Chapter 8

Red Sands Deserts, Contested Border Region

In flight above the outskirts of the Old World Ruins of "Angel Fall"

"Are we there yet?"

Pyris sighed. She had to remind herself, again, that throwing her teammate and friend into a sand dune wasn't a good idea, and that the ensuing fight would make them lose a fair amount of time, as well as potentially break the very complicated (and expensive, although they hadn't bought them, perks of having a skilled sorceress in the party) magic items of flying they were all currently using.

Well, all...

"Come on Pyris, don't make that face, it's a fair question."

The paladin looked up, and immediately looked back down, blushing.

"Sonya, please." She said in a long suffering tone.

"Come on, I know you like it! Naughty, naughty~"

Pyris sighed, and declined to answer, which was probably for the best. Sonya, her party's sorceress was incredibly talented, resourceful, and always had an idea to get out of a sticky situation. She was also very prone to teasing her teammates. Which was why, when they were out on a mission, at least when they were unlikely to meet anyone along the way, she had a tendency to wear a rather short, revealing robe. And that the angle from which Pyris had looked at her (and the sorceress had almost certainly placed herself there for that specific purpose), she had gotten a very clear view of the fact that Sonya thought wearing underwear was something that happened to other people.

Now, that would have usually been considered a very rude thing to do, even in a tightly knit adventurer party like theirs, to flash their lover like that in front of her teammates...if Sonya's lovers weren't the whole party to begin with.

Pyris was honest enough to admit that Sonya was very much what was holding them together. The sometimes insufferable sorceress had a talent for making everyone get along, no matter the situation, and their group...night time activities didn't hurt either.

Truth was, most teams of their rank, Mythril, broke up. The problem was that past a certain rank it became much easier to do jobs on your own, and most people felt powerful enough that they had problems taking orders, and wanted to issue them...to people that had the same problem. Thus, Mythril parties usually formed on the fly for a particular mission, then usually dissolved a few months afterwards.

Theirs, however, had been going strong for several decades, mostly due to their common relationship with their sorceress (and thus, the intimate relationships they'd inevitably all developed with one another). There were still some tense moment, but they usually only happened over sticky decisions, when a job landed them in the middle of a moral quagmire. Fortunately, this should be nothing of the sort.

"More seriously, are we actually close or not? You girls know I can't orientate myself well in the wastelands."

Pyris slowly nodded, and looked back at her party's close quarters combatant, Arinka. The heavily armored woman was their shield and bulwark, but the designation of warrior no longer quite fit her (although they still called her that for simplicity's sake). As with all myhtril ranked and above, she had learned massively from several specializations, and had started mixing 'traditional' fighting styles together to create her own, unique one. She was also the one that had asked the question that had started this whole conversation to begin with, as she loved getting a rise out of her leader.

"We're pretty close, I think. 30 minutes out at most."

Pyris looked at the other side, and smiled at Ellyris, their ranged combatant. Like Arinka, ranger wouldn't quite describe her anymore. Ellyris smiled back.

"Like Ellyris said, 30 minutes at most. Although I think we're far closer than that." She pointed at the cluster of mesas that had just popped over the horizon. "Because that looks like our destination. Buckle up ladies, we're landing soon."

She heard a chorus of aknowledgements, and prepared herself to land, quite possibly in combat, you never knew with new dungeons.

*****

"You know, there are other materials you could make it out of." Said Emilia, as she contemplated the broken mess of what had once been a scorpio prototype (essentially a small ballista. It was to a ballista what a 20mm anti-infantry autocannon was to a 155mm artillery piece, essentially). "Like, I don't know, spring steel. Heck, some enchanted materials might be even better, and I could make them."

Alexandra sighed as she looked at the thoroughly destroyed siege engine.

"I know. But would you be able to make them cheaply? Cheap enough that it'd be viable to replace it after adventurers break it or even take it as loot?"

"...No. Sorry."

Alexandra absent-mindedly patted the vampire girl on the head as she heard the dejected tone in her voice.

"Don't be, it's not your fault." Then she stopped as she felt Emilia's emotions spike, and lifted her hand from her head with a giggle. "Alright, alright!"

Her smile faded slightly as she looked at the war machine again. It was an early prototype, but still, she hadn't expected it to fail this catastrophically. Or for so many iterations to fail before it as well. The problem was that while she had a good idea of the concept of a scorpio, she had no idea how to actually make the parts. Sure, some of them were simple (it was, after all, more or less a big crossbow), but the limb, the part that actually bended and essentially stored the energy to propel the bolt, she had no idea how to make. Or rather, she had no idea how to make a wooden (and thus, cheap), version of it. She had no idea how to treat the wood, or even what type of wood she should use.

The more she thought about it, the more she came back to using steel. But that was too costly...unless...

The European Federation saw no point in instructing engineering students, even those in the navy, into making primitive steel, but they did have a very thorough course on how to mass produce it. It was, after all, a core component of most space stations and civilian spaceships. Military ships had a tendency to use far, far more advanced and tougher materials (and while neo-steel might have the word steel in it, it was closer to a mix between cobalt alloy and fullerene monomollecular armor plating than actual steel. Well, once you got past the first version. In fact, although she hadn't been privy to that information, there were various indications and rumors that the newest armor material of the EFSN, Neosteel-6, was the first true monomolecular armor plating ever developed, as in the entire armor belt of an entire starship was one cohesive molecule, instead of interconnected composite plates of pseudo-monomollecular materials). Still, Alexandra was nothing if not curious, and although she hadn't necessarily been that interested in medieval history, she had been fascinated in the first pseudo-industrial processes to be born, and a lot of those revolved around metallurgy, which had lead her to have an interest in early steel and iron production method.

And magic might simplify a lot of the answers...especially with her capacity as a dungeon of acting like a massive central computer (if she could get overrides of enchantments linked to her core, she was sure she could do more) and power core for the whole system.

She quickly opened her TO-DO list, and found the steel making one...and bumped it up. She'd have to look it up as soon as she reached the entrance and finally acquired that turret. She also dropped the priority of the scorpio. She could get back to it once she had a better idea what she was dealing with, and especially if she got some spring steel.

"Alright, I think it's time to switch priorities."

"Oh?"

Emilia raised an eyebrow. She wasn't protesting, but she seemed surprised. Alexandra colored slightly as she realized that it probably had to do with her own...drive to achieve whatever she set her mind to. Some less charitable person could have called it 'stubborness'.

"Yes. We're not making any progress here. There are solutions, but none of them are economically viable...Which means that we're going to switch to something else until we've either acquired better knowledge or a new material. Or hell, even just a new approach to the problem. Right now, let's focus on that redesign." She winced. "It's kind of overdue."

