The ashen walkers rushed toward Nessa and Vic, both of whom stepped out wide and then struck as one.

Vic lunged with his rapier, its long, lethal blade sliding effortlessly into his walker’s head, piercing clear through with unerring accuracy.

Nessa, mindful of the close quarters, swept her blade up from the Tail Guard, slicing both outstretched hands. This didn’t stop the walker; it barreled in, but only for a second longer; Nessa’s blade rose, twirled on the upswing, then cut back down in the classic overhand cut to shear clear through the walker’s neck, down through its chest, and out the other side.

The walker fell apart at Nessa’s feet, dust puffing into the air from its mostly hollow chest.

Vic’s walker fumbled its claws at his blade, as if trying to understand what had happened, and then sank to its knees. Vic placed his boot on its chest and shoved it off.

The third and fourth ashen walkers had slowed, grown tentative. They shuffled forward, grasping at the air and clacking their porcelain claws as they drew closer.

“Your turn!” Vic skipped back, making room for Harald to take his place. Sam did the same, stepping into Nessa’s position, and then the walkers were on them.

A thousand thoughts swirled through Harald’s mind: Chest puffed, deep stance, breathe, here it comes, here it comes - !

Harald brought his longsword down with a cry, striking as he’d done a hundred, a thousand times in the gym. His blade caught the outstretched arms just beyond the wrists and cleaved through both forearms with ease.

The walker made no sound, no moan or scream of pain. It just kept coming, stumps raised as if it intended to shove them in Harald’s mouth and suffocate him.

The Dungeon Square.

Instinct and practice caused him to reverse the attack, to swipe upward from the bottom left and cut a deep tear through the walker’s chest, a furrow inches deep from which more dust billowed forth.

Backing away, he spun the blade back and down to cut up again from the other side, this time slashing off an arm at the elbow and cutting the walker again across the chest.

His blade seemed to move of its own accord. The wasp’s nest texture of the body was stiff, yes, but hardly as durable as he’d feared; a moment later the walker crashed to its knees then fell facedown on the hallway floor, to squirm like a dying beetle.

“Put it out of its misery, Harry-boy,” said Vic from a safe distance. “Don’t be cruel.”

Harald stabbed the misshapen head and the walker died.

He was breathing in sharp pants, his body alive with tension and excitement, and only then did he realize: he’d done it. He’d killed a Level 4 monster without taking a wound. For all the excitement it had felt like a drill.

Sam had dispatched her own, and now turned to flash a wild, victorious smile, her eyes wide, her chest rising and falling as she raised her blade and stepped back from her chopped up foe.

“Well done! Bravo!” Vic stepped forward top peer at both dead monsters, then beamed at them both. “Calm, excellent precision, and no wounds taken! That’s how we do it in the dungeon. Bravo indeed!”

Harald couldn’t help but grin. He felt foolish, sure, for Vic and Nessa had been on hand to ensure nothing would go wrong, but still, this had been real. Those porcelain claws would have fucked him up.

But he’d won.

He’d killed his foes, and now their scales were his for the taking.

“One each!” Vic moved to his own opponent and collected the floating scale that had appeared over its corpse. “Three Copper Moons for myself.”

Harald saw two Coppers hovering over his own. A pittance, sure, but now they felt like the spoils of war. He collected them, then hesitated. “Should I keep them?”

Nessa had moved to collect her own scales. “Or absorb them? The eternal question.” She pocketed her scales. “Can you afford to buy bread tomorrow?”

“We can,” said Sam, collecting her three scales.

“Only because you’ve been footing the grocery bill,” said Harald. “I’ll keep them for now.”

“Then onwards,” said Vic. “Let’s find ourselves a warren and a real fight. For why do the ashen walkers locate their warrens where they do?”

“Scales cache,” said Sam, taking one final deep breath. “Like most dungeon lairs. Monsters are drawn to where the scales are richest.”

“Exactly.” Vic sheathed his rapier and took up his lantern. “The very basis of all ecology in the dungeon. Shall we?”

“Lead on, Maestro,” said Nessa wryly. “Unless scouting will interfere with your lecturing?”

“I can do just about any activity while lecturing,” said Vic brightly, then turned to waggle his eyebrows at Sam. “Literally any activity. I’m very impressive, and very informative.”

“By the angels,” laughed Sam, amused despite herself. “I pity your conquests.”

“As one should.” Vic raised his lantern and proceeded down the hall. “After succumbing to my charms, their world is left gray and dull forever more. What is life after experiencing the blissful delirium of my company? Nasty, brutish, and short.”

“Poor Vic,” said Nessa, tone fond. “He still believes what the ladies of fortune whisper in his ear. Ah, to be so naive again.”

