Bob ate his lasagna thoughtfully. Jack seemed willing, even eager, to jump in. Tony would go along to pay a perceived debt. He wasn't sure about Vera, as she hadn't given any indication one way or another, while Dave and Amanda had seemed somewhat receptive, if cautious.

A paw gently patted his cheek in conjunction with a plaintive meow. Bob turned his head to look at Monroe, who was staring intently at his lasagna. "Vera," Bob began, "do you mind if I grab a plate for Monroe? Apparently, he's deeply interested in your lasagna."

"I suppose," Vera replied, "there are always leftovers, but is lasagna good for him?"

Bob shrugged as he plated up another square of lasagna, sitting it on the floor and sliding Monroe off the Makres, placing him in front of his feast. "Monroe is effectively immortal," Bob said as he sat up, "he's my familiar, so as long as I'm alive, he'll be alive. His soul is attached to my own, so if something were to kill him, I could ritually summon him back out."

"How does that even work?" Dave asked.

"Well, when I was blown into the other universe, Monroe was waiting for me to come home from work," Bob explained, "so naturally my primary concern, once I had my feet under me, was to save him from starving, as I only had about three weeks of food in the house for him."

He reached down and ran his fingers through Monroe's ruff. "It took a lot of blood and sweat, but I managed to level up to the point where I was able to summon him from Earth to Thayland, at which point he became my familiar." Bob smiled down at Monroe, "Now I never have to worry about losing him; we'll always have each other."

Amanda leveled a look of some kind at Dave, then turned to Bob. "So, killing monsters," she said, "how does all this work?"

"Initially, at level zero and level one, you kill them with spears or clubs, or you would if I didn't have the crystals to get you to level two when you can start leveling up a school and a skill," Bob answered, "but a broader response would be that you go down into a subterranean building, designed and created by a Curator, which is someone trained to build Dungeons, and you kill the monsters as they spawn."

"By using the special paths I've found, it stops being dangerous and becomes routine," Bob said, "as long as you follow the rules, it's pretty safe."

"We're gamers, Bob," Amanda gestured to the table, "give us some numbers, will ya?"

"Well, I would like you all to take the Path of the Endless Swarm," Bob said, "because it's the absolute safest path and is also very powerful."

"The key to the powerful paths is something called an Affinity Crystal," Bob began, pulling out six Summoning Affinity Crystals and handing them out to everyone at the table, "At level one, you choose the Arcane School of Summoning, and then at level two, you choose the spell 'Summon Mana-Infused Creature,' and then you use the Summoning Affinity Crystal to increase the maximum level of your 'Summon Mana-Infused Creature' by ten."

"Spells are capped at your level, so if you grind out the experience, instead of having a level two summoned monster, you can have a level twelve summoned monster," Bob continued, "which, I can assure you, will absolutely destroy monsters. The icing on the cake is that once your School of Summoning reaches level five because you used that Summoning Affinity Crystal, you're given the option to increase the maximum level of your 'Summon Mana-Infused Creature' spell by twenty-five percent."

He took a deep breath and continued, "But there's more, once your School of Summoning reaches level ten, which is the cap for schools, by the way, you can choose to increase that bonus from twenty-five percent to fifty percent, so when you are level twenty-five, your 'Summon Mana-Infused Creature' spell isn't level twenty-five, it's actually level fifty-two."

"Is that as stupidly overpowered as I think it is?" Amanda asked, her eyes shining excitedly.

"Oh, it gets so much worse," Bob replied gleefully, "that's just what you get from choosing the right options when you use the Summoning Affinity Crystal. When you combine that with the Path of the Endless Swarm, you end up with forty level twenty-four monsters that, and I can't stress how overpowered this is, automatically reappear if they are killed."

Bob shook his head ruefully, "It's ridiculous how powerful that Path is when combined with a Summoning Affinity Crystal."

"What about healing?" Vera asked.

