After the brutal fight near the entrance, Roland expected things to get worse. As they explored the Pylon’s interior, he was disappointed. Not because they got better. They just got worse in disappointing ways.
Raven chose every turn they made through the maze of corridors. The plastic-like walls and ceilings were C-Grade Dungeon structures, impervious to lower-tier attacks.
Every few hundred feet, there were alcoves people could use to take a breather or catch some zees. He spotted the charred remains of a campfire once. He never spotted any garbage or other waste, though. The Dungeon must dispose of anything left in the alcoves after a while.
They encountered a bunch of adventurers as they walked through plain corridors that appeared to be made of yellow plastic. Four men and three women, all human Classers, wearing an assortment of medieval armor and equipment. Their levels ranged from ten to fifteen. Three guys in full plate mail, although of different designs, a cowled man with a roguish set of gear, two magic-user types, and a female archer with a bow taller than her. The highest-level in the bunch was a fifteenth level E-Grade Magi, a tall woman in a plain-looking but Epic-tier set of robes and a glowing staff.
The group came into view as they turned a corner leading to Roland’s corridor. There was a brief pause as both sides took stock of the situation.
Roland tried to tamp down his aura so that its mere presence wasn’t taken as a hostile act, but not to the point that the strangers didn’t realize he had more stuff going for him than his levels and cultivation rank indicated. An aura version of the ‘don’t tread on me’ flag.
His balancing act must have worked, because the woman whispered “Let’s keep moving” to her party and they walked past him, giving him a wide berth.
That’s nice, meeting strangers who don’t want to rob and murder me, Roland thought happily, sharing his opinion with Raven.
Methinks that said strangers might have wanted to rob and murder you but decided you might be more trouble than you are worth, was the bird’s considered opinion.
Said opinion proved possibly right half an hour later, when they passed an alcove with two corpses in it. The bodies had been stripped down to their stained underwear. The blood pooled under them didn’t look very old.
Those bastards did that, didn’t they?
Possibly. Or they passed by those who did. Hard to tell. Didn’t see any signs of battle on them, but with Skills like Cleanse, there often aren’t any.
A part of Roland wanted to chase down the adventuring group and get the truth out of them by any means necessary. He wasn’t a cop, though; this wasn’t his world, and he needed to get back home. Getting killed trying to avenge dead strangers by killing other strangers would be the dumbest thing he could ever do.
He still wanted to do it.
Raven just watched him from his shoulder perch, making no suggestions and giving no advice.
“We keep going,” Roland finally said, the words tasting like ash in his mouth.
Driving past Shades being killed during his rides through the Dread Lands hadn’t made him feel this bad – they were already dead – but the two people he left in the alcove had been alive maybe an hour or two ago. And the indestructible plastic corridor wouldn’t let him give the bodies a proper burial.
He just kept walking, shaking his head.
Next, he ran into a mixed party of Classers and Cultivators, the first time he’d seen the two groups working together. They all had Asian features, and their equipment had a more modern feel. Half of them wore mirror shades, for one. Two of them carried guns, compact bull-up models with glowing inscriptions on their barrels and floating sights made of blue light. One of them had something like futuristic power armor – its original chrome finish marred by several crudely patched holes – that clanked with every step.
They also didn’t mess with him; they were all Tins or F-Grades, so that made sense. Roland and they exchanged nods and went their separate ways. If they followed the same route Raven had led Roland through, they would walk by the dead bodies in thirty minutes or so.
And they may think I killed them, Roland thought. Will they react the way I almost did?
Nobody chased him down. Either the mixed group didn’t see the bodies, didn’t associate them with Roland, or didn’t care enough to do anything about it.
They eventually reached a large nexus linked to half a dozen corridors. The plaza featured two buildings with signs over their doors. One looked to have been painted over the plastic-like surface with some dark tarlike substance. It read ‘Thad’s General and Adventuring Goods.’ The other sign was actually built into the structure in glowing letters, spelling out ‘Portal Access.’
Roland wanted to check out the store, but ‘Portal Access’ had priority. Besides, the general store probably didn’t have anything that would be both affordable and worth the expense, so he’d just end up frustrated.
Instead, he went to the portal room, Raven still attached to his shoulder.
A bored-looking man sat behind a circular desk in the center of the room, which was fifty yards in diameter. Portals surrounded him, thirteen in number, each glowing a different color.
