Was Jack happy about not being confined to the house today? Yes. Was he feeling sour that he had to leave the smithy as well? Also yes.

Lugh had been forced to kick him out when a band of guards had arrived for the bi-yearly checkup on the smithy. A routine check, one that had been months in the making yet still arriving some six hours earlier than expected. Nothing too serious, and nothing that posed a threat to their secrets, but Aleksi had regardless been forced to escort Jack as far away from the premises as possible.

Which meant he was here, sitting on his ass while watching Sasha beat somebody up until they were on their ass as well.

“You forget your footing,” she commented, when a roundhouse kick was able to land in full force, forcing the man onto the ground in pain. Jack could hear the strained moans clearly, and he winced at the twitching movements. “Move your body properly, and you might become less of a disappointment.”

Ruthless as ever, though he had to admit she was giving advice every time she beat somebody up. And, hey, the people were coming back into the ring every now and then to get beat up again, this time trying to focus on fixing the pointed-out flaws while also letting her find some other problem.

“Not a bad show, Joel,” Jack commented to the bruised man as they walked by him. He got a nod of appreciation in reply, the man in question not able to talk much due to the blue marks steadily swelling on his face. It wouldn’t be fun to be him in a few hours. “Don’t you need some rest as well, Sasha? You’ve been up there for a few hours now.”

He realized as much when he looked down and found that he’d gone through twelve different cartridge attempts while she had continued with her beatdowns. With how long that process took outside of the Dungeon, and with how much extra tweaking he did with each version, lunch must’ve passed them both by without their notice.

His stomach finally gurgling at the thought of food proved that right. Dinner might’ve even been closing in on them when he had to hunch over slightly at the feeling of full-on emptiness in his body.

“There’s food to get if you get out of the ring,” Jack offered when his first comment went ignored while she stretched. The second proposal was more enticing, however, as she slowly got back up on her feet and climbed out of the ring. “Nice to see. Wonder what they got around here.”

Not every day he ventured into the basement of a brothel if he was being honest. Not every day he went into a brothel at all, really. Jack had had no clue what to expect, back when Aleksi explained how he would be hiding out with a ‘Madame Cleo,’ but this certainly wasn’t on the list of possibilities. A group of incredibly nice people had welcomed him inside, making sure he wasn’t injured, and then leading him down to the basement and sitting while Sasha was already beating some poor fool’s head in while standing in some fighting ring that fit what you’d find in one of those MMA arenas.

“After you,” Jack said, opening up the door into the breakroom and letting Sasha go first. She knew the people here best, after all, so letting her take control would help them more than anything. “Damn, it smells good in here.”

Meat of some kind, with enough spices to make his mouth water. The massive kitchen where it was all happening was to his left, with some dozen people inside working on some meal, while there were a few rows of tables to their right where people were already sitting, eating, and drinking to their heart’s content.

“Oh, hey, you two!”

He turned his head to see Mia waving at them. She was the one who’d welcomed him inside, asking questions about Sasha until the moment when they’d stepped into the basement. Jack wasn’t exactly sure what the deal was, but she seemed nice regardless.

“Mind if we sit here?” he asked. Sasha was already settling down on the bench before Mia could say yes, though it wasn’t commented on as he was offered a plate within seconds. “Meat, some kind of vegetable, and… what’s this?”

“Rockbuds,” Mia offered, smiling when he just looked at her with confusion. The name didn't exactly fit the hard, brown things. “They’re a dark gray when unboiled, which they get their name from. You have to remove the shell with your knife and then eat the insides. Surprisingly sweet, if you’ve never tried them before.”

Jack couldn’t say he had, carefully avoiding burning his finger as he figured out how to properly remove the shell of the vegetable. That it had such a hard shell, which did somewhat feel like a rock, was incredibly strange to him, but he didn’t question it too much when he finally opened it up.

The inside looked much more recognizable, feeling and looking like a green orange. Didn’t taste like one, tasting closer to an apple while still retaining the consistency of the former. A… strange combination, if Jack was being honest, but it wasn’t exactly terrible.

“Where do I get more?” Sasha asked when she finished her plate before Jack was halfway through his own. Mia pointed to the kitchen on the other side of the room, mouth full and unable to answer with words, which didn’t seem to matter to the fighter as she immediately rose to her feet and walked over to get more to eat.

