Immovable Mage

– Era of the Wastes, Cycle 216, Season of the Rising Moon, Day 45 –

Terry was waiting at the spot where they wanted to meet up before leaving Arcana City.

“You should have seen their faces when Terry appeared,” said Miguel with a snicker. “They looked as if their brains were hurting worse than from the fire in training.” Miguel glanced at Terry. “And when he signed up for the other available aspect resistance courses, you could almost see their brains melting.”

While Miguel was telling his story, Lori’s eyes were fixated on Terry. Next to Lori, Jorg smiled, but his expression seemed forced.

“Can’t say I blame them,” muttered Gellath with a horrified glance towards Terry.

“It does sound unpleasant, doesn’t it?” quipped Siling.

Calam held his own nape with his right hand. He was looking at the floor in thought.

“Nevertheless, I appreciate the additional company,” said Miguel lightheartedly. “Misery loves company or some such thing.”

“Anyway, what’s that base material of your armor?” Miguel asked Terry. “It looks strangely glossy. And the color is a bit…”

“Reminiscent of a turd?” suggested Gellath helpfully. “A polished turd.”

Siling snorted and suppressed a snicker.

Terry ignored the jab. “Volcanic mycelium. A type of mushroom leather. Since it can be grown, it is cheaper than comparable alternatives and the armorsmith even gave a special discount to test the new material. It is tougher than cloud badger hide and it comes with a strong resistance to heat and fire.”

The armor had been crafted according to Terry’s specifications. His bracers, shin-protectors, boot-mechanism, and chest plate were still there. The septimum pieces were now all covered by one layer of heat-resistant mushroom leather in addition to the mana-osmotic material.

Shielded septimum scales were woven into the inner fabric of the armor to fulfill the same purpose as Terry’s previous inlay with sparse scales woven into it.

Several shielded rotation pearls were placed along the metal armor pieces. This time, the pearls were several sizes smaller and even the chest plate included a few.

Last, Terry was now wearing a visorless helmet from the same base material and with several shielded septimum scales. The helmet carried an inscription to summon an unaspected barrier to both form a visor and create additional protection along the rest of the helmet.

Terry raised his eyebrows at some approaching figures. Emaldine was walking towards them with Thena following at her heel and Clayson slightly behind.

“Still here?” asked Emaldine.

Thena was standing next to Emaldine and occasionally stole starry-eyed glances at her. Meanwhile, Clayson was yawning and scratching his belly.

“We’re still waiting for Elena,” said Lori.

“She’ll be here soon,” added Terry. “How was the assessment?”

“Alright,” replied Emaldine. “Almost done. Soon, I can officially join Matteo as his Guardian partner.”

“It was amazing,” interjected Thena with a giddy squeak. “They had to rotate in new combat examiners. Thrice!”

Terry saw Emaldine squirming uncomfortably under the starry-eyed gaze from Thena.

“It was entertaining to watch,” added Clayson and yawned again.

“They asked me if I want to sign up as an instructor for burst techniques and my dual spear style,” muttered Emaldine. She glanced at Thena, who was blinking innocently with unrestrained admiration. “Ahem.” She turned back to Terry.

“Anyway, I don’t really see myself as an instructor,” said Emaldine. She tried to ignore the pout on Thena’s face and the way she now hung her head. “I still need to catch up on dungeon work experience if Matteo insists on dungeon pioneering missions.”

“Where is your cousin?” asked Miguel.

“Currently out on a Guild mission further in the north,” replied Terry.

“Should be done soon unless something unexpected happens,” added Emaldine. She moved her eyes back to Terry. “How was your own assessment?”

“Sufficient for this particular dungeon,” replied Terry. “As long as we stay in the upper half.”

“Mhmh.” Emaldine nodded slightly. “You’ve basically fulfilled the advanced curriculum given your experiences in Tiv. Your burst techniques and discharges should even qualify beyond that.”

This time, it was Terry that winced slightly. He recalled the words from the Guardian examiners after his assessment: ‘If you want, you could have a bright future in bounty hunting and escort missions.’

On the one hand, Terry had been happy to have his sensing and combat ability praised. On the other hand, the latter praise was specifically narrowed to anti-personnel combat ability. Terry had to admit that his combat experience was getting more and more skewed towards facing folk as opponents. He was not sure how to feel about that.