Harald and Sam chuckled, but this only caused Vic to glance back at them with a grin. “Laugh if you like, but I didn’t earn my class through combat. There is a truer, deeper meaning to being a Rapier Regent.”

“Darling, you’re doing yourself no favors.” Nessa paused as they reached a T-junction, slowing to lean out and peer around the corner then in the other direction. “Clear, but there’s a light down to the left.”

“Let’s take a look,” said Vic.

Harald felt amazing. Weeks of exercise and his stat gains meant this was the fittest and most energized he’d ever been, and with the rush of the kill and the warmth of this camaraderie, he felt exactly where he should be.

Sam returned his smile. She looked as excited and alive as he did, her cheeks colored, her eyes fever-bright.

“Never thought you and I would be hunting ashen walkers together,” Harald said quietly, stepping closer. “But this feels so right.”

“I was about to say. My class skills are jangling and confused, but I’ve never felt more alive. My Guardian’s Vigil keeps trying to acquire the local tunnels as a domain and collapsing upon itself. It’s hilarious.”

“Hilarious?”

“After years of resenting its calm and boring awareness of the pantry and mudroom? Yes.” She grinned. “I won’t miss it.”

“You think we’ll get Class offers on this run?”

She shrugged. “Who knows? Maybe? I hope so. Having Nessa and Vic here is dampening the possibilities, but it’s a trade off, right? Safety for experience.”

“Maybe one day you and I can come in here by ourselves,” said Harald, envisioning the prospect. “Make a run of it, really test ourselves.”

“One step at a time.” But then she winked. “But once we’re ready, you’ll find me ready to serve, Master Darrowdelve.”

“Eyes front,” said Nessa. “We’ve a large entrance past the light. Let’s move through it quick to avoid dealing with a Haunt right outside a potential warren. This is the plan. Vic and I will move into the warren proper and get to work. Harald, Sam, you both hold the doorway. Stay just a step inside the hall so you can’t be flanked. Mind your swings so you don’t hit each other. We’ll keep an eye on you both, and call out any commands as the situation arises.”

“By the angels I love her,” said Vic admiringly. “When she gets like this I could just watch her all day. The flashing eyes, that tempestuous beauty, her command—absolutely enthralling.”

Nessa raised a dark brow at him. “You done?”

“Oh no, not nearly. Later tonight, once I’ve gotten a celebratory bottle of wine inside me, I’ll compose an epic in your honor. Just you wait.”

“Joy. I’ll take the far side. You two ready?”

Harald nodded firmly. He felt all jangly and nervous, his body shivery with anticipation. But Nessa’s steady gaze helped settle him.

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“Yes,” said Sam, sounding composed and solid. “Ready.”

“Then let’s move. Don’t linger in the light.” And with that Nessa strode forward, blade resting on her shoulder.

Vic winked at them both and followed.

The sharp, icy-blue light came from a lamp affixed to a piton driven between the blocks. Its woven metal sides were barely visible against the glare, and the temperature dropped as Harald entered its radiance. The pool was perhaps five or six yards in diameter, and his breath ghosted before him as he hurried through.

Nessa and Vic entered the broad archway ahead without hesitation, and Harald hurried to catch up, only to pause, overwhelmed, just within the entrance.

The room beyond was expansive, its vaulted brick ceiling supported by ancient columns, with sections having collapsed to either form precarious hills of masonry or sealed away altogether.

But it was the webbing that caused his whole body to freeze up. Thick sheets connected the columns to the floor, to the ceiling, to each other, separating into strands and meshing in dense, dark clumps that acted like woven nodes.

It was like a vision from an arachnid hell.

And Harald hated spiders.

Nessa and Vic had set their lanterns just within the entrance, flush against the walls, and the golden scale-light caused great shadows to project against the walls, to ripple and dance amongst the great expanses of webbing, to make the dark extremities of the room all the more menacing.

Standing amidst the webs were over a dozen ashen walkers.

Ten? Twenty? Harald couldn’t tell. They all oriented on Nessa and Vic who’d stepped into the warren proper, moving apart to give each other room to swing.

“The Fallen Angel wept,” whispered Sam. “There are so many!”

“Stay sharp,” said Harald, stomach clenched, breath locked in his chest. “Back into the hallway a little.”

They both stepped back, but couldn’t tear their eyes away from their companions.

It was suicide to stand in the center of the warren, wasn’t? To risk being swarmed by some twenty ashen walkers? And didn’t they get more lethal the more of them there were?

