

The cultist turned towards Em, raised his hand, and sent a ball of fire straight at her. She raised her riot shield just in time as the flames washed over her, and her health dropped drastically. She fell to the ground with second-degree burns all over her body. "Stop, Drop, and Roll, Em," I yelled but quickly saw she was beyond that.

Sid looked freaked out when he popped out of nowhere and slammed his knives into the cultist. He ran over to his Wife, cradling her head in his arms, and yelled, "Randy, do something; she is dying." At the same time, I was casting cure wounds on Em as quickly as I could.

The cultist was not dead yet, though. Whisps of green vapor began to form around his fingers. And I had to switch from healing Em to blasting the cultist with electricity. "Sid, get your head back in the game," I yelled as the vapor left the cultist's control and fell to the ground. Where it landed, corpses began pulling themselves out of the earth.

The naked teenager screamed, and I agreed, spamming Em with my healing macro and pulling my baseball bat out of inventory, when I noticed that Sid was nowhere to be seen.

I went over and stood over top Em's prone body, and whenever a zombie came near, I [Hulk Smashed] it real good. The cultist was not relaxing either. I felt electricity course through my body. I almost fell to the ground, convulsing. Shit, I was getting a taste of my own medicine. My health was down halfway.

Sid popped out of nowhere and plunged his knives into the cultist's eyes. "That one is for Emily. Mother fucker." The cultist fell to the ground, but his three risen undead kept trying to kill us. "How is she, Randy."

"She is hanging on; every time I cast a heal, the sheer amount of burns soak up her healing. She is losing more health than I can heal. But she is still alive. We have to get out of this soon. Shut up and focus on killing zombies." I said as I swung at the head of the nearest Zombie who didn't even have the common decency to moan about brains before I shattered his skull.

I looked over and Sid was nowhere to be seen. "Fuck, Sidney, speed is important here. These guys are brainless. You don't have to sneak-attack them."

Sid popped out of nowhere and stuck his knives in a zombie's back. It just kept moving towards me. "Use Blunt weapons, or you have to cut them up."

I commanded Mr. Linty to go after the Zombie Sid had just stabbed, then pressed the fire button. Mr. Linty burst into flames, and that Zombie went up like dry kindling. Em's health was deteriorating, so I cast another healing spell on her and another Heal over Time.

"Shit!" I yelled. "What. Is it Em? Please tell me she isn't dead." Sid yelled.

"No, I forgot about a spell I bought that could help her a lot." And then I cast [Stabilize] on her, and her health stopped deteriorating.

I stepped away from Emily and swung at the last Zombie shuffling towards the naked teenage girl on the sacrificial altar. I connected with its skull. Sid held a mace that he'd pulled out of who knows where, and he swung at the last Zombie. I turned away. Sid had that Zombie under control. And I was worried about the Zombie I had set on fire burning the house down, so I cast [moisten] on him a few times while looking around the room for a fire extinguisher.

I saw a fire blanket on one of the storage shelves and grabbed it, throwing it on the burning Zombie. Who groaned in a zombie-like fashion as I put him out. "Ungrateful son of a bitch." As I slammed him over and over again with my baseball bat until it stopped twitching.

I then knelt by Emily's side and started layering on heals. The black skin flaked away, and I pushed the melted bits of her mail aside. A lot of the fabric of her clothing had caught fire and burnt off. "Sid, grab those blankets in that box over there. Cut. A hole in the middle of two of them so both women aren't as exposed."

Then I turned to the would-be sacrifice, "Hello, sweetheart, who are you, and what are you doing in my dungeon? What is your name?"

The girl started to speak and a popup appeared in my vision.

Buy Language -- Basic: Speak and Read Darlan'ii

25 XP

Yes / No

I selected "Yes"

All of a sudden I could understand what the girl was yammering on about. "My name is Quimby." I almost spit all over myself when she said her name. "The goblins keep raiding my village. I was at my father's farm when they came the last time they killed my parents, and that foul man brought me here. I thought I'd be eaten, not sacrificed to whatever dark god he worshiped."

