Two pathless participants. Excluded from the selection process.

One participant on the Path of Conflict.

Selected dungeon type: Conflict.>

Sarah took a heavy breath when she finally felt herself surrounded by air again. The system announcement was still etched into her brain. She didn’t really know what a dungeon was, but if it was designed after her chosen path, then they were in trouble.

She looked around to orient herself. She was in a dark cave, but with very weird walls made out of a gray, dirty-looking material. The walls were completely straight, and the ceiling was at a right angle to the wall. It just seemed… unnatural. As if somebody had shaped it that way. She looked around some more and saw that there were pillars of the same material in the whole cave.

Between the pillars were weird… things standing around in rows. They were all coated in a red and brown case and seemed to be hollow inside. Between them, there was a lot of stuff lying around in messy piles.

"What the heck?" Sarah mumbled under her breath. She felt a prick somewhere in the back of her head. It was telling her that she should know what the sight in front of her was. But she just couldn’t say what.

She shook her head to get out of her daze and started to look for Melissa and the man, who had been unlucky enough to get transported to this place with her.

They were lying not far from her, Melissa still unconscious. The guy was awake, though, staring blankly at the ceiling. Sarah only now noticed that he was one of the kitchen crew and was called Neil.

Sarah quickly checked on Melissa to see whether she was breathing. With relief, she saw that Melissa’s condition was stable, although she seemed to have some trouble breathing.

Only then did she turn around to Neil, who was still just lying on the ground. She went over and kicked him in the stomach first. He started wheezing and held his aching side while Sarah grabbed him by his collar and lifted him up.

He seemed to be a little out of it, as his eyes were darting around without focus. Perfect for her intention. With her other hand, she extended her claws a little and grabbed the guy by his head. He started howling in pain when the claws dug into his scalp.

"Deal with it." Sarah grumbled through gritted teeth while she sent her mind into his.

It didn’t take as much power as usual with humans, probably due to his confusion. But it still wasn’t easy. His brain activity was truly a mess. She still hadn’t figured out much about the complex human brain, but she was pretty sure that it shouldn’t look like this.

Sarah was looking inside him to figure out if the soul parasite from Denise also affected the physical mind. And there it was. There seemed to be… something burrowing in his mind. This something was probably the soul parasite, as it was sending out barely noticeable signals into the brain.

She tried to somehow cut off the influence but only managed to disrupt the signal for a few moments. And then it started again, as if she had never done anything to it.

"Shit." Sarah grumbled and let Neil fall to the ground, where he curled up and held his head while whimpering. She knew that she wouldn’t be successful. But she had to see for herself if she would damage something in the brain if she did something like this. Sarah kicked him slightly in the head, and Neil fell unconscious.

After that, she walked over to Melissa and gently touched her head. This time, without the claws, though. It was a little harder to enter her mind without direct contact with her nerves, but it was alleviated by the fact that she was still unconscious.

Sarah looked deep inside Melissa's mind, which had very low activity. This was pretty fascinating, as she had never seen the mind of an unconscious person like this. But she had no time for this right now, as she had to see if Melissa was also infected.

And sadly, she was. But contrary to Neil, the soul parasite didn’t seem to send out very strong signals. They were only miniscule and irregular. The soul parasite seemed somewhat suppressed. "That’s my girl." Sarah purred and exited Melissa's mind. Now onto business.

She felt her instincts from her time in the swamp come back to her. They flooded her mind and body, and a strange excitement filled her. "I am so strange." She mumbled and started pulling the two unconscious bodies behind one of these strange, hollow objects.

Unauthorized duplication: this tale has been taken without consent. Report sightings.

She tied up Neil with some kind of weird rope she found lying around and tried to position Melissa as comfortably as possible. When she was somewhat content with this, Sarah started to scout.

She ran through the cave like a ghost, her senses sharpened to their utmost. The cave was rather big and filled to the brim with these weird, red-brown objects. But she couldn’t see or sense anything alive here. The only thing that was noticeable was the insane amount of ambient magic power in the air. It was so much that it almost felt suffocating for her.

She quickly reached the other end of the cave and started walking alongside the wall to the right. Some segments were collapsed here and there, and she made a big circle around them. No need for her to be buried underneath a few tons of stone.

Because of this, she nearly didn’t notice the slight shimmer of light that was coming through a gap in one of the piles of debris. She came to a grinding halt and gingerly stepped closer. There were reddish spikes coming out of the rock with dangerously sharp tips.

