As it turned out, most of what Ben had looted was trash. That was to be expected, Ben had a Utility Pocket, which meant he could and should loot everything he possibly could. He had the space for it, after all.

What was unexpected, however, was how absolutely garbage Ben actually was at identifying valuable things to pick up. He'd been operating on video game logic, and grabbing anything shiny or that looked like a weapon or accessory. What he should have been doing was, apparently, grabbing shit like furniture, the mutation chamber controls, and a bunch of other stuff that went way over Ben's head as to how or why it would be valuable.

“At least you siphoned off most of the mutagens,” the Gray said irritably after sorting through the large pile of notably unvaluable weapons, which were really just bug parts. “You should have brought back a bag of their larva, or even better, slapped a couple of slave collars on their [Scientists]. That would have been worth something.”

“Sorry, we were fresh out of slave collars,” Ben said happily, not at all sympathetic to the Gray's pain.

“I'll get you a couple dozen, on the house, out of the sheer disgust I have for how much wealth you left behind. At least the location of a relatively unlooted citadel is worth something. . . probably worth a lot. You're lucky!” the gray said, then added, “fuckboy! Chief Cragg'll be able to auction the information off, and that will more than cover the cost of his assistance, but that's just luck!”

“Noted,” Ben said dryly.

“What else do you have, besides garbage?”

“I've got a bunch of bodies,” Ben said, shrugging.

“Oh really?” the gray, who had declined and continued to decline to name himself, said, “I've got a room for that, follow me.” Ben was led to a backdoor, and on the other side of it was a large white, chilly room with three large, white, floating rectangles in the center. “Place them here, and I'll analyze them.”

“Ok, but I've got more than three,” Ben said, and deposited three of the citadel monster corpses on the slabs, which immediately began to glow. Transparent energy that moved like crystal jelly pooled on the surface of the slabs, encasing the bodies and lifting them slightly off the surface. A moment passed, and then a holographic screen appeared in front of each new bug-sicle, facing Ben and the Gray. The process only took a few quiet, conversation free moments.

“How many more than three?” the gray asked, then his eyes widened as if he'd seen something obvious, “of course, you're one of those humans with the pocket dimension powers.” Ben nodded. “Better question then,” the at-height with Ben alien said, “do you have more than fifteen bodies total?”

To be somewhat precise, Ben had around a hundred and fifty bodies in his Utility Pocket.

“I've got more than forty,” Ben said, downplaying how many he actually had.

“Hmm, well,” the alien said, then went over to check on the monster corpses, “I doubt we'll want-” then he paused when he checked the readout, “come over here, if you please.” Ben walked over, and the Gray pointed at the screen.

“As per our agreement to have me explain how things work, I feel it would be remiss if I failed to explain what is about to happen.”

“Ok, that sounds important,” Ben said neutrally, listening.

“Intact corpses,” he began, “have many, many different uses. [Necromancers] obviously never have enough of them, [Scientists] are always looking for more, [Slavers] are always happy to take them, and [Revivalists] always pay good coin for bodies in good condition. There are adventurer teams that specialize in corpse acquisition, at killing in specific, easily repaired ways. Our best acquisition team, Dryden's Poets, are able to produce corpses of the highest quality, and make a fortune doing so.”

“I'm tracking so far,” Ben said, eyeing the obvious signs of ultra-violence Short Bus had inflicted on the monster, “so are these worthless or something?”

“Normally. . . these would still have good value. The [Revivalists] wouldn't take them, nobody would pay to be reborn in one of these,” he said, and suddenly Ben had questions, but he held his tongue, “Fortunately for you, the Citadel you raided was experimenting with recycling their bodies for further use. All that slime and mutagen you wisely raided? If these bodies are submerged in them and repaired adequately, you'll have quite the haul on your hands.”

“Say all that again, but slower,” Ben said, wanting some extra clarity.