Emily groaned, waking up. "I feel like shit. We won? Who is the naked babe? And I just got a popup"

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

"Me too." Said Sid.

"It is the language she is speaking." I said. "Might as well get it."

"Speak for yourself, Em, the fabric of your clothes caught fire, and your boobs are hanging out. Anyway, she says she comes from a nearby village. And get this. Her name is Quimby." I said while Emily started to giggle. "Anyway, There seems to be a human village in my dungeon." I asked her, "Do you think you can bring us there?"

Sid handed the girl one of the blankets he'd gathered and said, "Here you go Quimby, and I don't think your name is funny. Different cultures, that kind of thing." He said, staring straight at Quimby's perky boobs.

Then he gave the other blanket to Em, who punched him before saying, "Eyes over here, Sidney."

I said to the girl, "Put your head through the hole. Wear it like a Poncho. I'm sorry we don't have a lot of extra clothes right now. If we leave the dungeon to get some, I suspect this place will reset, and you will be a prisoner again. I think. I'm not sure how this works with actual people. I'm not even sure if I can take a goblin out. I keep meaning to put one in a duffle bag and try. Do you know, can you leave with us. A guy in a Top Hat came out once."

"I cannot leave the Dinge. And you claim to have met one of the Forerunners?"

"Forerunner? What are they? What is the Dinge?"

"This place is the Dinge. It is a place of power used to cross the border between your world and mine. The Forerunners are legends. They are the ones who come before. In the stories, they were supposed to be heralds of destruction, death, and chaos."

"Can you take us to your home?"

"Yes. I know the way."

I looked over at Em and Sid. "Looks like we found our first side quest."

Sid said, "I hate escort missions."

"Okay, Let's go," I said.

"Mind if I check the other boxes for some better clothes first? I feel ridiculous in this blanket." Em said.

"Go ahead. I went over and sat on the bottom step of the stairway. And I opened the [market]. We needed some buff against elemental attacks. More fireballs would easily have killed us all."

I found a [Basic: Fire resistance] and a [Basic: Lightning Resistance] for 45 xp each. Both worked like a heal spell, where I could cast them on a group member individually, and they would have resistance for an hour. They were better than nothing. But I wanted a group buff. There was a Basic: Elemental Resistance Group that cost 250 xp. But I only had 175 xp.

"Sid? Em? Do you think you could lend me some experience ?There is an Elemental resistance buff that I want to get, but I am 75 xp short."

"Sorry, Randy." Sid said, while he crushed some skill crystals in his hand, "I just bought [Basic: Archery], [Basic: Combat Sharpen], [Basic: Lockpicking], [Basic: Equipment Upkeep], and [Basic: Tracking] so I only have 15 xp left. I can send that over to you." Said, Sid.

Looking at Emily, she said, "I can't help you much either. I just bought [Basic: Fire Resistance], [Basic: Regenerate], [Basic: Combat Sharpen], and [Summon: Cashmere Robe], and I have 32 xp left."

"Send me what you can, you guys," I said. "I guess I will save up for it." And with that, we set off with Quimby in the lead. Both she and Em had dressed in unreasonably decadent Cashmere Bath Robes. The blankets they'd been wearing a few minutes before were left behind.

Quimby went up the stairs. On the top step, I resummoned Mr. Linty, added Quimby to the party, and recast all my buffs on the group.

We headed towards the main gate where the mimic chair had been. "Keep an eye out." I said, "When I came this way last time, I didn't see any guards, but I might have gotten lucky." As we walked, we heard war drums beat over towards where the swimming pool, bocce courts, and clubhouse, and smoke rose in the distance.

When we got to the pond, I said, "Careful, that bench eats ass and not in a sexy way."