Beating people senselessly must form some mighty appetite.

He’d had something like it, back in the day of his peak physical fitness. Base training did that to people, with days of training without respite. It built muscle, built a stomach ready to consume whatever was served, and formed a void inside him that allowed Jack to eat whatever he wished for two years without putting on a single gram.

How he wished for that metabolism again sometimes. Without the physical movement, of course.

“So… are you two together?” Mia asked, just as Jack tried to swallow a piece of meat. The question made him try to take in air, instantly causing him to cough as his body did its best to stop a possible choking emergency. “Oh, did I hit a nerve?”

“Just bad timing on your end,” Jack squeezed out, feeling at his throat as some part of it ached from the experience. Looking over, he made sure Sasha was still busy making the people in the kitchen only give her the parts she wanted. It was going to take some time, by the looks of it. “And, no, we’re not together. I’m not really interested in that kind of stuff.”

“... Is she?”

His eyebrows rose just a little. Mia smiled back.

“We all want a little danger in our lives,” she reasoned, before glancing over at the danger in question. “She fits the criteria, if you get what I mean.”

“Right, yes, of course,” Jack replied, not getting it at all. Was he the crazy one for not feeling any kind of attraction for the woman? Were they not seeing the dried blood flakes on her knuckles? That was both a very clear sign of what she could do and it was incredibly unhygienic to eat without washing that off. “And... maybe? I don’t know. Never thought to ask.”

“Ah, a shame. I’ll let the thoughts rest then.”

Jack made the decision to not question whatever that meant, as the others at the table looked on amused. Especially that bearded fellow at the end who sent him a smile when their eyes met. Wasn’t that the Chronomancer guy that Sasha had talked about? Jas? Cassy? Cas? One of those was probably right.

The topic wasn’t brought up again, as they all finished their lunch they returned to their own tasks for the day. Mia and the others went back upstairs to continue meeting customers, Sasha went back into the ring to beat another person within an inch of their life, and Jack settled back down to hopefully figure out a design that would work for him.

He’d gotten the main shape of the cartridge down since morning, already having a width that worked perfectly for his Makarov knock-off, but figuring out the primer was taking its time. That slight indent at the back of the cartridge was such a headache to do evenly, but he was getting close. With a bit of improvisation, Jack was able to spend an hour finally getting an even shape that wouldn’t curse him forevermore. The primer was still a headache in the way that it needed a different material than the rest, but it was such a small part that he barely needed to spend Mana on it before he had it looking like he wanted it to.

Within another hour, he had it. The entire process had taken him since the early morning and had caused its fair share of headaches, but he had it now. A single cartridge that he could feel happy about, and one that would fit his new pistol once he got that put together properly.

No single-shot disasters after tomorrow.

Jack was still moping about what had happened in the Dungeon, though he didn’t let the others know. Standing before a giant spider of all things, one with such a disgusting fish head had made his heart stop until the very second he’d pulled the trigger and shot at the beast. He still smiled about how close his aim had been to the target area, hitting it in the top of the throat instead of the head directly. A serious wound, though not one that had killed it instantly.

If he’d had another shot to fire then, he would have probably downed it with how close it got to him. Yet he wasn’t given that privilege, that single shot being all he’d been ready for, the monster able to jump him a moment later without him being able to do anything.

This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

Those needle teeth… he couldn’t remember the sensation as well anymore, but the sounds he made when it tore through his side were certainly ringing in his ears. And that feeling of muscles being torn was definitely something he wouldn’t forget for the rest of his life.

But the focus of that experience, the only thing he could remember thinking about, was his own failings with his weapon. He’d been too slow to improve, and when the time had come he hadn’t been able to perform.

That weakness would be a thing of the past real soon. With this in his hand, and the recoil of a bullet fired being more than enough to incorporate a self-loading mechanism in the new pistol, a second shot toward an enemy would be a single trigger pull away.

This isn’t what I’m meant to be thinking about, though, is it?

Jack could remember how he’d been back when the fragments had pierced through his leg. While he liked to act like he’d toughened it out, he’d been a mess on the ground. Tears had flowed, whimpers had been made, and it hadn’t stopped when the pain had disappeared from the ketamine. It had taken days for him to be semi-functioning when interacting with others, weeks for him to be seen as normal, and months for him not to have random bouts of silence.