"Well, you get to choose one skill at each level," Bob replied, "The Path of the Endless Swarm requires you to have the Arcane School of Summoning, Summon Mana-Infused Creature, Barrage, Effect Over Time, and Persistent Effect in order to be able to take the Path at level five. You'll also want to have Armor, an Armor type, Dodge, and Melee in order to maximize your summons effectiveness and your own survivability," Bob paused to take a drink of water before continuing. "Once you have those skills, you have another sixteen levels ahead of you, and you can, and should take the Divine School of Animancy, Healing Blast, and Regeneration, as well as Ritual magic, because having the potential to regrow limbs and not choosing to be able to is just stupid," Bob shook his head, "Take the Arcane School of Dimension, and then Teleport or Portal, and Flight."

"Now you're level sixteen with nine levels of skills to spend, and you just need to decide what else you want to do at that point," Bob finished.

"And how long does it take to level up?" Dave preempted Amanda.

"Assuming you're putting in the work and delving as deeply as you can for as long as you can," Bob said, "and assuming you have access to a well-built Dungeon that is deep enough, you could reach level five in a week, level ten in two weeks, level fifteen in a month."

"Past that, the experience requirements for pushing your Summon Mana-Infused Creature spell to the next level will have ramped up to the point where you're going to be burning a lot of time just grinding out the experience for that one spell," Bob shrugged, "But given that it's your bread and butter, it's worth it, and it isn't like you won't be stockpiling mana crystals while you grind it out, which you'll need for leveling up and gear."

"How long did it take you to reach level thirty-two?" Jack was the one to ask that question.

"A bit over a year and a half," Bob admitted, "But I could have done it much more quickly had I not been fucked over with a damaged matrix from the explosion. A friend of mine went from zero to twenty-five in about four months using one of the advanced paths."

"So let's say we do this," Amanda said slowly, looking at Dave, "besides the whole Earth is going to be uninhabitable for a hundred and ten days, and having magic is pretty sweet, what else is there?"

"You'll live longer," Bob offered, "once you're integrated into the system, which you already have been, life span is determined by your tier² plus your Endurance times your tier. Given that all of your attributes increase by one point for each level you've earned, and you gain your tier in points to allocate each level, along with your tier² as a bonus when you reach your first tier threshold, or level five, and you end up living a lot longer."

"How much longer?" Tamila spoke up for the first time since they'd started discussing magic.

"Well, at the moment, I'm due to live for five hundred and twenty-eight years, plus or minus twelve," Bob replied calmly, "and I'm using the standard spellcaster method of placing two points into Wisdom and Intelligence each level, then one point into Endurance."

"So if I didn't want to fight monsters," Talima's voice wavered, "what could I do?"

"Do you like gardening?" Bob asked.

Talima smiled brilliantly, "I love gardening."

"She really does," Tony added, "she always had a garden in front and back of the house."

"Take the Divine School of Plant, Plant Growth, Divine School of Earth, Control Earth, and Ritual Magic," Bob said confidently, "you'll be able to use a ritual to grow enough food to feed everyone here for a month, and it'll take you longer to harvest it than it will for it to grow."

"You'll cap at five because you can't advance without crystals you gained from killing a monster yourself, but even then, if you do a two wisdom, two endurance, one intelligence allocation, and dump your bonus into intelligence, you'll have an Endurance of twenty, which will give you a hundred and twenty-five years, plus or minus ten."

"And if the cancer comes back?" She asked quietly.

"Someone will throw another regeneration ritual at you," Bob smiled at her, "it's a hundred mana crystals, which is about two or three hours worth of work in the Dungeon," he said gently, "it's not something you'll ever have to worry about again."

"You can't be thinking about going there," Tony protested as he took Talima's hands.

"What else would I do?" She asked, "I couldn't be happier to be free of that hospital bed, but I can't explain how or why my cancer is gone, or my lung has regrown, or that I have my own teeth again. If I go there, you can bring Lakisha with you, and I can watch over the twins while you two are at work." Talima laughed and shook her head, "It'll be like it was before I got sick."

Tony leaned back in his chair, still holding Talima's hands. "This is all happening so fast," he grumbled.

"Sorry about that," Bob shrugged his shoulders, "hopefully someone else will be able to take over the recruitment process, and I'll step back."

"I'm doing this," Jack stated firmly. "I've got nothing else going on, and I'm going all in."

"Can I bring my roommate?" Vera asked, "I can't promise how hard she'll buy into all this, but she can't afford to live on her own, and she doesn't do very well with people."

"I want to save everyone," Bob replied, his tone serious, "even if they don't want to delve the Dungeon, even if they don't want to level up, even if they don't believe any of this."

