"Is everybody ready?" Max asked, glancing around at his team. He was pleased to see that, while most of them looked worried, they were also determined. Sarah had a few drops of blood on her cheek. She’d killed two kobolds on her own, chasing one of the monsters down.

Ethan had done a great job of handling the reporters, who were all currently standing a respectful distance away. Most of the reporters seemed to be taking a break, recording them, or talking into a microphone facing a camera. The reaction to Max's fight against the champion monster had been excitement and awe, which seemed to have lingered as the newly formed Trifecta Guild prepared to enter the portal.

Max knew it was unfortunate for regular people that no powerful Returners had appeared in this area, but it had definitely created an opportunity for his group to stand out.

"I think we're good to go," said Blake, giving a thumbs up. Everyone else nodded.

"Good. I'm not expecting this to be a long fight, but double check your gear anyway. Make sure you have extra water," Max instructed. He half expected at least some of them to argue, but none did. They merely mechanically checked their gear again. Maybe they were more worried than they were letting on, which would make sense since this would definitely be their first time into a portal. If it weren't for Max leading them, he was sure this was not something they would have attempted on their own.

His victory over the champions had emboldened his friends as much as it’d impressed the reporters.

All the members of his team were using similar gear. They all wore a high-end katana on their hip, a quality sword they’d all done practice cutting with before the world went crazy. In addition to their swords, Ethan and Chad also carried spears.

For any combat mission, nothing was certain. There would always be a chance of death. But Max was fairly confident that they should be okay, especially since he was going to do most of the heavy lifting.

"Ethan, are you ready, buddy? You're going to be second in command," Max said, patting Ethon on the shoulder of his crude, improvised, but nonetheless effective armor.

Ethan quietly said, "Yeah. So you're going to range ahead, right?"

"That's right," said Max. "Just like how you guys mopped up the last of the kobolds a little bit ago, you'll basically be doing the same in the dungeon." Ethan nodded.

After each member of the Trifecta Guild met Max's eyes, he turned and walked toward the portal. The other members followed and followed his example in ignoring the press.

Flash.

The transition through the portal was a somewhat familiar feeling. What felt like less than a second later, Max was striding forward into a large cave with glowing mushrooms on the floor and walls. The strange lighting dipped all of the area in shadow. For adventurers relying on their eyes, the entire dungeon would be a death trap.

The moment Max entered the dungeon, Lavinia's spirits had ranged ahead and now she whispered information about the nearest enemies in his ear.

He wasted no time. The moment the spirits reported back, he sprang forward toward a ratty, wooden defensive emplacement, tossing one of his enchanted beads over before ducking and channeling his mana in a defensive way. A second later the bead exploded and pieces of the two kobolds that had been on the other side scattered all over the cavern. Though the explosion had been loud, it’d been worth it to stop the creatures from activating their giant security horn. A few moments later, the rest of the Trifecta Guild entered after him and gaped at the immediate destruction that Max had wrought.

"Okay, stay on your toes," said Max. "Be ready to turn your headlights on if you need them."

The Trifecta fighters without spears had their swords drawn. Ethan and Chad took up the rear since they had the reach to help those fighting up front. Satisfied with how his friends were situated, he turned off all of his own lights and ranged ahead. As he traveled the ominous tunnels, he felt incredibly grateful for the fact that the dungeon was exactly as he'd expected.

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One side tunnel led down to what looked like a dead end. But he knew better.

Max climbed up and wedged himself into a much smaller, hidden tunnel. It was…not pleasant. He thought about how claustrophobic it was, and then put it out of mind.

Luckily, he didn't need to see ahead of him to know he was safe. Lavinia's spirits had already scouted the tunnel ahead. Max shimmied himself forward, going slow enough not to make too much noise, but also being highly aware that he had limited time. If he took too long, he might lose his friends, his guildmates.

