I opened the door behind the dead roach with caution. It was obvious Sam had been talking about this “Dungeon Depot” place in her messages, but it wouldn’t kill me to be cautious.
“I would kill me to not be, though…” I whispered, hearing the door close behind me.
“Welcome to Dungeon Depot!” I heard a voice howling next to my ear, sending me flying backwards in fear. “Where you Gear Up so you don’t Give Up!”
A clown. A real, motherfucking clown, screaming at me like I owed him money. “Jesus Christ!” I yelled as the clown kept approaching me. “What the fuck!”
“Are you interested in some Potions of Mild Inconvenience?” He produced a sickly red bottle out of thin air and shoved it in my direction. “It can heal minor wounds but it tastes awful!”
I tried pushing the thing away as I walked into a shelf that clinked furiously.
But my hands went right through it. “Aaaaaah!” I screamed. “What the fuck!”
“Elliot” I heard as I crawled into a ball in a corner while the damned clown from hell showed me something he was calling a “Bottle of minor disillusion”
“Sam!” I screamed from beneath the ghost. “What’s the fuck is this thing!”
She stood there, a funny smile in her face. “Well, that would be Ronnie.”
The clown smiled a smile too wide for a normal creature and moved away from me. “Ronald, at your service.” He said, changing his demeanor in an instant.
“What the fuck, Sam.” I said. “What the actual fucking fuck, Sam…”
Sam bent down with laughter, grabbing her stomach as that jovial sound I loved so much filled the place. Her long red hair flowed down her shoulders and she looked at me, a mischievous glint in her green eyes. “I’m sorry…” She said between laughters. “I know you don’t like clowns but… But I thought it might help you deal with the stress…”
I sat up as the clown moved further back. I really did hate clowns, but I couldn’t help myself from smiling at seeing her like this. She was alright, I had managed to find her.
“Sam…” I said, beginning to stand up. “Did you really tell the clown to scare me?”
Sam giggled like a little girl as she looked at me and nodded.
“Well, you suck.”
She looked up, her expression worried for a second, but I didn’t let her have a moment to let that thought linger.
I rushed in and hugged her. Hugged her so hard I felt myself melt into her body. “You suck so much Samantha Hayes.”
She stiffened for a second before melting into me and hugging me back. I felt her face rest in the crook of my neck. “I missed you too, silly head.”
I planted a kiss in her red hair. “I must smell pretty bad, though, so I think it might be good to… you know… let go of each other.”
“Don’t wanna.” She said, snuggling deeper into my neck before snapping back and pushing away from me a bit. “You do smell like shit, though… And you look like shit too, what the fuck happened to you?”
“Oh… That’s one hell of a story, you see I…”
“Ahem…” I heard someone say behind me, interrupting our lovely reunion. “Might I offer mister Elliot a shower?”
The fucking clown.
I let go of Sam and turner around slowly, trying to avoid eye contact with the thing. “Look man,” I said. “I want you to know I don’t have a problem with you specifically, it’s just…” I waved, pointing to his whole body.
He nodded. “I understand.” He said. “Childhood trauma can be a bitch, but showers are free for adventurers!”
I couldn’t avoid face-palming. It was clear Sam had told this dude everything about me. “Sure… sure, I could use a shower. Do you do laundry too? My whole outfit is covered in black slime…”
Ronnie rubbed his hands together. “For a small fee, everything is possible here at Dungeon Depot!” He said. “The cleaning service comes as an extra for the shower service, it would be just 3 credits to get your gear cleaned.”
I nodded as I brought out my PDA. “Yeah, I should have en… ough…” I stared silently at my screen.
Last time I checked I had 9 Credits left to my name.
Now I had 338.
“Holy shit…” I whispered. “Is this for the boss?”
Ronnie moved his hands as if he was looking at invisible windows. “It should be… 12 for each killed roach foot soldier, so a total of 48, minus your expenses at The Inner Inn, so 38, plus 100 for the mid boss solo battle, so 138, plus 200 for the Boss solo battle, so 338.”
This time I had to look at the clown. “How… How do you know all that?” I said.
He smiled that eerie smile of his. “Well, sir, we can see things you can’t.”
I sighed, looking down. “Whatever, man. Just take me to the showers, I really need a place to relax for a bit, I feel like I’ve been up for forever.”
“29 hours.” He said without hesitation. “Well, technically, 29 hours, 4 minutes and 34 seconds… 35… 36… but who keeps count, right?”
“I… Uh… Yeah… Just… Shower, cleaning, resting, please… We’ll check the store after that…”
“Access to the resting area would be an additional 2 credits per person.” He said.
I nodded. “Just, please, dude, you are getting on my nerves.”
He smiled as he pointed to a door at the back of the store. “Just walk in there and you will find yourself in a room with a shower, place your clothes in the basket and they will be cleaned once you finish washing yourself.”
Sam took my hand and guided me. I hadn’t really noticed how tired I felt until now. “It’s been hard, hasn’t it.”
But it was obvious to me that I wasn’t the only one feeling the weight. Her spark was still there, but it was dimmer, smothered under the dungeon’s pressure.
We both were.
