Soulforged Dungeoneer

When the boss doors opened and Mel's group was allowed in, I was kind of hoping for like, one of those moments where everyone crowded around you and told you that you were awesome, or whatever. What I got was a lot of confused stares, which, uh, I guess was also okay.

Louise rushed over and immediately pushed some healing abilities at me, which I definitely appreciated because those were a lot better than healing potions for what ails you, and I sat down and took a breather on the floor.

"I have questions," said Jenna, who was second to the scene. "What the hell were you fighting?"

I froze up. Had the Administrator hidden the whole battle? "What?"

"Aside from the bosses, you were fighting something the whole time. What was that, and how did you--whoa." She stopped to look around the room. "They're gone!"

"Oh." I looked around. Only the Hordes were invisible? The harpies at the wall's edge were invisible to me from the outside. "Uh, it was a variant fight--"

"Obviously," said Mel, her voice dripping with sarcasm.

"...and a whole bunch of Hungry Hordes came out of the walls. So, I could land on the walls briefly, but also, they would chase me a little if I got close."

"Hungry hordes? From all those eggs?" The shield tank grimaced and gave a theatrical shudder. "Damn, man, that's too many of them."

"Yeah, it was intense." I went on to talk about the airborne patterns of the birds during the open sections, as well as the Synth Harpy, who they had in fact been able to see.

"So," Mel snipped at me, I thought good naturedly, "you gonna stay for another round?"

I seriously considered it, but shook my head. "Well," I said, "I did gain four levels from that fight--"

"Four--"

"...but I want to come back when I have a few more under my belt and my damage is a little higher. I also need to appraise my loot and..." My mind drifted, finally, back to the Harpy Birdman and the quest that had preceded the battle. It didn't totally dispel my good humor, since I was riding on kind of a battle high, but it did force me to reconsider my priorities. "...and we need to have a very serious talk, in town, about what to do next."

The others exchanged looks, and for some reason, Louise and I met each other's eyes. I... I didn't usually do that. She had pretty eyes, and they were scared, and somehow, I didn't think that it was her being scared for herself... at least, not entirely.

"Can I ask a question?" asked Will,

"Shoot."

"I know for a fact that there is no known artifact to resist the fucking Dancing Plague below level, like, 200. How were you good to just charge in there? Even with natural resistance--"

"Oh. Yeah, that's... complicated. A mix of my class being a cheat and getting a cheat item from an Administrator and--well, even then I probably should have been more cautious, but my Will is pretty high, and from what I understand once an attempt is actively resisted, the chance goes down. There was some other effect that I resisted, too, at the start, but I don't know what it was." The Dancing Plague? A cute name for the Spontaneous Musical Number, I guess. I'd never actually seen the effects. I should check Youtube later.

"Man..." Will brushed his hair back away from his face in what was probably mostly an excuse to rub his head. I looked around and the whole lot of them seemed like they were really some mix of jealous, confused, and upset about seeing me...

Well, in a way, I was playing a completely different game, diving a different dungeon, living a different life in a different world from them, wasn't I? It's hard to know exactly what they thought about that. It would have been different to see me fight the exact fight that they just went through, and maybe that's what they were really hoping for, something that made my crazy Solo Diving more relatable rather than less.

Will picked up his thought after a moment of moping. "So what was with the setup? I admit I don't think we could beat that fight without some time to talk strategy, but it looked like you called them out for something."

"Oh... I met a secret NPC whose backstory involved being abused by the big bad harpy, a whole battle of the sexes thing, and I wanted to see if the Administrator would escalate the fight if I brought it up, which she did, though uh, I'm pretty sure--"

I felt another odd blink, and felt a very sudden urge to shut the hell up. I frowned in response. Was it a secret somehow that the Administrators would actively meddle in things? I searched for a plausible way to end the sentence, only managing, "--it's a kind of one-time thing, since it was associated with... well, the matter I want to talk with you guys about."

"What--"

"FIRST, though, let's get out of here," I was tired enough that I didn't really give a damn if they were jealous or confused or anything else at the moment. In the old days, I would have moved back into the level and camped out before trying again, to grind the boss once I had my energy back, but back then I was... kind of convinced that my life was going to be over when I left the Dungeon, what with the murder and all.

I don't know exactly why I was surprised when Louise went out of her way to re-attach herself to my party in the fifteen seconds between me saying that and actually getting to the exit. She was serious about the whole redemption thing, which I now saw in a different light after the Harpy Birdman's speech, and I had already twice kind of abandoned her after someone else (well, both times it was Brock) pissed me off, although the second time I kept stalking the two of them through the Dungeon to make sure she'd be okay. Point is, I guess I'd proven to be a little flighty, not that I was planning on running off after telling everyone we needed to talk.

