Chapter 36: Kalana Vayra

When did it happen? When did he, Zachys Calador, become such a Gods-be-damned pessimist? No, seriously, when? It must’ve been recently. That much was for certain. He wasn’t like this a few weeks ago. So when had it happened? Was it when he saw his father’s dead, mangled corpse? Was it when Kalana had been forced to leave him? Was it when Mr. Oren made him feel unworthy to join the GSG? These were questions he pondered only because he knew there was no way this brand new “defeatist” attitude of his had emerged just as a result of a few rotten levels. Sure, they didn’t help much, but at the same time, the Zach of just a few weeks ago would’ve willingly leveled all the way to a million just in the chance something good might happen when he got there.

I can’t help it, he thought. Just gloomy as hell.

Not wanting to spoil the mood of his two new friends, he tried his best to shove aside his dejected feelings, and with as much cheer as he could muster, he said, “Grats!” as the dead scarecrow gave way to words which were joyous to everyone but him. Zach watched enviously as Lienne gained another two points in intelligence, a point in constitution, and a point in speed. Then he watched with even greater jealousy as Rian gained a point in strength, a point in dex, and another two points in constitution—and learned some kind of ability called “Bully,” which from the brief glance Rian had shown him at the description, seemed to cause a mob of equal or lower level to “flee” for ten or twenty seconds or something. Apparently it was in a class of ability that adventurers referred to as a “fear.”

Both of them had pushed their way through a rather large batch of purple pumpkins with a joy and eagerness that he himself should have been feeling as he got closer to his next level. But rather than view his own experience gains with excitement and enthusiasm the way he had back when he was leveling with Kalana or even by himself early on against the Skelly Grunts, Zach now dreaded his next level, because he feared it would reinforce the nightmarish thought that had been working its way deeper into his brain: the idea that there was nothing inside of him. That he was hollow. That the reason his inner strength could not be brought to the surface was because he had no inner strength.

But if I don’t, what do I have? he wondered.

He knew he was behaving erratically compared to his usual self, but a part of it was the realization that he no longer had anything in his life but this. Mr. Oren claimed he was being hunted. He no longer felt welcome in his own home city. He wouldn’t be safe there even if he went back. So what did that leave him in life? It left him this. Being an adventurer was now his only option. And that on its own wasn’t something he minded, either. A big part of him craved this. Yet, the thought that he might not be good enough for it was driving him insane. His self-esteem was in tatters, and if he was being honest with himself, it had been in a freefall awhile now.

And so, going through the motions while lacking any of the genuine adventuring spirit, he did his part and played his role as they spent the next two hours fighting pumpkins and scarecrows, racking up an additional 325xp and putting Zach at 450/600xp needed to reach level 8. Their pace had slowed significantly from where it had been at the start due to the chill in the air requiring them to take increasingly longer and more frequent “heating breaks” near the campfire.

Yet, even with the somewhat reduced rate of experience gain, he still figured he would level up sometime within the next half hour—or at least that was what he’d expected to happen. But then the campfire died, the weather turned even colder, and in a matter of moments, there was an unspoken understanding among the three of them that it was time to move on.

“It’s way too cold now,” Rian said. “Even for me. Which is weird because”—he pointed up at the sky—“it actually looks like the sun is coming out.”

The change in light had been so gradual that Zach had barely noticed it, but it was indeed true: at some point during the past hour, the sky had turned from a dark black to a dark blue, one which was becoming brighter by the moment as the dual moons seemed to fade away against a backdrop of a gradually more azure atmosphere.

Lienne looked like she wanted to voice her agreement, but her teeth were now chattering so fiercely that it had become an open question as to whether or not the girl was still capable of forming words. This, Zach could completely understand, because now, his teeth were also chattering. In fact, it had actually become so cold that their breath now let off water vapor. It reminded Zach of when he was younger and he used to believe he could breathe fire. One of his rare memories of his late mother was of her telling him that he was a dragon in the winter time, because he could make smoke come out of his mouth. For some reason, the random memory caused him to feel an abrupt pang of heartache for a woman he hadn’t really thought about in a long, long time.

Mom, he thought. I had a mom. It feels weird to say.

“I think,” Rian said, “we should consider leaving this floor.”

It was almost comical how unnecessary Rian’s words were, because for the past ten minutes, without anyone actually saying a thing, the three of them had already begun walking towards the exit as though on autopilot. When they’d first arrived here, the temperature felt like late fall with a touch of early winter. But now? Now it felt like mid-winter during a cold snap—and it was still dropping, too! With such rapidity, the ambient temperature was becoming so uncomfortable that Zach temporarily lost all concern over his levels and stats as his mind shifted gears and instead focused on warmth and leaving this hell behind him.

Or is it actually hell here after all?

As the three of them approached the toolshed with the B3->B4 metal door, the sun finally made itself visible, and to Zach’s astonishment, he realized that, under the proper lighting, this planet, wherever or whatever it was, happened to be breathtakingly beautiful.

“W-w-w-w-wow,” Lienne said, her teeth chattering. “I d-d-d-didn’t even s-s-s-see th-those m-m-m-mountains.”

With the darkness abating, Zach could now see significantly farther out into the distance. Because of this, he only now realized that the three of them weren’t just surrounded by mountains, but they were on a mountain, too. Not far from the tool shed there was a cliff, and beyond the cliff, at least three-thousand feet below them was a massive forest that seemed to stretch on for hundreds of miles. There were birds flying above the trees, too, and they were some of the strangest, most beautiful, and exotic creatures that Zach had ever seen. Their bodies were orange in color, with red, gold, and white feathers, and this particular flock seemed to be heading all the way off to Zach’s right, where he could see a river that ran through the forest, which ended in a waterfall and led down to a much thicker, denser woodland area.