A door in the gate was beside the automatic mechanism on the road leading in. This place was a broken reflection of the world outside. I lived in a condo complex. The dungeon had taken the shape of a condo complex. There were roads and buildings and meticulous landscaping that were nothing like the roads and buildings and landscaping, yet I instinctively knew how everything was laid out. There were roads, car ports, and parking spaces, but no cars. There were Alligators and Ibises that, from a distance, were almost identical to the wildlife outside in the real world.

Still, everything was subtly different. It wasn't anything obvious. The sky outside was blue. There was only one sun in the sky. No superfluous moons were visible in the sunlit sky. The structures looked like structures you would find in any condominium complex. The plants were green. The trees were treelike.

Then it hit me—the feeling of incongruity which had been bothering me for so long. The regular life in the condo was missing. My Karen next door, Marigold, was not sitting on a lawn chair in front of her home scolding passersby. People weren't out walking their dogs. No older people were trying to accumulate enough steps on their Fitbit for the day. It was quiet except for the goblin war drums pouting over by the clubhouse. Too damned quiet.

Quimby led us through the gate, and she became visibly more relaxed when we were outside the complex. According to my [Sense: North] spell, we headed North across a pasture-like field until we came to a river. And then Quimby followed the river west upstream. We walked following the current for over two hours, only stopping once for a bagel, smoked salmon, and cream cheese break. I kept a steady stream of [Basic: Increased Stamina recovery] going on everyone, so nobody tired out.

Which led my thoughts in a different direction. I wonder what would happen if I went to the gym and kept refreshing someone's stamina and health as they worked out, allowing them to push well past their limits. I could make millions as a workout guru. But what would be the effect on my stats? Well, it wouldn't be hard to buy a weight set and find out. But where to put it? I was running out of space in my small condo.

We had traveled around 5 miles, and the sun was going down when Quimby said, "We should set up a camp for the night. We have a lot of walking to do tomorrow. There aren't a lot of monsters out here, but you can't be too careful."

Sid was having Em perform a Tick check. This is something Sid did whenever he was exposed to nature. He had been doing this ever since he had read about Lone Star Ticks and the horrible sickness they inflicted on their victims.

"If you are this scared of insects, I don't get how you plan on being a scout," I told him.

"As soon as I get more experience, I, there are a bunch of anti-insect spells I plan to get."

"And what is the [Basic: Combat Sharpen] spell you both got? Should I get it too?" I asked.

"Up to you dood. All it does is makes the bladed weapon in your hand sharper than steel can normally get for a few minutes at the expense of wearing down your blade." Sid said.

I cast [Basic: Dig] a few times and lined the hole with branches and kindling. Quimby said, “no fire. We are still too close to the green manling abominations. Can you bring forth more of those bread things from earlier?"

So it was Everything Bagels with Bacon and Cheddar for dinner. Then Emily cast her [Summon Cashmere robe a few dozen times to give us ample bedding.

I volunteered to keep watch since I had the [Stamina Recovery spell] and could effectively use it to stay awake forever. Then I cast Drain Stamina on Sid and Em so that their sleep was more effective, and while they slept, I cast [Basic: Group Increase Healing Rate] and [Basic: Group Increase Mana Recovery] on everyone. Mr. Linty patrolled around the camp, looking for danger.

The night passed quietly and would have been uneventful, except I killed a Rabbit with [Shock] that startled and terrified Mr. Linty. It wasn't a monstrous bunny—just this world's equivalent to a typical American Cottontail. I felt terrible about it because Quimby's no fires restriction made it so we couldn't eat it for breakfast. Plus, it was cute.

The morning sun appeared out from behind the mountains in the difference, and after a breakfast of toasted everything bagels (and one cheddar and jalapeño bagel — I had finally learned the spell), we set off.

We walked for another four hours following the stream until we reached a stone bridge over the creek and muddy dirt road. Quimby seemed more and more relaxed the further we went down the road. Eventually, we started to see houses and fields of crops. Many of the homes showed signs of fire and those that didn't showed signs of having been repaired recently.

At one of the Recently repaired houses, Quimby ran to the door and opened it, "Mother, Father, it is your Quim. I have returned."