Vivi promptly passed out after making it to safety.

Before collapsing, she checked her wounds. There were bruises all over and slash marks on her back and chest. Vivi cleaned the wounds with river water. Beyond that, she was too tired to care. Her muscles were exhausted beyond failure. Even with ether in her veins, sitting still was difficult.

She had just enough energy to hack off a piece of an emberstone with her claws. She placed it in the middle of the cavern. Keep it warm, she told Lucius. Good night.

***

Vivi woke up with the worst aches she’d ever had.

She lay on her back, staring at the ceiling. She could feel each one of her wounds burning. One night hadn’t been enough to heal her from the fight. It felt as if she’d woken up while her body was in the process of being reshaped from the inside.

“Morning,” Lucius said. “How was your first hunt?”

The cat walked in circles around Vivi’s stomach. His whiskers and tail took turns showing at the very bottom of her vision. She was too tired to lift her head.

“The first time is always the worst,” Lucius said. “Exerting yourself with ether, that is. Human muscles aren’t used to being spent so thoroughly. But don’t worry, you’ll recover stronger than ever. Even if it takes a few days.”

“Fantastic,” Vivi muttered. “How deep do you think we are?”

“The fang tanker is likely a squadron boss of sorts. There is no way it’s the boss of this dungeon. I’d say we still have at least ten levels to descend.”

“No, I meant the world’s levels,” Vivi said. “We entered the dungeon on the fourth level. How deep into the world can we really descend?”

“We’re officially still on the fourth level,” Lucius said. “This dungeon is inside a descent. A part of the land where the sky turns vertical. We’re currently inside the sky. Descents usually span multiple levels. The dungeon is trapped inside. It’s usually impossible to travel between levels through descents unless you manage to destroy your way through the sky.

“If we think purely in terms of depth…” Lucius thought for a bit. “We’re probably somewhere around the sixth or seventh level.”

“The seventh level exists?” Vivi asked.

“It does,” Lucius said. “So does the eighth, ninth, and tenth, and beyond. The world is deep.”

Vivi continued staring at the ceiling. Somehow, she was less surprised than she thought she’d be. “The humans are still arguing about whether the fifth level exists. How do you know so much?”

“Only surface dwellers argue about the fifth level,” Lucius said. “Ether hunters are aware of the sixth and seventh levels officially. I know of the deeper levels because…”

“Because?”

“Well, me and my old wielder got on a bit of an adventure,” Lucius said.

His tone suggested he didn’t want to speak any more. A bad memory, perhaps? Vivi had heard that spirits weren’t supposed to have long memories. Most spirits forgot old adventures after their wielders died. However, Lucius seemed to remember past adventures just fine. Was he an exception?

“You need to eat, don’t you?” Lucius asked. “We’re lucky there’s a river right beside us.”

Vivi lay still for a moment longer. She knew she’d need to get up sooner than later. She groaned as she pushed herself to sit. She stretched each aching muscle, testing the extent of her wounds. Everything hurt, but Vivi knew she had to manage. Zand didn’t allow time for leisure and rest.

She’d slept with her raincoat on. The coat was probably ruined. That fact was another reason she didn’t want to wake up. Her roughed-up gray raincoat was the only memoir she still had from home. To see it broken would be almost as bad as losing a finger. Vivi wouldn’t have the equipment to repair a rip in the fabric.

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Examining it, however, Vivi found the coat perfectly intact. It was as good as new. Vivi had wounds on her chest and back, but somehow, the coat was untouched?

“I imbued your coat with ether,” Lucius said. “It holds ether well. Not perfectly, which is why you’re cut beneath the coat. But the coat itself survived. It’s a pretty good armor, I think.”

Vivi grew sparkles in her eyes. She almost wanted to hug Lucius. But she contained herself. “Thank you. That’s convenient.”

Lucius let out a laugh, posing proudly.

Vivi stood and stretched further. She had a lot to do, starting with food and the boring stuff.

The next several hours of Vivi’s extended morning were spent building a makeshift camp and attempting to catch fish. The river was relatively slow, but the fishes were small and nimble, and rare enough for Vivi’s attention to dwindle while she waited for a new one to arrive. She sat on top of a rock, watching the current for movement. Each time a fish tried to pass, she thrust one of Lucius’s claws forth, hoping to land a clean hit.