Emilia put her hands on her cheek, with the most faked surprised expression Alexandra had ever seen.

"Nooooo, you think?" She dropped her hands. "Seriously, with all due respect Alexandra, this place is starting to look like a bland wreck. The puzzle room is nice, and so are the pendulum corridors, but otherwise most of the 1st floor is currently just various amounts of golems and pit traps."

Alexandra winced again. Emilia...wasn't wrong. At all. The problem was that she had grossly underestimated the size of this installation. This place was huge, at least for the first floor of a newborn dungeon. She had been investing nearly all of her accumulated mana into expanding her influence, dedicating her time to designing new armor and weapons to save it up, and she still wasn't at the entrance! She wasn't far, only a dozen meters or so...except that the mana cost for expanding had started increasing. It wasn't very noticeable at first, but now every meter of expansion cost noticeably more than the last. According to Emilia, she was far past the point at which a normal dungeon would have started new floors instead of trying to expand their influence.

Then again, she wasn't a normal dungeon, and the sheer amount of mana she had to burn thanks to her extradimensional status had allowed her to push this far (although it, unfortunately, wasn't enough to justify spending a small fortune on the scorpios). It was still getting expensive as all hell to push forward. And due to this cost (and her absorption in the armor, bracelets and scorpio problems), she hadn't spent as much time as she should have diversifying her first floor. In fact, it looked even worse than barebone. The only thing she had added other than the puzzle room, and the Royal Guardians (with brand new giant steel halberds, that they handled surprisingly well, and a brand new bracelet of power beam), was a set of weapon drop traps (essentially a simple pressure tile that when activated triggered a double axe to drop from the ceiling) and a pendulum hallway, where giant blades swung through the room, powered by kinesys (she had learned the proper term from Emilia. They were the same runes that held the momentum part of kinetic strike, and apparently they indeed controlled gravity and momentum) runes. She had installed a button at the end of the hallway, labeled 'STOP', that caused the blades to swing into one of the recesses in the sides and then stop moving for 60 seconds. Pushing the button more than 3 times in 5 minutes triggered a fireball trap. It was as much to prevent people from taking their sweet time as well as to avoid someone parking themselves there in the future and offering a trap avoidal service. She might need more counter measures to this kind of stuff later as well. Emilia had told her that most adventurers refused to venture into unexplored parts of the dungeon, and that a specialized section of the adventurer guild, only present in dungeon towns or cities, was tasked with venturing into unexplored sections and carefully recording everything that could be of use. That 'Assault guild' as some called it (after the Eris Empire's assault units, whose apparent use was force recon) suffered completely disproportionate casulaties compared to the rest of the guild, but they were very well paid for their services, and especially their information.

And according to Emilia, it was a known fact among dungeons and advisors (although few outside of them and the assault guild leadership knew), that higher ups in the assault guild were very interested in....negotiated solutions for insurance pacts and especially dungeon sections that rearranged themselves periodically, hereby landing them a sustainable and predictable source of work and income. While she already had the resurrection system in place, it would be interesting to see if one of them approached her to quite literally bribe her into creating a self-rearranging maze or something. It was already on her TO-DO list, but they didn't need to know that. Plus, gaining gratitude through having an insurance pact (although she wouldn't be making them pay really anything, well, besides 20% or so of their essence, the resurrection was more by default than anything else, so it probably could just be called 'resurrection system') by default would be welcome.

"Right, fair enough. So, let's get started!"

What followed was nearly a day long redesign session of frantically drawing plans, re-drawing them, and then absorbing metric tons of rocks to dig new hallways and creating more to fill others.

The result was an 19 rooms dungeon, with 15 'normal' combat rooms, the puzzle room, a safe zone, a challenge room, and a shrine room. That was without counting the boss room (that she intended to move deeper along with her core anyway. She'll just replace it with something else, or just leave the floor without a boss room. After all, boss rooms didn't have to be every floor, especially if she wanted to give more attention to details on her bosses rather than just pumping them out) or the 6 room entrance safe zone (that she simply couldn't quite reach yet, as her influence was halfway through the hallway leading from the 1st room to the entrance safezone).

The challenge room she designed to be, well, a challenge, with the reward being the golems (well, their bodies), although she had plans to add a treasure chest with potions or maybe some equipment in it. The challenge room itself required the adventurers to push a button on a pedestal (with an engraving upon it asking if they wanted to start the challenge, and a big 'YES' engraved on the button) at the center of the room, at which point the door slammed shut, and a countdown would start (enchantments could be surprisingly utilitarian. Then again, magic seemed to be code, so it would only make sense). After 5 seconds had elapsed, several parts of the ceiling would collapse, letting 12 standard golems and 12 martial golems fall from concealed compartments into the challenge room. Then, 60 seconds after that, the second wave of 16 martial golems would erupt from the ceiling as well, and the third wave would arrive another minute afterwards, with 3 Legionnaires Mk1s leading the martial golems this time.

The shrine room (which she had named the Shrine of War) was straight out of her TO-DO list. Alexandra had always loved those shrine rooms in roguelikes where the player could either pay something to get an advantage, or trigger a random event, or a boon or a curse. Since her options were limited however, she decided that upon pressing the button on the pedestal (it was engraved with a cryptic sentence), it would adjust the number of golems in the next room, which was also the last room before CQ's boss room (and her core room). Once the button was pressed, the enchantment essentially rolled/generated a random number between 1 and 100 (which made it easy to make probabilities). On a roll of 1 to 45, the message "Your enemies weaken" would appear, hologram style, over the pedestal/altar, and half of the golems in the next room (the 16th to be precise) would withdraw in a concealed corridor, that led to a small holding area, making the fight easier. On a roll of 46 to 90, the message "Your enemies gather" would appear, and hidden alcoves would open in the 16th room, releasing hidden golems and effectively doubling their number. Finally, on a roll of 91 to 100, the message "The way is clear, but the greater foe grows stronger" would appear, and all golems from the 16th room would withdraw, but another Royal Guardian and 6 Palatial Guards Mk2s golems would emerge from hidden alcoves in the boss room. It was debatable which was the best outcome, and honestly it depends a lot on the party activating the shrine and what their objectives were. If they were out to collect golems, the second outcome would be best, while if they were trying to avoid fighting as much as possible, the first one would be optimal.

Additionally, she'd also dispersed traps in several hallways, and even in some rooms. A few pendulum blades here and there, a few pit traps...however, she wanted to make it manageable, and avoid putting too many of them, if only because a trap filled dungeon was never fun, but also because the element of surprise made them much more effective, letting the adventurers let their guard down before the next batch of traps would probably help her chances of catching someone with them considerably.