The next floor, of course, was a Town, and this was built to appear as the inside of the Tower that the last boss fight had been outside of. A big circular wall with a gate in it was behind the entrance, and there was a cramped space with the usual buildings crowded around it, though this time the entrance was in the middle with buildings spread in either direction. Opposite the curved wall, and not far away, was a flat one with a door in it, making the area a rather narrow wedge. Surprisingly for all that, the ceiling was high, almost thirty feet, while none of the buildings were more than a story, leaving an unusual airspace. Was the height necessary for the next biome, or was it some kind of weird hint?

It was a little difficult to identify the buildings all at a glance, but even as a light drinker, it's not that hard to find the bar, mostly because there's always two people sitting or standing by the entrance--one man, one woman, talking to each other about absolutely nothing forever. As I marched right for them, I couldn't help listening, as a matter of morbid curiosity.

"You mean Bill did it?" asked Mr. NPC.

"No, I'm going to have Frank do it," replied Ms. NPC.

"What about Tom?"

"Yes, but then I have to ask Robin."

"Isn't that what Steve was going to do?"

"Sarah was the one who said I should do it."

The entire time I could hear them, it was one question with a name in it, one answer with a name in it, the sentences otherwise being devoid of all meaning and purpose. Any given pair of sentences seemed to make sense, but the entire conversation was random garbage.

As I stepped into the bar, I found to nobody's surprise that all of the tables, except the NPC table closest to the fire, were empty. The NPC table had an old man, an old woman, a young boy, and a middle aged woman, and they all took turns sipping from endless mugs of whatever, grumping about absolutely nothing, or if you were very lucky (or paid them money), they might drop a hint about something somewhere in the Dungeon. The Beanpole Administrator's Taverns had been exactly the same, to such a degree that I wondered if the Administrators were in fact completely incapable of changing them, except for a thin coat of paint.

Anyway, I claimed the big table and ignored the serving woman while the others piled in after me. I took a moment to glance at the loot from the last boss, not taking the time to do much more than glance at the names and levels, but still managing to curse myself for getting distracted by even that much:

[ B.J. SMOKIN HOT Lv 55 ]

[ GASSY PANTS Lv 55 ]

[ FEATHER-BANE BERET Lv 45 ]

[ JET RACK Lv 45 ]

[ BRASS BLASTER Lv 45 ]

...well, I thought it pretty obvious that three of those were the same loot I would have gotten from the normal fight, since Level 45 was about right for a Boss rare drop at floor 10 in a thirty-plus Dungeon. Ten levels above that... plus the Administrator had gone all out on the terrible naming scheme, so I had to at least peek at the two new items.

That's why, as the others sat down, I couldn't help but faceplant into the table, trying to scrub the stupid humor out of my system in time to have a serious talk, to no avail.

"What's wrong?"

"Loot. Special--stupid loot. Special stupid, stupid special. It's stupid and it's..." I sat back up and placed my hand on the center of the table. "It's better if I just show you."

I picked my hand up off the table, revealing as it went another foot tall harpy-esque bird--but this one was a phoenix that was constantly on fire, with turntable wings, sick shades, and a pair of over-ear headphones with glowing wing emblems on the sides. Like the DJ at the Disco, she--and this one was clearly a woman--nodded her head to a beat only she could hear, with an unusual added pair of small feathered and clawed arms crossed in front of her, as if defying us to not find her rad as fuck.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I give you, a Smoking Hot BJ."

Will, to his credit, threw his head back and let out a howl of a laugh. The tank started out just shaking his head and chuckling, but got a little more into it as it hit him. The assassin I noticed go into Stealth and I couldn't tell what he did after that, whether it was going to get a drink or walking outside to laugh away from prying eyes. Louise's eyes and smile lit up as she always seemed to whenever these damned puns came up, and Mel's face went from astonishment to being fucking pissed.

"No!" she shouted, pounding her hands on the table and standing up suddenly enough to throw her chair back. "You CANNOT have a better PIANIST than I do! I have the BEST PIANIST! The--" she couldn't quite keep a straight face as she tried her best to keep the rage going. "The biggest, prettiest pianist in the entire world!"

I held up my hands in a conciliatory gesture. "You have the best pianist, Mel. I can't begin to compete with it, truly."

"Damn straight I do!" Mel slammed her hand on the table as she whipped hers out. "Hey, Stud, play the Anthem of Heart!" And just like that, a twelve inch bird started playing an upbeat number on his piano wings.