“Lesson learned,” he said aloud, shivering. “Everything looks scary and shitty when it’s dark outside.”

Lienne laughed, even as her whole body shook. “It’s s-s-so b-b-beautiful. I almost w-w-want to st-stay.”

Rian placed his hand on the push bar. “I don’t. Let’s go, dudes. If it’s too cold for me, it’s definitely too cold for you two.”

With that, he pushed in the door and stepped inside. Zach followed behind him—or attempted to, at least. But Lienne, apparently too cold to spend another moment out here, actually shoved him aside, squeaked out an “I’m sorry!” and then rushed in behind her brother. Cracking a grin, Zach followed after her.

She’s cute. I can’t deny that, he thought with a smile. Then, more seriously, he realized: but still, she’s not Kalana. I need to not have these thoughts.

The moment the door closed behind them, the temperature went from below-freezing to room temperature, and Zach literally sighed with relief, as did Lienne. They were in some kind of narrow stairwell that looked like the sort one would find in an apartment complex or office building. Ever since the trip down from B1->B2, Zach now found himself nervous in the presence of stairs. He wouldn’t put it past this dungeon to make them go through something like that again.

“What do you guys think?” he asked. “Ten-second flight down to B4 or another billion-hour plunge where we have to risk breaking our legs just to get from platform to platform?”

Rian shrugged. “To be honest, it probably doesn’t matter anymore.”

“Why’s that?”

He smirked. “My constitution is high enough now that I can probably take a hundred-foot fall and be all right. I can put Lienne on my back and catch you if we need to go that route.”

“Having stats is nice,” Zach said dryly. “I wonder what it’s like to level up and get more points into things.”

“I don’t know. Get more experience and you’ll find out.”

“Don’t make me slap you,” Zach joked.

Rian’s only reply was to give him a rough pat on the back; it was playful, but it actually hurt. Zach coughed out a laugh and then gave him one back. Before he knew what was happening, the two somehow erupted into a pseudo wrestling match right there in the stairwell while Lienne rolled her eyes and said she’d punch either of them if they knocked into her.

Given what they’d been through together during the last two—more like three now—days, Zach felt like he’d been their friend for years. The more time they spent together, the more comfortable he became with them.

And just like that, he found himself somewhat at peace with his situation. It was a shift that came on so suddenly he wasn’t even prepared for it. One moment, he was feeling gloomy over his lack of progress, and the very next, his emotions took a one-eighty as it dawned on him that it didn’t matter how strong he was or wasn’t, because he was going on an adventure with people he really liked and who seemed to like him back. But it was more than that: it was the fact that he had become so “comfortable” with the idea of guilds and leveling and power that he’d actually forgotten how to appreciate what he already had.

Once upon a time, a boy named Zachys Calador would have literally traded his soul just to be level 2. Just to have a point in anything at all. Forget “keeping up” with this person or that person or joining a guild or trying to “one up” his new friends. If someone had told Zach that he’d be in a dungeon today with a sword and that he’d know how to use it and he would kill mobs with it, he would have been moved to tears from the sheer joy of it. And now, here he was, and he was acting like a grumpy bitch because he wasn’t as powerful as he wanted to be.

“What’s so funny?” Rian asked him. “You look so different all of a sudden.”

Zach laughed. “I just finally get it.”

“Get what?”

“This,” he said as he began to descend the stairs.

“What about it?”

“I would’ve killed to be here right now doing this. And I am. So there’s no reason for me to be upset. Or to quit if level 8 sucks as much as 6 and 7. I got so caught in the wrong outlook that I forgot why I ever wanted something like this to happen to me in the first place.”

Rian stopped short on the middle of the second flight of steps, and Zach paused after passing him. “You know what? Me too,” he admitted. “Until you mentioned it just now, I almost forgot how excited I was when Li and I first learned we were going to be adventurers. The more into this world you get, the more normal it feels, and the more you lose sight of why you wanted to be part of it.”

“Exactly!” Zach said. “That’s what I’m trying to say. But then again, in my case, part of it was this whole ‘guild’ bullshit.”

“Hm?” Lienne asked, as though she were only first becoming interested in the conversation now.

“Well, when I first found my spawn,” Zach began, “all I wanted to do was go on an adventure with Kalana. You know: level up a few times. Do something no one in my city has ever done before, or at least no one I’d ever heard of. Just me and Kal, partners in crime.” Lienne frowned at the mention of her name, but Zach pretended not to notice. “But I guess when I found out I’d have to get level 10 to see her again, I kind of shifted my view on what I was supposed to care about, and in a way, it spoiled things for me. It became about the grind and not the journey.”

“Here’s what I don’t understand,” Rian said. “Why do you care?”

“Huh? Care about what?”

“About this guild. The GSG. Why do you feel like you have to join them? Why do you give a fuck about them, dude? They sound like they’re elitist assholes. You can still make adventuring about whatever you want it to be about. You don’t have to check off power boxes on some douchebag’s checklist.”

“It’s so I can see Kalana again,” Zach said.

“That doesn’t even make sense. Why can’t you see her without being level 10? I mean, you’ll probably be level 10 before the end of today or tomorrow, but even still, why does it matter?”

“Because Mr. Oren said…” Zach tilted his head sideways as he realized the absurdity of his words. Still, he spoke them anyway. “Mr. Oren said I couldn’t until I joined a guild. Any guild.”