"What the hell is wrong with these rocks?" She wondered while touching one of the spikes slightly. There was some kind of coating on it, and she smelled it. "It smells like… blood? What the…"

Sarah became more and more confused by the second, but she tried to focus on her goals. Finding a way out and looking for potential dangers.

While shuffling through the gap in the debris, she really had to watch out not to accidentally stab herself on one of those spikes. It probably wouldn’t hurt her all that much, but she had learned in the swamp that one had to always be cautious around weird stuff.

The gap led up a slope, and the light got brighter and brighter. Just before the entrance, she had to shove away a large stone, which blocked her from exiting the cave.

With a grunt, she pushed it aside and stumbled outside when it crumbled away. She quickly regained her balance and scanned her surroundings. But her focus was immediately shattered.

"What the actual fuck?" she said in shock while looking at her surroundings. One tiny memory managed to slip out of her subconscious, and she realized what she saw in front of her.

These were enormous houses. And she was in a city. She more or less understood what that meant, but only parts of it. She couldn’t imagine the number of people living in the building in front of her. The whole community of the caves would probably fit on only one or two floors.

The next thing she noticed was that this "city" was long past its prime. Most buildings were at least partly caved in, and everything was in a dilapidated state. When Sarah’s gaze wandered higher up, she just stood there for a few moments with a wide, open mouth.

Parts of debris and sometimes even whole buildings were suspended in the air. Sharp winds were flowing around them, and smaller rubble was flying around like leaves in the wind. The sky was a weird mix of different-colored strings that were flowing around like water. There was red, blue, green, purple, and every other color she could imagine. It seemed more like a fever dream than reality. After a few moments, she noticed that there was something substantial missing in this scene. There was no sound. It was perfectly quiet, as if she were staying in the middle of nothingness.

Sarah had no idea where she was. But she was pretty sure that she was far, far away from the caves.

This scene was so alien that her brain could barely accept what she was seeing. She had seen a lot of weird stuff up until now, but this made everything else look insignificant.

Right when she somewhat regained her bearings, the system gave her another shock.

This dungeon is an enclosed area. Nothing and no one can enter or leave during the time the dungeon is active. Your goal is to reach the objective of the dungeon. Upon completion, you will receive rewards and be able to leave. The objectives of dungeons are to help you grow and overcome new challenges.

Challenges:

* Defeat 100 normal enemies (0/100)

* Defeat 2 elite enemies (0/2)

* Defeat the dungeon boss (0/1)

Rewards (which will be awarded at different progression states):

* + 5 levels

* Achievement "Dungeon conqueror"

* Special consumable "Genetic material sample"

* Upgrade for one random mutation

Good luck in surviving>

Sarah couldn’t even be mad at the system because the boiling rage inside of her was already directed towards a very tangible entity. Denise.

"I will rip you apart when I get out of here." Sarah swore with burning eyes as she made her way back into the building she came out of.

While she ran back towards the location where she had hidden Melissa and Neil, she pondered what to do. The most important thing right now was to secure food and water. She guessed that she could survive a long time without it, as the ambient magic power was pretty high. And if she kept her usage of it on the low side, she wouldn’t risk getting depleted any time soon.

The problem was the other two and the fact that she hadn’t even seen an insect up until now. When she reached the hideout, only Neil was lying there on the ground. She panicked for a second, until she could see Melissa walking towards her from the side.

"Sarah… you… are here too…" Melissa said this while breathing heavily. She seemed to have difficulties talking and even walking, as she was more stumbling around than anything else.

"Sit down." Sarah told her and gently pushed her to the ground.

"It is… so hard… to breathe." Melissa said and made a pained expression. "It even… hurts… my lungs. What’s… going on?"

Sarah sat down next to her and told her about their predicament. Melissa looked a little bit spooked and glanced at her from the side. "Will you… leave us?" Melissa asked in a quivering voice, the fear apparent in her cramped up body.

"Don’t worry." Sarah said and laid a hand on her shoulder. Melissa nodded gratefully, and her tensed-up body loosened a little. She leaned her head towards the wall behind her and closed her eyes. "So… tired…"

"Just stay here and rest for a moment. I’ll be close by." Sarah spoke softly and stood up again.

With a determined expression, she made herself ready for another round of mutations.