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“I know! I’m sorry! But I must go.” Ariana crashed into him and gave him a tight hug with her short, four-year-old arms. “Continue showing me your way of being powerful while having powerful bonds. I will continue cheering you on, as always.”

Before Zarian could stop her, Ariana faded away. The dream lost its coherency. Then Zarian was gently nudged into consciousness by Para’s threads, waking him up to a cobalt blue morning before sunrise.

The campfire was mostly smoke, ash, and a few orange glints of dying embers. Everyone was still asleep except for Naomi. She was doing early morning stretches and a light warm up.

Another day in the Infinita Star System had arrived. It came with an interesting gold notification meant for Zarian.

Zarian smiled, thinking of his dream and the addition of a new trait. He wondered what he should bring up first as he watched Naomi twist her body into several flexible poses.

“Hey, you know how you can disrupt my magic with your Mind Spike?” Zarian asked.

Before the new trait, if Naomi landed her skill perfectly, then she could cancel out his spells and mess with his abilities. Para hated that the most, since it screwed with her connection to Zarian.

“Good morning, sir, and yes, I know.” Naomi smiled a little, which Zarian could easily see in the cobalt blue morning.

Zarian told her about his new rare trait, Aura Channeler.

Naomi stopped smiling.

Zarian held back a laugh. He didn’t want to wake up the others just yet.

“I was going to say I’ve grown and earned +1 in Strength and +1 in Agility,” Naomi admitted quietly.

Zarian lost some of his humor and felt a little guilty. Before he could say anything, Naomi waved him off.

She wasn’t the type who wanted pity. She was more interested in the chase, if anything.

She bounced back from the mild upset, looking more motivated to keep up her insane training routine.

If it wasn’t for me, would you be a lonely junkie of a narcissist, Naomi?

She probably would.

I’ll have to stay stronger than you to keep you a little humble. Or you’ll go off the deep end if the power gets to your head.

Maybe that reflected poorly on Naomi, but nobody here was a saint. Except maybe Bianca, but that was a big maybe.

Once he felt fully awake, Zarian joined Naomi for stretches and a warm up.

Morning sunrise peeked over the eastern horizon, turning the sky into shades of fiery orange and honey gold. Blocky clouds gathered in heavier clumps, like Jenga stacks climbing higher into the sky.

Zarian felt distraught as he enjoyed the sight of morning and detested the feeling of daylight smothering the cool embrace of the dark night. Before the others woke up fully, Zarian covered himself fully with the Parasite Cloak, the darkness under his hood becoming deep and near-impenetrable.

Then he positioned himself over the next person to likely wake up.

Three.

Two.

One.

“Oh, God, dammit! I don’t want you standing over me like that when I’m waking, chief!” Gilbert roared.

Zarian snickered darkly before he backed off, leaving Gilbert shaking with his hand over his heart. He relaxed a few seconds later. He must’ve used a small dose of his tranquilizer skill to take the edge off.

Thanks to Gilbert’s hollering, everyone was fully awake and prepared for Naomi’s killer morning exercise program. There were no exemptions. Everyone had to partake during the first part.

Then they fell off based on tiers of fitness, which depended on their points in Strength and Agility for the most part.

Hannah and Bianca were the first to drop after Naomi made sure they were thoroughly destroyed. Zarian and Gilbert fell off next, though Zarian cheated with Para’s help so he could keep up with Gilbert, who had solid physical stats and his Adrenaline Jolt skill.

Once Naomi was on her own, she picked up the pace for herself. The others cooked and ate breakfast based on what the spectral spiders and skeletons found last night – a small basilisk with an avian’s head and reptilian tail.

“The lost knight came from a dungeon,” Hannah informed the party. “A powerful and unique dungeon. One that’s like a kingdom unto itself and might live by different rules compared to the White Spider Dungeon. Oh, and I’m three levels higher now from completing a special side quest based on this discovery. I have an achievement, too.”

Naomi tripped over own legs, surprised by the news. She was more than agile enough to flip out of the fall and land back squarely on her feet. She ended her personal training early and joined them for breakfast, her eyes on Hannah.

“Nice work, Hannah,” Zarian praised.

The thirty-year-old straightened in her seat and smiled. “Sorry for being snappy yesterday. I was consumed with the work. It’s incredible how this class of mine can feel so useful depending on the situation. But I digress. The point I want to make is I need a better understanding of our geography. Then I can take us to a unique dungeon nobody has touched since the start of the Dark Era. Maybe for over two thousand years.”