“You don’t even imagine…” I said. “I know there’s no, like, HP gage in this place, but I’m pretty sure I was about to die a couple of times out there.”
Sam squeezed my hand. “But we are together again.” She said. “That’s what’s important, we found each other.”
I bumped my shoulder on hers. “Yeah.”
She squeezed a bit harder.
We walked into the room together and I heard a faint Ding coming from my PDA. Probably telling me the cost for the room had been deducted from my credits.
Sam helped me undress, taking the pajama sweater off me as she pressed her hand gently over the many bruises that were beginning to show in my chest and back. “Oh, god…” She said, touching one of the many bruises in my chest and making me flinch. “You’re so beaten up…”
“I had to fight hard to make it here…” I touched a small cut underneath her left eye. “But so did you… I saw the bug outside, are you alright?”
I caressed her hair, passing my hand through those red, usually silky strands of hers.
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They were tangled.
She began to sob as she hugged me, pressing her head against my chest. “I was so scared…” She said. “The thing sneaked up on me, I thought for a moment I wasn’t going to make it.” She looked up at me. “All I could think of was that I needed to live long enough to see you…”
She tapped on my shoulder with her fist, almost as if she was relieving a memory. “It just… didn’t die…” She said. “I had to stab it over and over again…”
“I know…” I said as I kissed her forehead and held her in my arms.
We stayed like that until her sobbing subdued.
We got into the shower together.
We woke up after what felt like a whole day and my body felt… hurt all over.
When we went to sleep I had thought maybe the dungeon would, I don’t know, magically cure our wounds, help us feel better, but as I woke up to searing pain in my side where I had hit the pillar the day before, I was reminded of what Bennie had said at the Inner Inn.
“The dungeon is trying to kill you…”
And I was starting to believe it was true. Sure, it had said our purpose there was to become stronger, or something like that, but up until now the dungeon had done little to actually help us, it had just provided the minimum needed for us not to die.
It was still too early to come to conclusions, but I already had my suspicions.
“I could sleep a few more days.” Said Sam, raising from within the covers. “This bed is pretty good.”
I nodded, combing my hand through her hair. “I want to go out soon-ish.” I saw her expression darken at the idea of leaving. “I know you don’t want to go, but I have a strange feeling the same thing that happened to your room will eventually happen to this floor.”
She trembled a bit. “You think it’s gonna collapse?”
I nodded. “Yeah.” I said. “This is supposed to be a tutorial stage, right? And it’s clear the dungeon didn’t want you staying in your room for too long. I’m guessing it also doesn’t want us to stay in this floor forever.”
I looked to the door. “But we can ask Ronnie,” I say. “I met a Benny before, the owner of the Inn I passed through before, and he knew a lot. Ronnie also seems very knowledgeable… creepiness notwithstanding.”
She smiled. “You seem… pretty good at this whole adventuring thing…” She said.
I shook my head. “Nah… I think I’m still in shock, like I haven’t processed things yet.” I said. “It all feels like a dream…” I placed my hand in my side. “A nightmare…”
She placed a hand in my back as she sat besides me. “But we are together.” She said. “We can do this.”
I nodded, kissed her softly, cupping her head in my hands. “Yeah, I’ve got my brains back, so everything’s good.”
“Brains?” She asked, a skewed smile in her face.
“Yeah,” I said. “Like always. I’m the brawns, you are the brains.”
Her smirk bloomed into a full on smile. “You trying to earn good points?” She said. “Because you are doing a good job.”
I smiled. “Good to know.” I said, standing up and grabbing my black t-shirt from the basket next to the bathroom. “Oh, they are pretty clean.”
I dressed up as I waited for Sam to exit the toilet. “We should get going.” She said. “Yesterday I saw a few things in the store that might come in useful.”
I nodded. “Yeah, we need some supplies.”
I opened the door and was immediately greeted by Ronnie The Clown… to my total discomfort. “Hello, sir, madam. Did you have a good night of sleep? You slept for 12 hours straight!” He said.
I looked at the clown feeling a shiver run down my spine. “What even are you, how do you know so much…”
Ronnie smiled as his whole being flickered in and out of existance. “Well,” He said. “I’m a hologram, of course!”
I blinked. “Well, that’s… not very fantasy of the dungeon.”
Sam came behind me. “But it is pretty Sci-fi of it.”
“You knew?” I asked, pointing at Ronnie.
“Yes, I noticed when I entered that he flickered a bit.” She said. “I thought he might be a ghost, but it turned out he was, well… that.”
I sighed, the dungeon kept on surprising me. The store itself was a mix and match game gone wrong. Some shelves were metallic, taken straight out from IKEA, some where wooden and looked as old as time. There were signs written in several different languages and, in one corner, was an actual small arcade room with tables that looked like vintage pinball machines.
I got closer to them and notice one of them wasn’t actually a game machine. It had a title on top that read: “Allocate your unused attribute points here!”
“Oh! Right!” I said. “I have some of those!”
Sam got closer. “You too? I level up once when I killed the roach. Ronnie taught me how to use this yesterday. You just place your PDA there and then click on the arrows next to each stat on the machine to adjust the points.”