After some considerable debate with Emilia, she came up with a tiered threat level system. Every room had a color in the form of a piece of colored stone embedded on top of the hallway leading to them. Green was for minimal threat level, any party that had made it through the previous floor or, in the case of the first floor, had minimal combat skills, could make it through relatively easily. Not unharmed, but without major injuries as long as they played it safe. Orange was for significant threat level, here adventurers of the recommended level would face serious injury and even death if they failed badly enough. In the case of the first floor, Orange was where most clay parties would get wiped out, and Iron parties would have to start taking things seriously. Then Red was for lethal threat level (challenge rooms were threat level red by default). There, the gloves came off, and even steel parties in the Red rooms of the first floor would have a run for their money (or at least, she hoped so). Then there was threat level Black (she had wanted to name it Void, but she forgot that people that didn't have space faring technology, or at least didn't seem to have retained much of it, wouldn't make the analogy with extreme danger like a space faring culture would). Threat level Black was simple: don't go there. At all. As in 'off limits, any trespasser will be terminated with extreme prejudice. Oh, and don't expect to come back'. For now, only the staircase leading deeper into the installation, and the rooms she had severed from the dungeon that served as a buffer were threat level Black. She didn't plan on advertising it (after all, she knew human nature, if word got around there was a set of rooms segregated from the rest of the dungeon and heavily interdicted by the dungeon, there would inevitably be some idiots that would try to raid it, thinking it would be packed with some form of treasure. Technically, they'd be right, but Alexandra would drop the entire mesa on top of them before these morons got down there and woke up whatever defensive systems slumbered in this place).

After her redesign however, she realized that there was still a large amounts of unused rooms that she had just unceremoniously cut off from the main dungeon, and were just...there. She had plans for those, of course, like extra challenge rooms, but for now they would serve as handy storage space and testing areas. Disposable testing areas to be precise. She had armored her testing room, but there was no way in hell she was going to house some of the heavy duty unstable experiments she had planned anywhere close to her command center, core, workshop, or Emilia. The vampire girl might be near immortal, but Alexandra wasn't about to take any unnecessary chances.

She looked at the design files in dungeon mode, and quickly started annotating them. She had found a way to give a limited access to Emilia to her files (no, she had no idea how that worked, but that dungeon advisor bond fascinated her more and more the more she learned about it), and the vampire was gazing at them as well. In fact, Alexandra had outright materialized a hologram of her right next to her own self image. It was easier on her mind to interpret this as a digital space, kind of like when people with implants directly connected with each others and had a virtual conference.

"I think we're good." Said the vampire girl.

"It better be, I'm almost out of mana." Alexandra shrugged as Emilia looked at her, her eyebrows raised. "I know, it was necessary, and I'm not complaining about the tab, I'm just noting that this was expensive. We'll need to keep that in mind when we start another of those redesigns, they're fast, but very costly."

Emilia nodded.

"Yeah, I agree. Still, this place is now worthy of being called a dungeon at last!"

Alexandra put a hand on her chest, with a fake hurt expression.

"And it wasn't before? Such insult!"

Emilia giggled, and the Earth-born smiled. Then her smile froze.

"What is it?"

Alexandra looked at the vampire girl.

"Adventurers! Come on, to the command center!"

Emilia's eyes widened, and she nodded, before following Alexandra as she rushed to the command center, quickly followed by Jared.

*****

Pyris carefully looked around, her eyes seeing far more than most people would expect. She might not be the richest or most powerful of adventurers, but she was from Gorromar, and her homeland valued service to the nation above all else. Adventuring wasn't necessarily badly seen, but it was seen as a distraction from serving in Gorromar's various military branches. However, adventurers that went above and beyond the call of duty, and when she had saved an entire battleship from sinking (with substantial help from Sonya and the rest of her team) after a difficult fight against a kraken, in the middle of the ocean, the Colonel, the ruler of Gorromar, had decided that she was worthy of some official recognition of her help.

That recognition came, of course, in the form of a medal first...and what on Earth would have been called military grade cybernetic sensor systems.

Technically, Pyris' eyes weren't seeing anything outside of the ordinary, but the bone surrounding the eye cavities had been seeded with subdermal sensors that reported to a miniaturized computer implanted directly beneath her brain, that in turn tapped into her Ocipital Lobe through complex wires and neural interfaces. Thus she was able to "see" well into the infrared, scan for radio signals, gamma radiation, X-rays (she cannot emit any of those, preventing her from actively seeing through walls the way EuroFed or UISN marines could), and a plethora of exotic particles and various chunks of the electromagnetic spectrum. Those implants also informed her on the approximate level of whatever was coming at her, and also housed an extensive database containing a trove of information cataloged over the millenia by Gorromar's scholars, soldiers and adventurers, with part of this database's origin disappearing into the mists of the Old World. That information ranged from how to maintain and disassemble some weapons to the weak points of Quill Raptors.

Needless to say, such implants were tedious and expensive to manufacture, even from Gorromar, who was easily one of the 5 most advanced nations in the world, although this was simplified somewhat by a very few "fabricators" of the Old World that Gorromar had more or less gotten functioning again (and a few others buried in Gorromar Central that somehow survived the Long Night).

She scanned the entire area, then calmly sheathed her sword as the "No Threat Detected" message popped up on her HUD. While she might not know exactly what most of the things in her vision said meant, Gorromar still retained extensive empirical knowledge of her implants' functionalities and uses. It was very traditional, ritualistic and dogmatic, but it had gotten the information through a thousand year dark age and 5 millenia of comparatively barbaric civilization.

She blinked three times rapidly, and the HUD deactivated. She liked the possibilities it offered, but she had only gotten it a few months ago, and she was far from used to it's presence yet, let alone using it in combat. She knew she would have to try eventually -she was very much aware that they would only make her stronger and deadlier- but right now she did not want any distraction or potential fuckup. The evaluation of a newborn dungeon was a rare and prestigious event, and if done badly, it could sink the career of any adventurer. By the same token however, it could boost the career of said adventurers quite significantly if done right.

Pyris was under no illusion that the reason her team was selected was because they were the only highly ranked enough party currently between jobs and close enough to a teleportation hub to quickly make their way to Darthar, otherwise the guild would have no doubt hired Orichalcum ranked adventurers for the job. Since most high ranked parties were assembled for a specific purpose (and took a lot of squabbling to put into place) and usually went on an adventure spree in dangerous areas as long as they held together, her party's peculiarity had played right into their hands.

"Alright, what now Pyris?"

Pyris shook herself out of her thoughts, and looked at Arinka.

"The area looks clear. Nothing's showing up on my HUD. I assume you haven't seen anything either Ellyris?"

