Leaving the Tavern was easy. Eric tossed a gold coin on the counter and just left. Coney knew people who did that in other games, but that was an insane amount of wealth compared to the few silver pieces he’d acquired in his time. “Why’d you pay so much?” He asked, looking at the other boy.

“Oh that? It’s simple, I set up a tab, so any extra goes to that and will be saved for drinks, minus appropriate tip of course. “But that booth wasn’t that cheap either. It costs, hmm, about one silver an hour.”

“That’s insane, why do you have so much? We’ve only been in the game so long.” Coney was astounded. “Have you already been adventuring that much?”

Walking down the street was easy enough. They walked down and towards the outskirts of town. There were smaller buildings in this direction. It seemed to Coney to be farms, with fields out front of them. He wondered how the town protected them as he walked through one of the main town gates and into the farmland.

“Oh, nowhere near, I’ve just been working hard with the resources provided by my background. As have these two.” He waved a hand at the girls.

“He means he took a bunch of money from his daddy and began investing it.” Carrie said, a grin on her face. “And I’ve been stealing. Mostly from rich bastards like this little a-hole.”

“Oh? What changed?” Coney asked, a little bit confused.

“He caught me. That’s how we met. I broke into this rich fuck’s house during a party and had the missfortune of it being his.” She stuck her tongue out at him.

“I was returning for the day after spending some time training.” Eric said, shrugging. As he did Coney barely noticed as Carrie disappeared. She melted into the bushes beside the path, and Coney realized it was now just him, Eric, and the stoic girl.

“The game’s only been out for two weeks, how have you done this much?” Coney asked, staring at the mage.

“Sis, it’s been out a month. You really lost that much track of time?”

“I… I don’t know. I swear it hasn’t been that much.” Coney looked at her paws for a second. “Man, this game is really messing with my head.”

“I hear that.” Eric said, a serious note in his voice for once. “I’ve been having dreams of my life here. But like… dreams of what it was like before I started. What it was like to be a noble.”

“Dreams are weird man, I don’t know what to tell you.” Briana said, patting him on the back. “Anyway how much farther are we from the dungeon?”

“About three miles.” Carrie said, her head poking down from the trees above them. Coney pointedly didn’t look up, worried he’d catch a glimpse up her skirt. Eric had no such compunctions, and was looking her right in the face.

“Okay Carrie, what do you think we need to be careful with?” He asked, his voice confident. He held his hand up and lightning began to spark in a ball over his hand. “Any enemies.”

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“Just some pigs up ahead. I suppose those can be dangerous, but I’m not scared.” She jumped down from the tree and landed in front of them, a large knife that was long as her forearm in her hand. “Let’s do some killing!”

Coney wasn’t prepared that the hogs would be right there when he went around the corner. Focusing on them he got their information.

Wild Hogs. Lvl Unknown. Danger: Moderate.

That shouldn’t be too hard, he thought to himself as he took out his sickle. It still felt dangerous in his paw, he could almost hear the blood that dripped as he was fighting before. “Let's go.” He said, following the reckless girl.

Eric stood where he was, and began to wave his hands in front of him, almost looking like sign language. At the end, however, the ball of lightning turned into a set of darts that sparked into several of the hogs. Coney grabbed one of them and cut their throat with his sickle, blood finally dripping again. It felt right on some level, like he was doing the work he was meant to do.

Around him he could feel the others. It was more than sight or sound, he had a sense of their location just from the knowledge of the fight. Two more of the hogs were quickly dispatched, leaving only two on the field. One was the largest, tusks nearly a foot long, that came berling at the party.

Coney ran after the other, a smaller hog, and grabbed it up by it’s tusk. In the air he used his sickle to bleed it, the blood dripping to the floor. He licked it a little, a bit of the red staining his fur around his mouth, even as the others fought the large hog. He heard the clash of shield against beast behind him, turning around to look.

It was true, Briana and the hog were one on one, but Eric was doing something again. This time a ring of electrical energy was charging around him, like a circle of lightning, which slowly moved inward into his chest. At the end he thrust his hands into the air and a bolt of lightning moved up into the sky. After a second it came down on the hog, which Braiana was just barely able to dodge out of the way, leaving the creature charred.

“Good job!” Coney said, clapping his paws. Eric really had done a lot more than he’d expected from his flippant attitude.

“Anything for my girls.” Eric said with a wink. “Now let's get into the dungeon. I’m sure we’ll all find something we’re looking for in the Labyrinth.” The trio walked forward, leaving Coney looking at the bodies. “Are we not gonna loot these or anything? That’s a lot of meat.”

“Nah, we don’t need to do anything like that.” Eric said with a grin. “We’re gonna have so much more to carry on our way out. What could we get out of these bodies anyway? They are half charged from my sparks.”

Coney sighed and nodded. “Give me a second then.” He knelt and pressed his paws together as the others kept walking.

“Artume, mistress of animals, please forgive me. We took wantonly, without consideration for the hunt. Please, goddess, forgive me of this crime and absolve these poor souls of their improper use.” He looked at them. “Allow their bones to crack, their flesh to be chewed, and their blood to fertilize the ground. Allow scavengers to pick their skin from their mussels, and their brains from their skulls. Please, goddess, let not our self defense mean only that nature is deprived of its due.”

As Coney spoke, a soft silver light appeared around him. This was the true power of Clerics in this game, prayer. While divine magic functioned similar to arcane, the power behind it was based on the will of unknowable entities rather than the laws of nature. Coney was glad that his prayer was being answered, and hoped he would not have to do this again.

Walking the last half mile he found himself at the entrance the others were waiting for him at. “Are you ready?” He asked.

“Ready as ever.” Briana responded in her terse but confident voice.

The four nodded at each other and walked into the cave, the sound behind them slowly picking up as the forest returned to its natural state… maybe a little bit quicker than normally.