In an attempt to change the topic, Terry looked at Thena, who was still sneaking glances at Emaldine, and Clayson next to her. “How about you two? Have you found your courses and instructors?”

“I mostly practice my family’s axe style,” said Clayson while patting his two one-handed axes. “There are a few courses that I am interested in though.” He glanced at Thena. “I’ll make the decision once I know Thena’s schedule.”

“...” Thena was lightly kicking some dirt on the ground.

“What about you…?” Terry paused when he realized that Thena’s action was not of bashfulness but more a result of gloominess. Therefore, he added: “Senior Sister Thena?”

Among the group, many people smiled warmly at the unusual address for the short, young dwarf. Terry had explained it once before, but they still thought it funny. They also understood that it was intended to cheer her up.

Thena lifted her head with some newfound dignity. “There are several instructors for the dwarven two-handed axe. They do seem to make less use of the modified grip for thrusts though.” Thena shrugged. She remembered her time being instructed by Sigille, who had always made it a point to incorporate thrusts. Her voice became weaker: “...don’t know. I’ll have to get used to it.”

“Pa Bjorln originally learned the two-handed axe in the same style as Aunt Sigille.” Jorg pointed out. “Once he’s back, we can ask him to instruct you as well.”

Thena nodded faintly.

Emaldine bit her lip. She repeatedly averted her eyes, only to have them find their way back to Thena. Eventually, Emaldine sighed. “You know, back when I had not settled on spears, I also picked up a few axe instructions from Ma. If you want, I could—”

Thena’s head whirled around and she nearly tripped over her own feet. The stars had reappeared in her eyes.

Emaldine was taken aback by the intense reaction and it took a moment for her to finish her words. “I could instruct you in what I still remember.”

“There she is!” exclaimed Lori and waved at Elena, who was walking over.

“New armor?” asked Terry. “Looks shiny.”

Elena grinned in her silvery ring mail. “I actually bought it a while ago but haven't gotten a chance to use it yet. I don’t break my equipment so often anymore, which does wonders for my purse. I guess we are both taking out our new outfits. Uhh…” Elena creased her brows.

“No need for turd jokes,” said Gellath. “We already got them covered.”

Elena snorted. “Good. I knew I could rely on you.”

Terry rolled his eyes and shrugged.

“How is your pa?” asked Jorg.

“Fine for now,” replied Elena. She glanced at Lori and then at Terry. “A day should be fine.”

Terry made sure that his expression reflected his acknowledgement of the pointed emphasis. Just like all the previous times…

“The healers are keeping him stable,” said Elena. “So that the doctors can perform the treatment.”

“Only treatment? Is there no cure?” asked Terry.

“Not really,” replied Elena. “It is not just an infection or wound. The doctors can only cut out the problematic cell growths. If his body stops producing such growths, then he will be cured. Otherwise, the only real option is for him to start mana cultivation so that his own mana can assist his immune system.”

“My grandma had the same illness at some point,” interjected Calam. “Her advanced age made it difficult to begin cultivating her mana, but afterwards, she got better. Here’s hoping your father can push through as well.”

“I hope so,” muttered Elena before smiling warmly at Calam. “Thanks.”

“Alright kids, I wish you a good dive,” said Emaldine. “Stay safe and don’t take unnecessary risks.”

Terry raised an eyebrow at Emaldine.

“What?” hissed Emaldine and narrowed her eyes at Terry’s skeptical expression.

Terry’s eyebrow lowered itself submissively.

“Time to go,” said Miguel. “Or all the good dungeon creatures will be taken.”

“Take care, Junior Brother Terry!” said Thena while waving happily.

“Yeah, take care, Junior Brother Terry,” repeated Clayson with a teasing tone that caused Thena to squint at him with a pout.

Afterwards, Terry and the others moved through the dimensional gate to exit Arcana City.

***

Next to Terry, Jorg suddenly vanished and reappeared at a distance.

“These are so awesome,” exclaimed Jorg. “Thank you, brother!”

Terry was happy that Jorg liked the Blink imprinted boot inlays he had gifted him. Initially, Terry had wanted to purchase them for himself, but when thinking about gifts for his siblings, he had remembered how Jorg had worried about not being able to reach Gellath back in the dungeon.

Additionally, Jorg’s biggest problem in their spars was that Terry only needed a single opportunity to permanently take him out of the fight with the Immovable Object spell. The additional mobility from the imprint should help Jorg bridge the ability gap somewhat.