The ashen walkers didn’t rush the pair at once, but gathered in a ring at a safe distance, giving each other time to form up, and then, only once they were all ready, did they leap forward, some springing over the thick ropes of webbing like fleas, others ducking and racing forward.

An onslaught.

And that’s when Harald saw what Blademasters and Rapier Regents were capable of.

Both of them blurred.

Nessa’s longsword flashed and wove amongst the walkers, parrying attacks that she couldn’t have seen coming, lashing out to sever limbs and open torsos. Her first blow unleashed Echoing Strike, so that the silver flash crackled from walker to walker, playing over their plaster-like forms and torching them.

Vic leaped forward, extending far farther than a lunge should have allowed, sliding the tip of his rapier into one foes’ head and then retreating, his blade warping around him as he laughed, forming a web of steel, a flashing defensive barrier that lopped off hands and claws even as his very presence on the battlefield changed.

Both of them were manifesting auras, Harald realized.

Vic’s turned his golden grace and devilish smile into something menacing, his mastery and brutality chilling to watch, making Harald feel reluctant to even imagine attacking the Regent.

Whereas as Nessa wove through the fray, a sense of awe overtook him. It wasn’t merely from her lethality, but rather how the very air around her seemed to thrum with palpable energy, a subtle power that resonated not just with her precision, but her purpose. Watching her, he felt his resolve bolstered, his desire to fight sharpened, his hunger to impress her, to be worthy of her company heightened.

Both spun and slashed, parried and ducked, dodged aside and lunged forward. Nessa’s blade never ceased to swirl about her, while Vic’s was a wasp’s sting, darting forward again and again, aim unerring as he pierced head after head.

But even so, there were too many opponents; Harald saw an ashen warrior strike at Vic from behind, its porcelain claws raking down his back—but though his clothing sheared apart, the claws seemed to have little effect otherwise on the warrior.

Nessa’s protection was more subtle, but Harald could have sworn that two distinct blows were turned aside at the last moment by no discernible power, changing lethal strikes to glancing blows.

The ashen walkers, Harald realized at last, had never had a chance.

“Incoming!” barked Sam, blade raised before her.

A trio of walkers were darting toward them, converging from all sides.

“Ready,” said Harald. Nessa’s presence steeled his nerves. “Just like before. Just like our drills.”

Then the walkers were on them.

The archway was wide enough for two to come at them at a time. From the Tower Guard Harald hacked through the outstretched wrists of his walker, cleaving through one arm and sinking deep in to the second.

The walker swarmed forward, taking advantage of his blade being trapped in its forearm. Harald almost panicked, almost set to wrenching at his sword, but instead he simply raised his leg and booted the walker in the chest.

The monster was shockingly light. His kick sent it sprawling back and off his blade, and then he stepped in after it to stab at its head before he could recover.

His blade slid past its head, missing by an inch.

“Fuck!” He retreated quickly as the walker surged back after him, keeping low, almost in a crouch as it wove to the side and leaped.

But again the Dungeon Square saved him. Harald hewed down, cut the monster in the shoulder, drove it down to all fours. His blade came back, reversed, then swept up through its head, cleaving it in two.

Sam had dispatched her first walker, but was giving way before the third, who had grabbed her sword somehow in both hands and was thrusting its way inside her guard.

Breathing heavily, Harald turned, took a breath, then thrust.

His blade missed again, but he recovered by turning the thrust into a drawing cut against the back of its neck, parting the woven skin and flesh and then he shouted in anger and kicked its legs out from under it.

Down the walker went, Sam wresting her blade free.

“Harald!” Vic’s bark was all business. “Eyes front!”

Another walker, but this one was lumbering, coming at him clumsily. Harald took a deep, shuddery breath, forced himself to reset his stance, blade up, and then stepped forward, deciding at the last moment to reposition himself past the corpses that tangled up the floor.

The walker drew close, claws clacking in its eagerness.

Calm.

Nessa was half-watching out of the corner of her eye.

Her example, her presence, her training.

Make it count.

At the last moment he lunged again.

This time his blade slid right between the monster’s claws and straight into its brow, punching into the spongy material to a depth of some six inches.

The walker spasmed and dropped like a marionette whose strings had been severed.

Savage satisfaction burned bright in Harald’s breast.

“And…” Vic cast around, expression one of dubious surprise. “We’re done?”

“We’re done,” agreed Nessa, twisting to examine gashes along her side. “Ow.”

“Getting sloppy, darling.” Vic winced and shook out his arm. “Still, we didn’t do too poorly. And you two! Veritable heroes!”

Harald went to respond when a message appeared in before him:

Your deeds have carved a path through the darkness.

Your prowess has been noticed.

By the authority of the Fallen Angel, you are hereby bestowed a new class:

Steelheart Rearguard

Do you choose to accept?

