As the group made their way towards the cave that housed the Crystal Devourers, Isla walked with Taloc to learn what she could about the party leader’s functions. She didn’t really want to be the leader, but Oeister had said that the Charisma attribute determined how effective a party leader was—which impacted how effective the whole party was—and that was her stat. She really had no interest in much of anything; she was still upset about the news that she was stuck here on this godforsaken planet, and now, even if she somehow managed to find her way back home, she might not recognize anyone that she knew.

Taloc was describing how to form a group, but she had missed part of the instructions, so he went through the process again. When he had said enough for her to feel confident, she made an attempt... Taloc was still talking, but he liked to hear himself speak, so she let him ramble on as she focused on the task at hand. Navigating to the controls section of her interface, she selected ‘Actions’. She scanned the list of actions until she found the one titled ‘Form a Party’. She liked to do things manually, so instead of simply thinking about the action ‘Form a Party,’ she preferred to scroll through. Similarly, she generally preferred to read her notifications instead of mentally absorbing them. It was weird to have all of that information shoved into her head at once; it was not natural at all. If she had had the ability to do this when studying in school, she would have jumped at the chance to cut corners on learning in those days, but here she actually rather liked learning. When she learned the butchering skill, the knowledge was just there in her mind. The notifications were a different matter, and she wanted to read them instead of getting mind-zapped with the information.

Once she had started the party, she focused on Taloc and invited him to join it. His name appeared on the left side of her display, and there were three small colored bars underneath his name: the top bar was red, then purple, then green at the bottom. This was similar to any video game; the red bar represented Taloc’s health, the purple was his mana, and the green one was his energy. Isla sent similar requests to Maroftis, Vultressant, Vanya, and Ewtain.

“What the hell is this buff?!” Maroftis exclaimed after joining the party.

“It’s a party buff that increases our attributes since Isla is now the party leader,” Ewtain said.

“We really should have made you party leader from the start,” Vultressant said. “It was in the name of the ability: born leader.” Isla quickly brought up her skills and abilities page and selected ‘Born Leader’ from the array listed. She was in a hurry, so she skipped reading the new information and willed herself to absorb the description of the ability. Creating a party had triggered her ability, and so long as her Charisma was at least 20, it delivered 20% of her Charisma stat to all of the stats for everyone in the party. Her Charisma was currently at 26, so it was giving an extra 5.2 points to all of her stats, including Charisma.

Since they had arrived in Ildul, Isla had prioritized Charisma due to her role in getting the group missions with the best rewards. She had, however, held back ten attribute points in case anything came up. She now put them directly into Charisma, making it 43.2 (base 36).

“Wait, my stats just went up again,” Vanya said.

“I had some extra points, so I put them into Charisma,” Isla explained. “My born leader ability works with my Charisma.” She read another notification: ‘Your Charisma is now high enough that the leader power has been unlocked.’ She focused on ‘leader power’, and a list of options appeared. There were a total of nine powers that she could choose from. There was one for each of the seven standard attributes, and each of which required that she have a minimum of 30 Charisma to access. Each of the attribute buffs added five points to the corresponding attribute for each party member. The other two powers had a threshold of 40 Charisma, which she only had due to being the party leader. She wondered: if she chose to add to everyone’s Charisma, would it stack with her ability? She selected the Charisma party bonus, but she only received a flat five points. All of the other abilities turned gray, and upon further inspection, she found that she was only able to remove a stat buff after it had been running for at least ten minutes.

“I have yet another buff,” Taloc said, shaking his head. “What else did you find, Isla?”

She read over the other two options and relayed the information to the group. “20 Charisma unlocks the 20% stat buff. 30 Charisma unlocks individual buffs for each of the stats. At 40…”

“Why’d you choose Charisma then?” Maroftis asked, laughing. “That won’t help us in a fight.”

Isla turned to the massive Korak, not bothering to hide her irritation. “Do you want to do this?” she asked sharply. Maroftis, sensing her mood, raised his claws defensively and shook his head.