“These are high value, in demand corpses,” the gray said, then pointed at the generic humanoid fly, “these, for example, have been identified as Beezel Elites. If properly repaired, they'll even tempt Enelim,” the gray said, greed plainly written on his face. Ben gave the Gray a blank expression. “The Enelim are a Signatory Race, you know what those are, correct?” Ben nodded. “Good. They are a race of Sentient Undead, and by far the richest civilization in The World. Immortality, [Tireless]ness, and a limitless free labor pool in the form of the dead have made them wealthy beyond all belief.”

“So if they want these bodies, that's really good,” Ben said slowly.

“The Enelim will pay ten times something's true value without blinking an eye if they want it. They'll be particularly interested in the Beezel corpses due to both their status as Elites, and their leadership traits, which are quite high. An Elite Undead Lieutenant on auction will always draw a wealthy crowd. These other bodies are less exciting, but if sold as a unit, a package deal. . . the Chief will be extremely pleased he took the time to make your acquaintance.”

“I'm sensing a 'but' coming,” Ben said, looking at the greedy alien as he did mental calculations, likely trying to figure out his cut in all this.

“But,” the Gray said, “I'm not even remotely equipped for this sort of thing. I'm going to write you a referral, a letter of introduction of sorts, and send you to a group of specialists.”

Ben felt a. . . tingle was the wrong word. He felt something like a breeze against his soul, or like sunlight breaking through the clouds and warming his skin on a cold day. A soft flash of light, and a glowing white ring way in the back of his brain.

“Question,” Ben said quickly, speaking and not exactly knowing what he was going to say next, “whoever you send me to, they're going to get a cut of this as well, right?”

“Obviously.”

“I'd like to go to a human owned business,” Ben said, then became extremely sure this was the route he wanted to go.

“Human? Oh, I see,” the gray said, “I can both understand and respect a preference for one's own species. We,” he said, gesturing at himself with his hands, “are the same way. I suppose this work isn't exactly hard, all it requires is a facility. . .” a momentary grimace graced the Gray's face, then vanished, “there's only one in Solas. Newly established and already making waves, making enemies and allies left and right. Run and operated by Earthlings like yourself, however. Are you sure you want to go there? It could be trouble.”

“I'm sure,” Ben said.

“As long as the Chief and I get paid,” he said, then shrugged and started walking out of the room. “Oh,” he said, stopping by the door, “those three back there? Our little secret. Consider that part of my cut, or consider yourself blacklisted. Understand?”

“I've got no idea what you're talking about, what bodies?” Ben said, feigning confusion.

“Good. The facility I'm sending you to is in the safe zone around the Outer Ring, so I recommend you take a lift platform or. . . anything. Just don't walk and waste everyone's time.”

“Ok,” Ben said. They left the room, and Ben's party stared at him with questions in their eyes. Ben gave them a covert thumbs up and nodded his head, pursing his lips and furrowing his eyebrows in the universal gesture for 'It's all good don't worry.'

The Gray pulled out a large piece of paper and focused on it. Moments later, it was filled with both text and illustration, making it look formal and official as fuck, before the Gray folded it up and sealed it with what Ben assumed was magic wax. It was actually just normal wax, but Ben didn’t know that, and he was making safe assumptions here.

“Don't open this, just hand it to whoever greets you at the door,” there was a pause, and then, “they're a little pushy. Don't let them talk you into anything stupid, got it?”

“Got it,” Ben said, taking the letter and making it vanish into his Utility Pocket. The Gray watched it happen with clear envy on his face.

“Incredible,” he sighed, and then shooed them away.

--

Travel in the Outer Ring of Solas was like an American All-You-Can-Eat Buffet, many options, and all of them were cheap. There were options both slow and fast, scenic and direct, conventional and unconventional.

They all cost money, and Ben was flat broke. If not for Thirty-One being with them, they would have had to walk, or, as Namey suggested, ‘Grand Theft Auto the fuck out of the city.’

“I’m just saying, this place isn’t your friend, and you should treat this place like the dungeon it really is” Namey said, making Ben want to slam his head into a wall. Partly because Namey was incredibly frustrating to be around, and partly because some of what he was saying made a disturbing level of sense. The Void Soul was getting very, very good at lying, and the longer he spent around Ben, the more he was adapting to Ben’s personality.