I wanted to get to the actual issue, but my new Phoenix pet--or whatever you'd call her--turned her head to look at me, as though asking if I was really just let it go at that.

So I sighed and nodded at her. "Okay, hot stuff. Amplify."

I don't know how a bird beak and a pair of sunglasses can smile, but somehow she managed. Instead of dueling the Pianist, when the tables on her wings spun up, her music merged with the piano, making a better version of the same.

"Wait, wait, wait, I'm sorry," Will could barely breathe for the laughing. "Did you just--give the pianist--"

Nobody there--not even Jenna, who had been doing her darnedest to remain stoic through the exchange--could keep from laughing as we realized that yes, I'd given him a BJ.

Fuck you, Administrator. Just... fuck you.

I also ended up sharing two other pieces of loot with the group--the Jet Rack, which was a flight item. I and everyone at the table who heard the name immediately assumed it was going to be breasts, and according to my read of the item, it would enhance breasts if you had them, but it was mostly just a frame that sat on your back and would sprout wings when you used the flight ability. Mel offered immediately to buy it for a decent price, and I accepted just to be rid of it.

And then there was the Gassy Pants.

"Okay," said Will with a big goofy smile on his face as I held up a pair of trousers that certainly looked neat, "but what do they do?"

"Honestly, I'll keep it just for the damn style of them." The pants might as well have been some kind of heavy silk for how smooth they were, but they also had a field of what might have been fog rotating around the cloth, if that fog were actually just made of long threads and sections of narrow, ragged-edged cloth that faded into and out of reality. The stylized effect was made to look like a special-effect of wind, long bands of wispy nothing that came and went in a constant spiral, with some threads slower and others faster to give an impression of depth. "But yeah, this loot is worth more than its level for sure. The ability lets you go ethereal."

"Sonofabitch," snapped Jenna, who seemed to still be holding on to her good humor but only just barely, for whichever reason she had to be pissy. "You just get all the good stuff in the world, don't you? How is that even fair?"

"Well, hang on," I said, putting the pants down for a moment, and then putting them away when they kind of got in the way. I was getting fucking tired of her making it sound like I was some damn prince getting hand-outs. "I mean yes, I get the complaint, good loot helps me get better loot, but at the same time, you can't deny that I solo'd a damn boss first try. A challenge boss. With no information. Fair my ass, you know that fight could have killed me a dozen ways, equipment be damned."

Jenna looked away. She wanted to argue this, I knew, but seemed to be biting her tongue. "Look, jus-- fuck. Whatever. What did you want to talk about?"

The others looked at me, and I thought the question had made the mood fall enough that I no longer felt quite so awkward broaching the topic. So, I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, and leaned back in my seat, searching for a good way to start things off.

"I got information... basically a quest... that tells me what's been killing divers in this Dungeon." I pursed my lips. "By basically a quest I mean it is one. I'm tasked specifically with handling it, and I was told exactly what is going on, and it's scary."

"Scary-you-scary?" The tank kept his voice even. "Like, you're scared, scary?"

"Like I'd rather have a team and a bunch of levels before I handle it scary, yeah."

"A solo diver wants a team?" The tank seemed to realize after a moment that he was talking into an awkward and suddenly strained silence, and shut his trap. The others were exchanging looks that were various levels of terrified.

"Yeah. So you understand why I wanted to talk to you." I ground my teeth, recognizing the bad habit after a moment, but my jaw was starting to clench up as my brain started processing things I'd put off thinking about. "Basically it's... another Diver, another one of us. Who was attacked and suborned by another faction and is apparently forced against his will to kill."

"Another faction? In a Dungeon?" Mel's voice and face were full to bursting with confusion. "How...?"

"I'm taking some stuff on faith..." I realized just how much when I realized I was going to absorb that fairy crystal without asking Harry or anyone else first, without even leaving the Dungeon. "...but yeah, from what I can tell, it has to do with a Fairy Dungeon. There are entrances to those things inside the dungeon, and he went in and... failed."

"Shit." Mel gripped the table with her hands, hard. "How the fuck do we avoid those things?"

"Fairy Dungeons?" I looked at her, but offered a sympathetic smile. "You don't have to worry about that. That's what has me so scared." I popped up the Interface window with the Fairy Pass and spun it around. "Only people like me are usually given the tools to see the damned things."

A moment later, Will leaped out of his seat like it bit him. "HOLY SHIT!" He blinked, and got a pained, terrified expression on his face really quickly. "People are being killed by a solo diver."

Every eye turned to me, and I nodded, opting to repeat the Birdman's warning. "Don't go past the Docks."

They swallowed and nodded.