The ranger shook her head, smiling slightly. The irony of having the party Paladin make a better scout than the ranger wasn't lost on her. Pyris was fortunate that she didn't resent that, and that instead took it as a challenge to improve into other areas and break through the traditional ranger role. She'd have vastly preferred to give the ranger the implants, but unfortunately Gorromarian law and custom was clear: no one born outside of Gorromar (or a loyal expatriated family) may receive Gorromarian technology. This isolationist policy kept angering everyone else in the world, but it had secured Gorromar's technological supremacy (over it's neighbors at least, the Eris Empire had long ago outpaced them through aggressive recovery of Old Worlds artifacts) for millenia.

"Alright then, let's head in. Arinka, you take point, I'll be right behind you. Sonya, you come right after, Ellyris you take the rear. Sonya, I want you to cover us if we run into any enemies. Ready?"

Everyone nodded. Even Sonya refrained from cracking a lewd joke. As long as they hadn't gotten this dungeon's measure, they needed to assume the next hallway could potentially be their death.

"Excellent! Go go go!"

They rushed into the door, and erupted into the first room. It was...eerily empty. Towards the back, the massive slab of metal (scarred from millenia of erosion, fights, scratches from equipment being laid against it and the inevitable idiots trying -and failing- to etch their names onto it) they had been told to expect stood, a sentinel from an age long past. They quickly darted into the side corridors, and slowly made their way deeper. After a minute or so, they arrived into the main hall, circumventing the massive metal 'blast door' that separated it from the entrance. And they stopped.

On the far side of the hall, beyond the constriction that someone might have called a broad hallway, stood a golem. It's head slowly tracking them as they entered into the hall.

Pyris blinked three times, and her HUD popped up. A box suddenly appeared around the golem.

[Scanning...]

[...]

[Scan complete: Standard Autonomous Golem, universal Model 4. Threat level: minimal]

Pyris frowned.

"That's not right..."

"What is it?"

Pyris turned towards Ellyris.

"We knew the dungeons used golems, but those...those aren't modern golems. They're Old Worlds ones."

"Ah."

'Ah' indeed, Pyris thought.

Truth was, a dungeon that decided to use golems and such automatas weren't necessarily rare, but they were a definite minority. However most, no, nearly all of them stuck to things they had either received when they first came to be, or automata they had created (well, officially, some governments had been known to have paid artificers to feed some dungeons specific parts or designs they wanted. It was usually part of a backroom deal, and highly illegal, but the gains were usually considered worth the risks, so it didn't stop them). In history, only three other dungeons had used Old Worlds artifacts and designs in large quantities or as their basis. One had simply retreated into isolation, and refused to admit anyone into their depths (and had recycled all of the adventurer parts of their dungeon), another had been killed by a Custodian of the Flame when he started a genocidal campaign against humanity millenia ago, and the last one was the leader of the United Dungeon Council, and had more or less obtained those designs at gunpoint through raiding the tech vaults of various nations during the wars that established the UDC.

In fact, as far as she knew, it must have been the first time a dungeon had been established right on top of Old World ruins. That would definitely be a factor the guild would have to consider in that dungeon's growth.

She gestured towards her teamate to stay where they were, and carefully approached the golem, slowly scanning around for traps. She found nothing, then, as she took another step, she shivered. The mana density, already pretty decent in the entrance hall, spiked enormously as the unmistakable feeling (for someone powerful enough at least) of passing through a dungeon's influence washed over her.

The golem looked up, and took a combat stance. She held up her hand.

"Don't. If you can hear me dungeon, I am part of the assessement team sent by the guild and I-"

The golem lunged towards her.

It would be generous to say that it got one step forward before an arrow made out of electricity disintegrated it's head and it's torso was crushed like if a massive hand had just squeezed it.

"...Thanks girls." She said as she turned around, to the smiles of Ellyris and Sonya. Ellyris had shot the arrow (well, technically it was more a lightning bolt) and Sonya had simply crushed the golem. Once again, having a Kinetic Sorceress had it's advantages. "So, it looks like we'll have to do this the hard wa-"

"Look out!"

She didn't even think, her brain had barely begun processing the shout that she had already dashed to the side, crouched and drawn her sword. She went still for a second, before her HUD highlighted an area on the ceiling. It seemed to be...carving itself?

She looked, surprised, before the carving stopped, and read the full text.

'Adventurers!

My apologies for this somewhat embarassing display. I am afraid that I have far less fine direct control upon those golems than I thought, and I had not planned for such a contigency I'm afraid. I suppose that is on me.

In any case, welcome! I am (as I'm sure you have gathered already), the dungeon. Yes, I can hear you, lady with the sword that is crouching, however I cannot see your comrades, although I can hear them if they yell hard enough.

Once again, my apologies for my golem attacking you, you were saying?'

Well, that's a way of discussing, I guess, Pyris thought. She looked back at her team, and only received shrugs. Well, she was the leader after all.

The paladin sheathed her sword, and slowly got up.

"I...see, miss dungeon. Well, the adventurers that found you said you were female. As I was saying, my comrades and I are the assessment team sent by the adventurers guild to verify the presence of your dungeon, as well as conduct an audit of your difficulty, personality, monsters, loot, ect. It is a pleasure to meet you, I am Pyris, and these.." She gestured to the rest of her team to join her. "Are my party members, Arinka, Ellyris and Sonya." She gestured at each of her friends as they crossed into the dungeon's influence "It is a pleasure to meet you, uh..."

There was a very awkward pause, as she trailed off. Then the ceiling started being carved (she wasn't sure she could call such crude things engravings) again.

'My name's Crystal. Nice to meet you Pyris & co. How may I be of assistance in your endeavor?'

"There is nothing you really need to do, except accept to talk to us once we finish? We would like to have a short discussion, the guild has given us a checklist of questions for you to answer. None of them are intrusive, they're mostly general stuff about the general direction you want your dungeon to head towards."

'Right. I see. Well, in that case, I'll be happy to answer those once you're through. The boss room is my core room, so it won't be hard to find. Good luck ladies! Given your rank and equipment, I'm confident you won't be needing it.'

Arinka chuckled, and Pyris smiled.

"We'll try not to breeze through it too fast. After all we're here to assess the difficulty, hard to do that if we just vaporize everything on sight!"

A strange symbol appeared on the ceiling. It looked like...those weird runes you sometimes saw in ancient texts, or the writings of extradimensionals, what were they called again? Ah, yes, Emojis. No one knew for sure what they meant, but their resemblance to human expressions was uncanny. Some said their purpose was to convey said emotions, but very few actually believed that. Texts where many emojis had been chained after one another had been found after all. And yet, no one to date had managed to crack the code.

Maybe there was more to this dungeon that it seemed...or she had just copied something she saw engraved in the ruins somewhere. She had Old World golems after all.

