The dwarves were much faster running than Luke and Penny in their current state, so Luke resigned himself to another fight, turning to face them. This meant he got to witness Emma's bow skills firsthand.

  A thick arrow, almost the girth of Luke's quarterstaff, struck one dwarf in the chest, throwing it back to the ground. Another arrow followed, hitting the second dwarf right in the face, ruining its not-so-good looks. Both died in an instant. Wielding that huge bow to fire arrows like that must require tremendous strength.

  "I'm okay now," Penny said, pulling her arm free so they could both clamber up a pair of wooden barrels, allowing them to reach the edge of the roof. Luke helped Penny up and followed. Once on top of the roof, he didn't even have time to greet the others before he spotted Mateo mid-jump, almost flying through the air to land all the way up on the roof with them.

  "My friends, I have come to your rescue!"

  "Those boots work a little better than I thought," Luke said.

  Mateo grinned. "They allow me to soar!"

  Below them, Curtis was chopping into large numbers of dwarves, showing no mercy as he killed his way forward.

  "Looks like we're rescued, boys," Emma told the others.

  There were still plenty of dwarves about, but not enough to be a real threat anymore.

  "Simon, what are you doing here?" Luke asked. "And more importantly, do you have any more of those mana gems?"

  Simon gave him a nervous look, then realized Luke wasn't scolding him and grinned, holding up a small cloth bag with light shining through the material from within.

  "Well," Simon began, a sheepish smile on his face, "Emma was going deeper. I thought I'd come along and make sure she had mana."

  Penny winked at him. "How thoughtful."

  "I shall take my leave and make sure the dwarven scourge does not approach again," Mateo said, taking a great leap off the building. The boots carried him far down the street as he fell at a slow, measured pace.

  "Now those boots," Emma said, nodding in approval, "would make it easier to get to high ground."

  "We got them from a monster," Luke said.

  "A dragon," Penny corrected. "We got them from a dragon."

  "Really? That's something," Abraham said. "I would have liked to have seen that."

  "I don't think you would have," Luke said, bringing out a bow and holding it up to Emma. "Can you use this?"

  "I don't know, it's a little small," she said, accepting it. "The Bite, huh?"

  When Emma accepted it, the weapon grew several sizes larger to match the bow she'd been using before. She raised an eyebrow again and tugged at her braid of blond hair that she kept over her left shoulder as a grin spread across her face, breaking up the otherwise hard angles of her face.

  "Now this is interesting."

  She held it up and pulled the string back, heaving, veins popping on her forehead. An arrow appeared from thin air, and she let it loose into a crowd of dwarves. Dust kicked up from the ground, and when it cleared, several were dead. Two dwarves were run through by the arrow itself, and a couple more were prone on the ground, not moving. Perhaps the force of the arrow had been enough to kill them.

  "Thanks," Emma said. "This will come in handy."

  "Luke," Penny asked. "The gem."

  Luke stifled a yawn that forced itself out. "Right. Of course. Which way did the defenders flee?"

  "Over there," Emma said, pointing straight into the cave wall to their left, just a stone’s throw away from the outpost.

  Luke blinked. "What, there's a tunnel or something over there?"

  "Has to be," Abraham said, hefting his machine gun so a long band of bullets clanked. Luke really didn't know much about guns, but this one looked like some older type. "A whole bunch of them fled that way," Abraham continued, "bringing everything they owned, from the looks of it. They disappeared behind those rock outcroppings."

  "A lot of dwarves followed," Emma said.

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  "We'd better follow them," Luke said.

  "You want us to tag along?" Emma asked. "You did give me this beautiful gift."

  "We have room," Luke said. "Simon, maybe you should head back to the portal."

  "That's probably a good idea," Simon said. "I am not enjoying my time here."

  "What about Kurt?" Penny asked.

  Emma shook her head. "He's just been sitting here like that since we got here. I'm not sure what an Empath does, but from what I can tell, it is completely useless."

  "My gun isn't useless," Abraham said.

  "All right. Emma, Abraham, you two come along," Luke said, leaning out over the edge of the roof, looking down at Curtis, who was sitting on a crate, breathing hard, a whole lot of dwarves dead around him. "Curtis, we're leaving!"

  Having made sure Simon made it out of the outpost to head out toward the portal, the group left Kurt to his own serene devices and followed after the fleeing defenders. By then, the Integrated had the defenses in order, and the remaining dwarves were pulling back, heading deeper into the tunnels.

  Liza: "Hannah isn't doing great. Is it okay if I stay with her?"

  Luke: "Of course. We'll bring the gem back soon."

