Given that all of my experiences in the desert thus far had been fairly brief, there was something that I hadn’t fully appreciated up till now.

The desert was hot.

A simple fact on the surface, although the more I thought about it, the stranger it felt. It wasn’t as if there was a sun, after all. Still, whatever faux realism the dungeon had created seemed to include basic temperature and humidity control. Not hard to deal with for an hour or two, but notably unpleasant after more than a day.

Heat Resistance paired with a healthy dose of Chill and my frost armor was enough to mostly ignore it. Unfortunately, unlike a real desert that grew colder at night, the artificial environment never cooled down. Each morning, I woke uncomfortably overheated, only saved from being drenched in sweat from my Charisma threshold bonus.

Still, considering that the climate was my biggest complaint so far, I had to admit that things were going well.

Three nights had passed as we followed the course that Cal had set for us, mostly going straight, but occasionally slipping behind the rolling dunes to avoid attention. Unlike during our hunts, we were doing our best to conserve energy, straying from fights whenever possible. Naturally, we weren’t always successful, but so far, we were only averaging about four fights a day.

Night for us was just whenever Verin needed to sleep. Given that she had the least Endurance out of any of us, the journey was hard on her, though with her frost magic, she had little to fear from the ever-present heat. When she grew too tired to go on, we hunkered down in whatever defensible location Cal could find for us. Lacking any mattresses, we slept directly on the sand, a fact which Verin openly bemoaned when she woke up covered in the irritating grainy substance.

Naturally, we kept watch. Or at least Cal did. I’d offered to take the job from her a number of times, but she consistently refused, claiming she had some manner of anti-sleep skill. That didn’t sound like something an Infiltrator would have, let alone a princess, but considering I didn’t once catch her dozing off, eventually, I relented.

She did a rather good job at keeping watch, too, as evidenced by the multiple times we were prodded awake to fight off an impending scorpion attack. We had a single close call when a very groggy Verin had taken too long to fully wake up, but weeks of fighting scorpions had lessened my reliance on her. Rather than taking their charge head-on, I’d grown adept at dashing to the side and hammering off entire legs, rendering their sand armor meaningless.

When we grew hungry, we ate from the weeks’ worth of food I’d pre-cooked and stuffed into my storage. When we grew thirsty, I conjured water and passed out cups. Just like this, we pushed deeper and deeper into the desert, mostly in companionable silence.

As we neared the six-day mark, though, our thoughts couldn’t help but wander to what would lie beyond this expanse of sand, and after that, our eventual escape from this bizarre dimension. Right as we were about to fall asleep on the fifth night, it was Verin who broached the subject.

“I am curious. What is the first thing you are looking forward to once we exit this place?” Already lying down, she stared wistfully out at the roiling, patchwork sky.

I’d never been one to think particularly long-term, and that was only triply true as of late. For months, my life had been portioned off into six-day chunks, and it was vanishingly rare that I was able to think more than that far in advance. It was thus no surprise when Cal answered first.

“Oh man. I don’t even know, honestly. Probably a whole month where I just do whatever I want, no limits. As soon as something pops into my head, I’ll just do it, over and over again.” She spread her hands out before her as if asking us to envision such a sight.

Her words were met with an amused huff. “Lady Calilah, forgive me if I am incorrect, but is that not what you already do?”

“Exactly! If it’s not broke, don’t fix it, right?” She chuckled to herself until, perhaps sensing Verin’s disapproval, she settled down. “Real answer, though, I’ll probably go home for a while. Check on my dad. Make sure he hasn’t started any new wars. I could use a nice bed and a palace chef -- no offense, Tess -- and everything else. Plus, if I end up continuing to level like this, by the time we leave this place, I think I’ll be on a better footing to have a more equal relationship with my dad.”

It was a surprisingly well thought-out answer, and for once, not even Verin had anything to say in judgment. As if embarrassed to have said something mildly serious, Cal immediately deflected attention away from her, thankfully skipping me for now. “What about you, Miss Noble?”

The vague impression of a mischievous smile crossed her face causing Verin to look far more like Cal than she ever had. “I am afraid I have quite a number of duties and expectations placed upon me and will need to travel home immediately. But if you must know, perhaps I will be a touch… rebellious. I am planning on soaking in the Emer’Thalis bathhouse for an entire day prior to my departure.”

No words were offered in response to her declaration, save for a single cough from Cal.

When the silence dragged on, it grew clear that neither of the others were going to force an answer from me, and something told me they wouldn’t like the real answer.

Sleep, I thought. Sleep for a hundred years. Maybe build a cabin somewhere no one can find me. Hunker down and try not to attract any Antagonists. That wouldn’t be so bad.

Instead, I answered more diplomatically. “I don’t know. I’ve leveled a lot of professional skills lately. Maybe I’ll take a year just for hobbies.” To sell the facade, I put in the effort to add an entire extra sentence. “I think there’s a way to make professional skills class-aligned for me, so maybe it wouldn’t be too hard.” Given that clearing the Mana Feet trial had made movement skills class-aligned, I could only imagine something similar would happen for Gloves of the Arcanist.