Terry suppressed his grin and warned: “Even though I got lucky by finding some well-crafted imprints with better than average primer-recovery, you should make sure that they are fully charged when we hit the dungeon.”

“Of course.” Jorg grinned.

“Where did you get them?” asked Miguel. “I was considering something like that as well. Together with the Immovable Object imprints, it could make for an intermediate solution before I can afford a proper flying artifact.”

“What?!” gasped Siling. “Is my Peekaboo not good enough for you?! And here the poor thing thought you had a special relationship!”

“If you are agreeable to always accompany me on hunts, then of course, I can reconsider,” retorted Miguel. “Grumpy would be a nice addition as well. At least Grumpy does not complain about how I taste afterwards.”

Siling giggled.

“Wait, what?” Terry blurted out.

“I don’t want to talk about it,” grumbled Miguel.

“Peekaboo has taste buds in its tentacles,” said Siling. “It is not fond of Miguel’s aftertaste.”

“Can you really blame the poor thing?” quipped Jorg sympathetically.

Gellath somberly shook his head. “I bow my head in front of Peekaboo’s tremendous sacrifice for the team.”

“ANYWAY,” interjected Miguel. “Where did you get them?”

“New shop next to the sweets peddler,” said Terry.

“And that explains how Terry found it.” Siling snickered.

Calam grinned at the familiar banter.

“I still don’t understand why you had to gift the inlays to Jorg and the mask to Lori.” Miguel shook his head in insincere exasperation. “I feel like the world would have been a better place the other way around.”

“Hey!” complained Jorg.

Gellath snorted amusedly.

Lori was wearing a pair of enchanted darkvision goggles that were currently located at her forehead instead of in front of her eyes. Additionally, she wore a neckcloth that she had put over her mouth to test its enchantment effect. Both items had been gifted to her by Terry.

“The mask allows Lori to breathe even under the earth,” said Terry. “Jorg does not know the Liquify Earth or Shape Earth spells. Together with Lori’s other spells, this makes for a good combination. At least, I still don’t have a good counter to a mage hiding underneath the earth while relying on ranged attacks.” Terry thought back to the death mage Yancey’s fighting style in Syn City.

“Are you sure it’s not your brotherly instincts acting up?” joked Miguel. “Are you by chance trying to hide your sister’s pretty face from the world?”

Lori stiffened and hastily moved the goggles over her eyes. Together with the mask, a large part of her face was now hidden.

Elena watched the remaining traces of skin on Lori’s face blush and leaned in to whisper something to her.

“What?” retorted Terry eloquently. “Why would I do that?”

“Same question here.” Jorg snuck a glance at Miguel. “As long as her face does not attract another Alrik, my brotherly instincts are telling me to root for my sister.”

While they talked some more nonsense, Terry focused on the throwing needles in his hands.

From his recent experiments, Terry discovered that there was a relation between the presence of his own naturalized mana inside an object and the activation delay when casting the Immovable Object spell afterwards.

It did not seem simply due to the amount of mana. He had noticed a difference in delay between a uniformly charged object and one that was being charged with the aspecting technique from the aspect archers. Terry was not sure yet what to make of that finding. One benefit was that he could gain the ability to more precisely control the activation time and extend or reduce the delay beyond the material’s inherent properties.

In theory. In reality, that would require me to create the required charge with naturalized mana and doing that takes some time. But if I manage to increase my mana intensity further…

Terry stopped his train of thoughts and considered further implications of his finding.

At the very least, it proves that the presence of oscillating mana can affect the spell’s effect and…

Terry furrowed his brow. He had involuntarily thought of the table in his notebook and the burst behavior. He had always wondered why the burst behavior did not manifest without bursting after he had progressed in his mana cultivation.

Balance.

The word sprung up in Terry’s mind. He subconsciously slowed his steps, which caused Calam to bump into him.

“Uhh, sorry,” exclaimed Calam.

“No, it’s my fault,” said Terry apologetically. “I got lost in thought.”

Terry’s gaze fell on Siling’s hands. “Huh?” He sensed mana movement from her hands.

“What? Surprised?” asked Siling. “I have my own worry stones now.” She revealed the mana containers in her hands.

Calam snorted.

“Actually, you should reimburse me for them.” Siling looked at Terry. “After all, you were the one that made us worry.”