“You did?” I asked. “I had to kill three roaches before leveling up, maybe they were different types?”
She shrugged. “Dunno.” I did as she said, placing my PDA in an indentation that seemed perfect for it. I saw the screen come to life as it showed all my unspent points in a large number. 15 unused points, I was now in level 5.
I looked at the stats I hadn’t really looked at since the beginning… and saw they had changed on their own.
Elliot Kane
LV.5
STR
12
DEX
9
CON
12
INT
6
WIZ
7
CHA
5
LUK
13
“What?” I said. “Some of them went up on their own!”
“Well, of course!” Said the clown manifesting next to me and scaring the shit out of me. “Same as in your world, while you train, you will improve on your own. Every time you level up, one point is automatically assigned to the stat you’ve been relying on the most. The rest are yours to distribute however you like.”
“Shit!” I yelled, containing a punch. “Thanks! Please… don’t get to close…” I asked before looking back at the machine and clicking on buttons as I saw fit.
Elliot Kane
LV.5
STR
15
DEX
12
CON
15
INT
6
WIZ
7
CHA
5
LUK
16
“You sure about that?” Asked Samantha.
“Nope.” I said. “But I’m pretty sure I don’t need Intelligence as much having you here with me. And I think Luck might come in handy later on.”
Sam smirked. “No pressure.” I finished.
“Don’t worry.” She said. “Intelligence and Wizdom are my highest stats…”
I smiled. “See? Brains and Brawns.”
After I finished allocating my points, we looked around the general store and found a few interesting items that might help us. A few more rations because, apparently, safe rooms were not as common in other levels, a couple of those sickly red Potions of Mild Inconvenience so cure small wounds (I drank one and a few bruises disappeared instantly… although it tasted like shit).
In one of the isles I found a knuckleduster that I could wear on my right hand without impeding hand movement much and I thought would fit my style of punching stuff I’d been using pretty well, so I bought it.
It didn’t give out any bonuses, but it would protect my hand when punching stuff, and after punching the queen I welcomed the added protection.
But by far the most important thing (and the most expensive) was something we found next to the counter. A wooden staff that the system cataloged as “Wooden Staff of Water.”
“That’s a magical item.” Said the clown. “It’s a good beginner staff to learn and use simple water based magic.”
Sam’s eyes lit up. “Like… actual magic?”
“Yes, when you equip it, it will teach you the magical skill Water Bullet, which will let you launch a water ball at high speeds from the tip of the staff.”
“How much is it?” I asked. Sam glanced at me. “Don’t worry, Sam. Whatever magic is in this place, it’s probably tied with Intelligence or Wisdom, and we both know I suck at those.”
Ronnie smiled. “It is pretty expensive…” Said the clown. “IT sure is an easy way to speed start your journey into magic early on, but this wand right here will run you down 200 credits.”
I winced. With everything we had gotten so far, we had already eaten about 50 credits of my 338 credits, leaving me at 285. Using 200 more for the wand would leave 85 for future meals and other essentials… but at the same time, it looked pretty useful.
“Nah,” said Sam. “That’s to expensive right now…”
“I’ll buy it.” I said. “200, right?” I extended my PDA towards Ronnie. The clown put on a wide grin and nodded, accepting payment.
I heard a Ding and saw my credit score drop to 85 credits. “Elliot, you didn’t need to, it was too expensive.”
I took the staff and waved it around before giving it to Sam. “No, we needed it.” I said. “Credits we can get more later, but we lack a strategy, and this gives us just that. I am an in-fighter, you will support from behind. You can bonk enemies in the head with the staff if they get too close and launch water bullets to the ones I’m fighting to break their focus. Then, I can use that break to do extra damage or kill them.”
She gripped the staff tightly, her eyes lighting up with a mix of awe and determination. “I guess it’s time I learn some magic, huh?”
Ronnie nodded. “I like your way of thinking, sir.” He said. “Your intelligence is, most certainly not reflected on your stats.” He vanished and appeared in our side of the counter. “Now, dear costumers, as much as I’ve enjoyed your presence in my establishment, I would encourage you to move on. The tutorial floors will announce their incoming collapse in about 3 hours, so you need to move quickly if you want to reach the other floors before it falls down on you.”
Sam gasped. “So it will collapse…”
“Shits.” I said, I had been to engrossed in the shopping that I had forgotten to ask about that. “Let’s go.” I told Sam. “We need to move.”
She nodded, turned to Ronnie and waved. “By Ronnie, hope I can see you again!”
I jogged to the door, hearing Sam’s steps behind me as I got closer to the door.
“Goodbye, sir, madam.” I heard Ronnie’s voice behind us. “Just so you know,” He said. “This floor was just an appetizer. You will be heading into the real dungeon now, and those other places are leagues harder than this one.”
I gulped at his words before opening the door. “Thank’s for the advice!” I yelled before stepping out into the dungeon.
I felt a sense of unease as I left the safety of the Dungeon Depot, the same I’d felt when I left the Inner Inn.
But there was something different this time. I look beside me at the redheaded woman giving a disgusted look at the dead roach.
I was not alone anymore.