I'll have to make a note of that. Could be important, she thought.

"Well," She turned towards her friends. "Let's do this girls!"

"Yeah!"

*****

Alexandra wasn't sure whether to be proud or depressed. Her golems hadn't even landed a single hit. No, that wasn't true, they had landed hits...because the women they were fighting had caught their punches or spear jabs, just to measure the strength and threat of the attacks.

The puzzle room hadn't even remotely been an issue, and they had literally flown over her pit traps. The only reason they'd triggered one of the her drop down weapons was to take the hit to measure it as well.

At least she had garnered useful data. What that girl with the pointy witch hat and scandalously short dress (and seeming lack of underwear) had done in her challenge room...Emilia had called it a kinesys storm spell. The witch hat girl had whipped out a grimoire out of her pouches faster than Alexandra had believed was possible, and immediately cast the spell. It had instantly shredded her entire first wave of golems dropping from the ceiling as if they were made of paper. Then she had calmly returned the grimoire to it's pouch like if nothing had happened.

But Alexandra had already seen something like that spell.

A gravitational pulse grenade. That device, the culmination of over a century of applied research into artificial gravity generation, then translated to a human portable weapon, had been the ultimate anti infantry weapons. Anything in it's effective radius that didn't have it's own gravity shielding, which was everything below of an APC or someone in power armor was dead meat. She had seen one literally tear apart an entire squad of UIS marines and their jeep. The grenade (closer to a satchel charge in size, although it's gravity generators kept it relatively 'light', although still awkward to carry) worked by overloading several miniaturized artificial gravity generators, who where carefully calibrated to interfere with each other. The result was the generators' inevitable destruction...and the creation of thousands of localized, contradicting gravity fields. Anyone in range just got torn apart as their body was literally pulled in a hundred different directions at the same time. Needless to say, it wasn't pretty.

She wondered idly if it was a case of convergent evolution, that the design was so efficient different lines of research would inevitably lead to the same effect, or if had been inspired by the Earth weapon (or maybe something more ancient from this planet). After all, the cultural and technological contamination from Earth on this planet was pretty evident. She still wondered how deep it went, however.

She snapped back to reality as they arrived at the swinging blades corridor. Where her massive blade pendulums ponderously swung, perpetually moving thanks to their enchantments. At least she'd get to see if they had a good rythm.

The witch held up her hand.

The pendulums stopped.

And Alexandra's forehead promptly met the table.

She laid there for a few seconds, until she felt a small (compared to hers), delicate hand, patting her head, then caressing her hair.

"You know, despite what it may seem, they are trying to be as courteous as possible" Said Emilia.

"I know, I know!" Alexandra sighed, and straightened back up, turning around on her stone stool to look at the gently smiling vampire girl. "It's just that...Argh, no matter how much I intellectually know that, it still feels like shit for them to breeze through all of that hard work! It's even worse that they're the first ones!"

Emilia winced.

"Point taken. Still, there will be other groups like this, especially those coming for the first time, and that want to access your depths, the places where they will actually be challenged, fast."

Alexandra slowly nodded. Well, at least she now knew how a game developer felt when watching a speedrun of their game. Or at least, she guessed that's how they felt.

"I know. I'll have to make some form of elevator for those that want to get in and not have to do everything again. Maybe a bypass key linked to killing a boss. And I might set up a floor bypass depending on adventurer rank, to avoid having a group of high level adventurers just blast through my first few floors in a handful of minutes."

Emilia nodded.

"That'd probably be wise. Most dungeons do the former. Some also do the latter, but they're rarer." She chuckled. "And younger. The old guard firmly believes in the 'old values'."

Alexandra chuckled, shaking her head.

"Well, some things cross species boundaries, eh? Humans, dungeons, somethings seem to be universal."

"Yep."

Alexandra went back to watching the...screens? More like a pane of glass on which Emilia could project the image she was recording. It looked like they had crossed, and were now busy testing the strength of the blades, and their tempo. Holy shit, just how fast was that ranger? Alexandra was fairly sure that wasn't far below the sound barrier. It did seem to have it's limitations however, as the ranger promptly (and noisily) crashed into the back wall, and emerged from the cloud of dust (and crater. Something was wrong here, the kinetic force equation didn't shake out. Did that spell augment her impact energy as well?) laughing. What would it take to actually kill one of them? They were literally walking tanks! She wasn't sure someone in light power armor (with the appropriate weapons) would be able to take them down. Then again, very few things could survive a direct hit from a plasma rifle (300 million degrees hot ionized plasma would prove difficult to survive, even with magic), so it'd be down to their respective dodging capabilities and accuracy she guessed.

"So, that witch girl."

"Sorceress. She's covered in artifacts and scrolls. I don't think she cast a single spell yet. Most of the stuff she used was engraved on her bracelets. Except the kinesys storm, that was from her grimoire."

"Right, sorry. Wait, how can you tell? For the bracelets, I mean, the grimoire was kind of obvious."

Emilia shrugged.

"Practice. Unlike somebody." She glared at Alexandra, who smiled. "I can't see spells being cast directly. But on engraved or enchanted objects? While I can't necessarily tell what they can do without examining them, I can tell you when they're being activated."

"Magic signature?"

"And they glow."

"Oh. Fair enough"

Alexandra smiled. Sometimes it was the simple things...

"In any case, this sorceress seems to have a knack for things that have to do with movement and gravity. Is that some form of affinity, or...?"

Emilia shook her head.

"Not really. There were ancient myths about elemental affinities and such, but they're just that, myths. Anyone can learn any type of magic. However, it's kind of like your engineering." She looked at Alexandra, who raised an eyebrow. "You explained that you had to specialize. Well, since you had studied so much into 'code', you were much better at it than someone who specialized in 'hyperspace technology'. However, you both started with the same knowledge base and training, and nothing is stopping one of you from learning from the other's field. However, anything from your own field you'll have an easier time understanding, and it'll be more instinctive in your case?"

Alexandra slowly nodded.

"Guess that makes sense. It's a question of knowledge and study time, right?"

"Yep! That's why a lot of people care less about how high a mage or sorceress is in terms of level than their knowledge when determining their power. An incredibly high level mage with just the fireball spell isn't really going to be that dangerous or versatile, while a single low level mage with a whole panoply of knowledge and spells could dance rings around the other and eventually pummel their opponent into the ground. Well, that's not always true, but you get what I mean."

The Earth-born nodded again. The mage's knowledge of magic and spells acted as a force multiplier for their combat capabilities and overall utilities, thus making them much more dangerous than a higher leveled, but less knowledgeable mage. The way they judged their power kind of reminded her how the adventurers guild judged adventurers based on their level, but also their equipment. And hadn't Cassissa mentioned something about the guild monitoring your job history to determine your rank in the upper ranks?

