Dungeon Status:

Current Mana: 50 / 50

Current DP: 381

Current Floors: 1

Current Rooms: 5

Monsters

Critters

Construction

Research

Missions

Violet checked her [Dungeon Status] menu and frowned. It was so strange how the dungeon core room wasn't counted as part of the room number. She had to wonder if rooms with stairs to her next floor would count as a room or not. Of course, that was still a bit of a ways away, but it was still food for thought.

Violet shrugged as she entered her building view and began to fill her 10-Units deep hole with water. Luckily, water was only half as expensive to purchase as digging the hole had been. So, she was able to finish filling it with only a single round of 50 MP. Of course, it would still be a while before Violet was finished with the room, but she figured it would only take another three visits from adventurers before she'd have this room complete. Then she could move onto something else.

On the brightside, there was still plenty of time left in the day and there had been a few adventurer parties who showed interest in returning to finish her jigsaw puzzle. So, it was likely that she would have things finished up in the next few days. Of course, Violet had to remind herself, time wasn't as important now that she was a Dungeon Master. She had eternity to finish her dungeon, so long as she was able to protect her dungeon core in the meantime.

Emerald watched Gale with a wary expression as he stomped past her and towards the dungeon. He had been insistent that they had to have missed something the last time they had visited and that the woman they met had just been tricking them into giving up earlier than they otherwise would have. His attitude was starting to get on Emerald's nerves, but she had agreed he could explore the dungeon more since Cirdan had wanted to return to complete a puzzle anyway.

"What can you do? He'll get over it eventually, he just has yet to learn that everything won't always go the way he wants, clearly. Give it time, he'll mature with experience."

Emerald wasn't sure it was even worth doing that much. Cirdan was easy enough to work with, but there was no reason they couldn't part ways with Gale and look for new party members the next time they were in Elesfield. Still, it wasn't exactly worth bringing up right now.

"Let's just get this over with. He can explore all he wants and I'll keep guard while you complete the puzzle. Let's not make this take all day."

Cirdan said nothing about Emerald's impatience. As someone from the elf tribe, he had been raised in a quiet village where most of his elders were hundreds of years old. The fact that so many other races did not share this virtue had been surprising for Cirdan, at first, but he had adjusted soon enough. It simply wasn't worth the energy to constantly lecture those who had different upbringings than himself.

The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

Emerald was surprised to see that the entrances had changed since the last time they had been here. While Gale was off taking his anger out on the singular slime [Monster] in the room, Emerald investigated the issue. On both sides of the wildflower meadow room, there were entrances, but both seemed to lead to hallways that curved into another direction, making it impossible to tell which way would be best to continue their exploration.

"Which way do we go?"

Cirdan looked thoughtful as he replied

"It is hard to tell. It seemed some things have changed since we were last here. Why don't we go to the left for now and we can return if we hit a dead end?"

Emerald nodded in agreement. It wasn't like she had any better ideas anyway. Gale seemed bent on destroying the room as he searched every Unit of it in search of more [Monsters]. Before he could destroy a tree and anger a hive of bees, Emerald called out

"We're going to move on now. You're welcome to stay here and continue to throw a fit or you can join us and we can, hopefully, find more [Monsters] elsewhere."

Gale grumbled, but quickly rejoined the group and they continued on together. After walking around in a circle a few times over, Emerald was sure that there was only one way to go and they moved onto the next room. This one was the same size as the wildflower meadow had been, but was rather empty with two entrances they could continue through.

"Where now?"

Emerald questioned

"We should go this way. As long as it was only the hallways moved around and not entire rooms, this should be the way the puzzle was last time."

Cirdan answered, earning him a nod in confirmation from Emerald. Gale frustratedly kicked the wall before limping off ahead of the group and into the next room. Emerald really didn't understand why he was so frustrated. It wasn't like either of them had gained much experience either.

Besides, this wasn't entirely unexpected of such a new dungeon. One of the downsides of being so low-level that you had to rely on newer dungeons was that you ran the risk of there being too little loot and experience to gain. It was just that this particular dungeon was newer than any of the others in the area.

There were more established dungeons that they could attempt to explore, but they'd run the risk of running into more dangerous [Traps] and puzzles. Plenty of the more established dungeons had been renovated to the point of being too dangerous for inexperienced adventurers like themselves. They were more suitable for D and C-rank adventurers who had enough funds and time to research the dungeon and buy maps of the area. Many even insisted on including scouts and navigators in their party just for safety's sake as well.

So, they had to make do with this dungeon, for now, if they wanted to mitigate their chances of dying an early death. Still, it wasn't like Gale was the only one frustrated. Ember couldn't unlock better skills, earn attribute points, or earn valuable quests from a patron deity unless she could grow stronger. She just wasn't in such a rush that she couldn't see the benefit of having a mostly empty and weak dungeon to farm.

As things currently stood, they could easily camp the spot that one slime spawned and kill it repeatedly for some easy experience. It would annoy the Dungeon Master if they stayed too long, but that could be solved easily enough so long as they took frequent breaks and left the dungeon for a while. If anything, the Dungeon Master would be grateful for the free resources so long as they did that and remembered to leave a reasonable tribute in exchange for what they'd be gaining.

While Cirdan was busy trying to figure out the puzzle and Emerald was lost in thought, Gale decided to go off exploring the rest of the dungeon. Without his teammates there to try and talk him into leaving or to share the kills with, he was sure he'd have an easier time leveling up. Since he already knew the room they came from was empty, he decided to exit the slime jigsaw puzzle room from the other door.

However, Gale wasn't expecting to immediately drop into a 10-Units deep pool of water. Worst of all, Gale couldn't swim and his armor had made him sink deep into the water so he was completely submerged. Without the chance to even prepare, Gale soon lost his breath and began to drown. Air bubbled up to the surface, but no sounds of splashing or cries for help could escape the surface of the water. Before Gale could even consider how much he regretted wandering off by himself, he fell unconscious and his brain died from oxygen starvation.