“Can’t believe you had to be saved by a girl half your fucking level, Jakob.”

“Shut it, Kat.” The brown-haired man glowered as he marched forward into the tunnel. Trace pursed her lips, following hesitantly behind as he produced a large satchel. “I was caught off guard, alright? Bladeworms aren’t even supposed to be on this floor.”

“Still can’t believe you killed it in one shot, Trace.” Liz grinned, elbowing the redhead’s side. “Their skins are tough.”

“I have a skill that helped me find its weak spot,” Trace said. “That’s all.” This became a bigger deal than she thought it’d be. She didn’t expect to annoy Jakob by literally saving his life, but apparently, she did. And it didn’t help that his friends kept taunting him for it.

“Man, if you’re not ready, maybe we should just turn back. Come back when you’re feeling better.” Ken shrugged nonchalantly, and Jakob’s eyes flickered.

“I said—” He stepped forward as something moved in the darkness ahead. Dropping the satchel to the floor, he held a grey metallic object in his hand.

The first of the dark figures lashed out. Trace raised her pistol but didn’t get a chance to help. Jakob cocked his shotgun, firing an ear-splitting blast at the bladeworm. The creature shrieked as his weapon’s sparks briefly lit up the tunnel ahead. More of the undulating shapes crawled on the walls and the ceiling, roughly a metre long, hissing and ready to strike.

Jakob unloaded on them before they could even move. Bang. Pump. Bang. Pump. Bang. Pump. Bang. Bang. Bang. No pump. No reload. The golden streaks homed in on the scattering figures— a feat that defied reality.

A skill.

The last of the bladeworms peeled off to the mossy ground, riddled in gaping holes across their silvery skin.

“I was caught off guard. It won’t happen again.”

He glared back at Ken, who just nodded. “Good.”

Trace stepped apprehensively over the bladeworm corpses as the group pressed forward. “I really didn’t mean to piss him off.”

Liz blinked. “Was he pissed off? Seems more like he’s motivated to me.”

“You call that motivated?”

“I mean, look at him.” She gestured at Jakob as he stormed ahead, clearing the path of bladeworms for the party.

“Save some for the rest of us, you fucker!” Kat tossed a fireball over his shoulders, but he was relentless.

“Seems pretty motivated to me.” Liz chuckled, clearly not convincing herself.

The tunnel continued to wind down, although the swarms of bladeworms didn’t allay; the first floor was brimming with the monsters from the second floor. No one knew why they were here, just that this wasn’t supposed to be normal.

Now that the group was aware of what to expect from every corner they turned, Trace was able to contribute before Kat or Jakob killed them all.

[Your party has defeated a Bladeworm – Lvl 6!] Ex said a variation of the phrase multiple times.

[(G) Improved Accuracy has reached level 7!

(G) Improved Accuracy has reached level 8!

(F) Deadly Sight has reached level 4!

(F) Deadly Sight has reached level 5!

(F) Deadly Sight has reached level 6!

Spellshot has reached level 7!

Spellshot has reached level 8!]

Can you maybe chill? Trace mentally told Ex. You’re giving me a headache.

[Do you wish for me to limit the notifications to only what’s necessary?]

Please.

[Affirmative.]

Thank you, she thought, wondering why she was even bothering being polite with an AI.

“I see you’ve already levelled twice in just a few hours.” Ken glanced at her. “Pretty impressive stuff. I can see why you wanted her to come, Liz.”

“That, and she’s my best friend. I’m not going to leave her to waste away doing nothing at home while I’m out here levelling and being badass.” Unsheathing her blade, Liz sliced a pair of bladeworms in half with a single swing. She stopped to pose as their writhing bodies dropped around her.

“Show off.” Trace snorted.

The party stopped to rest at some point, and the redhead passed out some snacks that she had packed in her bag. Jakob kindly rebuked her— not that she cared. It just meant more granola bars for her.

“I appreciate it.” Ken accepted a bottle of water, glugging it down and splashing it over his face.

“How much further to the second floor?” Trace sat against the stone wall. “This is taking a lot longer than I thought it would.”