Yet right now? It’d barely been 18 hours since a giant spider with an eel head had bitten into his side and tried to tear him apart, and yet his biggest issue with it all was the fact his gun wasn’t good enough. Jack had tried to reason that it was because of shock, that he was just having a delayed reaction to the trauma, yet time passed and… he felt none the worse for wear.

Annoyed? Like you wouldn’t believe. Scared to go back down into the Dungeon and try again? Quite the opposite! His hands didn’t tremble at the thought of facing a creature like that again, his mind didn’t remind him of the pain suffered by the teeth of the monster, and there were no lines of thought in the back of his head, scared about what could happen if it all messed up.

He felt little to no fear. Nothing more serious than what he would experience when going to a dark kitchen for a late-night snack.

And that isn’t normal.

Abnormal to the highest degree. The signs of trauma, of fear, of being so close to death weren't there. Jack felt like he normally did and nothing more than that. He was handling this too well.

It was such a serious shift from before entering into this world that he knew that this place had changed something in him. Maybe it was the Mana, or maybe the journey to another reality had caused some serious form of brain damage, but his reaction to danger had been altered significantly. It’d been stunted to the extreme, and he was beginning to wonder what would happen if that ever changed.

If his previous self, if the man that hid when the toaster made a weird noise, appeared again, would Jack be able to handle all of this? Would the reality finally settle in? Would he crumble together like he was supposed to do?

God, I hope not.

“Best bomb to make on a short notice…” Jack muttered to himself, as he was forced to move away from fiddling with the pistol and distract himself with something else. The cartridge was as good as done, now needing a mold to be copied over again and again, and the other parts for the new gun would require some tools at the smithy to make. “So much for Transmutation if you can’t do it all by hand.”

Pulling out his last empty bottle, he grabbed some sand from the ground and sent a command to his Core. It responded instantly like it was expecting the word before he could even formulate it.

Channeling of [Transmute Powder] has been activated! Current cost: 14MP/sec

So high.

With a capacity of around 400MP nowadays, he could slowly transform the sand into a mix of saltpeter, normal sugar, some of the easier moderators, and, finally, some bright-pink dye. A recipe for disaster in the wrong hands, Jack remembering making something like it when he was younger. Only… back then he hadn’t been able to find it all in its pure form, substituting too much and getting a reduced effect in return.

He didn’t suffer from that weakness now, and he allowed himself to bring out a small fuse that he inserted into the top of the bottle before putting on the cork beside it. Hopefully, none of it would spill.

Jack looked up from his work as he heard a grunt of pain leave the latest victim, a larger woman with plenty of muscle yet without the ability to deal with Sasha’s hits completely. A cheap shot to the liver made him wince, though the larger woman’s instant swing towards Sasha’s made him worry.

Only for an instant, though, as he remembered why she was up there to begin with.

A shout of confusion left the woman when her fist reached Sasha’s head and instantly stopped, the smaller of the two looking on unamused before using the momentary shock to deliver another devastating hit and get the opponent on the ground.

“Don’t get distracted,” Sasha commented, not sparing the other fighter a glance as she removed the cloth around the lower part of her arms. “Get ready to leave.”

Jack blinked when he realized those words were meant for him, no looks given to the woman in the ring.

“What? Why?” he asked, but Sasha didn’t answer as she pulled off the training outfit and got into her normal getup. “Aleksi isn’t here yet. We were meant to wait for him until he got here. Hey, we are not doing what we did—”

The lights in the corners of the room began blinking, changing between white and red every second. The hulk of a woman in the ring cursed at the light, understanding something Jack wasn’t.

“Pay attention for once,” Sasha muttered, looking up at the ceiling. Jack did the same, frowning when he was able to see through the wood and spot a deep blue-and-purple aura looking back at him.

Or, well, not just him. It was looking at everybody, the massive presence spread out in search. An Aura of that size… Jack didn’t fully comprehend whatever was required to reach that level of power. When he tried, he could make his own press out of his skin by about a finger-width, but this was dozens of meters. What was a person like this doing here?

The door into the other room with the stairs to the ground floor flew open, Mia nearly barrelling into Sasha who was already heading for it.

“You two!” Mia said, eyes wide and cheeks red. “With me now! The Madame says we need to hurry.”

