Marvin's class change quest came with a special key that unlocked a training ground full of stone statues covered in faintly glowing moss. There was a table in the middle loaded with different kinds of weapons that looked eerily similar to the one in the first meadow I'd woken up in. Add in the campfire and I half expected to find Dave lurking around somewhere ready to teach me how to be a better adventurer.

Fiona walked out ahead, scouting the area, but she just turned back and shook her head. "Nobody's here."

"What now?" Marvin asked from inside the dungeon corridor. He hadn't stepped out to let the door close yet, as if he was planning on dashing back to my cafe at any moment.

Cole crossed his arms. "Now you come over here so the quest activates."

"Sorry, but I think he's right," I said. "This is your quest, so you probably need to actually step outside to start it."

"Unless you want to give up," Fiona said. "That's definitely an option. It's not a good option, but it's an option."

Marvin seemed to take a minute to seriously consider that before shaking his head. "No. I want to do this. I want to get over this fear and move on."

Good. It was nice seeing him take charge and step out of that corridor all on his own. Even if this wasn't exactly what he wanted, it was still a really good step in the right direction for the dungeon. Offering a class change quest was huge, like it knew forcing people to stick with their original choice was wrong. After that, maybe it would realize that more choices were better too. And if it didn't realize that on its own, then maybe I'd have to give the system a little nudge.

As Marvin walked over to the table, the moss on the stone statues glowed brighter. The one in front depicted a chubby little dragon with a big smile on its face and a paw on its belly like it was laughing. Marvin stepped onto a round stone in front of the table and the dragon came to life, flapping wings of creaking stone and shaking itself like a dog that had just gotten out of a bath.

Marvin fell back, landing hard on the ground as Fiona rushed toward the statue, hammer at the ready.

"Who are you?" she asked. "Are you friend or foe?"

"Friend. Probably." The dragon statue opened its mouth wide in a yawn. "Slept too long. Need food."

The statue turned to me, leaping through the air on tiny stone wings that should not have been able to actually fly. It sniffed me, searching my pockets just like that little goat monster had last time.

I calmed my racing heart and handed it one of the rolls Cole and I had made. "Here you go. My name's Hazel. What's yours?"

The dragon ripped into the roll, devouring it in two gulps. It rubbed its stomach, making an mmmmmm noise. "Bread good. Name's Smudge."

"Hello." I held my hand out, but paused. It was a dragon, not to mention a statue, so it probably wouldn't shake hands. I dropped my hand back to my side, fiddling with my apron as I glanced up at Cole, who nodded like I should continue. "We're here for a class change quest."

"All of you?" Smudge asked. "Or just the scaredy cat over there?"

"Hey, I'm not–"

"Rawr!" Smudge growled and pounced at Marvin, who scurried away. The little dragon laughed boldly, straight from its belly. "Sorry, sorry. Had to test your fighting skills. They're bad."

Fiona took a step back, guarding Marvin, but it didn't seem like she really needed to. It felt like the dragon statue was part of the quest, not sure which part, but part of it. It didn't seem violent either, because honestly, that little rawr was adorable and I kind of wanted to see it again. Maybe the dragon was like Dave, a helper meant to guide adventurers through their choices.

I walked over to Marvin, offering him a hand. "I think this dragon is here to help you change your class. Why don't you ask him about it?"

"Okay..." Marvin stood on shaking legs, glancing between the weapons' table and the dragon statue. "Mr. Smudge, I'd like a new class."

The dragon flew over the weapons' table upside down, smiling at him. "Would you? Then return your weapon and take a new one. Believe in yourself."

Marvin nodded, stepping closer as the rest of us watched on. He pulled out his battered sword and dropped it on the table with an unceremonious thunk. Smudge sighed, landing on the table.

"Respect the weapons," the dragon said. "Or they won't respect you."

"Sorry."

Marvin held his hand out to take a different weapon, but he couldn't seem to decide which. He hovered over swords, daggers, bows, spellbooks, staffs, but he didn't touch a single one. The dragon eventually started thwapping its tail against the table and rubbing its belly.

"Hungry. This is taking too long." Smudge leapt up, pouncing on Marvin's hand and forcing it down onto a spellbook. The dragon gave a goofy grin. "There. Decision made."

If you encounter this story on Amazon, note that it's taken without permission from the author. Report it.

"Wait, no, you can't just do that," Marvin stammered, backing away from the table. "What if I don't want to be a mage?"

I crossed my arms, staring the dragon down. "Isn't this supposed to be his choice? Why would you do that?"

"Just training," the dragon said, rolling its eyes. "No choices yet. Grab a weapon. Train. See what you think. Then decide."

"Oh," I glanced around the area, realizing the other statues were set up like training dummies with targets on them and everything. "Ohhhh, so this is a new way of making sure people choose a class they like?"

"Yes, yes." Smudge flew little figure eights in the air. "Hurry and train. Hurry and choose. Smudge is ravenous."

I laughed, going through my inventory to see what I had for the hungry dragon statue. If this was a new quest, how long had Smudge been waiting here for us? Maybe the area had always been here, but served some other purpose? I didn't know much about how the dungeon worked, but hopefully I could satisfy this little guy. I handed the statue a few cookies and its eyes widened.