Despite my final words being fully truthful, it seemed the system recognized the lie buried beneath it.

Deception has reached level 8!

Seemingly sold, the other two encouraged my goal. For the next ten minutes, they came up with all sorts of projects for me. They would commission some carvings from me. We could make stone statues of us to put up in the middle of Emer’Thalis. I could build Cal and me houses to put right next to Verin’s vacation home, and whenever they got tired of being princesses and nobles, they could teleport in for a drinking night. Failing that, Cal said she would get me some sort of illusion charm and hire me as a royal crafter in Ftheran.

It was all very nice. And who knew? Maybe by the time that we left, I’d even want to take them up on some of that.

I didn’t think so, but then again, more than the others, I was expecting to be here for a long time.

Thankfully, the conversation eventually shifted, and Verin and Cal spent the better part of half an hour debating the relative merits of their cities. Despite being the only one who’d spent any reasonable time in both of them, I was blissfully not asked to weigh in.

Eventually, Verin could take no more, trailing off as she fell asleep mid-conversation. Naturally, Cal did not join her, but shortly thereafter, I went to sleep atop my sandy bed. My final thought before I passed out for the night was one that Verin would heavily approve of.

I should really make us mattresses somehow.

----------------------------------------

Neither day six nor day seven led us to the end of the desert. They did, however, bring about some manner of change.

As if some minor afterthought, a small number of bushes and cacti poked up from the ground every so often. Paired with the sparse vegetation was some equally sparse wildlife, as the occasional lizard skittered across the sand. God’s Eye didn’t mark anything as a threat, but out of an abundance of caution, I shot one down with a wind arrow. As best I could tell, they truly were just normal animals, neither venomous or otherwise dangerous in any way.

This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

Still, that didn’t stop me from dispatching a few more. Who knew what they would taste like when properly cooked?

It was strange, in a way. The dungeon had gone all out for the forest, forming an entire ecosystem within. In comparison, the desert was barren, as if the dungeon had started rendering it and gave up halfway through.

Then again, maybe that was to be expected: The dungeon wasn’t supposed to be ready to delve for another few centuries, right? Maybe by then, there would be a dozen types of monster here, along with all manner of wildlife.

If perhaps it made for a rather monotonous eyesore at times, I wasn’t complaining. If we could cut through the desert without any real incident, that was only for the better.

And it seemed that we would do just that, too. On the eighth day, we climbed a particularly tall dune, and our destination finally came into view.

“Dark,” Cal helpfully offered.

Then again, there wasn’t much else to say. Off in the distance, about a day’s walk away, the sand abruptly cut off, replaced with a formless expanse of dimness. Or at least it was just dim to me. The others described it as a wall of pure black. I imagined my boon-granted darkvision was to blame for this. With any luck, it would make the next stretch of our journey effortless.

Not that we planned to cut through to the next section immediately, but we would at least dip our toes in and get some information. Otherwise this trip would have been meaningless. Feeling more energized with our goal in sight, the three of us set off anew.

Perhaps happy to see us off, the desert even left us with a parting gift. As we began to descend the massive dune, a gentle breeze passed over us, cutting some of the cloying heat. I dismissed my frost armor, letting myself bask in the feeling of the wind on my skin.

“Kind of weird that this is the first time we’ve seen any wind in all our time here, yeah?” Cal held a hand out, testing the direction of the winds. “Not that I’m complaining, but what gives? Something to do with being near the next section?”

Who knew? I was perfectly content to let it happen without questioning it too much.

Or, that’s what I thought, at least. That opinion quickly shifted as the breeze started to kick up a few grains of sand, not strongly enough to hurt, but enough to get into my boots.

I was wrong. Maybe this is the desert’s way of telling us to get lost. I wondered if the dungeon was sentient enough to be angry at us for killing so many of its scorpions. If I understood, it was forced to use more energy to respawn the monsters every time we killed them.

As if to prove that theory correct, the wind intensified further until I was forced to resummon my armor. I initially worried for the others, but I needn’t have. Verin took a similar route, donning her ice armor, and Cal activated some sort of permeability skill, the sand passing right through her. Neither, however, seemed to overly enjoy this new development.

“I will admit to feeling slightly… unsettled by this change. Perhaps we should hasten our advance? I doubt this will be an issue if we are able to reach the next section, and I do not relish the thought of falling asleep in this weather.” Given that Verin was the slowest of all of us, no one would argue with her if she wanted to pick up the pace. From a standard walk, we broke out into a jog.

Bit by bit, however, the wind began to intensify. From a simple discomfort, it evolved into a full-blown impediment as it pushed and pulled at us, threatening to bowl us over. After a particularly nasty gust, I activated Heavy Step to stabilize my footing.

“Fucking sand!” Cal yelled. “Once we get back, I’m never setting foot in a desert again!”