“Okay, then,” she continued. “I tried stacking Charisma with my Born Leader ability, but it didn’t work. Now I have to wait at least ten minutes before I can switch the buff to another option. As I was saying, when I hit 40—with the extra 20% boost from my ability—two more buffs became available. One increases our damage dealt by 10%, and the other reduces the damage we take by 10%. I can only use one at a time for now, but it looks like I’ll eventually unlock more slots, so I won’t be limited to just one buff. The damage modifier abilities last for two minutes and can be deactivated at will, but the stat buffs have to run for a full ten minutes.”

“That’s really great,” Taloc said, “and I’m glad that I don’t have to be the one dumping points into Charisma.”

“Her born leader bonus has given us about fifty stat points,” Vultressant said. “That equates to ten levels for those of us who get five stat points per level. That’s ten levels worth of stats, plus the extra five if she plans on using one of those buffs. That’s a huge upgrade.”

“It’s effectively less than ten levels,” Maroftis said, “because none of us spread the points evenly among the stats.”

“Sure, we would assign them differently,” Vultressant said, “but every point can be potentially helpful. Remember when we fought that skeleton captain in the crypt? You couldn’t understand its commands, but Isla managed to overcome the debuff because of her high Charisma. If the rest of us had more Charisma back then, we might have been able to charge the skeleton too.”

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“This is really great, Isla,” Vanya said. Isla beamed at all of the praise, but her newfound ability to buff the party was another reason for her to adventure. Currently, no one else could provide them with any buffs as party leader, so she was now even more essential to the party—her desire to stick to the town stuff would have to wait.

They traveled most of the day, stopping only for a midday meal and the occasional break to “water the bushes,” the group’s term for answering nature’s call. They camped without incident and set out again the next morning. Just before lunchtime on the second day, Isla caught a scent that transported her back to her childhood. It was reminiscent of a skunk’s smell but far less pungent, with a strong sulfuric note that grew more intense as they continued. The smell reminded her of a visit to Yellowstone National Park as a child, when she had first encountered the geysers. It was odd that she could remember that scent so vividly while she could barely picture the face of the boy she had given her virginity to; the mind was a crazy thing. The geysers were a lot more memorable, she thought wryly.

A short time later, they came upon a large hole in the ground. The area around the opening was bright orange in color, transforming to yellow, and then bright green in the entrance itself. The ground was wet around the hole, and the sulfur smell intensified as they approached. “I’m pretty sure that that thing is a geyser,” Isla said.

“This is the place,” Vultressant said, “but Oeister didn’t mention a geyser. He said it was a cave system. What should we do?”

“I say we move back and have lunch,” Taloc offered. “If it blows, then we head in.”

“And if it doesn’t?” Vanya asked. “What do we...”

“I’ll go in and check while you guys eat,” Maroftis said, interrupting Vanya. “I’m immune to fire damage, so I assume that includes hot water too.”

“Are you immune to getting shot out of that thing cartoon-style?” Ewtain asked. “Wait, what am I saying? Great idea!” He gave the lizard an enthusiastic thumbs-up. While Taloc and Vultressant laughed, Isla and Vanya looked at the Night Stalker reproachfully. Isla thought, not for the first time, that Ewtain would be a certified hottie if he would just keep his mouth shut.

“I’ll go set my bind point over there,” Maroftis said, pointing back the way they had come. “You guys might want to do that too.”

They all took his advice, and then they sat down to eat while the large Korak lit a lantern and carefully descended into the hole. A few minutes later, he re-emerged and joined the rest of the group.

“Isla is probably right about it being a geyser, but it shouldn’t take long to get to a safe spot.”

They discussed their options, but they eventually decided to go in. They lit two more lanterns, which Ewtain and Vanya carried. Vanya could see in the dark, so Isla thought it odd that she was carrying a light source. But as long as she had her arms free for her sword and shield, she didn’t care who carried the lanterns. Maybe Vanya couldn’t see in total darkness? Well, better for her to carry it anyway. Isla had voted to wait until there was an eruption before going down into that hell pit, but the rest of the group was apparently good with a respawn. She said her piece, but they all said that it would be fine. She knew that she complained a lot, and she usually got overruled on stuff like this.

