Adama strolled his way up the white, spiraling egress of the Dungeon with a slight jump in his step that only those who knew him would have seen. A stranger would have seen a cut up, tired young man leaving the Dungeon after a long day’s work, ready to pound a few beers and sleep before he had to do it again tomorrow. But for the first time since his death, Timaias was at peace. The minute pep in his step and the shadow of a smile on his face gave that away. He had lived for the thrill of the hunt, the thrill of victory, in his life on Cradle, and a leopard didn’t change his spots.

The sun was beginning to set, bathing the guild headquarters in a pleasant orange glow that reminded him of Hestia, as he sidled up to the magic stone exchange. He wordlessly dumped his haul in the intake slot and waited patiently for the sleepy looking Guild employee on the other side of the glass to jump to alertness and take the jewels. The young man was a little older than Timothy Forrester, perhaps 17 summers, though he counted and examined the pile of stones with the gravitas of an older man, sleepiness long forgotten. His raised an eyebrow and glanced back at the adventurer on the other side of the glass, saying:

“A pretty decent haul. Where’s the rest of your team?”

Adama shrugged:

“Earned each one of those by my lonesome. Swear on my own grave.”

“It really will be on your grave if you try to go beyond the Upper floors without a party. I suppose a veteran should be able to do this much without one, though.”

That earned the employee only silence. Shaking his head, he reached under his desk and pulled out a roll of bandages.

“Some of those cuts still look bloody. Have this. On the house.”

The cuts were all quite shallow, so Adama had ignored them, but he bandaged himself up as the employee went back to his calculations. Soon after, he got his quote:

“That’ll come to 4,500 vals. Do you have a debt to the Guild you would like to put that money toward?”

Adama fought to not role his eyes. How many people owed money to these loan sharks?

“I’ll put 3,000 to paying off a 9,000 vals debt.”

“Name?”

“Timaias Adama.”

The employee made a note in a book and smiled at him, “You’re all set. Take care, now.”

Purse clinking, he made his way out of the office and onto the bustling Main Street of Orario. Stepping quickly, he made a beeline for the food vendors on the side of the road. He bought 4 grilled fish for 200 vals from a salty looking old fisherman and a basket of bread and apples for another 100 from a matronly looking middle-aged woman. She fussed over his beat-up condition and ended up giving him a free apple, which he munched on as he headed towards the church.

He passed the statue and went inside, before gently placing the basket down in front of the trapdoor and replacing one of the loaves of bread with a grilled fish. He then knocked on the trapdoor and briskly walked out of the building, tearing into his three remaining fish and the loaf of bread with a voracious appetite as he promptly made his way back towards the Dungeon.

Hestia

She had come back to the church after helping Adama finish his paperwork, leaving him to earn their dinner while going back to the church to read her mail and think. She was starting to worry a bit for him as the sun began to set, but soon she heard a knock on the trapdoor above.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

“Finally,” she thought, “He is certainly one to make a lady wait. It would have been a real shame to have to bury my first child on his first day. Why is he knocking instead of coming down, though?”

She got off the couch and made her way up the ladder, opening the trapdoor and finding…no one. No one besides a basket right nearby. She approached the basket with some curiosity and opened it to find a fish alongside some bread and fruit. She looked around again, though, and found no sign of Adama whatsoever.

“What on earth…?”

Had one of the neighbors left this out of the kindness of their hearts or had he done so and left on some other business? What on earth was going on with this child?

The Sword Sage

He was surprised to find the entrance to the Dungeon unguarded as he made his way into Babel. After taking a break to eat dinner and sit for a while, he had made his way back into Guild headquarters after the sun had fully set. The teller at the exchange was gone, so the entire lobby felt like a ghost town, and there were no sentinels at the entrance to the most dangerous place in the world. He knew that there were powerful wards at the exit, designed to prevent any monsters from escaping, but this seemed a little sloppy.

Regardless, he was glad that he didn’t have to talk his way past any guards. He quickly made his way down the Dungeon entranceway once again. After a full meal and about an hour and a half of rest, most of his earlier exhaustion was shaken off and he cleaved through his opponents with ease and grace. This time, he made a beeline for the fourth floor, where the weakest monsters spawned in the greatest numbers, and stayed there. He had learned his lesson and wasn’t about to challenge the fifth floor again. Yet.