“We’re getting close.” He ran a hand through his wet black hair. There was a light sheen reflected from Kat’s flame hovering over the ground. “But even if there were lower-levelled monsters here, we’d still take some time to clear this floor.”

“I thought you guys were experts or something,” she said. “I guess I expected you guys to be a lot more… efficient.” It wasn’t an insult; while they were certainly individually skilled, Trace expected them to have better teamwork. Not this, with Jakob charging in while Kat cursed as she followed right behind.

“We’re not action heroes. We’ve never done anything like this before a week ago. If a hundred men with rifles show up and try to kill us, we’ll probably die.”

“Like the National Guard?” Liz helpfully opined.

“Or the military.” Ken tapped a finger on his chin. “Although, I highly doubt that’d be the case, considering most of those abroad have already deserted.”

“I’m just surprised the government only deployed them to three out of the forty-nine states.”

“Fifty states.” Trace rolled her eyes. “Puerto Rico officially became a state last year, remember?”

“Oh, right. Sucks what happened to California though.”

“Shouldn’t have seceded.”

* * *

“This is the second floor?” Trace Taylor stared down at a deep hole. Its side walls were overgrown with vines and vegetation, and a sickening stench rose from the pit as she pinched her nose and spoke in a suppressed voice. “How are we supposed to get down?”

“We climb. Come on.” Liz waved her forward, beginning a slow descent.

Trace was never a fan of rock climbing: it was tiring, laborious, and dangerous. But, somehow, she didn’t find it too difficult to scale down to the second floor. Is this because of my increased strength and dexterity?

[Affirmative,] Ex said.

This really works like a video game, huh? The wretched smell was only exacerbated once she reached the bottom of the pit.

The second floor wasn’t just a long tunnel that snaked its way down: it was a cavernous room with mounds and forests and streams that expanded for kilometres on end. The party stood at the edge of a cliff, at the very end of one of the back walls. There was an alcove behind them, and that was where the smell was at its strongest.

“Oh god, that’s fucking gross.” Kat reeled back.

Trace made a face of disgust as she saw what the others were looking at. It was a pile of human corpses, crawling and covered with maggots the size of small dogs. Their white mucus-like forms writhed in blood, and they squelched as they noticed the intruders. One of them flopped out of the pile, trying to make its way towards them.

[Larva Bladeworm – Lvl 2.]

“Oof. So, that’s where all the dead bodies went.” Liz peered at the monster. It hopped up like it was trying to strike her leg, but she simply stomped it under her boot. “Is this a nest or something?”

“I don’t fucking know!” Kat stumbled away, gagging and pointing. “Just burn it!”

“You burn it.” Crossing her arms, Liz scoffed. “You’re the Pyromancer here.”

The goth girl hesitated as four heads turned to face her expectantly. Sighing, she drew herself to her feet and unleashed a plume of flames into the alcove. She burned it for five minutes straight, not once letting up to see if they were gone. Only when she was confident the fire would burn by itself did she finally stop. “Now, let’s get out of here.” She scurried off, not even waiting for a response.

Trace raised a brow as she watched Kat go. The party continued through the second floor, trudging through the forest as they made their way to the centre of the room, where an obelisk stood above the canopy of trees, marking the entrance to the third and final floor.

“No bladeworms.” Ken idly cast his gaze around the forest, using his daggers to cut down the branches and leaves obstructing their path. He led the way here as Jakob repositioned to the back.

The brown-haired man seemed exhausted; he must’ve used most of his skills on the first floor.

Breaking away from Liz, Trace’s feet sank deep into the mud as she walked up to Kat. “Hey, erm, are you alright?”

“Me?” The goth girl looked up in surprise. “Why wouldn’t I be fine?”

“You seemed a bit freaked out earlier. Just wanted to check in on you.” The redhead spoke softly: she didn’t want to give off the impression that she was trying to mock Kat. Just worried.

“O-oh, that…” Kat trailed off. She averted her eyes, clearly uncomfortable.

“If you don’t want to talk about it, you don’t have to.”

“N-no, I just—” She bit her lower lip. “I just hate gross things. Like spiders and maggots and rats and cockroaches and… yeah, a lot of things.”

