Soulforged Dungeoneer

The first thing I did in response to a clearly labelled sign telling me what not to do was obvious for anyone who knew my personality: I procrastinated. I went home and grumped and grouched and did some googling to see if there were exceptions (there weren't) and considered my options.

On the one hand, a state law forbidding entry wasn't a huge deal to break. I'd literally been in jail for murder; as long as I didn't rise to that level of badness again, it would probably just be a fine. On the other hand, sneaking through a military-controlled facility to enter a very small hole that was very well guarded was not an easy task, especially since they almost certainly employed higher-than-me level people or bought higher-than-me level items to make this feat difficult if not impossible. And while my stealth skill was boosted fairly well, it was nothing compared to the stealth skill of a level 75-ish sneaky scofflaw who might want to solo the dungeon one time before he hit the level cap.

I mean, also, they might have a reason for the law, but let's be honest, who would ever give the government credit for that?

The easiest way to bypass the restriction was to enter with a party and ditch them, a tried-and-true practice that just happened to also usually indicate you were a pickpocket or a backstabber, and again, I'd just been in jail for murder. So, yeah. Additionally, as soon as I came to the authority's attention for breaking any law, it just might be considered a parole violation on top of whatever else I was charged with.

I did some googling on the specific dungeon, but the warnings I found online were kind of general. A lot of people disappeared in Armand Bayou, and there were "specific threats" that the sites I looked at didn't actually list. They did specifically suggest bringing someone who could cure status ailments, as well as equipment that guarded against paralysis and charm, but I didn't get the feeling the author was exactly in the know about the place.

So I waited a week, keeping up my dayjob as much to keep my sanity as anything. It was interesting seeing my perspective change as my attributes and skill levels went up; for people in the "real world" who didn't kill monsters for experience, they were making piecemeal progress, while people like me who used their skills and in a dungeon dive would come back and have greater abilities but usually the same basic level of personal talent. They would make the same mistakes, in each of the classes, and it was disheartening.

There were counter-examples, but they honestly didn't stay around long because the class just wasn't helping them much. If they learned from their mistakes, I ended up without a lot to teach them, again mostly because I was nobody's idea of a master. The only exception was a brunette named Alice Kale, who had long waist-length wavy hair pinned up in a foof on the back of her head while she worked, and who tended to wear nothing more than a sports bra for a top. She kept coming back to critical bladework and focusing on small improvements, sharpening her reflexes and accepting every criticism (well, from me; she tended to ignore the skeeves since they only pretended they had something useful to say to ogle her boobs) while putting more and more force behind her attacks. I was glad she stuck to practice equipment and not sparring, because she had a diver level over 100 and could have mopped the floor with any of us, even if she was using a sword made from paper mâché.

She was the only one in the critical bladework course I got along with, and it was purely professional, which was fine with me. If I was ever in her level range she might be an interesting person to party with, but from the occasional bumps to her level as time went by, she was active, so she'd probably keep ahead of me.

That thought led back to the Armand Bayou Dungeon, and reluctantly I stopped by on a day they scheduled for meet-and-greets. I suspected I'd do terribly with a pick-up group, but, well, I didn't have a lot of options.

Anyway, room, walked, she. Except not so much on the walking because she was there when I entered. She, of course, was Louise Velvetine, and the sight of her made me stop in my tracks. She was still just as pretty, still level 30, and much to my everlasting regret, hanging at her elbow was the same skeeve from the nightclub that she'd picked over me. Somehow, with everything else going on in that room, as soon as I walked in and saw her, she immediately turned her head, and our eyes locked.

And I was frozen there long enough that someone shoved me from behind and I fell on a folding chair, collapsed at the waist, and banged my forehead on the back of someone else's head one row up.

"Shit, sorry," I said, and said sorry more than a couple more times, and avoided eye contact with anyone else for the next five minutes as we waited for someone to come in and organize the rabble.

Louise didn't get up or come over to say hi or anything. I... I also didn't do that. You know, the thing you should do when you want to see someone. You go see them. I didn't. She didn't either. I wondered if she didn't like me, or if she didn't recognize me, or something. You know, the kind of dumb thoughts you have even though it's only been like a minute.

Finally, a strict looking man in military fatigues (I had to wrack my brain, but I think his pips meant corporal?) took his position behind a small lectern. "Alright, gentlemen, ladies." I don't think it was my imagination that his eyes picked me out of the crowd very quickly and lingered for a while. "Before you finalize your groups we'd like to give you a safety briefing on Armand Bayou. My name is Corporal Richard Carrot. Our dungeon was labelled a Class C danger zone after several groups reported that a large number of divers seemed to have turned against their fellows. A lot," he stressed the word heavily, with a pause afterward, "of divers have gone missing in Armand Bayou since then. We have yet to determine exactly why this is happening or whether any of the missing divers are still alive. Reports so far have the dangerous elements between floors 20 and 40. It's possible that people are being charmed by dungeon entities into becoming enemies of mankind." He glanced around the room. "Take the threat seriously. We can't compel you to stay out, and we are willing to pay a bounty for anyone who brings us information on this threat. But above all else, stay safe."