  With Liza out as well, Penny, Luke, Milla, Mateo, Curtis, Emma, and Abraham formed a new group chasing after the humans. With seven of them, there were too many for everyone to join the party, so Abraham volunteered to stay solo.

  Like they'd guessed, a hidden tunnel had been the defenders’ path away from the outpost. It was rough cut, with a low ceiling, but wide enough that they didn't have to walk in single file. They ran at near enough top speed with Mateo at the front, followed by Curtis and Luke, with Milla and the newcomers bringing up the rear.

  This new tunnel brought them into a different, larger chamber where, by all appearances, there had been some sort of mining operation at some point. Carts and tools were strewn around the ground, and scaffolding still covered part of the walls. Since they didn't meet any dwarves or defenders, the group continued deeper.

  "Why can't the dungeons ever be simple?" Luke asked with a sigh. "Always with the back and forth. Just once, I'd love a straightforward run up to a boss to kill."

  "Stop your complaining, little brother," Milla said, a glint of something in her eye. Always with the teasing.

  "They aren't as fun," Emma said. "The Tutorial Dungeon was boring compared to this."

  "What's that?" Curtis asked, nodding up ahead.

  A light much farther down the tunnel they were running through. As they approached, Luke couldn't help but curse. Another exit. They emerged into the open air, not on grass this time, but on a dirt path surrounded by tall pine trees. They looked up and back to see a mountain.

  "This is an actual exit from the cave," Penny said. "Not just some strange portal, like the doors to the dwarves."

  "But the defenders said they were stuck," Milla said.

  "Another lie," Curtis growled. "I can't stand liars."

  "These tracks here show a lot of people having gone past not long ago," Abraham said, gesturing to the mud where prints were plentiful.

  "How long since they went past?" Luke asked.

  Abraham straightened and shrugged. "I ain't no seer or magician, but they left the outpost less than half an hour before you arrived."

  "We can't be too far behind then. Let's hurry," Luke said, ignoring his tired legs.

  Mateo made a salute, grinned, and set off down the path. Luke and the others followed. A little later, they made it out of the forest and saw the dirt path continuing over slopes of farmland. In the distance, much like with the dwarves, the sea stretched out as far as the eye could see. The path they were on seemed to lead down to a large town right by the water.

  "What the hell is going on in this place?" Curtis growled.

  "There," Emma said, pointing.

  Luke followed and saw what she'd spotted. Two groups were engaged in combat, not on the road itself but off to its side, perhaps a ten-minute run from where they were standing. Another clump of trees covered them, the forest stretching out between two fields, which obscured most of what was happening over there.

  "That has to be them," Emma said.

  Penny squinted and held up a hand to shield her eyes from the sun. "You sure?"

  Emma pointed to her eyes. "Good eyesight. Part of the class."

  "Let's go then," Curtis said, and he was off running again.

  With all this running around, Luke should have...

  Boon of Potential grants you an attribute point (+1 Endurance).

  And there it was. That was something at least. The boon popping up reminded Luke of his new skill, Weavestep. As they ran, he pondered what he'd attempted so far and why it hadn't worked. It didn’t seem like the intention of the skill was just to have him stand on his head, so he must be doing something wrong. Giving the matter some thought and concentration made Luke let out a groan. It was so simple, why hadn't he seen it before?

  "What?" Penny asked, running next to him through a field of what looked like barley. Insects buzzed all around them, and birds were jumping around, fighting over seeds.

  "Weavestep," Luke said. "I've been going about it all wrong."

  "Sounds like you made a breakthrough."

  "Maybe," Luke said. "If I'm right."

  They continued running, but Luke extended a thread of mana straight ahead as far as it would go. Even now, after all he'd been through, he couldn't extend it more than two feet without running into issues. It was yet another thing he needed to work on once things calmed down a little. Perhaps when he'd rescued Ray from Relian, he'd have some time for non-dungeon-related activities. When, not if.

  Pushing, he was able to extend the thread perhaps another half a foot, but it required a lot of mana to do so, so he didn't keep it like that for long. Instead, he activated the Weavestep and felt the world shift around him. It was like he became one with the threads of The Greater System, and Luke felt himself traveling, not along the threads of the system, but through his own thread running parallel to them.

  It was a mere instant before he was back in the physical realm, two and a half feet farther ahead from where he'd been running. Luke stumbled into the barley but recovered within a step, running again.

  "Thank you, agility," he muttered.

  Penny gave an excited shout. "You did it! Not very far, but you did it!"

  He looked back. "It's my Threads of Mana. I have to show it where I want to go. I'll find a way to extend the range, one way or another!"

  "Focus up!" Curtis shouted.

  They were approaching the forested area separating this field from the next, where more sounds of battle could be heard through the patch of forest. It was time to get serious.