“What happened to them?” Kitz quietly asked as we weaved around the bodies on the floor.

  “I don’t think this was done by monsters,” Ersabet said, bending down to inspect a wound on a dead Dalari. “Players did this.” She stood and sighed. “It’s not uncommon for disreputable players to wait at the entrance to ambush fresh dungeoneers as many enter bearing their most prized gear. Furthermore, when one cannot complete the dungeon, they usually come back to the entrance in hopes that another party will take them in. Some players, particularly among the Kurskins, consider this disgraceful beyond measure and happily kill those players for their cowardice.”

  “That’s terrible,” Tabby said.

  I nudged the corpse of a Kurskin with my boot. He was stiff as a board. “The fewer players, the better.”

  We left the grisly mess behind us and reached the end of the hall, which opened into a massive, subterranean chamber. Crumbling buildings littered the expanse; the roofs of a few remained intact and seemed to support the cave ceiling, like little stone atlases straining to hold up the world above. This was a city frozen in time, entombed in sand, and it was one of the most breathtaking things I had ever seen.

  A distant scream echoed throughout the cavern, and a chill rose up my spine. What was I doing here? I wasn’t ready for this.

  I think this might have been a mistake, I told Val.

  “Of course it was,” she replied. “Your entire life has been a series of mistakes, yet you somehow keep failing upward. This will challenge you, but it’s not impossible. There’s no turning back now. Get through the first floor, and we can decide if we should continue from there.”

  I grit my teeth, fighting back my nerves. How much help can you be in here? Do you have a map?

  “I know the basic layout of the dungeon, but I cannot tell you where any traps, treasures, or enemies are located.”

  What’s the fastest route to the end of the floor?

  “There are multiple ‘ends’ to the floor. Some might just be a staircase that leads down to the next floor. You might find a magical portal that takes you down, or a boss guarding a door, and the only key is around its neck. There’s no right way or wrong way to go, but you should pick a direction soon. It’s a bad idea to linger around the entrance.”

  “Stay close,” I said. “Watch out for traps and keep your weapons at the ready.”

  We worked our way through the twisted ruins step after anxious step. I wasn’t heading in any specific direction. My only goal was to get deeper into the dungeon and away from any players who might have entered behind us.

  At first glance, this lost city seemed sterile and lifeless, but upon closer inspection, moss could be seen clinging to crumbling walls and crooked doorways. A colony of mushrooms grew out of a crack at the base of a wall, and I bent down for a closer look. Their flesh was stark white, including the cap, except for the rim, which was encircled by a purple streak so vibrant that it almost glowed in the dark.

  Curious, I focused my attention on a mushroom and used my HUD to inspect it.

  Amanita Violaceus

  This rare mushroom only sprouts in the dark, and any exposure to sunlight will cause it to shrivel and die. Its cap is mildly poisonous, but the stalk is edible, although Amanita Violaceus isn’t sought after for its taste. Instead, it's prized for its alchemical attributes and mind-boosting properties.

  “Hey Ersabet, check this out,” I said. “Can you use this in any potions?”

  She plucked a mushroom from the colony and inspected it. “I would need access to an alchemy bench to extract the necessary components, but yes, I have a few ideas on how I could incorporate this into a potion.”

  “When we get to Liport, we’re investing in alchemy,” I said. “Even if all you can make are basic potions, I think it would be worthwhile. We need every advantage we can get.”

  “I do not disagree. Pick as many as you can, and we’ll sell what we don’t use.”

  I foraged through the rest of the colony and vanished the mushrooms into my inventory.

  A new notification popped up on my overlay.

  Competency Unlocked: Herbalist

  Harness the power of nature by knowing which pretty plants are safe to touch and which ones will kill you if you eat them! Understanding the basics of herbology is the first step for any would-be alchemist. Upon completion of Tier 1, a herbarium will be available in your interface, which can serve as a useful reference for what plants to pick and how they can be used. Furthermore, at Tier 1, your ‘inspect’ feature will reveal more information about whatever specimen you’re inspecting.

  I smiled, pleased to unlock a new competency, even though this one didn’t serve much use to me. I wasn’t keen on picking flowers all day, and I had Ersabet around to take care of any alchemical needs… or so she claimed.

  The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

  We continued on, only to soon find our path blocked by a collapsed building. More of those purple mushrooms sprouted from between the stones, and I elected to take a right instead of attempting to climb over the mess. Since I didn’t have any real destination in mind, I didn’t mind the detour at first, but as we progressed, worry began to settle in. The fungus, which had previously been an odd novelty, was now everywhere. The largest of mushrooms had stalks as long as my forearm with caps the size of dinner plates. Earlier, when I was inspecting the first mushroom, the purple-highlighted edge of its cap was so vibrant that it seemed to glow. Here, the mushrooms were actually glowing. It was faint, but unmistakable.

  “I don’t like this,” I said, pausing our progress. “Kitz, can you use Petri to take a look up ahead?”

  “Of course!” he said, eager to help. “Be right back.” With those words, his eyes rolled back into his head, as if in a trance, and Petri screeched as the hawk launched itself from Kitz’s shoulders.

  Petri flew above the crumbling rooftops for about a hundred yards and turned back around when he reached a tall spire that looked like a giant, rusty nail driven through the cave ceiling. Petri beat his wings as he landed upon Kitz’s shoulders. Kitz’s eyelids fluttered and refocused, blinking his way back into himself.

  “There’s a lot more of these mushrooms ahead,” he said, “and strands of purple stuff criss-crossing across the street like spider webs.”