Terry squinted at her while trying to figure out if she was serious or not. Terry’s expression caused both Calam and Siling to guffaw.

***

Terry was carrying Gellath on his back while running over the plains towards the dungeon. He sensed the mana signatures of his companions to estimate their current mana pool levels.

Siling was riding her wiremoss tarantula soul spirit Pricklybum and occasionally cast Haste on her soul spirit.

“This is humiliating.” Miguel had his arms crossed while he was floating in the air in Peekaboo’s embrace. The floating cuttlefish was latching onto Pricklybum with one tentacle and grabbing Miguel with the others.

“I feel like a children’s balloon.” Miguel’s grumbling caused Siling to snicker.

“I don’t know what you’re complaining about,” said Gellath from Terry’s back. “Onwards, my noble steed!” He raised his arm next to Terry’s head and pointed forward.

After they had passed the last tertiary gate on their route, they had decided to rush the remaining distance and later use time during the check-in with the stationed Guardians and perhaps the easier upper floors to regenerate their mana and stamina.

Lori and Jorg were capable of keeping up the speed despite their short legs, but the same did not apply to Gellath and Miguel.

“You better not get used to this,” said Elena between controlled breaths. She had changed her path to run next to Terry and Gellath. “You better make sure that you can exit the dungeon on your own two legs.”

“Yes, ma'am,” acknowledged Gellath. “But until then… Wheeee!”

Lori and Jorg, who were running next to them, snorted amusedly.

“If you don’t behave, then I’ll ask Calam to be your mount next time,” said Terry jokingly.

Gellath glanced up towards Calam, who was periodically using force-spells applied to himself that made it seem as if he was jumping long distances on air.

Gellath’s stomach turned just by imagining being subjected to the frequent acceleration, deceleration, and change in height. Not to mention the occasional somersaults and direction shifts that Calam added for his own practice.

Gellath’s mouth hung open while subconsciously shaking his head. He started coughing. “Blergh. I swallowed a bug.”

They proceeded like this until they were close to the dungeon.

“I’ll go check in with the stationed Guardians,” said Terry and put Gellath down. Siling and Jorg joined Terry while the others took a breather and rehydrated.

Terry nearly stumbled when he recognized one of the mana signatures among the Guardians. “Instructor Verecund?”

“Greetings, you’re earlier than I expected,” said Verecund.

“Did you know that we were coming?” asked Siling with curved brows.

“Are you here at Uncle Samuel’s request?” asked Jorg. “If so, I am grateful.”

“No need for that,” said Verecund. “Samuel contacted me, yes, but it was merely a change in schedule for me. I would have come here in the next two weeks anyway.”

“For any particular reason?” inquired Terry concernedly. “Anything going on with this dungeon that is not in the recent reports?”

“Not really,” replied Verecund. “But this dungeon requires regular measurements since it has been classified as a target of interest. It crosses quite a number of surveillance criteria that mark it as such. Spatial manipulation. Irregular rooms.”

Terry glanced at the dungeon’s entrance. The Guardians had practically constructed the entrance room themselves so that the reservoir mechanism could activate.

“Active dungeon interference,” continued Verecund. “Additionally, the dungeon challenges and special encounters appear to be more than a level beyond the floors that they appear on.”

Verecund looked over the three. “For example, that inscribed earth giant you described normally only appears more than two dozen floors later.”

“We won’t go that deep,” said Terry. “We are mostly interested in the purplemist lynx.”

Verecund looked at Siling. “I got curious when I heard about your soul spirits from Samuel, so I checked with Guardian records.”

Siling perked her ears.

“There are not many records on capturing soul spirits in dungeons…” Verecund made an expression as if it couldn’t be helped. “...but the few that exist suggest that many dungeon creature souls are slightly, and I quote, ‘purer’ than their counterparts outside the dungeon.

“This has piqued my own curiosity,” continued Verecund. “My guess would be that this is limited to creatures that have been born in the dungeon or those that have been directly constituted from a core. The creatures that have developed outside the dungeon and only assimilated after the fact, should not be that different.

“Be that as it may, I’m only telling you that for two reasons.” Verecund intently looked at Siling. “I am not familiar with this type of spirit magic. I can’t evaluate if ‘purer’ means problematic. So be careful.”

Siling nodded. “If I understand it right, then ‘purer’ should actually be helpful to me. That would make integrating the soul spirit into a soul spot easier and it would also cut down the number of souls I require for the spirit’s complete strengthening. Still, I’ll watch myself. Thank you.”