His hand explored the pouch tied to his belt that held his exploding, enchanted beads. He’d used one of them to test earlier, five of them in the earlier fight with the champion monster, and he'd just used one of them after getting into the dungeon itself. That meant he'd used a grand total of seven out of the original 20 beads. He had 13 left. He hoped it’d be enough..

Max crawled around in his tunnel and breathed a sigh of relief as it began to open up, expanding wider until he could eventually barely move forward in a crouch. But when he saw light up ahead, he got onto his belly again, crawling forward cautiously. He stopped when he could see inside the next cavern.

This was definitely the boss room.

Max's tunnel opened up high over the cavern, at least fifteen feet up. The room had at least twenty kobolds inside, including a good number of shamans. The boss, unlike the champion, showed no evidence of arcane knowledge. Instead, he was a hulking brute of a kobold in heavy bronze armor. The creature sat brooding on his throne, listening as a shaman seemed to be reporting to him using a series of yips, barks, and chirps.

This is it! Max grinned. Even though there were so many enemies in a small place and this would theoretically be a tougher fight on paper than taking out the kobold champion, he was actually far less worried. Reaching into his bag, he grabbed every remaining fire-enchanted bead and without hesitation, threw them all into the cavern. He tried to put most of them near the boss and the highest concentration of shamans.

Every bead detonated at the exact same time, rocking the cave and creating a blast that almost pushed Max back down his tunnel. Only staying low and the other defensive measures he'd taken helped him withstand it.

Before the smoke even cleared, Max jumped into the large chamber, clearing his sword from its sheath and taking the head off one of the last remaining kobolds. Then he followed the noises, whether yells in surprise, questions in an alien language, dispatched every kobold that hadn’t been blown to pieces.

He found the boss on its back, blood flowing from every facial orifice, gasping for air and holding a section of staff that had penetrated the creature’s torso through a gap in its armor. The kobold weakly looked up at Max’s approach. Lips pulled back from bloody teeth showed a freshly broken canine.

Max’s expression didn’t flicker. The former hero of Albion gave the monster no chance for any last second show of defiance. His sword came down with a skilled, savage chop, separating the creature's head from its body.

Then he moved to where he'd seen the large room’s main opening before, leaving the ruined room. A group of heavily armed kobolds ran toward the explosion. As they rounded the corner and saw Max, their obvious surprise was almost comical before he was among them, cleaving heads and hewing off limbs. The group of four was down before they could even make a sound.

With smoke billowing out of the cleared boss room and standing in a pile of guts, Max flicked blood off of his sword and spit. “I hate kobolds,” he muttered.

He began moving again, taking the main path and heading back towards the entry of the dungeon, killing every kobold he could find, easily locating them with the help of his spirits. Every defensive emplacement was facing the other direction, making the fights quick and easy. Max ambushed team after team of shocked kobolds.

He continued this way until he found his guildmates. They had been fighting a group of four. Two of the kobolds were down, dead. And as Max watched, a third died to Ethan's spear. The last kobold tried to run away, and the last thing it saw was Max's sword descending in a glittering arc.

"The boss is down," Max informed. "I left before the smoke cleared, and I didn’t grab any loot." The four other Trifecta Guild members were nervous and keyed up on adrenaline, but they still smiled in excitement. After all, publicity was not the only reason why they were braving this dungeon. The new guild needed more gear.

Max noted that beside Ethan's katana he now also wore a new short sword. The kobolds’ standard weapons were trash, but a few of them had equipment that was far superior, magically, than almost anything that Max's friends could buy in the near future.

Guilds clearing dungeons always kept the best weapons for themselves. Magic equipment sold around the world would be inferior to what the teams clearing new portals used.

"I see you guys were handling yourself. Shall we go check out the boss room and portal out?" asked Max. As he spoke, Lavinia whispered in his ear, telling him where her spirits had spotted the remaining kobolds.

Ethan smiled and padded the new weapon on his belt. "Let's take all their shit."