The initial descent was slippery, and the cave opening looked like a funnel. There was a path that hugged the wall; on the other side of the path was a sheer drop down further than she could see, but given the echoes their small amount of noise created, it was likely very deep. The path spiraled down for three revolutions and ended at an opening in the wall, which led away from the shaft and the light from the opening. As they moved away from the pit, they initially traveled upward, but eventually the slope began to angle downward slightly, and they slowly made their way into the depths of the cave.

Nearly five minutes after the directional change, the earth began to shake, and a loud noise could be heard coming from behind them. After about ten seconds, the shaking and the noise abruptly ended.

“What the hell was that?” Maroftis exclaimed, turning to look back but unable to see anything beyond a few feet.

“That was probably the geyser going off,” Isla offered. “I said that I thought that it was a bad idea to go in before it erupted, but nobody listened.”

“I listened,” Taloc said, “but we didn’t have any idea as to how often the thing erupted. It might not be consistent at all, and we could have been waiting outside all day. I think that Old Faithful went off every hour, but the others took much longer, from what I remember. We should be able to get a read on it, because those tremors were no joke, and we should be able to feel them down here.”

Isla didn’t like being ignored, but this reasoning was almost worse. If that was his actual reason for deciding to enter the geyser, he should have shared his logic with the rest of them. Although she couldn’t see Taloc’s face, she was certain he wore a smug expression. She could almost feel his arrogance radiating toward her.

She was only the party leader because of her buffs; it was clear the Ranger was still calling the shots. The thought stung. Bitterness welled up inside her, but she held it at bay.

She had forgotten to check the interface when they entered, but she estimated they had been moving downward for nearly an hour when a purplish light appeared ahead. Ewtain halted the group, handing his lantern to Taloc before moving forward to investigate.

A few minutes later, the Night Stalker returned, his voice barely above a whisper. “It opens up into a very large cavern, and the crystals are in there—they glow. They’re bright enough to see by, so we won’t need the lanterns. I saw some creatures in the cavern that might be the Devourers. I counted three, but there could be more hidden in the shadows.”

“Show me,” Maroftis said. When Ewtain only looked back at him, he added, “I can use my assess other skill on one of them and hopefully find out what we’re dealing with.”

Ewtain nodded, and the two of them headed for the cavern. They returned shortly.

“They’re called ‘Stone Ogres,’ and we can take them. At least one of them is weaker than I am,” Maroftis reported.

“Stone Trolls, and now Stone Ogres?” Isla scoffed. “Where’s the imagination of the creators of this place? It can’t just be regular Ogres; it has to be fancy Stone Ogres. Come up with something new. This world sucks.” She turned away in disgust, shaking her head.

“I don’t know about the Troll,” Maroftis said, “but these Ogres are mostly covered in a protective stone layer that comes from eating rocks, so the name kind of fits.”

“I thought that thing we fought was called a Rock Troll,” Vultressant said.

“Not helping,” Vanya admonished.

“The layout of the cavern should work to our advantage,” Ewtain said, changing the subject. “There’s a ledge where we enter about ten feet above the floor. There are tall plateaus scattered around the cavern. We’ll have the high ground, and we can fire at the Ogres to draw them in and fight them from above. We can probably stop them from climbing up to get to us. If there are too many, we can retreat to this spot and flee the cave system if we have to. We’ll leave the lamps here until we clear the area. I don’t have a ranged weapon, so I’ll intercept any that get too close.”

“That sounds pretty good,” Taloc said, and after some preparations, the party made its way to the cavern.

“What if the Ogres start throwing the stones instead of eating them?” Vanya asked in a whisper as they approached the entrance to the cavern.

“We fall back into the passageway and try to fight them one or two at a time,” Taloc said, as if he’d already thought of that contingency.