“We’ll watch you, too,” added Terry.

“Good,” approved Verecund. “The second reason is just a request from someone that has spent too much time among scholars. It would be great if you could include your soul spirit experience in the after mission report. Just because we don’t have many records now, does not mean it has to be like that forever. The more records we have, the better.”

Siling grinned and nodded, clearly happy at the non-judgemental interest from Verecund.

After they had all rested, Terry paired his signaling device with the Guardian station and verified that everything was working. They each set up three Mark-and-Recall and recall scrolls and proceeded into the dungeon.

***

Siling and Calam both unleashed a Kinetic Push and the wall of shield legger constructs was blown apart.

Lori finished her dual-casting of Propel Rock and the rocks in her hands shot forward. The rock projectiles blasted the head off of the inscribed earth warrior without damaging its core.

“Nicely done,” praised Jorg. He hurled a weighted sphere towards the location that Terry had pointed out earlier.

The sphere landed right at the suspected location of the vacuum cannon construct. The sphere was weighted on one side, which caused it to position itself with that area at the bottom. Shortly after, the imprints activated and four earthen walls were raised that covered all directions.

“Wroom!” The vacuum cannon unleashed its attack against the earthen walls. The rebounding force blasted itself apart while the earthen walls collapsed around it.

Elena was dashing forward to engage the last earth warrior.

Miguel was wearing an enchanted scope in front of one of his eyes. He took aim at the heat signature that was walking on top of a wall.

Terry furrowed his brow when he noticed that Miguel did not immediately shoot the shining dropbear that was approaching the position on top of Gellath.

Meanwhile, Gellath was gleefully bashing a bunch of grievance toads into mush.

Terry prepared himself to channel mana into his gloves to pull Gellath aside. However, when he recalled Miguel’s previous action, he also refrained from acting immediately.

The shining dropbear jumped from the wall. During the mana corrupted creature’s descent, Calam and Gellath both noticed the light-aspected mana signature. Calam prepared a spell to push Gellath out of harm’s way. But before Calam had finished his spell, Gellath already unleashed his Icy Blast spell. A spherical layer of ice-aspected mana rushed away from Gellath and pushed the shining dropbear away while freezing it.

Gellath immediately distanced himself and prepared his combat stance. A thin layer of snow from the icy blast clung to him.

Miguel nodded approvingly and finally unleashed his coldfire-aspected arrow to finish off the shining dropbear.

“Clear!” shouted Siling. “No more life signatures!”

Terry watched Elena deal with the last earth warrior construct.

Her fighting style is becoming similar to Tiana's. Different weapons depending on the situation.

She hasn’t attempted a burst even once. Terry smiled with praise.

Elena nimbly evaded the incoming attack and then she yanked the mana core right out of the earthen warrior.

“Clear!” shouted Terry. “That was the last mana signature on this floor.”

“Are you still testing us?” asked Calam while moving his eyes from Terry to Miguel. He felt something on his shoulder. He turned around and saw nothing.

“Boo!” shouted Siling and Peekaboo appeared right in front of Calam, baring its beak with spread tentacles.

Calam flinched and reflexively released a Repulsion Force that pushed the floating duo made up of Peekaboo and Siling away.

Calam squinted at Siling with a scrunched up face.

“Perhaps I am,” said Siling with narrowed eyes. She began smiling. “So far, you are passing.”

Calam sighed. “I guess that’s fair after I uhh… Back then…”

“No, that’s already behind us, silly,” said Siling. “Nevertheless, it’s still better to make sure while we’re up here.”

“I agree,” interjected Terry. “I feel better knowing that the dungeon’s mana suppression isn’t interfering with your habitualized spells.”

“Also, it’s undeniably entertaining to see Gellath turn into a snowball,” said Miguel dryly.

“The dungeon creatures on this floor are slightly different from the last time we were here,” said Jorg with worry in his voice.

A snowball hit Miguel on the head. Miguel turned around to Gellath, who reacted by averting his eyes and whistling very badly.

“It matches the dungeon reports,” said Terry. “The specific creature combinations are changing, but the types remain the same. Let’s collect the cores and inscription material. We are a lot faster than expected. Next up is the labyrinth.”

“We can use my five-point inscription ring,” said Miguel. “How are we going to deal with the sleepmoth thingies?”