The ranged claw attack also worked as a spear. The claws didn’t have to dissipate immediately like a projectile. Instead, Lucius could keep the ether active, which kept the extended claws solid for a longer duration. This way, Vivi could use the long claws for fishing.

That didn’t mean Vivi’s aim was any good. She kept missing. For hours, to the point that it was getting annoying. She asked Lucius to help out since he was a lot better at catching smaller prey than she was. Lucius refused. He claimed fishing was good practice. Vivi needed accuracy and instincts, both of which were trained through fishing.

Catching the first fish took her two and a half hours. The catch was a small sardine-shaped fellow with dark scales, ether oozing out of its eyes. Vivi hesitated about eating it, but Lucius reassured her that the fish probably wasn’t poisonous.

So Vivi got to cooking. She laid out a nice rack of emberstones, then perched and gutted the fish carefully with her claws. It had been a while since she cleaned a fish, but Grandpa had taught her how to do it. She placed the fish on top of the emberstones and told Lucius to lightly heat the stones.

The fish tasted amazing. It was unseasoned, but still far better than Axback’s soup or Grandpa’s nonsense meals. Grandpa usually ate the leftover grains of whatever was available, purchasing the cheapest foods possible. That often meant bread and nuts. The bare minimum to keep muscles growing.

With a river next to her and a body in need of repair, Vivi wasn’t going to stop at just one fish. She spent another hour at the river, catching as much fish as she could. Her accuracy improved after each catch.

Finally, she laid out her catches, satisfied with the morning’s work. Ten freshly killed fish. She picked a rock to use as a stool, then sat down to clean the first fish.

That was when a figure jumped down from a crawl space into Vivi’s safe space.

Invader! Vivi sprung to her feet in an instant. The fish fell from her hands, fingers turning to claws.

The invader was the white-haired little fiend! The fiend ran for Vivi’s fishes, quickly grabbing as many as she could before running off. She ran for another crawl space.

“No!” Vivi shouted. She thrust a claw forth, piercing the corner of the fiend’s oversized cloth. She made sure not to pierce skin. Hurting the fiend seemed too cruel.

The fiend’s jump got stopped by its own clothes stuck in Vivi’s claw. Momentum turned downward, and the fiend plumped face-first onto the ground.

Vivi ran over and pressed her hand on the fiend’s back, stopping an escape.

The fiend yelled out. She flailed her arms, kicking, attempting to bite. Her teeth couldn’t quite reach Vivi’s hand, and her kicks were powerless. Vivi sat there, catching her breath as the fiend struggled.

“Gods, you scared me…” Vivi said softly. “How did you get in here?”

The fiend continued kicking. She let out weak cries. Not monstrous or devilish hisses, as Vivi would have expected from a fiend. She sounded more like a poor little girl.

Lucius appeared out of Vivi’s core and walked around the fiend, examining her. “That’s a surprise. I was sure it was a monster attacking us. I didn’t think other nimrods would survive this deep.”

She almost escaped from me, too, Vivi thought.

The question was, what would she do with the girl? Vivi obviously couldn’t kill her. The fiend was a nimrod. Everyone above hated this little girl. Being caught must have been terrifying. The fiend was still struggling. Vivi feared it would never stop.

Vivi sighed, then placed one of the fishes next to the fiend’s head.

“If you’re hungry, I’ll share,” Vivi said.

Finally, the struggle stopped. The fiend attempted to reach the fish with her teeth, then her arms. Vivi kept it just far enough so that the fiend couldn’t reach.

“Calm down and I’ll give it to you,” Vivi said.

Her words didn’t work. The fiend continued reaching for the fish. A new struggle began. This time, the focus was not to escape, but to reach the fish.

Vivi let out a sigh. This won’t work, will it…

Vivi gave in. She offered the fish to the fiend. Immediately, the fiend secured the fish in its mouth, munching on it with two fanged teeth.

“I think she’s an idiot,” Lucius said.

Hungry if nothing else, Vivi thought.

Finally, Vivi let go of her hold. She sat calmly between the fiend and the fishes. Hopefully, the fiend wouldn’t immediately run off. Vivi picked up another fish, holding it in the fiend’s vision. “I’m Vivi. What’s your name?”