Hiral carefully – very carefully – slid the rope of braided crystal into place, channeling his Mold Crystal ability. Like his senses were extending outside of his fingers, he felt the edges slip into the space he’d just prepared, then fused the ends right where he needed them. Still holding his breath, he eased himself back until he was sitting on the floor, looking up at the crystal roots beneath the final Fallen’s tower.

All ten towers were now complete, and it’d only taken…

Uh, how long did it take?

With each tower he’d gotten faster and faster – more sure of his ability and what he needed to do – but it’d still all blurred together. Hours, at least. More likely dozens of hours, and that was even after he’d taken a break to meet Seena.

When they’d gotten that quest.

Blowing out his breath in an exaggerated sigh, he opened the blue window so he could read the quest text for the hundredth time.

Dynamic Quest – That’s Asking a Lot

Though you’ve saved Fallen Reach, the Enemy is still out there, with free entry into your world.

Will you let that stand?

Black Gates closed: 0/3

World saved: 0/1

The whole party had gotten the quest, as had other B-Ranks and above on the islands. The Black Gates mentioned had to be those doorways the Enemy was using to cross worlds, and apparently there were three. Or, at least three the PIMP believed needed to be closed.

“Whatever,” Hiral grumbled, dismissing the window again. They’d have to talk about it sooner or later – probably sooner now that he’d finished repairing the Fallen towers – but he was hoping for a small break before that. Was that really too much to ask?

A small flash at the corner of his Party Interface said it might be, and Seena’s voice reached his ears a second later.

“Hey,” she said.

“Hey yourself,” he replied, reaching over to grab his canteen. “Miss me already?”

“Already? You’ve been holed up so long even Li’l Ur was pestering me about whether you were okay or not.”

“He was just worried he wouldn’t have my body to turn me into his undead apprentice,” Hiral said flatly, and Seena didn’t immediately respond.

“It’s the thought that counts…” she finally said.

“Not exactly sure that’s how it works,” Hiral chuckled. “Probably not what you wanted to talk about though. If this is about cheese…”

“It’s not. Unless… you have some?”

“You polished off my stash last time we saw each other.”

“It was good.”

“It was. So…?”

“Right, sorry,” she said. “How close are you to finishing the towers?”

“Actually, just finished. Not even a minute before you contacted me.”

“Perfect!”

“Oh? Why’s that?”

“Fallen Reach is about twenty hours from leaving the Horns zone and moving into the next, but we found the second dungeon. We need to run you through it before we leave,” Seena explained.

“But, it’s a D-Rank zone,” Hiral said. “Shouldn’t that make the dungeon D-Rank too?”

“Mid D-Rank, actually,” Seena said. “Not even a wild dungeon.”

“We’re B-Rank now… actually, did Yanily hit B-?”

“He’s about to. We’re waiting for you so you can get the benefit from Evolutionary Inspiration.”

“Oh, wow, thanks! Back to my question – Why would we want to run a D-Rank dungeon?”

“The same two reasons we run every dungeon,” Seena said, then seemed to consider something. “Well… the two reasons we would run dungeons if we hadn’t been rushing back to save Fallen Reach.”

Hiral only needed to think about it for a second before he figured it out. “Loot and achievements?”

“Exactly! The experience for us at B-Rank is terrible, but this dungeon has a piece of loot you need to get, and the achievements will be handy too.”

“I didn’t think we’d actually get achievements from a dungeon two ranks below us…”

“Normally wouldn’t,” Seena interrupted. “But, we will if we escort some people who are E-Rank through it.”

Hiral whistled gently. “How did you ever figure that out?”

“Yan did, actually. He was helping some people cross from E- to D-rank, and he got it at the end of the run.”

“Nice! So, what are these achievements?”

Seena actually chuckled. “I won’t ruin it for you.”

“That makes me nervous.”

“Oh c’mon, where’s the trust in your party leader?”