“Who gives a shit what he says?” Rian asked with a frown. “There’s no law that says people named Zach need to be in a guild to see people named Kalana. That doesn’t even make sense, man. Think about that. Why do you need to be in a guild to see her? Is there some kind of invisible barrier that won’t let you? How about, when we get out of this dungeon, you just go? Hell, I’ll go with you. We’ll all just go. Who’s physically stopping us?”

Zach felt his eyebrows raise. How could something so simple and so dumb be so profound? The questions were so rudimentary and unsophisticated that they bordered on comical, and yet they were so damn true. What was stopping him?

“Hey,” Rian said, pointing at his pocket. “Mr. Oren, your sponsor—he didn’t ban you from having a phone, right?”

Confused, Zach asked, “Obviously not, but what’s that got to do with anything?”

“Did he ban Kalana from having a phone?”

“I don’t think so.”

“So why don’t you just call her? Again, why are you just assuming you can’t do something just because no one told you that you can?”

Zach felt his chest tighten as, once again, such an uncomplicated, simple statement struck him with the force of something so much more profound. “I guess…I don’t know, Rian. I got swept up in this stuff. Since I came home that night and saw my dad thrown out of the window, I’ve just been, you know…I’ve been swept up. I haven’t had the chance to really think about things like this.”

Sitting on the bottom step of the second flight of stairs, Rian said, “You should take out your phone and see if you have service. If so, call her.”

Zach blinked. “Right now?”

“Yeah, dude. Right now.”

Lienne cleared her throat. “Boys, we’re kind of in the middle of something? Can we get going, please?”

“Li, stop.”

She glared at Rian but said nothing. Zach removed his new phone. He didn’t actually have Kalana’s number programmed into it, but he didn’t need to, either, as it was one he’d memorized. “I should call her? Right now?”

“Do you have service?”

“Somehow, yeah. Half a bar. Guess we’re back on Galterra.”

“So call her.”

Zach, unable to believe he was actually doing this, began to dial Kalana’s number—then stopped, as he remembered something kind of important, and it made him laugh. “I broke her phone,” he said. “I can’t call her. I don’t know her new number.”

“What about her dad? Do you know his number?”

Strangely enough, Zach did. It was mostly because Kal and her dad didn’t have a home phone number and used their dad’s cell as their apartment line, so whenever Zach couldn’t reach Kalana on her cell—which happened a lot given the thing was old and needed replacing long before he broke it—he’d call her apartment, which was really just her dad’s cell which was connected to a cordless home phone.

Actually, I technically didn’t even break her phone, he realized. If we’re being totally fair here, the Will of the Favored buff broke it.

Looking down at his cell, Zach rubbed his chin and thought carefully about whether or not this was something he should really do. Even as he tried to tune out Rian, who continued to goad him on, he needed to seriously consider this. What if hearing from him disturbed her? What if she had changed so much in such a short time like he had?

“Stop thinking about it and call,” Rian said.

Becoming nervous, Zach was surprised by how much his hand shook as he dialed in her dad’s number. He had no idea if it would even work. Wouldn’t Mr. Oren want him to get a new phone or whatever after the Varsh incident? Wouldn’t it be dangerous for him to still be using the same number? Hell, for that matter, was anyone actually even still after Kalana? From the way Mr. Oren made things sound, the situation was kind of reversed now, and it was him whom they wanted, not her.

“Here goes nothing,” he said, pressing the green “send” button.

The phone rang, and Zach felt his heart skip a beat. Then it rang a second time, and he was suddenly nauseous. A third time and he had to resist the urge to hang up. After the fourth ring, he began to strongly consider ending the call, even as he lacked any understanding of why he was so nervous in the first place. This was Kalana. He knew her better than he knew anyone. Since when did he find silly Kalana so Gods-damned intimidating? What was behind his sudden feelings of inadequacy? Was it really just because she was apparently super powerful now or whatever?

She was level 15 the day I left my apartment. Gods only know what level she is now.

Becoming too nervous, Zach made up his mind to end the call. He couldn’t do it. He couldn’t go through with this. Try as he might, he simply could not set aside his feelings of intimidation and unworthiness. It was something he’d need to work on and fix before he could possibly—

“Hello?” a man’s voice said, causing Zach to gasp. That was definitely her father. That was definitely Mr. Vayra. “Hello?” he asked again. “Who is this?” Zach swallowed. He opened his mouth to speak, but he found himself unable to form words. His throat went dry, and his heart began hammering in his chest. “Hello?” Mr. Vayra asked again. “Well, if no one’s there, I guess I’ll just hang—”

“Uh! Um, hold on a second, Mr. Vayra.”

There was a brief pause. Then, in an excited, animated tone of voice, Kalana’s father—a literal prince—said, “Zach?”

“Ah…yeah, it’s me,” he said.

“Gods above! It’s so good to hear from you.”

Zach was about to reply that he felt the same, but then he was once again stunned into silence as he heard another voice on the line, one which sounded like it came from a distance—like the other end of a room. To his complete shock, he found his eyes beginning to dampen just at the sound of it. This was not the reaction he’d expected. This wasn’t even something he thought himself capable of. Getting teary-eyed just at the sound of a voice? Since when was he that kind of person?

“Dad, did you just say Zach?” asked the voice of Kalana. “No way! Is he on the phone?”

Zach’s nerves intensified as he realized he might very well be about to speak to Kalana. How was it even possible that something he’d done a billion times over the last two years was now, for some reason, the scariest thing he could even imagine doing? How would he break the ice? How would he prevent the conversation from being awkward? How would he keep things sounding natural and cool? The last thing he wanted was to trap Kalana on a phone call where he came across as terrified and awkward.

“Dad, is that really Zach?”

“Yes, sweetheart. He just called me—hey, take it easy!”