Alexandra's shoulders tensed as she thought about her...friend? Acquaintance? Protector? Whatever, she had fallen and quite possibly even been killed trying to protect her. Whatever will do. She needed to make plans about a strike force, something that could take the fight to the surface if need be. She had already started planning for her eventual revenge, but her status as a dungeon severely limited her options. She could lure her enemies to her of course (if they didn't find her first. She shivered as she remembered the soldiers in power armor, and the traces of the shuttle), but there was no guarantee that would work (or that they wouldn't be able to escape). If she couldn't make them come to her, she'd have her forces go to them.

TO-DO LIST UPDATED.

...

System, make new directory: Strategic Strike Options, she thought.

NEW DIRECTORY CREATED: STRATEGIC STRIKE OPTIONS.

She quickly wrote down her first few ideas, before blinking as Emilia shook her shoulder.

"Uh, what?"

"Look! She's accepting the duel!"

Alexandra looked, and saw that indeed, after being through the blade hallway, and into the room where a single legionnaire stood guard, challenging them to a one on one duel. Their paladin, uh, Pyris if she remembered corrected, had seemingly accepted.

The woman, covered in heavy armor, took a step forward, bowed, then put herself in a ready position, the side of her body almost facing the golem, her right foot forward, and her hand on the hilt of her sword, her eyes closed. The golem waited for a split second, then charged.

If she hadn't had her own upgraded senses as a dungeon, she probably wouldn't have caught it. Pyris opened her eyes. And they were burning with blue fire. She stepped forwards, and in one smooth movement, unsheathed her sword, and swung it. The sword created a blade of energy that sliced through the air, straight towards the golem.

The golem got cleanly sliced in half.

And so did the wall.

And 3 good meters of solid rock behind it.

Fuck. Was all Alexandra could thing as the mythril adventurer sheathed her sword and smiled to her cheering (and catcalling? That sorceress definitely seemed to be catcalling her) friends. That was how powerful mythril ranked adventurers were?

Forget her previous plans to drop the mesa on them, that wouldn't work. Or at least, she wasn't sure it would, which was a terrifying admission it's own. She was going to need a contingency failsafe for these kind of insanely powerful beings. Dear gods, how many ranks were above mythril? 5? Shit. And she was supposed to be able to handle them all eventually? This planet was insane.

And she probably hadn't even seen them truly fight yet.

She watched calmly (to some extent) as the mythril ranked women plowed through her carefully made dungeon defenders like they were made out of cardboard. Then, at last, they made it to CQ's Boss room, and her Core Room. She winked at Emilia.

"Time to get the show on the road!"

She smiled at the vampire girl's eye roll.

"I know. Still, stay safe, I'm here if you need me."

Alexandra felt a bit of a tremor as she saw the determination in her advisor's eyes. She meant what she was saying. She always forgot that despite her cute demeanor and unassuming appearance, the vampire girl was no pushover.

"Right. I'll try to avoid angering the powerful adventurers though."

Emilia smiled in response, and Alexandra plunged into dungeon mode, and quickly entered CQ's body.

Time to get her ass kicked and have her name taken. That felt incredibly weird to say.

*****

Pyris walked around the corner, and stopped, looking at the woman in front of her. The golems she saw and cataloged in the back of her mind, she could handle them easily enough, although the 2 ones accompanying the mysterious woman were in full plate armor. The woman in question however...was breathtaking. Not necessarily in an amorous way, but her face, armor, pose and attitude spoke of elegance.

Their eyes met, and her powerful, but still slightly melodious voice spoke.

"Greetings Pyris!" She chuckled as the paladin's eyes went wide. "Relax, it's me, Crystal, I'm controlling my boss for the time being. If I could ask you for a slight favor before we begin? Please don't destroy my boss, it'll make it easier to talk and answer your question. Oh, and don't try to enter those rooms behind my core. They are private."

Pyris blinked. Then looked back at her friends, and gestured them forwards. They formed up behind her, at a relaxed combat posture.

"Uh, sure. Are you sure you want to fight us though? We all know this is a formality, and quite frankly even I, alone, would pummel all of your monsters into dust. So how about we cut to the chase. You said your core room was the same as your boss room, right?"

"Yes, indeed." The woman, the boss possessed by the dungeon apparently, nimbly stepped aside, revealing the perfect red gem of the dungeon core.

"Excellent!" She met Crystal's curious gaze. "Our job only tells us that we needed to neutralize the defenders up to the core room, and then talk with you. I don't want to needlessly destroy your golems -or rob the assault guild of a good paycheck- , so I'd rather not engage in combat."

Not to mention the fact that it would probably make the dungeon feel like crap. Having your best and greatest creation trampled like it was nothing really wouldn't feel good, and Pyris would rather not have any lingering animosity between her and the dungeon core if she could help it. Especially since with it's position, it would make a great base of operation to lead forays into the surrounding soon-to-be-reclaimed wasteland. Plus, she would grow into a dungeon that could challenge even them, and establishing an early, friendly relationship couldn't hurt.

Crystal giggled.

"Fair enough. Alright then." She sat on the giant slab of stone under the floating core, lifting one of her legs and hugging it. "So, you had a series of questions for me?"

Pyris nodded, and stepped forward, before pulling out a sheet of archaic parchment (the guild and it's old traditions. They could have at least used paper, it was actually cheaper nowadays) and a pen. The sheer incongruousness of someone about to write with a ball point pen on parchment was apparently lost on anyone but the dungeon core, who looked bemused.

"Alright, so, first..."

What ensued was a short questions and answer session. The questions were pretty simple, and all more or less had to do with the dungeon's general plans for the future, if there was any particular direction she wanted to go in, if she wanted to have an insurance pact (she surprised them all when she told them there already was one in place), those kind of things.

Then, as Pyris thanked the dungeon and folded the parchment, Sonya stepped forward. Pyris barely had time to mentally curse as the sorceress started talking.

"Hello! Crystal, was it? Can I ask you for a favor?"

The woman looked at her and shrugged.

"Sure, go ahead, I cannot promise that I'll accept however."

"Excellent! I've heard that you had an Oswald dungeon advisor, could I please meet her?"