That certainly put a damper on things. So much for not giving them any credit for having their reasons, I guess.

After that, the Corporal--National Guard, by the way; there was debate in the legislature about using the active duty Army, but the state governments objected, since they could direct the Guard but not the Army--stepped back and just watched from the door as we ended up in a typical social clusterfuck, as you'd expect from a meet and greet. There weren't many here who recognized me or cared, so I wasn't exactly swamped either right off the bat or in the long term, and the guys who came up to say hello were generally people with twisted faces that I immediately distrusted.

So I stood there with all the social nuance and skill of a guy who went solo into a death trap because that seemed like the best possible life choice he had available, and quietly rejected a couple people who seemed completely skeevy, and then finally chose to try walking up to the one person in the room I actually cared about, with my heart pounding and my spleen (or something) wanting desperately to crush itself out of existence so it didn't have to continue being a part of me while I did this. I understood the feeling.

Louise was at that point one of only two priestesses in the room, and she had her pick of suitors, with or without the creep involved. The only thing that kept me from turning around and just flat out leaving was that her face visibly brightened when she caught sight of me. But, she was also too polite to immediately stop talking to the people who were trying to monopolize her attention, which was... awkward.

So feeling like I was in third grade and cutting in line and would be yelled at by a teacher, I just kind of sidestepped the others and said, "Hi, Louise."

"Hi! J--Jeremy." I saw her face blank in the middle of forgetting my name.

"Jerry."

"Jerry, right." She turned back to the large tank of a man she'd been politely listening to, offered him a smile without saying anything at all, and then turned her attention back to me. "How are you?"

A little butthurt, but, uh, "I'm fine. I'm... kind of in an awkward spot because I was hoping to go solo in the dungeon and they won't let me."

"Right, they said that." Louise kind of looked down, but then met my eyes again. "H--we were going to go in as a group of two but they didn't let us do that, either. If you want, we can go together?"

"Sure," I said, not immediately processing literally any of the subtext of the conversation.

"I dunno, babe," said the guy behind her. "All I've heard about solo divers is they get themselves killed doing stupid sh--pulling stupid stunts. They think they're invincible and they're not."

I... stared at the guy, my brain still too locked up by exposure to Louise to really have a snappy comeback ready.

"Well, we can try it, and if things don't work out, we can go our separate ways." Louise folded her hands in her lap. "Okay?"

"Ugh, fine." He stood up and got in front of Louise, which all on its own made me want to hit him, but I resisted. "My name is Brock Beetle. My level is higher than yours, and my dick is fucking huge, so back the fuck off."

I... what?

"Brock, we talked about this..."

"I'm just making sure he knows where we stand on this." He forced his way completely in between me and Louise. "What I say goes, and if you don't like it, you can just fucking leave."

Behind him, Louise looked away, embarrassed. I was... honestly showing incredible restraint. I hadn't punched him, hadn't loudly proclaimed to everyone there that I had already murdered people for less, hadn't even told him off about solo divers. I felt the blood pressure in my head threatening to make my skull pop open, and I'm pretty sure if I'd done that my skull would have grown teeth and torn open his chest, in order to rip out his heart and spit it on the ground.

But I don't think Louise would have liked that. And, like, to hell with whether or not they were sleeping together (and my money was on, no), I really wanted her approval. So I kept firmly latched onto my chair and forced a smile.

"I'm Jerry Appleby. Pleased to meet you."

"And don't even think of calling for outside help to fight me. I have a brother who's over level 100, and he will rip you to fucking shreds, you and whoever the fuck you con into working with you."

"Brock, please..." Louise's voice sounded so hurt.

"Outside help?" I grit my teeth, trying not to get baited into a fight. "Boy, you have no idea..."

"What, you wanna fight?" Brock stepped closer than he should have dared, considering there were military men standing there watching us, plus a whole room full of divers who had mostly gone quiet as Brock put on his cock-fighting display. Nobody might have had weapons out or pointed at us, but there was no doubt that the people here could interfere with a fight in instants if they chose to.

"No thanks." I do, I really really do...

"Brock..."

"Yeah, you understand. I'm the fucking leader here." He reached out and tried to shove my head backwards, still apparently not having gotten the point that I was a telekinetic, and seemed thoroughly confused when I didn't yield.

So I just stood up and glared at him. "Sure you are, Brock. Sure you are." And with a wave of my hand, I nudged him gently aside, deliberately not watching him trip over a row of folding chairs and collapse into a mess of them. "Louise. Can we swap phone numbers?"

The suddenly brighter look on her face was all I needed to endure the looming prospect of spending more time with Brock Beetle.