“Gimme, gimme, gimme!” There was a brief pause. “Um, hello? Zach? It’s me, Kalana! Why’d you wait so long to call me, jerk?”

Zach wiped his eyes. He was so damn glad she couldn’t see him right now. This was just pathetic. He was supposed to be a man. Why was he getting all emotional? It was to such an extent he was afraid to speak to her, as he worried his voice would break.

I’m behaving like a woman. Get it together, Zach. Shit.

“Hey, Kal,” he said. “To be honest, I didn’t know I could. For all I know, Mr. Oren might throw a fit if he finds out I’m talking to you without being the appropriate level or whatever.”

“Who cares what he thinks? Forget him. I just can’t believe it’s really you. I’m so happy. You finally called me. I missed you! Where are you, anyway? I wanna know everything, you hear me? Everything!”

Zach smiled. “I’m actually in a dungeon right now.”

“Wow! You’re in a real live dungeon?”

“Yeah. I made some friends, actually. You would’ve…I wish you would’ve been here with us. It’s weird doing something like this without you.”

“What kind of dungeon is it? Tell me.”

Having no idea what to say or in what order, Zach decided to just go with the flow, and so he told Kalana everything that’d happened. The only parts he left out were his level and the fact that his stats didn’t seem to be going up. He knew Kal wouldn’t care. He knew the right choice would be to just tell her everything. But he just couldn’t bring himself: not yet, anyway.

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As Zach spoke, he felt gradually more comfortable as he realized that she was still the same girl, and a week or two away hadn’t changed her.

“You went to another planet?” she shouted. “Without me?”

“Two other planets,” he said.

“And you drove a DEHV?”

“A car. Something called a Ford Mustang. It was really cool. You would’ve loved it.”

“Zach, you’re so mean. You can’t just go visiting other planets without me. You should come get me next time!”

“Wait, for real? I mean, I don’t even know if I’m allowed to see you yet. I still don’t know why we were separated at all.”

“Because Alex is a know-it-all, that’s why. But I don’t have to listen to him anymore, because I’m more powerful than he is now.”

Zach could feel his eyes widening. “Sorry, what?”

“I got really strong really fast,” she said. “I’m level 65.”

“Wh…”

He felt the blood draining from his face. He wasn’t sure how to react to something like this. He wasn’t sure how he was supposed to feel. He couldn’t understand how what she was saying was possible. How different could Elvish folk possibly be from humans that they could accomplish something like that? Even Rian seemed taken aback, as Zach’s eavesdropping friend had a look on his face that Zach was sure was mirrored on his own.

“Did you say level 65?”

Zach desperately hoped he’d misheard—and then he felt shitty for hoping such a thing. What did that say about him as a person? That he was so insecure it made him upset that Kalana was really powerful. But in total fairness, it wasn’t like he actually chose to get upset. That was the thing, really. He wanted to be happy for her. He did! But people were not able to just pick and choose their emotions. Even though he didn’t want to feel so emasculated, and even though he knew that, logically, he shouldn’t, he could not control the fact that he did. Wanting to feel one way and actually feeling it were two different things. And so, if he were being honest with himself, he had to admit that it bothered him Kalana was so far ahead of him. Well…assuming, of course, that he’d actually heard her correctly, because the level she’d just claimed to be was simply ridiculous.

“Kal,” he asked, “did you just say that you are level sixty-five? As in six with a five after it?”

“Well, okay…I kinda fibbed a tiny bit there. I’m actually only level 64, but I’m so close to 65 it almost doesn’t matter. In fact, I think I’m only, like, 80,000xp away from leveling up, so I’m basically there already.”

“W-what?” Zach asked with a gasp. “That’s insane. It hasn’t even been that long since…so how can you be this powerful already?”

“Huh? Oh, you think that’s high level? My dad’s level 73 now.”

“Kal, I…this is too much for me to even take in. How? I don’t understand.”

“Elves are awesome, that’s how,” she said with a cute laugh.

Zach worried his brain would explode as the sheer insanity of this situation dawned on him. If Kalana was telling the truth—and he was pretty sure that she was—then that meant that, right now, at this very moment, Kalana was actually so powerful on such an absurd, ridiculous scale, that she was now strong enough to beat his cat in a hypothetical fight. She was actually more powerful than his cat! And you know what else? Yeah. This right here was now, officially, the “new” craziest thing he’d ever heard. Previously, the award for “this is so insane I can’t believe this is real” had gone to Fluffles for being a level-47 talking cat. Unfortunately, the kitty had now been dethroned. Kalana was the new champion. She was now the new reigning champion of “there’s no way this is possible.” And it wasn’t just Zach who had a hard time grasping this, either; Rian also seemed pretty taken aback. Zach could tell from the eerie way he was mumbling to himself.

“So, this is why Peter IV feared the Elvish so much,” he whispered, his voice barely audible. At first, Zach thought his friend was speaking to him, but glancing over to where he sat with his eyes practically staring at the ceiling, he realized that Rian was instead talking to his own self. “A human takes…decades to get to the 70s. This is unreal.”

“So,” Kalana said cheerfully. “What level are you, Zach?”

Gods-dammit!

Zach made a humiliating moan that he hoped she didn’t hear. “Ah, Kal, the phone is—chh!—the phone is—chh!—it’s—aking up—chh!—I can’t—you.”

“Nah-uh! No it’s not, you jerk. Just tell me what level you are. I hate how you get all defensive about this kind of thing.”

“Here’s the thing, Kal. I actually can’t tell you that, because Mr. Oren told me I’m not allowed to tell anyone my level.”

“Yah right. And even if he did say that, he didn’t mean you couldn’t tell someone like me. Anyways, I’ll find out sooner or later. I wish you’d come see me.”