“Just because it’s not my friend doesn’t mean it’s my enemy,” Ben said, “and right now, there’s no way stealing a vehicle and going on a Dark Wish fueled rampage is going to end well for me.”

“You’ll never know till you try,” Namey countered.

“I’m pretty sure I already know,” Ben said, and then realized he was arguing with a literal soulless psycho/sociopath, again, and disengaged. Instead of going on a Dark Wish fueled rampage, Thirty-One had led them to a different part of the Desperation Rapids building. It was a long enough trip from one part of the absolutely enormous building to the other, that there was time for something to happen. And something did happen. Oh, yes, something did happen indeed.

As they had walked, Frankie portaled back into existence, thankfully not wearing his Raiment of Power from Betsy the Purebeast, and was currently plopped down on Ben’s head.

Ben had no idea that Frankie, and his growing number of minions, of which he was also unaware, were currently emulating one of Ben’s best gamer habits. That habit, which Ben had modeled many, many times for them, was sheer, shameless thievery and looting of as much as they could both carry and get away with taking. And, as Utility Pocket elementals, they were quite adept at getting away with it, and could carry a jaw dropping amount of loot.

It was alot of little stuff mostly, random bits and pieces that nobody would notice missing, along with every wand of Create Lesser Elemental they found, but it was enough that more than a few of Frankie’s minions had gained the [Interdimensional Thief] class, and were leveling rapidly due to being in a Plus Player’s party. Frankie himself had gained the [Elemental Lord] class due to the number of underlings he had at his command, and felt he was going to progress to the next rank of elemental soon.

But Ben didn’t know any of that shit. He was just happy to see Frankie and feel his smooshy body on his head like the world’s smuggest, most comfortable hat. He argued with Namey, Short Bus grew rapidly more and more aggressively hungry, Ghost Ears was looking out for all the wrong things, and Thirty-One was busy looking at his internal navigation system. None of them knew what was going on, and lucky for them, today wasn’t the day it all came to a head.

Instead, today was the day they went to what looked like a full sized used car lot that occupied a full quarter of its floor in Desperation Rapids, and either sold or rented the same kind of glass floating platforms Ben’s party had been brought into the Outer Ring of Solas in. There was no attendant, or anyone to greet them. Thirty-One floated over to a platform that, as far as Ben was concerned, he’d picked at random, and then interacted with a stall in front of it.

“We’re good to go,” the cyborg said, “climb on board.”

“Did you just buy this thing?” Ben asked, their entire group getting on the platform, and Short Bus securing a blindfold.

“It’s really the least I could do,” Thirty-One said honestly, “and I might not have the means of Anna or Dryst, but I can at least afford to do this. Please don’t concern yourself with it.”

“Thanks!” Namey said, “I love it! Let’s get two!” Namey was ignored.

“I’m about to eat him,” Short Bus said, his voice freaky calm. It gave Ben goosebumps, and he rapidly searched his Utility Pocket for anything remotely edible. He didn’t find any food.

“Just hold on a bit longer,” Ben said, “Thirty-One, we’ve got to make a pit stop somewhere. Short Bus is about to start eating people, and I’m about to fall over. We’ve got to get some food.”

“Time is of the essence,” Thirty-One said, “but I understand. Luckily, according to the information I received from the shopkeeper back there, we’re headed to a full service facility with a cafeteria. We will be able to eat while doing business.”

“Good enough for me, let’s roll out,” Ben said, raising his voice and making it decisive, ‘let’s go’ gestures with his hands. The wall of the building opened like a garage door, the clear crystal platform rose up without regard for gravity, and then they departed.

--

The Outer Ring of Solas, viewed from the ground, was a chaotic, engulfing experience that blocked the sky and enveloped all the senses completely. When viewed from above, though so much was concealed by the buildings that grew like trees in a forest, the logic and layout of the place became more evident. It was, undoubtedly, an advanced city that blew anything humans had ever built out of the water, no question. The population density had to be in the billions, and yet there was no stink, no trash, and everything seemed to be running smoothly.