  What he described sounded like strands of mycelium to me, but I didn’t know too much about mushrooms. I did know that my wife thought they tasted delicious, and I thought they tasted like dirty rubber.

  “Did you see anything moving?” I asked.

  He shrugged. “All I saw was mushrooms.”

  “Thanks for the help, Kitz. “Everyone, keep an eye out. I have a bad feeling about this.”

  We wove around a large, bone-dry fountain. Its centerpiece was unrecognizable, having collapsed and broken into pieces long ago. Everywhere the fungus could find purchase, the beautiful mushrooms grew. They were so plentiful that I had little choice but to step on some of them, creating a nasty mushroom gunk at the bottom of my boots.

  We reached the first of the purple tendrils that Kitz had told us about. They were everywhere and covered the road entirely. This was a dungeon, and the point was to get through it, so I kept pushing and did my best to avoid stepping on the tiny tendrils of mycelium, but it was a lost cause. Eventually, my foot landed on one, and I tensed, afraid it would come alive and wrap itself around me. It didn’t. The only effect was a faint glow that moved through the tendrils like a little bolt of lightning, but the light faded away after a couple of feet.

  “Woah, I feel like I’m on Pandora,” Tabby said. She watched in wonder as each of her steps lit the ground beneath her.

  I couldn’t help but smile. “And people say that Avatar’s not culturally relevant.”

  “What are you two jabbering on about?” Ersabet asked.

  “Movie reference,” we said in unison.

  “If I recall, you promised Delen that you would avoid real-world references,” Ersabet chided. “It’s not fair to him or Kitz.”

  “Okay, Mom,” Tabby said.

  “Don’t take that tone with me, young lady.”

  “That mushroom moved,” Delen said.

  “Oh, come on, Ersabet,” Tabby said. “My mind was freed, and then I was immediately banned from using my real name or speaking about Earth for ‘safety,” she said, making mock quotes in the air. “Every second of every day I want to scream out my real name at the top of my lungs. I want to tell every single person I meet the truth, but I can’t. I’m desperate to share the real world with this world. I won’t use my real name. I won’t tell anyone the truth. I won’t say weird things in public. Let me have an occasional movie reference. If Delen was in my place, he’d understand.”

  “And if you were in his,” Ersabet said. “You’d know what it’s like to feel left out.”

  “Quiet!” Delen snapped, causing Ersabet to recoil in shock. “That mushroom just moved.” His finger was levelled at an ally on the left side of the street.

  We all stared at the area he was pointing at, but all the mushrooms looked identical. I didn’t see any movement.

  I took a step forward to get a better look, and before I could take a second, I saw it. A grouping of mushrooms shifted back and forth. Their movement increased to a violent sway as something began to push its way up from the ground. A figure sat up slowly, as if it had been sleeping on its back for years and had become embedded in the ground. As it sat forward, roots and tendrils snapped and popped, like bindings being broken.

  Three purple-rimmed mushrooms grew from its chest; the stalks dangled and snapped, unable to hold their own weight. Hard, cankerous fungi covered its dark, green skin in patches, and the monster’s head looked like a bulbous, petrified open wound. It let out a breathy moan that sounded like a rock scraping across sandstone as it slowly stood upright on two, rigid legs. I couldn’t tell for sure, but it might have been a goblin once. It might have even been a human. Or it might be a manifestation of the fungus itself.

  Hell no, I thought to myself. This nightmare was going to end now. I ran forward, stomping mushrooms in my path before the thing could get mobile. When I was close enough, I activated Devastating Strike and swung my razor-sharp sword laterally, but instead of cutting the creature in half, my sword made a hollow thud as it embedded itself about four inches into the side of the mycelium monster.

  I tried to yank my sword back out, but all it did was pull the monster closer to me. It reached out with its hands and latched onto me, tackling me to the ground like a lumbering zombie. It landed atop me, and its wretched, snarl-toothed maw opened wide. The creature’s teeth were a dark, disgusting green, and I knew for sure that I would turn into one of these mushroom zombies if it bit me.

  “Get it off!” I screamed.

  I heard Delen say, “No, not that. You saw the sword.”

  Through my screams, it was hard to hear who he was talking to, but I did hear Delen say, ‘I’ll do it myself.”

  I tried to sink into the earth to get distance from the repulsive beast atop me. It took all my strength to hold it back. If something didn’t happen soon, my strength would slip, and it would bite my face off.

  There was a loud thud immediately followed by a crack, and the monster ceased its attempts to gobble me up. I rolled to my side and tossed the body off of me. It was then that I noticed that the back of its head was caved in, like it had been smashed with a sledgehammer.

  Slowly, I turned to Delen, who was smiling proudly, holding a rock in his hand.

  “When your blade failed, I instantly knew that cutting these creatures would be a fruitless exercise.” He held up a rock. “They are apparently weak to bludgeoning damage.”

  I stood and brushed myself off. “You’re starting to sound like a player.”

  “Once we recharge V, I’m sure she could find a way to make me one.”

  “This is the first I’m hearing of this plan. Tell him no.”

  Ignoring Val, I said. “Thanks for saving me back there, Delen. You’ve got a knack for coming through when I need you the most.”

  The compliment made him blush, and then his blush vanished as his face turned to an ashy white. He pointed past me, further down the street. I turned and saw two patches of mushrooms shaking on the ground, and a third growing from an eroded wall. The wall cracked as the mycelium monster broke its upper body free of its resting place. Next, its right leg broke free, dislodging from the stone behind it and snapping the mycelium tendrils curled around it.

  The two spots on the ground sat up at almost the same time. It was a slow process, but they were becoming mobile quickly.

  “Anyone got a rock?”