“Attacus sleepmoth,” interjected Siling.

“How are we going to deal with the attacus thingies?” asked Miguel.

Siling rolled her eyes and smirked.

“We can just ignore them again, can’t we?” remarked Elena. “Dealing with these things would take time and dream-aspected cores aren’t a high priority, right?”

“True,” admitted Terry. “But I think we may be able to finish them quickly.” He looked at Calam. “A fire-aspected weapon and a good Kinetic Pull should do the trick.”

Calam grinned with anticipation.

“What do you think?” Lori threw the core of the inscribed earth warrior to Jorg.

“Much better condition than last time,” appraised Jorg. He turned to Elena. “Yours as well.”

***

“Huh,” uttered Miguel with a deadpan expression.

“Huh,” uttered Gellath with a furrowed brow.

“This was not uhh…” Calam tilted his head. “I expected this to be more difficult after what you told me of your last encounter.”

Siling and Calam had led with a series of empowered Kinetic Push spells. Afterwards, Lori and Jorg had quickly raised several earthen walls and the gaps were closed with Terry’s transfixed tertium slabs.

Miguel had already killed several shrub racoons before they even hit the ground from the initial Kinetic Push. His new composite bow allowed for more rapid reloads and added more punch behind each arrow.

Jorg had learned a variant of the Barrier spell that did not move with him and instead could be freely positioned within a certain range.

Siling’s wiremoss tarantula and jumpscare cuttlefish had made short work of any creatures crawling on the walls or ceiling. Calam, Siling, and Terry had been able to help out in the air as well.

Lori had first eradicated any swamp boas lurking beneath the earth. Afterwards, she had haunted the remaining creatures from her own liquified earth pocket below the floor.

Even the purplemist lynx had seemed like much less of a threat. They had been careful to trap the creature and then to separate it from the rest, so as to keep it for last. They had continued to be cautious and had first injured it from safe positions until several people had engaged it at once.

The time for clearing the whole room in a controlled manner was unexpectedly short.

“Don’t relax yet,” reminded Elena. “Siling is still vulnerable. We need to watch her.”

In front of them, Siling was performing the magic for capturing the soul of the deceased purplemist lynx.

Lori, who was covered in mud from head to toe, stepped next to Elena. “Right. Stay sharp. Even if we can’t sense any more creatures.”

“Well, I can still sense one creature…” Miguel stared at the jumpscare cuttlefish soul spirit. Peekaboo was happily munching on the last skybark spider it had plucked from the walls. After a few more bites, the dungeon creature vanished and a monster core dropped to the ground.

“Nevermind.” Miguel grimaced at the memory of Peakaboo stuffing itself with spiders.

On the other side, Terry was silently observing Siling’s progress without ever taking his mana sight from her. Eventually, he recognized a familiar mana flow pattern and a smile tugged at the corner of his lips.

A breath later, Siling stood up and grinned from ear to ear. “WOOHOO! The kitty is mine!” The tension vanished in an instant.

“Everything alright?” asked Elena.

“Better, actually.” Siling almost danced spontaneously. “I think the purplemist lynx soul is already corporeal.”

“Hm? I thought that is not how this works,” interjected Lori.

“I know, right?” This time, Siling actually performed a short happy dance. “This might be the soul purity that Instructor Verecund talked about. The soul’s strength was the same as outside I think. The capture was challenging and right on the edge of what I should be able to do, but the benefit of the capture here was several times what I would earn from a mana corrupted outside.”

“Are you sure it’s not related to the soul’s strength?” asked Terry in the same tone he would use for his pondering conversations with himself.

Siling tilted her head. “Well, I can’t be sure-sure because I’ve never caught a soul of comparable strength outside a dungeon, but the record on soul captures never mention the possibility of it being corporeal immediately. Also my— I’m not the first soul spirit user in my family.”

“What does this mean for the strengthening?” asked Calam.

“If every dungeon soul is like this, then it should become fully strengthened with ten or so,” said Siling excitedly. “Unless there is another difference between dungeon captures and outside captures.”

Siling began testing her new mana abilities. She prepared an arcane shield around herself. She summoned two arcane bolts that flew around her protectively and could be directed however she wished. “Uhh…” Siling glanced at the people around her. “I should probably wait to test the repulsion field.”

“Hmm if it’s only ten, then…” Terry crossed his arms.