“Fiiiiine,” Hiral said, but his tone made it clear he didn’t actually mind. “Can you at least tell me what the loot is, or who we’re escorting through?”

“The ‘who’ is another surprise, but I think you’ll agree they’re a good choice. As for the loot, I guess I shouldn’t keep everything from you.” Even though Seena said that, she didn’t immediately continue.

“You’re going to make me ask, aren’t you?”

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“Preferably with some praise at how amazing I am as a party leader to make sure you’re included, along with apologies for how you’ve been ignoring me,” Seena said smoothly. Like she’d practiced it.

“I was sealing the Fallen, which is slightly important! It’s not like I wanted to avoid you or anything.”

“That was neither praise nor an apology for our mistress,” Li’l Ur’s voice rasped over the party chat.

“He has a point,” Seena added, and Hiral could practically envision her patting the head of the six-inch-tall, lizardman lich floating at her shoulder.

“You know I would’ve much rather been with you than in these tunnels,” Hiral said. “And I am sorry we didn’t get to spend more time together. Let me make it up to you with another bottle of that red, along with the cheese from that place at the port?”

“Hrm, as a generous party leader and girlfriend, I’ll accept the peace offering.”

Hiral’s heart fluttered at the word girlfriend – were they actually that far along again? Apparently. All the implanted memories from the Rise of Fallen Reach dungeon surfaced in his mind, and he found himself blushing. I guess it’s time to find out how real all of that is.

Instead of mentioning any of that, he said, “Thank you oh generous one. And, as such a sagely party leader, I would be in your debt if you shared with me the loot you so wisely suggest we get.”

“Little over the top there,” Seena said.

“Yeah, I took it too far,” Hiral agreed. “But, the loot?”

“A Recall Token,” Seena said, a hint of conspiracy lacing her voice.

“A what now?”

Seena laughed. “I said exactly the same thing when Yan told me what he got.”

“Does it do something for memory?” Hiral asked, rolling the name of the item around in his head.

“Nothing so boring,” Seena said. “It actually teleports the holder back to the Grandfather. Or, I guess, the Measure for Makers.”

“Whaaaaaaat?” Hiral said, literally spitting out the water he’d just drank from the canteen. “Teleports? What’s the range? How many people?”

“Whoa, slow down there,” Seena said. “It only works for the person who looted the stone; there’s some kind of connection. Yanily showed me the window for it, and I think it said it was something called soulbound. Anyway, everybody in the group got one, and it has a really long cooldown.”

“Range?” Hiral repeated.

“Didn’t see one…” Seena trailed off like she was thinking. “Maybe it doesn’t have one?”

“I guess that could be possible,” Hiral mused. “If it’s got a long cooldown and can only take the person who owns it, that could be enough of a balance to make range not matter. And we can each get one from the same dungeon? It drops every time?”

“We’ve had six groups run it so far, actually, maybe more by this point, and everybody got a stone on their first run. Anybody who ran it a second time didn’t get anything, but that’s no different than the dungeons’ usual loot rules.”

“Hrm,” Hiral mumbled as he thought over the uses for an item like that. “That’s kind of amazing. For anybody running dungeons, it means they can get back to the safety of Fallen Reach – or your islands – from just about anywhere. Don’t have to worry about making it to the jump point or risk getting trapped on the surface.”

“Exactly!”

“Would’ve been handy to have those before.”

“You know that’s not really true,” Seena said. “If we’d had those, everything that happened since we went to the surface wouldn’t have happened. And Vorinal would probably be awake right now. Which means we wouldn’t be.”

“You’re right,” Hiral agreed. They’d had this kind of conversation several times. “Still means we should get one now, though. Is the teleportation instant? Do you know if we can use it from inside a dungeon?”

“No idea on either of those questions,” Seena said.

“Guess we’ll have to do some testing,” Hiral said, unable to completely keep the eagerness out of his voice.

“I can see why Gauto thinks you should’ve been an Academic. Again.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Would need to be a Maker and not a Builder for that.”