That didn’t mean he was going to be troubled by a few dog people and little green men, though. Canid warriors and angry goblins cried for his blood, but he carved through them all. Whenever he got in a serious pinch, like when they came after him in groups of four or more, a few well placed Rippling Swords put them in their place. His magic was far from unlimited, so he used those sparingly, but his mental energies recovered at a decent pace. He used a few tricks to buy himself time for recovery, like damaging the Dungeon wall, which apparently lowered monster spawn rates in an area. The Dungeon needed to use energy and time to heal itself, which it supposedly prioritized over spawning monsters. Eina had taught him that he mentioned that he had magic, so he stretched his magic to its absolute limit.

Use of this strategy, along with his natural focus and determination, made the hours tick by as he slew enemy after enemy. He developed a healthy rhythm as he turned aside attacks and struck at their vitals, moving economically, and operating within a comfortable bubble of complete focus. He was almost machinelike as he calmy stepped to the left and lopped off a kobold head with a one-handed strike, simultaneously striking a pouncing goblin with his left elbow, both his sword and his limbs deadly weapons.

He didn’t know how long he had been fighting like that but eventually he snapped out of his focus, his body screaming in painful protestations. Even though he hadn’t deliberately taken hits this time, he had still fought a lot of enemies and sometimes certain attacks couldn’t be avoided. He had been taking the time to patiently bandage himself, but now it seemed like his entire body was bandages, his complementary role emptied out. One of the last kobolds he had killed had dropped a gleaming white fang in addition to its’ magic stone. An item. He scooped that up, along with the last remnants of his most recent battle and began his commute back to the surface again.

He had had the foresight to use 1,000 of his remaining vals to buy another pouch for his belt while he was resting. But even with that, his belt and pockets bulged with his most recent intake, which made him grin a bit.

“A few more nights like that and we shouldn’t have to worry about food any time soon.”

They could even look into buying a small house for their Familia if he kept this up and grew stronger. He was disappointed to see that no one had replaced the old teller at the exchange, so he would have to wait until later to learn how much he had earned. It couldn’t be helped, though, since the sun had only barely begun to rise again as he made his way back onto the street.

He found some of the more enterprising street vendors and shelled out 150 for two large, tasty smelling meat pies and another 50 for some more apples before heading back to the church once again. This time, he intended to ask his benefactor about updating his blessing before recovering a bit and heading back to the Dungeon. He was pretty beat up, but it was nothing a few hours of rest couldn’t ameliorate. He could sleep for a longer stretch after another day’s work if he really needed to.

When he saw Hestia standing outside of the church, eyes locked on him, he started to suspect that wasn’t going to happen.

There were bags under her eyes, which were also were a little red, like she hadn’t gotten any sleep. When she saw him, her expression warred between relief and anger as she rushed over to greet him. She stopped in front of him, gave him a once over, and called out:

“Where were you? I was worried sick. Did you get beaten up again? Why did you leave last night? And look at your clothes…”

Her voiced was higher pitched than normal before she got it back under control and checked him over for any serious injuries. There weren’t any, but he let her fuss over him for a bit with some embarrassment. He couldn’t tell why she was all broken up over a man she barely knew, but he supposed she reminded him a bit of Min Shuei. The comparison softened him a bit as he looked down at her and he checked his initially gruff response, choosing something a bit more caring and apologetic.

“Figured you wouldn’t like me going back to the Dungeon so soon, but I knew I could handle it, so I did it anyways. Guess I shouldn’t have gone without being straight with you, though. Apologies.”

He offered her the meat pie that he hadn’t munched yet as a peace offering, but she looked back at him with widened eyes.

“Tim, you went Dungeon diving at night? After several hours of fighting already? And you stayed in the Dungeon all night?”

He looked from the meat pie in his hand and back to Hestia, before answering:

“Yep, sure did. Now do you want this, or can I have it? I’m hungrier than a Deepwalker Ape but I didn’t have much pocket change for breakfast.”