And yet, despite all that, the underlying logic of how it functioned remained the same as it was on Earth. The first thing Ben did was see if he could spot who was working for the city, without getting any assistance from Thirty-One. It was a welcome bit of exercise for his brain, like playing ‘Where’s Waldo’ if you didn’t know what Waldo looked like while moving at a high speed, thousands of feet off the ground. He didn’t look at the roads, or at the buildings, but instead turned his attention to anything that looked like a utility of some kind.

Unfortunately, Ben didn’t know enough about anything to do more than distinguish a residential/commercial building from things that weren’t residential/commercial buildings. There were so many weird, oddball structures in the Outer Ring; big crystal spires; huge spell circles with large, building sized spheres of metal floating motionless above them; a bunch of fenced off areas that reminded Ben of Power Substations back on Earth, not from appearance, but from how many warning signs were posted around it. So much of it was a total mystery to him, and he enjoyed that. Ben was the kind of person who liked looking at something he had no context for, and just experiencing it like a waking dream.

Soon, they had left the Outer Ring behind, and were losing altitude as they descended into the ‘Safe Zone’ of the Overcavern Forest around Solas. The light changed from ‘Sunny day’ to ‘Shade’ when they slipped in under the canopy of the enormous trees, and Thirty-One lowered their speed, navigating carefully.

“We should be there any second now,” Thirty One said, his red-lens camera eye looking around. Namey got a sly look on his face and slid on over to near Short Bus was standing.

“Bet you wish you had a bite to eat,” he said, and in response, Short Bus bared his terrifying teeth at the Void Soul and growled. Namey, being incapable of fear, laughed, but still got out of immediate striking range. The rest of the group was silent, their painful experiences in the Overcavern Forest still extremely fresh. Ben played with a brass colored button on his jacket, taking a moment to savor the novel sensation of physical clothing against his [Magical] skin.

Or just the sensation of wearing clothes, at all. A thread of irritation interrupted his focus, an unwelcome input from his damaged class informing him that the shitty twig and moss crown he’d whipped up in jail was not up to the standard of wealth he’d become accustomed to. The standard, by the way, was a shitty iron ring. A low bar to be sure, yet Ben had not met it, and his class was pissed. Plus, though he was clothed, his clothing apparently wasn’t ‘royal’ enough to satisfy his [Royal Requirements]. He also needed a scepter of some kind, and despite his best efforts, he couldn’t just pick up a stick off the ground and cheat it out like he had with his crown.

Even now, he felt the twig and moss crown itching on his scalp, and he realized the only reason he got away with it before was that he was an [Extremely Tiny] fairy. As a Leap-rechaun, he had the feeling his next crown was going to have to be made out of gold, or something even more valuable. He sighed and said quietly,

“The problems of Royalty,” and then left it at that. Their floating platform, which Ben didn’t know the name of, continued its silent flight until it landed in a completely empty, totally normal patch of gigantic forest.

“We’re here,” Thirty-One said dubiously, his mechanical eye looking around with the soft sound of cervos whining. Namey immediately hopped off the platform, nodding his head and walking confidently forward.

“I see, I see,” he said, though it was clear he didn’t see, at all. The rest of the group followed Ben’s lead, who covertly leaned down and whispered to Thirty-One;

“We’re going to leave Namey behind when we get out of here, understand?”

“Affirmative,” Thirty-one whispered back.

“You’re sure this is the right place?” he said, loudly enough this time for everyone to hear. Ben looked around for Red and Vivi, but they were both gone. Captured. It. . . irritated him on multiple levels that his people weren’t here, with him, safe.

“According to my information, it should be right-”

“Here,” Namey finished, stepping forward into the patch of completely normal forest, which shuddered like a digital camera having an error, then vanished completely, revealing a rather large, sprawling complex.

“Fuck yeah,” Ben said, walking forward and momentarily forgetting about pretty much every bad thing that had happened to him in The World thus far. Why? Because he never thought he’d see something like this outside of books.