“Going by the dungeon reports, three or four floors, right?” interjected Jorg. “After this floor, the purplemist lynx appears more frequently and rarely alone.”

Lori moved her darkvision goggles to the top of her head and looked at Terry.

“We’re still good in time, aren’t we?” said Miguel.

“Yeah…” muttered Elena. Even she was beginning to feel less hesitant about this dungeon dive. Compared to their last experience, this was going really smoothly.

“No need to rush on my account,” said Siling. “In here, I would probably stick with Pricklybum and Peekaboo anyway. They may be weaker, but their ability to reach the ceiling and walls makes up for it.”

“It’s not on your account,” said Terry. “Every arcane-aspected core helps. Let’s see how far we can go without taking unnecessary risks. We can decide based on what we sense in the floors ahead.”

Everyone nodded.

“How are you going to call the purplemist lynx soul spirit?” asked Calam.

“Hmm…” Siling put a finger on her lips.

“Murder mittens?” suggested Miguel.

“Whiskers?” suggested Lori.

“Boots?” suggested Jorg.

“Mutton chops?” suggested Elena.

“Peeve,” suggested Gellath.

Miguel narrowed his eyes at Gellath.

Siling looked at Gellath and exclaimed: “Ohh, I get it. I always wanted a pet Peeve.” She maintained a deadpan expression and Gellath nodded approvingly.

Elena snickered while Miguel groaned.

Miguel glanced at Gellath. “Your disease is spreading.”

“Not everyone is as uncultured as you, my friend.” Gellath smirked.

“But I’m not sure if this is already my pet Peeve,” said Siling. “Murdermittens or Muttonchops?” She looked at Terry and Calam.

“Murdermittens,” said Calam.

“Muttonchops,” said Terry.

“You’re as helpful as ever,” grumbled Siling.

“I’m trying to get into Elena’s good graces, so I would encourage you to go with Muttonchops,” said Miguel with a grin.

Elena rolled her eyes, but she involuntarily smiled.

“Huh?” Terry raised an eyebrow. “What did I miss?”

“Long-term plans, Terry,” said Miguel with a grin.

Lori snorted amusedly. “Miguel has heard about the spellwork that Elena is practicing.”

“Okay, Muttonchops it is,” declared Siling.

***

“This has been a pleasant dungeon dive so far,” said Elena with some surprise.

“Closer to what I originally thought dungeon work would be like,” said Gellath.

Jorg imperceptibly nodded.

“Shall we go to the next floor?” asked Calam.

“I already got diminishing returns from the last two purplemist lynx souls,” said Siling. “But the task of gathering cores remains.”

“It’s not that late yet,” said Miguel.

Lori frowned slightly.

Terry looked at everyone. He sensed their mana levels and searched for traces of fatigue. In the end, he shook his head. “Let’s call it a day. We can go deeper next time, but I think for our first proper dungeon work, this is more than enough.”

Terry glanced at Lori and Jorg and thought: Hopefully, they will calm down after everything is over and see that last time was abnormal.

“Let’s make sure that our cores reach the Guardians as soon as possible.” Terry waited for any further comment and was glad that no one disagreed.

“Alright, everyone got their Recall scrolls ready?” asked Terry.

Everyone prepared their scrolls. Terry did not sense any mana distortion but he still chose to shortly burst his mana. To his relief, he did not hear any shattering sound.

“Okay, then rip the scrolls,” said Terry.

“Wait, why should we go first?” objected Lori.

“Because I’m the one with oscillating mana,” retorted Terry. “As long as I am here, I can break any spatial locks. If the space is sealed after I’m out, then that would be a problem for the person staying behind.”

Lori’s expression darkened, but she did not object again.

“I’ll burst my mana while you are using your scrolls,” said Terry. “Afterwards, I will use my own.”

Terry thought back to his experiments with Ser and Samuel. Any transfer would fail to activate with him as the target if he was using mana. A group transfer would still work, but Terry would be excluded from its effects.

The companions ripped their Recall scrolls until only Terry was left. For a moment, Terry half expected something to happen… but this time, there were no bell sounds, no monsters creeping out of the shadows, nor any other anomalies. Terry performed another short mana burst. After his mana had settled down again, he ripped his own scroll.

Shortly after, Terry found himself in the dungeon entrance room and two short people were already hugging him. “See? No problem.” He patted Lori and Jorg on the back. “Let’s go home.”

***