Waving his hand at Rian, Zach got up off the step, ran halfway back up the flight of steps so that he could have a little privacy, and then, lowering his voice, he whispered, “I want to so badly, Kal. I really do.”

“Things are way different now than they were just a week ago,” she said. “I know I sound the same, but so much has happened—and most of it is stuff that I can only tell you in person. If you wanna come see me, you can now. I promise you: no one can boss me around anymore. I know it’s only been a little more than a week, but I don’t ever gotta worry about people like Varsh ever again. There’s a lot you don’t know.”

Zach put aside his feelings of powerlessness for a moment. His desire to both see—and be with—Kalana far outweighed any dumb pride of his that she might be wounding by achieving level 65 in the time it would take Zach to order a fucking pizza.

“Do you really mean that?” he asked. “I can come see you now?”

“Gods, yes!”

“But then…then if that’s the case, why did Mr. Oren specifically say I had to get level 10 and join a guild before I could see you? I just don’t understand. Are you sure this is okay?”

“Alex isn’t a factor in my life, Zach. I promise! He was only even here for a day. You don’t even know where I am right now, do you? I’m on Elvish hunting grounds. This is my domain. Mine and my father’s. No human can boss us around here. Oh, right. I’m also rich now and I own a private jet.”

Zach almost fell off the steps and rolled back down to Rian as his mind took in what she’d just said to him. “Fucking hell!” he yelled, not even meaning to raise his voice. “How in the name of each and every fuck do you own a private jet? Fucking Gods be damned, Kal!”

“Zach, you’re swearing so much,” she said grumpily. “You’ve developed bad habits. I knew you would! But anyways, now that we’re finally talking, I wanna bring you here. We can hunt mobs together, and I can help power-level you and all that.”

As if her words could not be any more shocking, she just had to unleash that on him. Was she actually asking him to come visit her in her special hunting grounds? She was, wasn’t she? There was no way he’d misheard her. She’d outright asked him to come and be power-leveled. But wait…wasn’t that a good thing? It was, right? But then, if so, what was that queasy feeling in his stomach? Why did the very idea of it cause him to feel so revolted? It was as though someone were twisting his insides. It wasn’t that it didn’t feel right—it felt downright wrong. And the most confusing part of all was that Zach wasn’t even sure why it felt so wrong. He only knew that the very notion of kicking back while a higher-leveled person—let alone the girl he wanted to marry someday—dragged him through level after level, it…it sickened him in a way he simply couldn’t understand or explain.

Naturally, he knew she was trying to be nice—no more than nice. She was trying to be loving. Kalana was, in her own way, trying to do everything she could to make him happy. Hearing this offer from her should have made him detonate with happiness. He should be crying tears of joy! But for some reason, he wasn’t. Not even close. There was something inside of him that felt almost insulted.

Oh, Gods, he thought, as understanding and clarity at last came to him as though through a divine act of intervention. I finally get it, Mr. Oren. I misjudged you…

It was now, in this moment, in this dungeon, that Zach came to understand that, while Mr. Oren may not always be right about everything, his former science teacher was right about a whole lot. Only now, having received such a generous offer from Kalana, did Zach finally realize just how—and may the Gods curse him for even admitting this—correct Mr. Oren had been in trying to prevent Zach from going with her.

You knew this would happen, Zach realized. That was why you didn’t want me to go with her. You knew what would happen to me.

It was only through fighting in a dungeon for his life and going on wild car chases in a desperate attempt to flee from purple bat-like monsters that it truly dawned on Zach—that deep down within himself was an adventurer’s spirit, and if he had gone with Kalana that day, she would have broken it. Never on purpose, of course. Gods no. But she would have. She would have torn it out of him, and he would never get it back.

I don’t want to be power-leveled, Kal, he thought to himself but did not dare say it aloud. I want to earn everything I get. I want to build my own life. I want to work for it! I don’t even know why, but I do. I want to create something for myself with my own efforts.

How did Mr. Oren know? How could he possibly have known?

“Did ya hear what I said, Zach?” Kalana asked, shaking Zach out of his moment of self-reflection. “There’s nothing Alex or any of them can do. I promise you. I know they seem scary, but if you come here, they can’t stop you ‘cause they can’t stop me. I like Alex, I mean, but…but he shouldn’t have kept us apart. And now he doesn’t have the power to do that anymore.”

“Kal, I…I don’t know if…if that’s how I…”

“Huh?”

“I don’t know if what I really want is…”

“You don’t know if…? Zach, you’re rambling. I’m not gonna be able to understand you if you don’t speak clearly.”

Zach gathered his courage. He truly loved Kalana. He loved everything about her: her voice, her face, her heart, her laugh, and even her dumb little names that she called him. The last thing Zach wanted to do was say something to upset her. But there were things he was still learning about himself—things he was only figuring out just this moment. For example: ten minutes ago, if someone had asked him how he felt about flying off to some Elvish hunting grounds to be power-leveled by his sort-of girlfriend, he would have replied, “Pfft, I wish.”

But now that the idea was presented to him—and was actually real—it was only right here, right now, that he discovered he not only didn’t want that but also that there wasn’t even a part of him that did. This wasn’t even like one of those things where there was a “small part of him” that did want to go and a “bigger part” that didn’t. No, there was no part of him that wanted to be power-leveled. The idea itself ran contrary to beliefs he didn’t even know until this very moment that he held—and strongly, too.

“Kal, you matter more to me than anyone in this world.”

“Zach,” she said in a somewhat higher pitch tone; despite it technically being impossible, he was sure he could actually hear her blushing. “I…I feel the same, just so ya know.”