Portal Room Attendant (Cybernetic Ascendant)
D-Grade Multitasker
Health 3,760 Mana 2,265 Endurance 3,750
The man looked perfectly normal except for the six segmented metal tentacles coming out of his shoulders and back, easily outclassing Roland’s own Doctor Octopus cosplay by virtue of being actual cybernetic limbs. Although the limbs in question were a bit on the skinny side and ended in eight-fingered hands.
One of the metal hands was holding a colorful manga porn book with a rather lurid hentai-oriented cover. Another metal limb turned the pages. The cyborg split his time between reading the manga and perusing a crystal tablet held by one of his human hands.
Other than the cyberlimbs, the guy looked normal enough, with dark brown skin, close-cropped gray hair, and a fringe beard, also gray. He was wearing a white jumpsuit with yellow trim. A drawing of the System Pylon was embroidered on the jumpsuit’s chest area.
As Roland and Raven approached, the man spoke without lifting his eyes from his reading material:
“Do you have coordinates or do you wish to purchase a set?”
I have the coordinates, Raven said. The Attendant handled the bird’s telepathy without any issues. Can I send them to you?
“Go ahead.”
Roland sensed a faint pulse of energy leave Raven’s head and travel to the man’s chest, where it was absorbed. At first the Attendant’s only reaction was to raise an eyebrow at the next page of his manga book, but a moment later he turned his head toward Raven.
“XXI-993? I thought that one was still closed.”
It still is, Raven said. We had a Quest and some leeway from the System. Praise its infinite wisdom.
“Yes. Praise,” the man said in the deadpan tone of an atheist being forced to recite the Lord’s Prayer.
He went back to his reading, the bored expression back in his face.
“That will be a hundred Essence each.”
Raven cocked his head and looked at Roland.
“What?”
“Pay the man,” Raven croaked.
“Okay, I’m paying the man,” Roland said with a shrug.
Roland opened his Essence counter and willed two hundred points to flow toward the Attendant.
Unbound Essence: 2,433
As he watched his Essence count go down, one of the portals flared brightly in half a dozen colors and an honest-to-God minotaur stepped out. It was about as wide as two linebackers standing side by side and tall enough to play in the NBA. An E-Grade Ascendant, with about a thousand hit points, armed and armored gladiator-style. It reared its head back, inhaling in preparation of the mother of all war cries.
If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.
“Hush,” the Attendant told it without looking up from his double helping of reading material.
The minotaur hushed and slinked out of the room, casting fearful glances at the bored man.
Nice of them to guard their special rooms with super-robots and cyborgs. But they’ll let people murder each other everywhere else, Roland thought.
It didn’t bode well for a world under the System, but this Pylon seemed to be in a bad neighborhood. Maybe things weren’t this lawless in more civilized worlds.
Let’s go.
Raven pointed to one of the portals and croaked.
“Sounds like a plan.”
He hoped he would return to a whole party – and a world that was still in one piece.
* * *
Cousin Bob:
Okay, I think we’ve got this, Bob thought as the party emerged into the pocket dimension their side quest had led them to. Hope I’m right.
The glowing portal took them to a large cavern. Huge pipes came out of the cavern walls, big enough to stand up in. They only went about a foot into the cavern; congealing pools of assorted waste under the pipes made it clear the cavern was a dump site for some unholy waste disposal system.
Even Bob, never a fan of government regulations, could see that filling a natural cavern with raw sewage and industrial pollutants ought to be against numerous laws. The place should be cleansed with fire and the perpetrators executed, to be honest.
Most of the liquid waste had dried out, but some of the open pipes were oozing fresh watery goo. The smell reawakened Bob’s nose, which had mercifully gone numb early into the delve. An acrid awfulness climbed up through his nostrils and irritated his throat. He could taste the stuff.
The stinking cavern went on for a while. Piles of refuse rose at random on the muddy ground, everything from old car parts and metal bed frames to rusting barrels with faded three-pronged biohazard symbols painted on their sides. Much of it had a faint greenish glow.
Rats (regular-sized ones) scurried around the piles. Some of the rodents glowed green, and a few of those had more legs (and in one case, heads) than standard-issue vermin. They didn’t attack, however, so Bob ignored them.
The cavern’s walls glowed faintly from some kind of bioluminescent fungi growing on them all the way to the ceiling. The moldy stuff gave everything a greenish-yellow hue that made Bob think of pea soup puke a la The Exorcist.
“Yeah, we’re never going to be allowed to reproduce after this,” Barton commented. “Did you bring a Geiger counter? I’m positive garbage doesn’t glow like that unless it’s giving out rads.”