Gilbert looked at Hannah like she grew another head. “And you learned all that by staring at a dead statue and a big ol’ pearl the size of a basketball?”

Speaking of the dungeon core, Hannah smirked at the magical object sitting next to her before passing the core to Para’s tendrils for safekeeping.

“Side note, you can plant that somewhere,” Hannah said. “The dungeon core is like a seed that you can pick up and move to grow anywhere. Where you plant it, I’m not sure. But I imagine the White Spider Dungeon would like a place where it can acquire better meals or material to mature further.”

“Are you listening to what you’re saying?” Gilbert asked, wide-eyed. “You’re talking about growing a place that pumps out man-eating monsters.”

“It seems more like a farm to me,” Naomi said.

“That’s the gamer term for it, if you didn’t know. To farm monsters. That might turn out useful,” Zarian said. “If not for us, maybe we can turn a profit selling safe dungeon crawls to other adventurers.”

“Oh, we need money! I forgot about that!” Bianca shouted. “Oh, I didn’t pay rent! I’m going to get kicked out back at home.”

Everyone had a pause from thinking about home and what they would lose. Zarian gave them time to settle their thoughts before he moved on:

“So, we have the White Spider Dungeon, and now we potentially have the Forgotten Kingdom Dungeon,” Zarian said. “I don’t know about you guys, but I feel like we are accomplishing a lot in a short time. Ignoring the weeks of journey between the action and adventuring.”

“Ekri mentioned there are other dungeons further west of Bramblevale,” Naomi said.

“Can we get to town and have a hot shower and a change of clothes first before crawling more dungeons? And, maybe, relax a teensy, teensy bit?” Bianca asked. “Hmm, Senor Zarian? Hmmmm?!”

Bianca gave him a demanding look, her eyes shining with zealous light.

Zarian laughed it off while under his Parasite Cloak and his unwavering darkness. “Alright, let’s focus on getting to Bramblevale. Now, before you tell us about your achievement, I got my own news.”

Zarian told them about the new trait. He received the reactions he was expecting: congrats, envy, and intellectual interest.

“I want that trait!” Bianca demanded.

“Keep channeling your magic.”

“But it’s costly, and you know I scale mainly with Wonder, not Mysticism.”

Wonder could give skills a big bang for smaller stat points. But Wonder-based abilities cost more aura.

On the flip side, Mysticism was not only the foundation for magic like Zarian’s and Hannah’s, but Mysticism helped with aura recovery. Bianca wasn’t wrong about how much harder she had it compared to Zarian when using magic consistently.

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“No excuses. Just leave some aura juice for potential fights.” Zarian chuckled. “Who knows? Maybe you’ll figure out Aura Ignition before me.”

Zarian and the others were nowhere near figuring out how Aura Ignition worked. It was another thing among many objectives they had to work on for their main quest.

“I’ll try!”

“Before you go, Hannah, I’ll admit I earned a few points this morning,” Naomi said. “It ain’t much, but I think that’s proof in the pudding that my extra training isn’t for nothing.”

“How much?” Gilbert asked.

Naomi glared at him. “They were +1 for Strength and +1 for Agility.”

“I guess that’s something.”

“Keep it up, Naomi!” Bianca cheered, two thumbs up.

“Exactly, keep it up. As for Hannah, what’s the achievement?” Zarian asked, nodding at their resident enchantress.

As Hannah explained while opening her achievement, Zarian imagined what the notifications would look like:

Once Hannah finished, a notification for the entire party appeared overhead:

“Guys, a quest like that is going to require a strong party,” Zarian said, his heart thumping in excitement as Hannah’s new rewards appeared next to her. “We all need to be over Level 40. Maybe even further than that. We’ll need to grind some more.”

Gilbert gawked at the big, two-foot wide ball of smooth marble stone laying next to Hannah.

The enchantress’s eyes moved with the franticness of a young girl. She rubbed her hand over the roller golem’s surface while picking up a single gauntlet of heavy leather and metal plates similar in color to the golem.

“They both use kinetic energy for force and propulsion while also being easy for me to alter. And they come with other unique features,” Hannah said with rising excitement. “I can honestly contribute to the fights now. Oh, wow, I can’t believe this is happening.”

While glad for Hannah, Zarian didn’t miss the desperate thrill in her voice about how she could contribute to fights. He hadn’t realized that was a concern for her.