“But the thing is, Kal, I don’t…I don’t want to be power-leveled.”

“That’s okay.”

Zach’s mouth fell open in shock. “Wait, really?” he asked as relief flooded into him.

“Of course! Did ya think I was gonna make you do that if you didn’t want to, silly? I know you’ve always loved challenges. So um, you can level the hard way if you want. There’s this beautiful beach that has these level 15 things that look like snakes but they have wings and can fly. They give tons of xp a kill. You can start there, and I can watch you just in case, you know, you get in over your head.”

Zach pretended not to hear that last bit, as he knew Kalana was not deliberately trying to belittle him. Yet for someone who was always so sensitive and careful about saying things that could upset others, she was on a Gods-damned roll today.

“That sounds really lovely,” he replied. “But it’s not what I…okay, so the thing is that you don’t seem to—”

“And there’s this beautiful garden where there’s a spawn of Goba Bombers that also gives lots of xp. Or, if you want, you can even level by the—”

“No, wait, Kal, please, you don’t understand,” he interrupted.

“What…what’s wrong?” she asked, her voice coming across as puzzled but also a little bit pained. She also sounded worried—fearful, even. “You’re making it sound like you don’t wanna come. But you are though, right, Zach? You still want…you know, to be with me, right?”

“The hell kind of question is that?” Zach asked, having to force himself not to shout. “Of course I do! So much it’s like the only thing I can even think about most days. Kal, I’m fighting my ass off in this dungeon right now just so we can be together.”

“But you don’t have to. If you’re scared of Alex, you don’t need to be. I already told you—”

“It’s not that, Kal.”

“Whatever it is, I’ll take care of it. I…” she lowered her voice to a whisper. “I…I love you,” she said quietly. “So I promise it’ll be okay.”

Zach held the phone with one hand and wiped his eyes with his other. He was so torn and conflicted that it was physically painful. On the one hand, the entire reason he was in this dungeon—in this entire situation—was so that he could see Kalana again. It truly was something he wanted more than anything in this world.

On the other hand, he’d awoken something within himself that he couldn’t put back to sleep. He was still here for her, but he wasn’t here for her in the way he thought he was here for her. It was confusing, it was difficult, and it didn’t even make sense to himself. How could he justify being in this dungeon for Kalana when Kalana was outright telling him to leave it and come straight to her? How could he—or anyone—possibly explain that? Seriously, though! If something like this didn’t even make sense to himself, then how on Galterra could he possibly expect her to understand it?

“Why do you sound like you don’t wanna see me?”

“I do. I want to so bad, Kal. You’re not…you’re misunderstanding.”

“So you’re gonna come here, right?”

“I…”

Now, her voice truly took on a pained quality, but there was more to it, too. When she spoke, there were elements of both surprise and outrage—of stunned disbelief and genuine indignation. “You’re definitely gonna come here. What’s there to even talk about? You wanna see me, right?”

How could Zach delicately let her know that he wanted to see her—right now, if he could!—but also that he didn’t want her to accidentally destroy the part of himself that he was still discovering: the part of himself that he’d first realized existed on the day he hopped on his bicycle and road off with his cat-turned-best-friend.

Wait, I know! I have an idea!

The answer was staring him right in the face. There was a way they could in fact be together, and all without him having to compromise on his personal growth and desire for adventure. It was so obvious that he couldn’t believe this hadn’t been the first thing he’d thought of.

“Kal, you know what? We might actually be able to see each other sooner than you’d think. Maybe even in just a day or two.”

“We can?” she chirped, now sounding far less upset.

“Yep. I can’t believe I didn’t think of this right away.”

“Think of what?” she asked, sounding excited. “How?”

“Let’s just meet at Angelica’s.”

“At where?”

Zach frowned. “You know…Angelica’s.”

“What’s that?”

“I thought…I thought you’d know because of your level. Surely, you’ve been to Angelica’s, right? Every adventurer at your level knows…right?”

“Adventurer? Zach, do you…do you think I still have that buff?”

Her words took him by such surprise he almost dropped the phone. “The Will of the Favored? Of course you have it. That’s why we found those mobs that day, Kal. It was meant to happen.”

“I don’t have that.”

“No, no, you do. I didn’t know about this at first either, Kal, but it turns out, you never would’ve—”

“You don’t understand. I did have it. But now I don’t.”

“What do you mean?”

“Zach, I got rid of that.”

“Got rid of what?”

“That weird buff. That’s for humans. We don’t…Elvish kind are not adventurers. We’re…well, you know.”

“What?” Zach asked, becoming more confused and alarmed by the second.

“We’re Gods.”

For the second time, Zach had to struggle to hold onto his phone. “The fuck is that supposed to mean, Kal?”

“Don’t be mean. I’ll tell you about that some other time.”

Zach was growing more uneasy with this conversation by the moment. Kalana was still the same girl she’d always been—at least superficially—but there was something different about her. Something that was beginning to frighten him.

“Why did you get rid of it?” Zach asked. “Now you can’t get into Angelica’s. I wanted…I wanted so badly to show you that place. There’s so many places I wanted you to see.”

“I don’t need that buff to go into dungeons or do whatever stuff you’re talking about.”

“You do, though. I only just learned this myself. In order for people to go into—”

“Humans,” she fired in.

“Huh?”

“In order for ‘humans’ to go into dungeons. My kind doesn’t need any special buff for permission. Look, Zach, I don’t wanna argue with you. I just want to see you again.”

“That’s all I want, Kal.”

“Then why won’t you just come here? You keep changing the topic and running around it. If you don’t wanna come, then at least tell me why.”