The funny thing was that Bob knew Barton wasn’t scared, not anymore. He was just pretending to be afraid of radioactive trash because he was staying in character. Barton’s current Willpower was massive; his ‘I’m scared’ bit was meant to help steady everyone’s nerves.
“We regenerate now,” Bob told him, playing along. “I’m sure we can recover from anything that doesn’t kill us outright. Roland grew new fingers once, remember?”
“I think I do. The horror stories begin to blur after a while.”
“Bloh-Dee.”
“What he said,” Barton added, gesturing to Bloodykee, who had sniffed the air before curling into a ball on Dahlia’s shoulder, making pitiful-sounding versions of his trademarked phrase. Her surviving pets – Killodillo and Sangara?a – were also nearby, protecting their mistress.
“Boss gotta be on the biggest pile of crap,” Dahlia said, pointing to a noticeably larger pile of variety-pack refuse about a hundred meters out.
It wasn’t as tall as Trash Hill, but it stood out, being at least twice as tall as the second biggest garbage heap.
Bob reviewed the Quest they all got after killing the hidden Boss and opening an Epic Chest that gave everyone an Epic item and a couple dozen Rare Potions that healed fifty points of one resource immediately and another fifty over ten seconds. Tons of Monster Cores, too. The room Rodenroach had guarded also held a lot of crafting resources that now filled their inventory slots.
The Quest promised even more loot:
You have accepted a Side Quest: Slay the Kinglet of Filth.
Doctor Flinders’ mutagenic process requires endless supplies of chemical waste, biological or unnatural. The good doctor’s death hasn’t stopped the process, however: more Ratlings, Roach Folk, and other Vermin Entities continue to be created elsewhere in the Halls of Refuse.
To keep the Dungeon from producing endless hordes of monsters, the source of arcane pollutants must be destroyed.
The Kinglet of Filth rules over a miniature Concept Realm dedicated to Poison, Pollution, and Disease. It provides the Lord of Refuse with the raw material needed to create Ratlings and Roach People, the foot soldiers the Dungeon will use to spawn and populate other Dungeons and eventually trigger a Monster Surge on Integration Day.
Slay the Kinglet and its Realm will collapse in short order, depriving the Halls of Refuse of an important resource.
Rewards: 150 Essence, 10 gold, one Epic Quality Item Upgrade Token, one Epic Quality Skill Upgrade Token.
Consequences: Destroying the Concept Realm will reduce Dungeon Spawn frequency and numbers by 80%.
The rewards were better than the original ‘clear the whole dungeon’ quest, but Bob had a feeling that the main quest would upgrade its rewards if they all leveled up enough before they got to it. Assuming they did, of course.
There was no movement other than the semi-regular rats, which soon scurried out of sight.
“I think the spot we’re in is an antechamber,” Bob said. “The moment we move deeper in, we’ll start seeing action.”
Barton nodded. “I think you’re right. We should do all the prep before advancing. I’ve got seven Hex Tiers loaded and five in reserve.”
Bob had gone over Barton's Hex list. The Hex Wizard had a good mix of attack, defense and even a couple of heals, including one that cleansed targets of debuffs. Barton was taking to the dungeoneering life like a Russian to Vodka.
Barton Martinez (Human Ascendant)
Level 4 Hex Wizard (E) (Magick, Rules)
Health 133 Endurance 151 Mana 243
“Get two Restore Hexes ready, just in case,” he told Barton. “I’m betting disease debuffs are going to be in play.”
Barton nodded and began memorizing the Hexes.
Bob went over the rest of the party, starting with himself and saving Josh for last, because nobody really knew what to make of the guy’s transformation.
Bob’s new Vengeful War Hammer shot ghost hammers that did Spirit damage based on his Arcane Rating. He had also gotten an Epic Skill Upgrade Token and used it on Sorcerous Shield, now called Sorcerer’s Aegis. The Skill’s damage resistance was now equal to his Arcane Rating, plus it had double his Aura Rating as Durability. His Spell carried over the new Skill and he had put Aegises on everybody, giving them decent protection on top of their own Skills and gear.
Bob Acosta (Human Ascendant)
Level 4 One-Man-Army
Health 168 Endurance 169 Mana 190
Bob couldn’t wait to make it to level five. People supposedly got a decent bump even if they didn’t upgrade their Class. It would be more exciting if they hadn’t seen what happened to Josh when he dinged.
Of course, Josh had probably done it to himself. That weasel couldn’t help picking Ls every time.
Sticking to his decision to save Wendy’s brother for last, Bob checked out Dahlia. Strictly for dungeoneering purposes. The scary Fiend Mistress had managed to kill Bob’s already remote hopes of being anything other than a fellow adventurer to her. The only thing worse than being her boyfriend would be being her enemy. Or maybe it was the other way around.