“Did you ever talk to your mother?” Seena suddenly changed the topic. “About, you know, the glyph? Or how she treated you during your childhood?”

Hiral’s stomach dropped at the mention of his mother and the glyph of fertility she’d gotten while she was pregnant with him. The glyph that’d possibly caused him to be born as a Builder instead of a Maker. That’d caused him to get branded as the Everfail for not being able to pass the Shaper test even after ten attempts.

That’d caused him to go to the surface with Seena and the others.

He… couldn’t really be mad at the glyph. If his theory was true, the single character inscribed on his mother’s stomach had completely changed the trajectory of his life. It’d opened up new classes and opportunities for him, and there was no way he’d be where he was if it wasn’t for the glyph. Unless…

For a moment, he imagined himself as a Shaper. Seven feet tall, slow and built like…well, like a Shaper. Or maybe he just would have been like Left and Right: still him, just with different powers. He might have been happy like that—and strong—but how different would he be? If he’d had it so easy from birth, maybe he would have been one of the Shapers sneering in the arena, looking down on the Growers.

No, his path in life, even those hard years as the ‘Everfail’ were worth it. Without them, he would never have gone down to the surface. Never have discovered the truth.. Never would have met Seena.

In the end, the glyph was for the best.

His mother’s behaviour, on the other hand, wasn’t something he could think about so rationally. A decade of indifference – and outright ignoring him – hadn’t exactly endeared him to her.

“Not yet. We always seem to miss each other at the house,” Hiral said, the words coming out lame even to his own ears.

“How many times have you even been back since you started repairing the towers?” The tone of her voice made it very clear she would know if he was lying. And it wouldn’t be good for him.

“Once,” he admitted.

“What?! Where have you been sleeping? In the tunnels by the towers?” Seena rapid-fired the questions. “Wait… have you been sleeping?”

“Uh…” Hiral started.

“Still having nightmares?” Seena asked softly, the genuine concern in her voice melting Hiral’s resistance to answering the question.

“Yeah,” he admitted. He’d been… killed twice during the Fall of Fallen Reach dungeon, and even though his That All You Got? ability had brought him back, it didn’t remove the memories. The… nothingness after Vule had punched him or Vorinal had hit him with the super-death beam – as Yanily called it.

It’d only been a heartbeat he’d been gone, if that, and he couldn’t really remember anything about that instant. While he was awake. When he slept, though, his mind filled in all the blanks… with terrible things. As soon as he woke up – which he did, sweating like mad and his heart racing – the nightmares fled before he had a chance to latch onto the images. Something about that fraction of a second before his ability rewound his time was terrifying.

And it came to him every time he slept.

“I’m sure they’ll fade with time,” he lied.

“Hiral…”

“It’s fine, really,” he quickly interrupted. “Cycling is almost as good as sleep. It’s like meditation. Back to more important things – when are we leaving for the dungeon?”

“You’re sure you’re okay?”

“Just fine,” Hiral said. “Besides, a good ol’ dungeon run will let me stretch and work off some tension.”

“If you say so. How about in an hour? Should be plenty of time to get the others together. Meet us at Arty’s?”

“Arty’s?” Hiral asked. “Why don’t I just head down to Caaven’s on Drake?”

“We need you to carry somebody else with you down to the dungeon,” Seena said, another conspiratorial note in her voice.

“Down to the…? One of the people we’re escorting is from Fallen Reach? Is it Arty?”

“You’ll find out when you get there in an hour, and I’m not telling you until then! See you soon!”

With that, Seena vanished from the party chat, and Hiral was left with his thoughts. The Recall Token sounded amazing, and would really allow dungeon runners to push harder. Which would get the PIMP more, stronger fighters sooner. It was win-win.

And, truth-be-told, Hiral really wasn’t against going to do a dungeon run. All the work on the towers had been important – and not not fun – but his body was already missing the workout from the near-constant fighting they’d been going through.

“Maybe I’m as much an experience junkie as Yan is,” Hiral sighed softly to himself.