“Who’s up there?” Sasha asked, not sounding nearly as stressed but following regardless. They went into the other room but walked by the stairs in favor of going through a tight hallway instead. “A threat?”

“To this establishment? Probably not, even if they’re searching through the place without regard for laws of any kind,” Mia answered, muttering as she tried to remember where to go in the tight hallway. Jack wasn’t a fan of the lackluster lighting, barely able to see where the other two were going. “To you two? Yes. They had drawings of your faces, asking everybody if they’d seen you. Nobody said anything, but the Royal Mage they’ve got with them is getting weirdly close to the basement stairs. The Madame doesn’t want to risk your lives by trusting them to follow the letter of the law, so you have to leave before they catch you.”

They reached a ladder by the time she was done talking, Mia climbing up first and Sasha coming up with her a moment later. Jack went last, barely able to see what he was meant to hold onto before a stream of light came from above. A hatch door had been opened up, the rays of the sun hitting his face.

Getting all the way up revealed an alleyway one street over from the brothel. It was filled with garbage, the trash piled up around them to make the hatch door invisible to those who didn’t already know of its existence.

“I can’t lead you back myself, but you can wear these for now,” Mia said, handing them both hooded robes. The one for Jack was a little too small, but it would have to do for now. “Don’t go into the main streets, don’t run but don’t walk too slowly either. Act like you’ve walked this route a thousand times before. Do you both understand?”

“Obviously,” Sasha replied, the fighter sending a glance towards the brothel which Jack mirrored. Guards were leaving the establishment already. “So long.”

And then she left, Jack mouthing a goodbye to the other woman before taking a few quick steps to catch up. They left the alley in seconds, taking a sharp left and joining the dispersing crowd that had gathered as a reaction to the sudden guard presence.

“What do you think made them realize we were there?” Jack whispered as they left the street a minute later, going down an alley to avoid the larger crowds. No reason to randomly meet a patrol that remembers their faces.

“Maybe it was your lack of ability to keep quiet,” Sasha replied.

He got the message and shut up for the rest of the way. While they did see guards, some wearing different insignias on their shoulders from the normal ones, none looked their way. Most seemed outright bored, standing around without keeping watch of whoever passed them by.

Within twenty minutes, they were back at the shop, going through the unlocked front door and seeing Aleksi’s face of shock when his eyes met theirs.

“Sorry, Lea, but I just remembered that we ran out of ointment last week,” the giant told the lady standing by the counter. “If you come back tomorrow, Elijah should have been able to make a new batch. You can even get a discount since you just reminded me of it.”

That worked flawlessly, and the old lady left without complaint before Aleksi walked over and locked the door. Every curtain was pulled, every window avoided, and it was only when they stood inside the laboratory that the giant spoke again.

“What happened?”

He was serious, all nonchalance dropped as the face of a hardened warrior looked down at them.

“Guards flooded into the brothel along with a Royal Mage,” Sasha replied, Aleksi’s eyes darkening as he continued to listen. “They had posters of our faces, asking around for information. The Mage was also approaching the stairs into the basement, so they likely knew of our precise location.”

“... Shit,” the giant cursed, eyes moving across the laboratory. “Great time to do it, hours before Elijah returns, though… if he could help with this, I can’t say. Did you learn the name of the Royal Mage?”

“No,” Sasha said, eliciting another curse from the man.

“They had a massive blue-purplish Aura if that helps,” Jack supplied. “Felt like it had eyes.”

“I don’t have any clues on the Auras of the Royal Mages, so that can’t help us much at the moment,” Aleksi replied, taking a few seconds to think. “If whatever method they used to find you is one-time-use, they won’t find you here. If it’s continuous, they’ll find you no matter if you stay here or leave for another hiding place. A Mana-Dense place like the Dungeon could muddle the usual tracking spells that I know about, but there’s no way to enter that place by ourselves. The… yeah, I’ll bring Elijah into this. I’m walking over and bringing him here. In the meantime, the two of you are hiding in the basement.”

“And if they break into the shop to find us?” Sasha asked.

“You have robes and I hope you still know how to escape through the window like you’ve done before,” came the answer, a quick chuckle coming from the giant. “I’ll trust you to conceal the entrance yourselves. Stay safe, please.”

Just like that, he was gone out of the back door, and the duo was left to their own devices once again.

Jack wasn’t sure how to feel about that fact.