Before he could respond, Naomi extended some words of surprising kindness.

“You were always able to contribute. Not everybody’s meant for direct ground fighting. We need brainiacs like you to see things from different angles. It’s good you got something that can hit worth a damn, but don’t forget where you shine best, Hannah,” Naomi said.

“What Naomi said,” Zarian added.

“Yeah, exactly! Who else could do what you do?” Bianca threw her arms around Hannah. “You’re already awesome!”

They cheered Hannah on to where she nearly teared up. Bianca was cheering for her the most to see her cry.

Bianca had a weird thing for crying and had openly admitted she wanted to catch everyone’s tears, which was even more weird.

Thankfully, Zarian was there to peel Bianca away to do some elemental practice – light versus dark – and work on each other’s strengths and weaknesses.

Naomi invited Gilbert for another physical training session with her, which he accepted with more enthusiasm. Maybe Zarian’s, Hannah’s, and even Naomi’s new growth motivated him to do more.

Hannah took her time testing out her new golem and gauntlet. The smooth, two-foot-wide ball of stone rolled after her obediently as runic symbols glowed across its entire surface. More runic symbols glowed from the plates on Hannah’s gauntlet.

She looked like a kid playing with her new favorite toys.

When it came down to training with Bianca, there were two aspects. The first aspect was range battle and tactics. The second aspect was up close fighting and tricks.

Zarian was better at the range stuff, while Bianca showed budding talent for up close fighting when using her sword.

Obviously, Zarian had to hold back while applying proficient pressure to make Bianca work. He benefited by enduring painful flashes and learning how to adapt and out-think around Bianca’s illusive style.

More importantly, he felt the difference Aura Channeler made.

If Zarian before was a hose pouring normally from one open end, he now felt like a sophisticated nozzle, able to spray the same amount of water harder and farther, while switching to different settings easier.

It was so easy the beta version of Straight Darkness +1 took on a huge qualitative jump in efficiency, which enabled him to do more despite the beta debuff.

“This isn’t fair! I’m already feeling drained against you when it’s daylight!” Bianca complained, moving frantically around dark projectiles sent out by Zarian.

“Cry some more, do-gooder!” Zarian cackled evilly as he kept throwing oblong blobs of darkness at her. The non-lethal projectiles flowed in a constant stream from the opening of his cloak.

For kicks and giggles, he shot soft dark beams from his face like shooting black eye lasers. Bianca didn’t seem to appreciate that when she took solid blows that knocked the air out of her.

Because of his overwhelming advantage, Zarian didn’t complain when she struck him with the equivalent of a miniature solar flare. She made his skin want to scream even while under his Parasite Cloak.

He doubled down with another stream of nonlethal bolts to flow with the first. Bianca repaid him back with solid swordplay when they switched from range attacks to close quarters.

Reiki had taught Bianca well, but he didn’t make it easy for the Light Bringer Child.

When they both received enough punishment, they called for Gilbert to extend his Healing Force and fix them up. Then they went right back to it. More often than not, Bianca had her butt handed to her, sometimes with her face eating dirt.

It was for the best, honestly. She had a class that was elusive and flashy. She could avoid most dangers, but the ones she couldn’t avoid might end her.

Zarian wanted to toughen her up for those deadly moments. The extra padding in vitality could be the difference between life or death.

The suns rose higher into the sky, and by the time they reached mid morning, Zarian’s party was ready to move on with their journey to Bramblevale. Despite the accursed daylight, Zarian was in a good mood.

He had eaten a hearty breakfast. The levels and powers of his companions had progressed considerably on their first two days out of the caverns.

They had a major side quest to find a secret dungeon nobody had touched for over two thousand years. It felt like they were going in the right direction to grow strong enough to backtrack and rescue Foodie.

Everyone’s motivation was sky high. And the rolling landscape of castle parts, verdant forests, and wildflowers gave them an amazing presentation of the World of Castles and Caverns.

They walked across earthy bridges arched above winding river-moats. They walked through blocky hills made of gate towers and fortress keeps, the tunnels and side passages filled with roots dangling from the ceiling and carpets of mushrooms.

They passed by towers made of stone blocks and thick, veiny trees with healthy green crowns and strange, magical birds tweeting from their branches. They explored wild gardens filled with vibrant flowers, giant hedges, and ancient garden statues that didn’t move.

