I flew right past Britain, and the sphere of certain death surrounding it. Past France and their unsurprisingly mediocre medieval architecture. Past Italy to ease my increasing disappointment in this pointless detour, even though it brought me even more disappointment. I was sure that it would offer something of note, but just like France, it didn’t. It had boring, similar looking medieval towns. Not an ounce of actual culture was hidden away in those cities.

I sped up as my curiosity diminished. My engine warmed up, and I went FTL again. The feeling of getting pulled apart and back together always left me feeling like something was crawling under my skin. It only took a moment, and then the nano-chatte stopped me. We had gathered enough info for a map and database.

“Alright. I’ve compiled every single dungeon on earth, ranked them by size, the monsters within it, and estimated rewards. The two biggest dungeons are in the Tibetan mountains, and in the quote on quote ‘Death Valley’. You primitives weren’t even in a fantasy world! Why did you call a place on earth Death Valley?!” Hold on, what cities were there near either of those? I thought the pillars only appeared in cities.

“Because it’s an incredibly hot and salty desert. How’d you even know what monsters are in them?” I took a quick look at the dungeon information for the two biggest ones. They’re both estimated to be level twelve dungeons, with potential of enemies from level fifteen dungeons. The one in Death Valley was a hoard type dungeon. That meant a few necromancer enemies spewed out entire low level armies. On the other hand, Tibet was a dragon type dungeon, which was the opposite. It only had a couple incredibly strong enemies.

“Dungeons spill enemies out into the real world. By seeing how many, and of what type, I can estimate the enemies within the dungeon.” When I looked closer at the data, I saw what a dragon type dungeon really entailed. The nano-chatte estimated four level seventeen ice type enemies. That meant they had four thousand times the amount of XP I do. There was no way in hell I could beat them.

“Ok… Let me think. We go to the nearest town to death valley, advertise ourselves as ‘god’s chosen carrier’, flex on everyone with our blessings, and then use some sort of nano-whatever magic tech to join a party and store people’s items while we grind the enemies there.” The nano-chatte took control of my arm and facepalmed the suit.

“That is the most foolish plan I have ever heard of. We will consume an entire mountain, create a single ship of my design, and then annihilate the entire dungeon in one sweep.” Did the nano-chatte forget we have one of the ten strongest people alive after us?

“We have the king of the world hunting us, you idiot! We need something inconspicuous.” I could feel the nano-chatte get a moment of sudden realisation, before the anger returned again.

“Then why are you ‘flexing’ your blessings? Wouldn’t he already have made it known that someone with two legendary, unheard of blessings is flying around?” That was just extrapolating.

“We got caught once. He didn’t even send anyone else after us. He only knows that I have a nano-chatte with me, which is rare and noteworthy. He didn’t know about my blessings.” Several seconds of silence passed, and then the suit tightened to the point where the air was being squeezed out of my body. “You know I’m right!” I screamed at the nano-chatte, who released me into a new suit. This one was designed like a suit of armour, with a colour scheme to boot. The black suit with outlines of light was gone. White and gold was the new, disguised and distinguished look I had to wear.

I stretched a little, before blasting off in the direction of California. I quickly thought of a cover story as my engine was being covered up to make me look less conspicuous. I was from a small Alaskan town, and the only survivor of its dungeon. I was rescued by the goddess right before dying, and put in this unremovable amour so that I wouldn’t die.

I would land just outside the town, and pray that the nano-chatte’s calculations worked so that I wouldn’t crash. The heat of my reactor piled up thanks to my armour covering up the cooling. My chest was becoming a non-newtonian fluid thanks to the heat and weird matter that powered the reactor. Pistons pushed themselves against my chest to keep it solid for a couple more seconds.

I could feel a couple bones break as I landed. My armour was a wet puddle on the floor. It reformed itself of course, and the brief moment of being disconnected from the nano-chatte ended. This armour was way too makeshift. I needed to redesign it later. The reactor was the main issue, but FTL was practically impossible in the first place, so I should’ve been grateful.