It was a sentiment I was quickly growing to share with her. As bad as the wind was, it had nothing on the waves and waves of sand which came along with it. The force of it wasn’t too horrible given our respective skills, but it worked hard to limit our vision. In no time at all, the darkness was fully obscured by an endless wall of tan, at which point, I could no longer deny it.

A sandstorm. Not an errant burst of wind that would end in a few seconds, but a real, honest-to-gods storm. With how calm the weather had been thus far, it hadn’t even occurred to me that this was a possibility.

I cursed myself, remembering that a long, long time ago, I’d won a pair of contacts from the dungeon in Drawgin that would have been perfect for this situation, making me immune to getting sand in my eyes. Having taken them out, though, they were lying unused in my malfunctioning spatial pouch. By now, my vision was so poor, I could barely even see the others, opting to close my eyes for a moment to protect them from the sand.

Cal was shouting something again, but she seemed to have grown distant. Even with my Perception, her words were swallowed by the wind. I tried to reorient myself, running to the sound of her voice until I could make out what she was saying. When her words finally registered, my blood ran cold.

“WHERE’S VERIN?”

I spun about, finding no trace of her. With as much urgency as I could muster, I ran back the way I’d come from. Not wanting to make the same mistake twice, I grabbed Cal, initially surprised to find my hand pass right through her until I remembered she had a skill activated. Understanding my intent, she deactivated it, and I took hold of her wrist.

Where, where, where? Why had I agreed to this? I wouldn’t have been willing to go south over the water biome because of the risk of drowning, right? How was sand really any different?

Worse, I could tell that I wasn’t nearly as worried as I should have been. Verin was a friend. I cared about Verin. I needed to save her. I knew that. Why wasn’t I worried enough, then? My thoughts spun about in a jumbled mess of self-flagellation and forced focus until I snapped myself out of it. Belatedly recalling I had more options, I kicked myself for not thinking to use my spells and vision skills sooner.

Sense Minds rippled out. Nothing. Thermal Vision. Nothing. Tremor Sight. Nothing.

Vitality Sigh-

There!

I yanked Cal along, eliciting a startled squawk from her as I layered Light Step onto my existing Heavy Step. I flew over the sand faster than I’d run in ages, not blinking for a second on the off chance that I’d lose sight of Verin.

For the briefest of moments, I worried that Vitality Sight was misleading me, guiding me towards a scorpion instead of my companion. But no. At last I grew close enough to see her without the aid of my vision skill.

It was a good thing I’d found her, too, as the sand was clearly too much for her to handle. Already up to her thighs, it threatened to swallow her, fully locking her in place. Unthinking, I dashed for her, clasping her hand while my other still held Cal.

“Verin! It’s okay! We got you!” Come on. It’s going to be fine. I braced myself and pulled, watching with great satisfaction as I forced her slightly upwards, the sand now at her calves instead of her thighs.

Given how well my initial efforts had gone, it was with some confusion, then, that I noticed that Verin was no longer moving upwards. Figuring I needed some better leverage or to pull from a different angle, I started to walk backwards.

At least I tried to.

As soon as I attempted to move, I felt resistance from my feet. Glancing down, I discovered that the sand had swallowed me past my ankles. When simply lifting my legs wasn’t enough to unstick them, I resorted to more forceful measures, trading Heavy Step for its fire variant. I chained together a few Jet Steps, hoping the force would be enough to push me up and out.

Instead, the flames had the opposite effect, and I could feel as my movements grew even more limited as the sand seemed to fuse to my feet.

Hoping to at least slow my burial, I activated my wind armor in an effort to divert the sand’s advance. I could tell that it was working, too, as the area around me started to clear up. It was with no small measure of horror, then, that I realized the sand was still climbing upwards.

Or no, I realized. It wasn’t that the sand was moving up. I was moving down.

“We’re sinking,” I whispered to myself. I ran through all my options, sure that one of my spells or skills would get me out of this situation. Spatial Step came to mind until I learned the hard way that the step part of the name was very literal. If I couldn’t at least take a full step, it wouldn’t activate. I considered what else I could do, coming up completely blank.

“Verin! Cal! Do either of you have anything?” But of course they didn’t. If Verin had a relevant skill, she wouldn’t have needed our help in the first place. Worse yet, it appeared that being partially buried kept Cal from activating her incorporeality.

Recalling one singular spell that might help, I rapidly cast Blip, moving tiny patches of sand away from me while thrashing about.

Impairment Resistance has reached level 5!

The skill level, much like my spell attempts, was just a drop in the ocean. As the sand moved from my knees to my waist, from my waist to my stomach, I stopped trying as my mind went empty.

Distantly, I could tell that Verin was holding back tears while Cal was saying something glib, her smile never faltering for a second.

I figured I should say something. What exactly? I didn’t know. That I was thankful for all they’d done? That I was sorry it was my fault they’d gotten trapped here?

Before I could settle on anything, it became a moot point as the sand covered up my mouth and then my ears shortly thereafter.

Buried beneath the sand with no way out, down and down we sank.