Even as Zach spoke, he could scarcely believe the words that were coming out of his mouth. Even though much of it was knowledge he’d acquired from Lienne and Rian, he felt as though the words were coming from his very soul.

“Because people like me, Kal, we…we don’t hunt on resorts or hunting grounds. We explore. We find. We adventure. It’s what I always wanted for us both. It’s what you wanted too, remember? You told me you didn’t care about being more powerful and you just wanted to enjoy the adventure of it all. That’s why you had the buff. Why would you get rid of it? I don’t understand. Don’t you remember what you said to me?”

“What did I say?” she asked. The question actually hurt Zach. The fact she needed to ask at all was painful.

“You said to me that your world was bigger than power and leveling. You said you only wanted this because I wanted it. You said…you said you just wanted to go on an adventure with me.”

“I remember,” she whispered. “It wasn’t that long ago. So of course I remember.”

“Then why did you ask me to tell you?”

“Because…I just wanted to hear you say it.”

Zach shook his head. “Kal, what’s going on? You’re confusing me.”

“I’m rediscovering the person I was supposed to be, Zach. Being here, leveling, and finding what I found…I’m slowly seeing the woman I would’ve become if humans hadn’t murdered my people and stolen my birthright.”

“That was shit of them to do, Kal, but what…what’s that got to do with—”

“I’m gonna rebuild it.”

“Rebuild what?”

“Everything. There’s a way to bring it all back. I wanna do it with you, though.”

Zach felt a chill run down his spine. “Kal, what are you even talking about?”

“I’d show you if you’d get your dumb jerk-face over here!”

“I don’t mind coming to see you, actually,” Zach said.

“Huh? Then what are we even arguing about?”

“Seeing you again is…of course I want to. If it’s to see you, I’d be there as soon as I get out of this dungeon. I just need you to know, that it’ll only be to see you. Not to level. Not to…not to give up my ways for yours.”

“You won’t have a choice.”

Zach laughed at Kalana’s silly attempt at humor. Then his laughter cut off as he realized she was being dead serious, as evidenced by her silence from the other end of the line. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“My dad and I are gonna bring it all back. Everything we lost. There’s a way. Alex showed us how without realizing he was doing it. He wants to use me and my dad to help him fight bosses, and we’re gonna, but…but that’s not all we’re gonna do. We’re gonna take everything back. And then you’re gonna be okay again, Zach, ‘cause the guilds that killed your parents are gonna be wiped out. The world used to be perfect when Elves ruled Galterra, and I’m gonna help my dad make it that way again, and then you and I can be together forever after we conquer North and South Bastia and kill every guild leader.”

Zach frowned. “Kal?”

“Yeah?”

“That’s not funny.”

“I’m not joking.”

*****

“Alex, do you think you might’ve made a mistake?” Maric asked.

Rather than answer, Alex jumped backwards as a disgusting, slimy cobra twice the size of a bus smashed an entire building to pieces. For a T3 Earth-world boss, this thing knew how to do some damage. Alixa was having to use a constant barrage of explosive light bolts just to keep it slowed long enough for Alex to cut it.

“Mistake how?” he replied, leaping sideways as the giant snake swung its body into another of the old, dilapidated buildings in what had once been a village in a land called “Italy.” Supposedly, this thing only spawned every fifteen years, and there was an extremely low chance for it to drop a pair of bracers that allowed the user to turn invisible. There were many useful applications for that kind of ability. Hopefully, Alex would win it. As things stood, there were at least fifteen other people on this raid who would roll for it—including Fluffles, who insisted that the item was compatible with cat-type Shadowfangs and that he could wear it as a collar. Though likely correct, Alex nevertheless did not find this pleasing. For what purpose would a cat require invisibility?

Distracted, he scrambled to get out of the way as the snake continued to unleash its frenzied attacks solely upon him. Honestly, however, he expected this to happen. Put simply, he just hit too damn hard. Maric was one of the greatest tanks Alex knew, but not even he could hold aggro once Alex began unloading on something. Thus, once Maric’s hold on the giant creature had slipped, it had begun its pursuit of Alex. The result, predictably, was that in a matter of minutes, almost every structure in this ancient village had been destroyed. It was a shame, too, because much here was of historical value.

Alex threw himself forward onto the stone pavement and out of the way as, with a hiss, the cobra spit venom where he’d only just been standing. Glancing over his shoulder, Alex saw it begin to burn a crater-sized hole through the stonework with an uncomfortably loud sizzling sound while smoke rose into the air.

With a growl, Maric jumped high into the air and then swung his gigantic, Iescian-steel hammer down onto the cobra’s face, causing a stream of dark red blood to spray all over the pavement followed by it briefly falling over onto its side and destroying yet another structure—this one the ruins of an old, two-story home. It simply crumpled into nonexistence, becoming yet another lost artifact under an uncaring crimson sky. Impressively, however, when the cobra again lifted itself upright, Maric had reestablished aggro.

“Stupid snake!” Fluffles shouted, as a seemingly never-ending parade of big, bright bolts of lightning rained down upon it mercilessly. “You give Fluffles magical bracelet! Zach say Fluffles get to roll for loot twice.”

“Fluffles, we need to work on your honesty,” Alixa said, her palms extended. From each of her hands, she fired off beams of light, which exploded on impact, causing the gigantic, tanker-truck-sized cobra to hiss, lean its head back, and shoot what was likely dozens of gallons of black-colored venom into the sky.

“Kesten!” Alex called. “It’s using Venom Rain. We need a barrier!”