“I know your broad plan, but what’re we going to actually do?” The nano-chatte quizzed me, trying to soothe its insecurity. To be honest, I had no plan. I hoped to wing it, and come out unharmed. Having a meticulous planner as a companion made that impossible.

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“We’ll go over to the guild and ask for a party. Simple.” The nano-chatte groaned. It was not that simple apparently.

“I need to do everything, don't I? They’ll surely ask for some sort of magic ID or whatnot.” Magic ID? What was it blabbering about?

“They won’t if we act confident enough.” With that, I walked into town. It was a shabby, small town straight out of a wild west movie. Nobody was at level eight yet, nonetheless level twelve. A few mavericks and idiots would still attempt the higher level dungeons anyway, hence why the town - however small it was - existed.

Instead of a normal guild building, there was an amalgamation that could just barely be called a building in the centre of town. The tavern, local shop, and golden guild station was in the same building, presumably because they wouldn’t be getting enough patronage to stay afloat otherwise. The tavern was the only populated part of town in the middle of the day. The heat was slightly offset thanks to the endless tap of ale. I spotted the guild master serving people by the counter, not even bothering to charge people for the alcohol.

“Are you the guild master?” I asked as I approached the counter. They looked up at me with an expression of boredom.

“Yea, unfortunately. You don’t need to register or anything. Nobody comes out of the dungeon anyway.” I smiled as the nano-chatte stayed silent. I looked around, and I could only see one party. The rest of the people seemed like normal fantasy people. Blacksmiths, farmers, butchers– Hold on! What could you possibly farm in Death Valley?

“Leave it to the experts, primitive.” The nano-chatte said, as it felt my confusion. It was right. There was no use in thinking about hypotheticals. If my curiosity really consumed me, I could’ve just asked. The party I was thinking about before my confusion had three people in it. A giant man with a massive sword to boot, a red haired woman covered head to toe in scars and burns with a staff and sword by her side, and a tiny black haired boy with a long black robe. I approached them and heard a brief snipped of their discussion,

“Look, I either perfect it here, or I die a nobody. Those rich bastards in the Scarlet Emporium are already creating magic weapons. I don’t wanna be left in the dust.” The red haired woman looked exasperated, as if explaining the same thing over and over.

“Just pick a path already. If you can’t beat them in one field, beat them in another.” The giant man briefly stopped drinking to say that, before resuming chugging the massive barrel.

“Oh? Just so I can compete with the sword saint and arch mage? No thank you.” I slammed my fist on the table, and caused them to all look at me.

“You’re going in, and I’m coming with you.” They all stared at me, before the boy cleared his throat.

“Who are you? And why would we let you come on this pilgrimage with us?” The robe already made me think he was a cultist, but this outright confirmed it. The red haired woman rolled her eyes when he said pilgrimage.

“Nobody returned from that dungeon, so the more people you have, the better. I’m also blessed by two gods.” The boy instantly changed his tune, and brought out an artefact. It was a compass with three pointers and a gem in the middle. He pressed it against me and only two out of the three pointers went north.

“What? Blessed by change and stillness? Are you a being of antithesis?” The woman looked at the compass and scratched her head, while the big guy smiled.

“Big words mean he’s better right? I say the lad can come with us.” The boy nodded extremely fast and grabbed my hand to shake it.

“Hold on! We don’t even know what class he is. Or his level.”

“I’m a ranger with the power of instant equipping and endless inventory. I’m also level five.” That would explain how I change my armour and the guns on my arm so quickly, and create a plausible excuse to store their items, thus still technically sticking to my original plan, and not make the nano-chatte angry at me for winging it.

“Fine. You’re allowed in as long as you carry all our stuff with that ‘endless’ inventory of yours.” What can I say? I was good at convincing people.