"That's a lot to shoulder on your own," Jack said softly.

Bob shook his head, "I'm not alone," he replied, "I've got hundreds of people back on Thayland who are helping me with this project, which may not sound like much, but when you consider there are only two thousand people in my town, it's pretty amazing."

"We're in too," Amanda announced, smiling at Dave.

"I'll drive you back to your van," Tony said to Vera, "then I'll pick up Lakisha and the twins and come back here. Do we need to bring anything beyond our clothes and toiletries?"

"Nope, the second story is set up with closet-size rooms with a bunk and a bathroom," Bob said, "although we'll probably need to figure out a better solution for families."

"I'll hit my apartment for my stuff," Jack grinned, "good thing I'm barely unpacked; I can just throw it back in the truck."

Bob watched as the gaming group scattered, leaving him alone with Dave and Amanda. Dave was cleaning up the table while Amanda had decided to go pack up the necessities.

"Man, this is nuts," Dave said to him, "Three hours ago, I was planning to help you roll up a sorcerer for the Tomb of Horrors campaign, and now I'm getting ready to become a sorcerer myself."

"I'm not trying to pressure you or anything," Bob responded uncomfortably, "but I really do need people to start leveling up quickly and as soon as possible."

He shook his head, "I know I won't be able to save everyone, but I have to try and save as many people as I can."

Dave sighed and stopped gathering the dishes, sitting down next to Bob instead. He reached out and laid a hand on Bob's shoulder. "You're getting the ball rolling, and you've done so as quickly as you could," Dave said softly, "this isn't a one-man job."

"Things are already starting to snowball," Dave reminded him, "you came here tonight hoping for five of us, and you're getting nine."

"Once we get our footing, Amanda and I will bring on our parents, and our brothers and sisters, which is another seven people, and they'll want to bring their partners, and their partner's parents, and their partner's siblings, and so on and so on."

"You'll be swamped with people pretty damn quickly," Dave reassured him.

Elizabeth Nalenthal (never Liz or Beth) was tired. She'd spent the better part of the past week in the company of Fermilab's lawyers, frantically looking for a way to pull back certain information that could prove devastating if the suddenly resurrected Robert Whitman decided to take legal action against Fermilab and the University.

She was well aware of what Mr. Whitman had gone through during his time at Fermilab. The director of the lab had been very forthcoming when it became clear that there would be criminal charges in relation to Mr. Whitman's death.

If only she'd kept her mouth shut, or at least not waived her right to counsel.

Sadly, she hadn't, and the entire sordid tale had been documented far too thoroughly by the police.

Elizabeth grimaced as she looked over the preliminary reports from two private investigative agencies. She prided herself on heading a diverse, inclusive environment, with a special focus on making sure that women weren't overlooked in a field that was still terribly dominated by men. She hadn't ever imagined that things could even swing the other way, but they had, and the mistakes that the director and those in her department had made in regards to Mr. Whitman could cast a very unfavorable light over both Fermilab and the University.

Despite having been highly recommended by Walther and Peirce, both investigative agencies had come up with almost nothing on Mr. Whitman. He had left no trace for nearly a year and a half before walking out of the veterinary clinic where he took his cat and boarding a bus. His trip to his bank had tripped certain flags that brought the police into the situation. Once he was provisionally returned to life, he'd purchased a cell phone and a laptop at a local Best Buy and then disappeared, only to reappear again on a train to LA.

Once there, he'd appeared twice at Denny's, and he'd ridden the bus around the city, not getting off at any stops. Then he'd disappeared again.

According to the reports, his cellphone completely disconnected from the network for extended periods of time, which was effectively impossible in LA. It would then reacquire a signal at a completely different location from where it had been lost.

She closed the folders and stood up, stretching.

She'd hoped to have him agree not to seek any legal action on the condition that the settlement with his mother would remain in place. That hope had been dashed when the investigative agencies discovered that Mr. Whitman and his mother hadn't spoken in a decade and that the only reason his mother had even known of her son's death was that a lawyer had sought her out, seeking a healthy payday.

Now she was just hoping that he would agree to a small settlement, allowing all parties to put the whole unfortunate mess behind them.

The problem was finding him.