Pyris held her breath. From the pre-quest briefing she had gotten, and knowledge she had accumulated on her own over the years, the attitude of dungeons towards their bonded advisors could be summed up in these words: overprotective and loyal to the point of fanaticism. There were very much true stories of dungeons going on an intercontinental crusade to recover a kidnapped advisor, and those that had lost theirs sometimes became Purifiers, the insane rogue dungeons that declared war on all sentient life and planned to wipe it off the face of the planet. They were usually put down by the Custodian of the Flames, or other groups if they were faster to react, but they wreaked a swath of destruction and obliteration so great they were talked of for centuries to come. The most terrifying example had been the Purification committee, where 3 dungeons, after being repeatedly raided, enslaved, and having their advisors murdered, went completely insane, threw off their shackles, and united, before starting a massive crusade against all sentient life. In the end, a Custodian of the Flame had to level an entire continent to finish them off. And he then proceeded to the kingdom (safely overseas from the abomination they had created) that had originally enslaved the dungeons and burned every.single.settlement to the ground. No sane person had defied the Custodians of the Flame afterwards, and the treatment of dungeons had gotten noticeably better. The dungeon uprising and the formation of the UDC had further improved their lot as well.

Still, it was a known fact for those powerful enough to actually reach said advisors: Do.Not.Touch. The dungeon will pursue you until the end of the universe if anything happened to them. And her resident sorceress, of course, wanted to meet said advisor because she had heard she was an Oswald mage, and she'd always wanted to meet one.

The dungeon's boss straightened, her demeanor visibly changing. She let go of her knee, and sat at the edge of the slab, looking far more alert.

"...I suppose so. Let me ask her."

She sat back, and her eyes changed for a few seconds, looking a tad bit confused and..curious? Then the dungeon seemingly reasserted herself, before hopping down from the stone slab.

"Alright. She'll be here in a few seconds."

And a few seconds later, the door Pyris had been able to half see behind the core lifted into the ceiling, and a decently tall young woman stepped through. Well, she certainly looked the part at least, especially when she smiled, revealing her vampire canines, and curtsied.

"Greetings adventurers! I am Emilia Von Oswald, daughter of Carlstein Von Oswald, duke of the Western Marches! What can I do for you?"

"Miss Oswald! I am Sonya Eversyls, mythril ranked adventurer! It's a pleasure to meet you!" Sonya took a step forward, and Pyris had to physically stop herself from grabbing her by the scruff of her neck and drag her out of the dungeon. Then Sonya leaned forward. "Dare I say, you look positively ravishing, may I inv-"

Sonya's word died on her lips as she felt the undescribable sensation of extreme danger washing over her. She had long ago learned that being prepared and never being surprised were essential to surviving as and adventurer, and to this end she had acquired a necklace of precognition. The (insanely) expensive trinket had saved her life and that of her team more times than she cared to count. The precognition spell, contrary to popular belief, didn't involve any form of peering into the future, or telling you of incoming danger. Instead, it was a form of super developed instinct, that alerted you when something was wrong, but your brain and conscious mind hadn't yet put the pieces together. The sensation when the spell attempted to warn you was virtually impossible to describe, a mix between extreme uneasiness and stress, which became even worst the more danger the spell thought you were in.

The sorceress took a step back..and yelped as an armored hand grabbed her by the neck and lifted her into the air, instinctively activating her flight spell and trying to escape, to no avail, the hand on her neck seemingly cast in orichalcum. Her grimoire flew out of her pouch, and she prepared to cast-

"That's enough. You've caused enough trouble for today."

Sonya instantly stopped struggling as she heard the tone of absolute command in her party leader's voice. Pyris might have mellowed over the years, but she was still Gorromarian, and she had, like every good Gorromarian, served her term in the military. Her tone brokered no argument, and promised hell and fire for any transgression. That explained, at least, why the sorceress wasn't able to escape.

Sonya turned her head to look at the paladin, and froze as she laid eyes on the boss in the process. The boss was now standing up, tensed like a coiled spring, her hand firmly gripping the hilt of her half-drawn sword and radiating killing intent. Then Sonya met her eyes. For a split second, her mind simply stopped working. It was like staring into the depths of the abyss, and for a fleeting instant, she felt something look back from behind those eyes. Something so terrifying her mind ran away from it, burying and burning the memory to escape from it, leaving her with just a vague impression of mindless terror.

"My apologies miss dungeon, my teammate here seems to think and talk with her hormones. With your permission, we will take our leave."

The dungeon boss nodded, and Sonya felt as sudden tugging as her friend dragged her out of the chamber, her floating grimoire following her like a sad puppy.

Just as she was leaving, she saw the briefest glimpse of a glowing pair of pink eyes in the dark hallway from which the Oswald had come from.

*****

Alexandra barely waited until the adventurers had left until she stormed into the core room, closing the entrance with a single gesture, a stone slab slamming into place and preventing them from hearing whatever happened in the room.

"WHAT THE FUCK! WHO THE HELL THIS BITCH THINK SHE IS?!?" Exclaimed the Earth-born, as she struggled with keeping her emotions in check. Apparently, she could activate in whatever she was in, because ability had accidentally activated when that gods damned sorceress had dared make advances to her Emilia! She-

Wait, her Emilia?

Alexandra barely had the time to reprocess her own thoughts before Emilia grabbed her shoulders and shook her.

"Calm down! Alex, for the love of the divines, calm down!"

Alexandra blinked, at took a deep breath.

"Right. Sorry, my apologies, I shouldn't have snapped like that, but still-!"

"I know. What she said was entirely out of place. But holy shit Alexandra, do you have any idea what you were about to do? You were half a second away from attacking her! You wouldn't have stood a chance!"

"I'd would have had a better one than you think."

She smiled as Emilia blinked in confusion.

"I'm an extradimensional remember? My specialty was code, so I found magic intuitive to say the least. I might suck at making enchantments for now, but I'm far from defenseless spellwise. And I have a few tricks up my sleeves."

Tricks like, oh, an upgraded and more focused power beam. A big flashy beam of energy was nice, but an extremely focused (if so energy intensive she wasn't sure she could use it for more than a second) energy beam with the power per square centimeter to give a EuroFed Marine Corps fusion powered laser canon a run for it's money was better.

"Right, still, it would have been a bad idea." Emilia smiled. "But thanks for defending me, I appreciate that."

Alexandra looked away, hiding her blush, rubbing her neck in embarassment.

"Well, you know, that's what friends are for. Plus, you'd have done the same for me."

"You're right about that. Although I dare say I would have been a tad bit more thoughtful about it."

Alexandra rolled her eyes.

"Riiiight. Anyway. Sorry for the outburst. The adventurers should be retreating to the surface right now. Hold on, let me check..." Alexandra quickly went into dungeon mode, and her eyebrows rose. "Nevermind they're almost...now they're out of my influence. Shit, these girls move fast. How are they flying through hallways like that? I mean, I get the whole 'flying with magic' thing, but how do they avoid hitting the walls?"

Emilia shrugged.

"Practice? I have the flight spell, but I wouldn't be able to do that. Flying through the corridors at home wasn't especially encouraged. Especially since, you know."