That was a surprise. Well, Trace kind of expected it, considering Kat’s earlier reaction, but she didn’t think the list would be that long. Especially considering what they were doing. “If you hate them so much, why are you doing this?”

“What do you mean?”

“You knew about the bladeworms, didn’t you?”

“They looked more like snakes than, like, worms or slugs or centipedes or millipedes. I didn’t think their babies were so…” Kat shuddered. “Anyways, I’m doing this because my friends want to,” she said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. Then she tilted her head back as another thought crossed her mind. “Also, you’ve got to admit, fighting monsters is pretty fucking cool.”

Trace had to agree: saving Jakob from that bladeworm made her feel badass.

“So, why did your friends want to do this?” She gestured at the two men. Trace barely knew Ken, but her first impression of him wasn’t one of a glory-seeking, monster-killing, Dungeon-diving madman. Not that there was anything wrong with being mad— everyone was mad these days, including Trace. What, with a voice speaking in her head twenty-four-seven? Of course she was.

Kat paused, in thought. “Jakob’s a gamer. He thought this whole thing with the System was interesting. He was the one who convinced us to go into the Dire Pits in the first place.” Then she glanced over at her leader. “Ken’s just Ken. He’s always logical, seeing things analytically. He thought that since this was going to be the new norm, we might as well get a head start while others were still in shock.”

“He definitely made the right call, alright.” Honestly, when Liz said she was going to work with a party of strangers, Trace expected them to be like Adair. Unhinged, eccentric, and very much sociopaths. But from her interactions with Kat and Ken, she thought that they were perfectly normal people.

“What about you?” Kat asked. “Why did you decide to delve into the Dire Pits?”

Trace wasn’t really sure what to say. “I don’t know. I was kind of against this whole Neo Genesis thing, thinking it would blow over soon enough. But after a week passed and things only got worse”— and the fact that she was nearly murdered by an insane intruder, although she left it unsaid— “I sort of realised that I’ll have to adapt or die.”

“And Liz, your best friend?”

“That’s just how she is, I guess.”

Trace didn’t want to go into detail about Liz’s own problems with her father. Jason Evergreen was a terrible father: he barely seemed to care for his own daughter, always leaving on trips with his various mistresses. That left Liz to always entertain herself.

This was something new and interesting, so it piqued her interest. Especially since Jason was likely never going to return home now that every single airline company went out of business in a single day. After all, when thousands of planes lost their pilots in the middle of a flight all at the same time, the cost of the crashes was going to rack up significantly. The pilots and passengers were returned to their destination airport hours later.

“She’ll probably get bored of fighting monsters once she clears enough Dungeons.” Trace had a heavy thought. “That is if we can even clear a single Dungeon and don’t all die gruesome deaths.”

“You’re a realist. I like that.”

“Please stop making things weird.”

Kat glared at Trace for a second, then the pair burst out laughing. “Honestly, it’s a little weird, isn’t it?”

“It’s very weird— but hey, at least it’s better than the other option of being hated.”

The moment of bonding was, however, cut short as a lumbering figure exploded from the thicket ahead, taking a swing at Ken. He rolled out of the way just in time to not get squished by the three-metre-tall monster.

“Ogrebears!” Liz drew her blade as she shouted. “Three of them!”

Kat cursed. “Why are there third-floor monsters here?”

Trace narrowed her eyes, even as she prepared for battle, because, well, she was beginning to see a pattern here. Anyone would. It was that bloody obvious.

Name: Trace Taylor

Race: Human (Earth A314)

Class: Spellshot – Lvl 8

Vocation: Builder – Lvl 4

Craft: Locked

Traits:

Strength: E+

Magic: F+

Endurance: E-

Vitality: F+

Dexterity: D-

Skills:

Class Skills:

(G) Improved Accuracy – Lvl 8

(F) Deadly Sight – Lvl 6

(F+) Last in the Chamber – Lvl 2

(F+) Recall Weapon – Lvl 3

Vocation Skills:

(G) Quick Hands – Lvl 4

(F) Makeshift Materials – Lvl 3

(F+) Rapid Repair – Lvl 4