Kesten, clad in his usual punk-rocker attire, spread his arms out wide, closed his eyes, and shouted an incantation a moment before it began to literally rain venom. Thankfully, Kesten succeeded in the nick of time, and so, rather than their raid being showered with a corrosive chemical that Alex’s analysis indicated was eighty-five times more acidic than battery acid, a multi-colored, umbrella-like barrier made up of shimmering prisms appeared in the air above them, repelling each and every drop that fell from the sky.

“HAAAAAAAAASSSSSSSSSSSSSSEEEEEEE!” Kasilis, the Undying Serpent King hissed. Using its head as sort of a battering ram, it launched itself forward at Maric, whose gargantuan shield was able to take the blow head-on with ease.

“Anyway, as I was saying,” he continued. “I think you might’ve really screwed up this time around, Alex. You’re tampering with things well outside the realm of science.” Twice more, Maric blocked the serpent’s vengeful blunt strikes. “I was all for providing the girl and her father a home. But to send them to an Elvish hunting ground? What were you thinking?”

“Relax,” Alex said, becoming agitated by Maric’s constant badgering. “Kalana is a good girl, and her father is a good man. Mind you, he’s also a construction worker.”

Standing side by side with Maric, the cobra began to spit out more venom, and the two were forced to dodge in separate directions. “I don’t care if he’s a Gods-damned party clown!” Maric called across the ancient town square to him. “When Elvish royalty comes into contact with Elvish magic, they become more than the sum of their parts.”

“We need them!” Alex called back to him. Launching a barrage of fifty light-arrows, he once more drew aggro off Maric and onto himself. “They will help us fight bosses.”

“What will you do if they actually find a way to resurrect the Elves?”

“They can’t, Maric. That’s not possible. Dead is dead. There is no such thing as resurrection.”

“You are too close minded,” he said, his tremendously deep voice booming as he spoke. “You think that just because a prince becomes a construction worker he cannot again become a prince. You think a schoolgirl cannot become a princess because she was not taught how. Gods help humanity if the Elvish Empire were to arise again.”

“Fearmongering nonsense,” Alex said. “Completely irrational phobias from one as intelligent as you, my friend.”

Both of them were forced to dive forward as the cobra used its tail to create such a massive, wide-ranging swipe that it covered nearly eighty feet of ground. Despite being an elite-only raid, Alex was both disappointed and saddened to see that there was one member of their raid who for some reason did not know to dodge forward. Now, his body was torn open from his stomach to his neck. He screamed and begged as his guts and internal organs slid out of him like yolk from an egg. There would be no healing an injury like that. Especially not since part of his small intestine got caught on the cobra’s tail, and it now looked like the boss spawn was playing jump rope as it uncoiled all twenty-two feet of it even as the man continued to scream and beg for aid.

“Fluffles!” Maric shouted. “Why are you attacking that man’s intestine?”

“Fluffles is sorry, daddy! It move and wiggle.”

“No chicken tonight.”

“No! Fluffles did nothing wrong. I was a good cat, and I get to still have dinner.”

“You don’t just attack something because it wiggles. How many times have we been over this?”

“Daddy is being mean! Man was already dead. Fluffles only play with intestine because it wiggled. Zach say Fluffles allowed.”

“Here we go again!” To Alex, he said, “Look, let’s just finish this thing off and go home. I’m not”—he performed a backflip as the cobra slammed its tail downward, causing a tremendous section of the pavement to detonate and shoot up rock and debris—“trying to start a fight with you, Alex. But don’t forget, I was there when Peter IV became a pariah. I alone saw how he suffered to fix his mistakes.”

“Please, Maric. Don’t compare me to that man. He knowingly gave a book of elemental chaos to a member of the Elvish royalty and expected them not to immediately weaponize it against him. I, on the other hand, merely gave them a home that was rightfully theirs.”

“They can’t control their nature when given power, Gods-dammit!” Maric shouted. “Fluffles has more restraint in chasing after a ball than the Elvish have in abusing power. You can’t possibly claim to know what artifacts are hidden in those hunting grounds. But I was there, Alex. I saw the actions Peter IV was forced to take…it drove him mad with grief and rage. I don’t want that for you.”

“And why would that happen to me, Maric?”

“Because when the girl and her father try to rebuild their empire, you’re going to be the one responsible for killing them.”

Alex frowned. “That will never happen. Kalana wouldn’t. I am a good judge of people. Now, enough of this. Let’s kill this Gods-cursed beast, roll for loot, and go home. I want to get back to the Whispery Woods region before Zach in case someone is foolish enough to actually attack him. But first I need to return to my lab. There’s something else I need to look into.”

Alex, growing impatient, unleashed all of his frustrations onto the T3 abomination, delivering the killing blow. Maric’s awful lack of trust in that sweet girl Kalana and her kind father…it rubbed him the wrong way. They were good people. They were not a threat to anything that wasn’t a boss spawn. Though Alex cared deeply for Maric, the man’s stubborn, inflexible ways could often put him in a foul mood. Unfortunately for Alex, however, his mood was about to get even fouler.

You see, it was said that, despite only spawning every 15 years, the bracelet in question still only had around a 1% drop rate. This meant that, on average, one bracelet was statistically likely to drop every 1,500 years. And lo and behold—the legendary bracelet of the Serpent King did in fact make an appearance on this day. It was a dream item. It was the kind of rare artifact that one would be lucky just to see with their own two eyes, let alone possess. And by the Gods, Alex wanted it. And he thought he’d have it, too, for out of 100, he managed to roll a 98. He was practically salivating at the thought of being able to analyze such a rare, priceless treasure.

But then someone rolled a 99.

“Hurray!” Fluffles cheered. “Fluffles get rare bracelet. Now Fluffles get to steal tuna and no one know!”

Alex narrowed his eyes and frowned. He was not pleased.