"For me?" The dragon's mouth fell open, eyes shining even brighter. "For me!"

Then it gobbled up the cookies and rolled around in the air, grinning. Everyone liked cookies, even stone dragons.

While the statue was distracted, Marvin finally gathered up the nerve to pick up the spell book. The symbols on it glowed as it hovered in the air in front of him, exactly like my cookbook did. Was my cookbook a spellbook too? Huh, that was kind of cool. Good food was magical after all.

"What now?" Marvin whispered, gaze begging Fiona for help. "Do I just say the spell?"

She shrugged. "How would I know? I'm not a mage."

Cole stepped in. "Yes, say the spell loud and clear, with intention. Feel what you want it to do and say it proudly. You can even shout it if you want."

I frowned as his words tugged at my mind. I'd heard that somewhere before. It was similar to when the system had told me to shout my skills, but maybe it told everyone that. Wait, what class did Cole even have? I'd never seen him use magic before, so why would he know how a mage class worked? The more I got to know him, the less sense he made.

Marvin stepped up to a statue, held his hand out, and shouted, "Fire blast!"

Flames licked his fingers, rolling over his spell book and exploding in a big puff of smoke. He coughed, waving his hand to clear the smoke as Smudge laughed hysterically.

"Ohhhh adventurer," the statue said between laughs, "that weapon is not for you. Try again. You'll find one that fits you."

The soot marks on Marvin's face kind of said otherwise, but I hoped the dragon was right. I still had that trowel in my inventory, but I honestly wasn't sure what it would do if I added it to the table. I should only use it as a last resort, if Marvin really hated every single other option. So I watched while he tried to throw daggers, ducking as he somehow threw them behind himself instead of forward, and as he fumbled with a bow string that snapped him in the face leaving a big red welt. Weapon after weapon wasn't the right fit and Marvin was starting to get pretty frustrated.

"I suck," he said, verging on tears. "I really am just terrible at everything. I should just go back to the safe zone and never leave. I'm a complete failure."

The dragon statue flew lower, patting him on the shoulder. "Nobody is a failure here. Just experimenting. You'll find one that fits you."

Except, the statue had said that at least a dozen times now like it was on repeat, and Marvin definitely wasn't finding anything that fit him. There were only a few weapons left for Marvin to try and they were pretty much the same as the others, more blades, more bows, more magical items. He didn't mesh with any of them though because they were all focused on fighting and that's just not who Marvin was. How could the system not realize that by now?

Fiona leaned closer to me, whispering. "This is getting hard to watch. We need to do something."

"Trust the system," Cole said. "It'll find something that works for Marvin."

"Will it really?" I asked, shaking my head. "I don't think the system has a clue how people think. There's more to life than fighting and until the system realizes that, people like Marvin are going to keep being miserable."

Marvin yelped, dropping whatever weapon he'd been trying this time and sucking his finger like he'd cut himself. This wasn't just painful to watch, but he was literally in pain. He couldn't keep going like this. I took a few steps back, blending in with some training dummies behind us and opened my inventory to pull out the gardening trowel. If I just casually placed it on the table, maybe Marvin would choose it as his next weapon, and this could all end in something great.

While Smudge was distracted teaching Marvin how to throw axes, I placed the trowel on the table. I half expected the system to yell at me or throw it back, but nothing happened at all. I let out a breath, stepping back as Marvin dropped the axes on the table, sighing.

"I'm hopeless," he said. "I don't even want a new class anymore. I'll just go back to the cafe and pretend like this never happened."

Glowing tears dripped from Smudge's eyes. "No. I'm supposed to help you. I failed. Not you."

Those tears tugged at my heart. "Neither of you failed. The system is the one who's the failure." I patted Marvin on the shoulder. "Maybe you should try one more weapon. I'm sure there's something here that you'd enjoy."

"I really don't think–" he froze, staring at the gardening trowel. "Was that here before? I didn't even notice it. It looks just like the one I use at the cafe."

I winced. It wasn't just like it, it was it.

Cole turned to me, eyes wide with horror. "What did you do?"

Before I could answer, Marvin picked up the trowel. The table flickered, almost like it was an illusion that had grown unstable, and Smudge fell to the ground with a thud.

"Are you okay?" I set the dragon upright, heaving the heavy stone into place. It didn't move, didn't blink, didn't act anything like before. "What's wrong?"

The moss glowed so bright I could barely look at it. I squinted, turning away as the rest of the training ground flickered, bright lights shooting through the sky like lightning. Fiona pulled me away from the statue as cracks of light burst through it.

My body felt strange. Lighter than usual. I ate a healing cookie hoping that would help, but it was tasteless.

"What's going on?"

[Plant mage class does not exist]

[Failure]

[Failure]

[Failure]

The system messages scrolled through the air over and over for all of us to see while Cole seemed to pull at the campfire's flames, tugging them this way and that like they were strings of light.

"Cole, what are you doing?" I asked, frowning at how odd the flames looked in his hands, almost like he was controlling them.

His gaze met mine, eyes wide in panic. "Sleep."

And then everything went dark.