It was a science facility, he knew it was, because it looked like something out of a Sci-Fi picture on Earth. It had satellite dishes on the roof, large antenna arrays, a huge fence; everything was painted white, and had a highly manufactured, sleek, smooth design. The facility had to be at least three stories tall, and Ben would have bet everything in his Utility Pocket that it extended underground as well.

“Uh-oh,” Thirty-One said, making a mechanical sound of distress, “I think we should just back up slowly-”

Way too late, Thirty-One. Way, way too late. Klaxon alarms started blaring, swirling red alarm lights began flashing, and the sci-fi facility stirred to life.

“Remain where you are standing!” a voice sounded over loud-speakers, firm and synthesized, “move, and you will be destroyed. Remain where you are standing! Move and you will be destroyed!”

Ben immediately put his hands up, feeling an odd sense of calm while everyone around him started to freak out. Something in his chest told him everything was going to be all right.

“Just hold still!” Ben shouted, “put your hands in the air and hold still. Let's see how this plays out.”

“Remain where you are standing! Move and-” the automated voice cut out, and was replaced by a living person.

“Hey, just wait right there. I'm coming out. Atomis, you can't-” the voice was interrupted by another voice, this one much higher pitched.

“I'm coming as well. Remain calm and you will survive this ordeal,” then more quietly, “prepare the maze.”

“No, don't prepare the maze,” the first voice said, sounding a little panicked.

“I kinda want to know about the maze,” Short Bus 'whispered' leaning closer to Ben with his thick arms in the air.

“See, they want the maze,” the high pitched voice, Atomis, said.

“No, they don't. Hey, are you human?” the first voice said, “ah, just give us a second. No maze!”

Ben shifted his weight from one leg to the other, and a moment later, someone emerged from the base. An honest to God human being in a white labcoat.

“Ho-leeey shit,” Ben said, putting his arms down and approaching the man.

“Still a Leap-rechaun,” the man said, a huge smile on his face. When they were close enough, he reached down and grabbed Ben's hand in a vigorous and friendly shake. “Don't worry too much, that's the last weird one before you get back to human. There’s, uh, there’s more weird shit after human, but don’t worry about that. My name's Nick, and this is Atomis,” he said, indicating a white lab mouse on his shoulder.

“I can introduce myself, Nick,” Atomis said, and Ben noticed the mouse was in black sunglasses, and had a small cigar in his mouth that he was smoking quite vigorously, “and you're all going in the maze, no questions asked.”

“No questions needed!” Short Bus said, a huge shark smile on his face, walking up to Nick and extending his arm out. Atomis jumped from Nick's shoulder and scurried onto Short Bus's, talking as he did so.

“Hm, finally, someone with a genuine love of science. Tell me, how good is your sense of direction?”

“I have no idea,” Short Bus said loudly, walking into the facility without any reservations.

“That's good, we'll find out.”

“What's your name?” Nick asked, ignoring the two Earth animals as they walked away.

“Ben. You already went through all this?” Ben said, indicating his body.

“Oof, yes. You're [Magical], I just now noticed. That's unfortunate, I'm sorry you died. Come on in, I've got some real food, good stuff that'll help you recover.” Ben was fully convinced of the inherent goodness of Nick the moment he mentioned he had food, and he immediately started speed walking into the facility.

“You’ll want to feed the shark before anything else, he’s about to go berserk,” Ghost Ears said, landing on Nick’s shoulder and occupying the spot Atomis had been using.

“I’ll call it in, but Atomis always stocks the maze with a bunch of food.”

“I’m sorry, what maze are you all talking about?” Thirty-One asked.

“Don’t worry about it,” Nick said, “It’s just Atomis working through some psychological stuff. He’s nursing a bit of a grudge, that’s all.”

Unknown to Ben or Nick, Atomis the white mouse wasn’t the only one with a bit of a grudge. Dryst-la-la-la, higher music elemental, watched from a distance, observing the suspicious circumstances and location of the lab, and began using his considerable reach and authority to begin making some inquiries.