She gestured at her dress.

"That didn't seem to phase the other girl much..." Muttered Alexandra, before coughing as they both blushed, remembering the woman's lack of undergarments. "Ahem, in any case, that seems to confirm the assassin and elf girl made it back to civilization. Since that was the guild's assessment team, I assume the adventurers won't be far behind?"

The vampire girl nodded.

"Yes, most probably, and then the government, then various settlers, farmers, ect, as your habitable area grows." She smiled. "This are will be a booming dungeon town in no time!"

"Right..." Alexandra looked at the ceiling, then sighed, before looking back at Emilia, and chuckling at her inquisitive look. "I'm not complaining mind you! Gods know we always need more mana, and adventurers should help with that, and I won't spit upon the essence either, if we kill one of them and bring them back, but it'll feel...weird. I mean, I'm so used to going everywhere I wish without any problem, even up to the surface to watch the stars. Now, I'll have to restrict my body to the restricted parts of the dungeon."

Emilia sighed.

"I know, but it was inevitable from the beginning." She grinned. "Well then, better make the most of your last few days of pure freedom, right?"

Alexandra nodded enthusiastically. Then she opened her mana reserves screen, and smirked. These mythril women might have been annoying, but they had produced an incredible amount of mana while inside her influence.

"Damned right! Although, there is something I'd like to do first..."

*****

"I see...while your teammate's faux pas might create some needless complications, it should be fairly benign. As long as she makes an official, and personal, apology. But that will have to wait until I'm here, understood?"

"Yes, guildmaster Starvak."

"Excellent! Now, you said that this dungeon indiscriminately used Old World technology, correct?"

"Yes sir."

"Then, would you please uproot and take the two sentinel pillars in front of the entrance? Then place them a hundred meters away or so."

Pyris blinked, and looked up from her com crystal to the equally confused expressions of her teammates.

"What do you me-"

She turned around, her hand on the hilt of her sword as she felt a rush of energy, the ambient mana density suddenly going up, while a literal wind of mana passed by her group, like if something had...pushed it.

Then she watched in amazement as the two pillars guarding the entrance, the ones they had just been told to grab, simply vanished, like if they had been hit with the dust to dust spell.

She gulped. Well, so much for that order. Looks like the dungeon had gotten to them first.

"Pyris? Pyris, can you hear me?"

She cleared her throat, then brought the com crystal up again.

"Yes, guild master. Uh, about those pillars..."

*****

"Lord Joachim. I have a message for you."

Gerald Joachim Eternel, newly promoted lord commander of the Arkan Continental Order action arm, looked up from his desk. He smiled broadly as he recognized the man standing in front of it.

"Gregor!" He got up, and quickly went around his desk, clasping forearms with his old comrade. "It has been too long. Come, come, sit!"

The smiling man in similar black robes to his own sat down in front of his desk.

"Hello to you too Gerald! It has been far too long indeed! I see you're doing quite well for yourself."

Joachim chuckled as his old friend looked around his almost brand new office. Gregor Surevoie was an old friend from his first induction and seminary in the Order, and they had quickly bonded over their shared passion for dwarven beverages (preferably the kind that had enough alcohol to be set on fire) and getting things done rather than sitting around and discussing semantics. The latter had landed both of them into the Order's action arm, charged with actually implementing the Order's great project, and doing whatever dirty work needed doing along the way. Unfortunately, their path had separated afterwards, with Gregor's almost pathological hatred of paperwork and bureaucracy firmly anchoring him in a field operative role, while Joachim's skill at management and navigating the internal factions, traps and vendettas of the Order's bureaucracy had directed him towards management and command roles.

"I go by Joachim nowadays, remember? But yeah. An operation went a bit sideways, but the result gave me quite the record. In fact, if I've read between the lines well enough, the way I've handled the complications actually spoke more in my favor than a flawless operation of this magnitude ever could have. So, you said you had a message for me?"

"Yep. It's from the intelligence arm, your eyes only." He handed him over a rather odd black brick, and Joachim whistled softly as he recognized the Message Security Container (MSC), an intricately engraved and enchanted box made to guarantee the destruction of the message inside of it in case an unauthorized person tried to open it. "Yep. Looks like someone thinks whatever they want to tell you is pretty important. In any case, my work here is done."

Joachim looked at his friend as he got up and started walking towards the exit.

"Wait!" He smiled as his friend turned around, an eyebrow raised. "If you don't have anything planned tonight, how about we go to the Fiery Dragon bar? My treat. How does 21h sound?"

Gregor smiled.

"You got it! I'll be there. And I hope your stint as a desk jockey hasn't damaged your alcohol tolerance!"

"No chance of that!"

They both laughed, then Gregor made a mock salute, and stepped outside of Joachim's office, closing the door behind him.

Joachim looked at the door for a few seconds, then pressed a button on his desk. A faint hum started in the background as multiple enchantments and even several Old World relics activated, weaving fields of energy to prevent anyone from spying on him. He knew it was completely superfluous (if someone had breached the stronghold's massive defenses, his own security measures would be positively laughable in comparison), but old habits died hard, and protocol was protocol.

He pressed his hand on the MSC, and waited for a few seconds as the complex verification process took place. Finally, the box flashed, and he quickly typed a complex password on the floating screen ('hologram' the artificers called it) that appeared above the container.

There was a click, and the MSC swung open, revealing a mundane looking piece of paper. Joachim gingerly took it, and unfolded the message, before quickly reading the terse missive.

'From: Lady Major Esteria Ouragan, Arkan Continent Intelligence Arm.

To: Lord Commander Gerald Joachim Eternel, Arkan Continent Action Arm.

We have just received confirmation of Lady Lesly's dungeon plan's success. The guild has sent an assessment team and confirmed her presence at the Site Seraph ruins.'

Joachim smiled. Looked like it was time for phase 3.

He put the message back into the MSC, and carefully closed it, before turning off his office's security features, and pressing a button on his desk.

"Yes my lord?" Said his secretary from the com crystal interlinked with the massive 'computer' integrated into the desk.

"Corson, could you please ask for a secure meeting with Lady Kalbir? I have need of the services of one of her agents."

"Of course, at once my lord."

Joachim cut the connection, and his smile broadened. It was a shame that High Commander Lesly's plan was on a strict need to know basis, but he understood the need for secrecy in this case, particularly after what had happened during phase 1. Handled differently, what had happened to princess Cassissa could have turned into a disaster of epic proportions. It was good to know that his old boss (well, technically she was still his superior, just no longer in a position to directly give orders or effectively command her post) was still around, and her plan was going on without a hitch. He was fairly sure that his already meteoric promotion would be nothing compared to what he would get once her plan came to fruition, and he proved to be a major reason for it's success.