“Oh shit!” His gasp caught everyone’s attention. “I’ve been offered a new class!”

“Already?” said Nessa dubiously.

“What is it?” asked Vic, drawing closer.

“Steelheart Rearguard.” His excitement dropped. “It’s pretty basic, but it’s a class, right?”

“Steelheart Rearguard,” said Sam. “That’s pretty solid. They specialize in protection and counter-assaults. You gain Passives that prevent our enemies from surprising or flanking the party.”

“Not very glamorous,” said Vic. “That’s one of the most common classes.”

“It’s common because it’s very useful,” protested Sam. “It allows the party to focus on the fight ahead of us, knowing that Harald would be watching out for us and preventing ambushes. Trigger the description.”

“Right,” said Harald, and focused on the title.

Steelheart Rearguard: Embodies the fortress of any party, a class for warriors adept in thwarting ambushes and securing the flank. These guardians excel in defensive strategies, ensuring no enemy can outmaneuver their charge. With vigilance and unwavering resolve, they shield their allies, enabling focus on the fray ahead, assured their back is defended by an unbreakable sentinel.

“What do you think?” Harald asked Nessa.

She frowned, considered, then shrugged. “It’s a class.”

His shoulders slumped. “That’s not very encouraging.”

“Aw, do you need a pat on the head, darling?” Nessa didn’t smile, but her eyes gleamed. “You’re a big boy. Decline if you want to hold out for something better.”

“The Fallen Angel is commonly held to be a female,” said Vic. “Due to her fickle nature and the ease with which she takes offense. If you refuse, she might take her sweet time in making you another offer.”

“Sexist pig,” said Nessa, tone even.

“Accurate,” agreed Vic. “But my statement stands. Declining could mean weeks if not months lost before another offer is made.”

“You’re making this offer actually sound like a bad thing,” protested Harald.

“It’s not.” Sam’s tone was firm. “It’s a solid class. You could accept it, level it till your fight with Yeoric, then replace it and start fresh with something better. And the fact that you received a class offer after only two fights in the dungeon is incredible.”

“She’s got a point,” allowed Vic. “Though I was hoping for something that would better nullify Yeoric’s Iron Vanguard. He specializes in front defenses, while you would specialize in party defense. He’d have the advantage on that one.”

“Having Actives and Passives is the real advantage,” said Nessa. “Without them, he might as well not show up.”

“And if you accept it now,” continued Sam, “you’ll have a couple of months to grow comfortable with your powers, develop new ones, and level up.”

“Damn it.” Harald stared at the message hovering before him. “I guess you’re right. I can’t risk being given a class only a couple of weeks before the fight. I can always change it later if I need to.”

“Ho hum,” said Vic. “A safe but boring choice.”

“It has the merits of increasing the odds of his winning his duel,” said Nessa. “And you said it yourself. Declining this offer could delay a second offer by months.”

“Fine,” said Harald. “It’s not what I wanted, but it’s better than nothing.”

“Better than I got, at any rate,” said Sam.

The golden scale-light abruptly began to shrink as the shadows darkened and began to ooze forward.

“What the hell?” Vic swept his blade around in a gleaming arc, even as Nessa entered the Roof Guard, blade raised high and pointing behind her, tension radiating from her in a way it hadn’t even in the heart of the ashen walker battle.

The warren was filling with that familiar, horrifying purple radiance. Purple light, soft and deep, gradating to black, but in the center a figure was forming, tall and terrifying.

“Oh shit,” whispered Harald. “Everyone, get back!”

“What?” Nessa darted him a furious glance. “What is it?”

“It’s a demon!” Harald raised his longsword, heart hammering, panic gripping his mind like a drug-addict trying to pry open a lockbox. “It’s—”

Vorakhar formed a moment later, as august and cruel as before. His horns swept back and rose toward the ceiling, his luxurious, jet-black coat hung like a cloak from his broad shoulders, its inner lining a rich purple. He wore a white cravat that hung in ruffles down his chest, a gold chain looping from its knot to disappear under the coat’s lapel.

Wicked elegance personified, he stared under lowered brows at Harald, his smile caustic, horrifying, heart-stopping.

Did you think I expended all this effort for you to waste yourself on such a plebian class?

“Harald! Sam!” Nessa’s bark was taut with fear. “Run! Vic and I will hold it off!”

Fell power radiated from the demon like invisible waves slamming against a cliff at night.

Vic had a better sense of what they faced. He was backing away, eyes wide in horror.

Decline that class, said Vorakhar, voice resonating in the depths of Harald’s skull. And I shall grant you something truly worthy of your potential.