New zones were strictly found in new expansions. The realm had been explored and conquered for at least one hundred years, or so the story goes; a story was written by and for the interests of those at the pinnacle of the Realm's Feats, this being the top guilds, rankers, and monopolizers of the realm. There had been a time when adventurers would camp out around areas for years as they endlessly tried new ways to defeat bosses that held the zone in a boss lock. This boss lock meant that nothing could be grown, housed, or used within that area for as long as the boss remained alive for the first time. Once slain, the boss would be given a spawn point within the region and unlock the rest of the area for farming and housing. More importantly, those who cleared the zone were given first rights to all the mercantile and ownership rights.

People are often under the misconception that the farmers are the rich when, in reality, it's always the landowners who hold all the real power. None of the risk that comes with farming and all the money. Renting out your land for our adventurers or people of the land to take the risk of making money off of it while you sit back and collect your monthly stipend.

Now, that was the dream.

Yeah, it has yet to become a common word. You see, only some people are trusted equally within Jude's squads?\

Rodger's words were still low, and his eyes darted around, searching for the spy hiding in every corner. Finally, he began to distrust the realm and those who fill it. The boy was growing up.

Hmm, you've learned some of the inner workings. Have you, Rodger?

He smiled back fiercely. Maybe a younger Rodger would have grown embarrassed at the comment, but in our short time together, he had grown, matured, and blossomed into a man I trusted while I was asleep. I didn't want to make a habit of this, but it made me happy knowing that while I am out of commission, my men are out gaining information and holding themselves up quite well without me. I may have rested, but they hadn't.

Someone has to make the moves while the captain rests.

These words came with a smile from the growing boy.

Speaking of that. What of Rafael and Shadeo?

They are further down, he said as he pointed a finger toward the slope of the mine shaft. We had been talking for minutes and still hadn't seen a soul. How long was this cavernous shaft? Just what was this dungeon-turned-zone?

Had Jude known that we were pioneering a zone and not a simple dungeon, that would have made the level of preparation and how important she took matters? She knew the stakes and gave us nothing until we needed it.

A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

We walked for a few more minutes down the sloping cavern as Rodger filled me in on everything that had transpired from the moment we defeated that Golem to now. After being set up and looting the area, they found that the crater in the wall led to an event room where they managed to secure rewards that would help with the run. Weapons that dealt more damage to armored creatures and armor that resisted blunt damage. From here, they slowly approached the rest of the dungeon. The very sloping shaft we were traversing took a day to clear, light, and loot. Everything was meticulously calculated by Jude, and orders were given out by Paul, that stone-faced commander.

After a few more minutes of walking, the shaft would open again and spiral down a rocky basin with an emerald lake. They had theorized that the more they traveled inward, the more outward the location would appear.

An underground valley? My inner thoughts came out as a question that escaped my lips.

Something like it. Hell, some soldiers are even whispering about a lost city, a forgotten village that could lie deep down in the core of this dungeon. What if…what if we find lost people? New people of the realm, with lives and cultures…

I cut his words off.

With lives and cultures that would be better off never meeting us.

His face went dark in the soft glow of the torchlight that clung to the walls. He knew that his words were fancy and that the reality was bleak.

You're right.

Not completely, right. This is just from what we've done in the past and continue doing in the present.

Our words caught their end as the descent led us to an opening, and that opening was at the end of a precipice that peered into the underground oasis below.

Sparkling radiance glowed from a pond that gave off the aura that should have existed anywhere but here. Green carpeted grass surrounded the water's edge with fauna and wildlife that had been missing in the shaft before. What a juxtapositional shift, I thought as we descended the stalagmite spiral staircase into the new biome below.

With a wiggle of my nose, I caught scents of fresh air, of everything that wasn't the claustrophobic walls of the mine shaft. Instantly, my body felt better, felt alive. A soul shouldn't be trapped in a mine, at least not the soul of an adventurer. As we made it into the clearing, we began to see the faces of the Mercs from before, as they all seemed busy doing something of the utmost importance. Whether collecting samples of mushrooms and other plant life or trying their hands at fishing in a new water source, everyone moved and dissected the area as if part of a gold rush.

Which, for the sake of things, they were.

Everyone's busy working as if their lives depend on it.

It ain't that captain. We were wrong about these folks being Merc's. Some of these come from top guilds, some are old veteran adventurers looking for more, and some are even graduates of the Sixteenth Saviors Academy.

That name, that school, brought a sharp pain to my heart. Religious piety and torturous academia combined to create the worst possible trials and rigor. Still, it also created damn good students, that's if you managed to stick around and graduate. Most flunked or dropped out, and if they could handle such a nasty loss and not search for the bottle or skooma, they turned out to be great men in their own rights.

She does things the right way. They lead by example and follow their own vindication, making things worse for us.

With a strange look, as if caught unbalanced, Rodger stared back and replied.

Why's that captain?

Because she's a great leader who might be on a separate path, what will she do to us if she sees her goal as the ultimate end, which differs from our own?

My words slowly resonated, and an understanding spread on Rodgers's face. By this point, we had crossed all those bumbling bees who worked at foraging and analyzing the biome and headed off into another camp stationed inside a cavern that was a natural enclave, as if the system cried for adventurers to build a camp there. And Jude and her men had answered the call.