Dahlia Zellner (Human Ascendant)
Level 3 MiniFiend Mistress (L)
Health 150 Endurance 146 Mana 262
She had everyone beat in Mana and was still strong enough to carry Bloodykee around like a plush teddy bear, even after the MiniFiend doubled in size as it gained levels:
Bloodykee (Undead Manifestation)
Grade-F Familiar (Undeath)
Health 270 Mana 270 Endurance n/a
The not-so-little monster could now take a hit better than anyone in the Party short of Killodillo or Roland, although it wasn’t as well-armored as a real tank. Only Bob’s Spell added Damage resistance to the plush Fiend. And nobody could heal him because of its Undead status. Which placed the bloody critter somewhere between a glass cannon and a bullet sponge.
He looked at Wendy, crouched behind everybody but Josh, who stood protectively next to her. Although from the glances she gave him, his presence wasn’t comforting her.
Wendy Hennessy (Demi-Fae Ascendant)
Level 4 Fae Cloud Maiden
Health 207 Endurance 190 Mana 250
Her stats were great. The amazeballs Fae Verdict had turned her into a mage-tank-healer. The Skill combined a DPS and healing into a ranged package.
On top of that, she had gotten a weird weapon from the last Boss drop, a staff-sling that created magical Life-attuned rocks that could explode on impact or deliver a lot of damage to a single target. The damage scaled with her Arcane Rating, which was pretty high. And she had a mundane skill with slings that had evolved into a Rare Skill.
She was the MVP or close to it.
Problem was, she had a brother.
Nobody was sure what happened when Josh dinged to level five. He started screaming and went into convulsions. Wendy had rushed to his side, of course, but his Health pool wasn’t dropping. In fact, it was growing.
Having undergone System induction, they all recognized the signs. This was more intensive and invasive. Everybody had missed Wendy’s transformation, being too busy having their own bodies unraveled and reknitted in real time.
This time, they watched it from the outside. It wasn’t pretty.
Josh screamed as his limbs stretched by at least two or three inches. His torso also grew longer, looking gruesomely like taffy being pulled. All the non-System equipment he had on was being torn up – and tearing into him – until Wendy started sending it to her inventory. Fast thinking on her part.
By the time it was over, Josh was down to his tighty-whities and a suit of leather scale armor he’d gotten from a loot chest. He didn’t look like Josh anymore.
His skin had an ashy complexion that made Dahlia look like a suntan queen. His dark blonde hair had turned a red so deep it was almost black. The weak chin and beak of a nose that gave him a weaselly look had gotten weaker and beakier.
While Wendy had turned into an inhumanly beautiful woman, her brother looked more like an elf whose ancestors had added a Goblin (or six) to the family tree. Or maybe like what you’d get if you put Legolas and Gollum through the matter transmitter from The Fly.
When the process was done, Josh gasped for breath and revealed a set of toofers more fitting in the mouth of a shark or piranha than on anything that walked on two legs.
Josh Hennessy (Mutated Demi-Fae Ascendant)
Level 5 Shadow Powrie (R) (Guns, Shadows)
Health 205 Endurance 164 Mana 147
Josh had refused to let Barton or even Wendy examine him with their analytical Skills. When they tried anyway, he surrounded himself in a shadowy cloud that blocked their senses.
Bob had considered forcing the issue but decided it'd be more trouble than it was worth. Nobody knew what new Skills he’d gained from the Class upgrade. A fight wouldn’t help them survive the Dungeon.
Let’s get through this side quest and we'll figure it out afterwards.
They got ready and were about to step out of the safe area when two things happened near simultaneously.
The big pile of garbage they thought would house the Boss turned out to be the Boss. It rose up, limbs coming out of it, and kept rising. It was a thing of goo and trash and mechanical pieces, like the lovechild of a cyborg and some kind of gelatinous ooze. Maybe the Blob itself, the movie horror one, not the high-BMI one from the X-Men. Although in a bad light it might look a little bit like Blob from the X-Men. A really bad light.
“Maybe we should retreat,” Bob suggested. Can’t let Barton do all the self-deprecating fearful nerd talk.
Barton shook his head. “I’m sure you can’t leave this area anymore. I believe the only way out is through.”
“Hey, that’s my mis – ”
Bob froze. His Party screen lit up with the notification he had been praying for.
Roland Webb has entered the Halls of Refuse.
Do you wish to add Roland Webb to the Party?
The band was back together.