They found plenty of quirky and sometimes harmless wildlife, which were the type of beasts only known in fantasy, unless they were beyond imagination.

This was their life for the next couple of days, growing more familiar with Corma’s inherent nature.

Naomi enjoyed the trip by doing ridiculous workouts on castle walls or on top of leafy towers, sometimes with big stone blocks held over her head. Hannah found the landscape less marvelous compared to her obsession with her new gauntlet and the golem that rolled along with them.

Gilbert kept wondering aloud about having an enchanted fishing rod and trying his hand at catching something from the river-moats while having stocks of beer stuffed in the Parasite Cloak. Bianca would sometimes run off to frolic through the fields before using her searing flashes to turn away hungry beasts who saw her as easy prey.

Para ate many of those hungry beasts. The skeletons acted like playful goblins when they were off duty. The spectral spiders skittered all over the place, popping up here and there to show off new bugs or shiny pebbles caught in their near-translucent webs.

Bianca was starting to like the spectral spider more and would sometimes teach them silly dances from the old world.

Zarian switched between studying the special fire spell and taking in the landscape as they traveled further west. Ever since that dream with Ariana, he found himself going about things at a slower pace outside of morning training.

He still hadn’t told the others about the dream. He wanted to think over Ariana’s strange manners and changes a little further, because there was more to the dream conversation than her admitting to lying and manipulating him.

She’s a Darkrun.

There was no doubt about it.

She was his actual sister. He knew that was true deep down in his soul.

And she was in this world.

She’s from this world.

She’d invited him to this world just so she could watch his adventures and learn from him. So if the part about them being family wasn’t a lie, then didn’t that mean somewhere out there Ariana was alive and well while able to watch him from afar?

If that was the case, how would Zarian go about finding her? And did he want to find her?

She’d lied to him.

But it didn’t feel like she did it for malicious reasons. It felt more like she was being ignorant or a little stupid.

So even if she was a tricky little sister, she clearly needed a big brother like him to set her straight.

Granted, that depended on if she would let him. There was a significant chance of the real Ariana being a powerful person, especially if she grew up in the Infinita Star System.

If she grew up here, would she know the truth about my origins? Would my parents be here?

Zarian grimaced under the dense darkness of his hood. How do I explain all of this to the others?

He still didn’t know Ariana’s true nature. The others might find that a little too scary. She’d manipulated the events that led them here and caused multiple deaths, after all.

Why do I have a complicated family when I barely know them other than Ariana.

Zarian frowned, shaking his head and rotating his shoulders around. He paused when he felt a snag from the bullet lodged in his back right shoulder.

He’d forgotten about that thing. It didn’t bother him too much. It couldn’t hurt him since he had a healthy amount of vitality for a wizard at his level. Maybe more than the usual wizard. Still, it was about time he removed it, wasn’t it?

“Gilbert, can you do me a favor?” Zarian called as the party traveled through another tunnel inside a blocky hill made of multiple verdant fortresses fused together.

Before reaching the tunnel, they had the pleasure of walking through a wild courtyard garden filled with giant butterflies. Everybody was in a pleasant mood after seeing that, so asking for that favor now should go without a hitch.

Their dead were buried.

The hatchet was buried.

“What’s up, chief?” Gilbert replied.

Before Zarian could ask, voices from up ahead caught his attention. The entire party stopped. Everyone probably had the same heart-pounding feeling that Zarian had.

The voices sounded recognizable, if a little distinct. They sounded like they spoke English at the end of the tunnel.

A split second later, Zarian saw one of his spectral spiders skittering down the tunnel in his direction.

He scooped it off the floor and waited for it to communicate through interpretive spider dances. Because of the spectral spider skill, he could understand what it was saying.

“Humans. Lots of them. They’re armed and prepared for a fight.” Zarian looked around at his party. “It might be too dangerous to meet them without further observation.”

Before anyone could provide their thoughts, a confident and young voice bellowed from the end of the tunnel:

“What sort of fiends wait in ambush inside of a tunnel? If you serve on the side of good, then come out and show yourselves! If not, then we have a company of the finest fighting men across all the Walled Continent, and we will meet you fiercely with blade, arrow, and skill!”

I guess we’ll get to see what happens with me being evil +1 around medieval fantasy humans. Zarian looked away from the tunnel exit and to his most vital party member right now.

“Bianca,” Zarian called smoothly. “It’s your time to shine.”