”I think I know how to beat the Second Level, but I’m not sure if I should.” I said to Felicia as we moved through the jungle of the second level.

“And since I know you, I know its not because of the danger, its because you think the Kobolds can be reasoned with,” she retorted. She was wearing her new armour - she’d gone with a stiff leather skirt and high boots to cover her lower half and a jacket similar to mine.

“Guilty,” I admitted. We were trying a different tactic this trip. Last time, we had exhausted my mana casting [Blind] so many times so this time we were trying [Greater Invisibility]. If I had been alone, I would have just cast it on myself and slipped through the jungle like a deadly ghost, but there were logistical issues with casting it on all of us.

I could still see those targeted by [Greater Invisibility], but they couldn’t see me, or each other, and I couldn’t hear them either. We couldn’t act as a group, not even to the extent of keeping together. So instead, we were trying something else.

I’d made Kyle invisible. He was ‘taking point’ as they said in the movies, moving ahead to try and spot any potential danger, then coming back to make sure he was moving in the right direction. He could see us, so he could stay nearby, and I could see him, and so would know if something happened to him.

We were still dependant on Felicia for directions. While I had memorised the map and could find the plants using [Identify], Felicia’s [Gather] skill let her pick up wanted plants just by glancing over an expanse of jungle. Trying to emulate her had eventually unlocked [Gather] for me, but with only one skill point left I was holding out for a better skill.

Kyle, on the other hand, was a complete monster when his opponent couldn’t see him. Most of our encounters now, we’d just hear a scream, and then move forward to see the corpse, or Kyle fighting a second monster. The few times something got by Kyle, I’d blind it and we’d call for support.

All up, it seemed a much more efficient method of moving through the jungle. We’d decided to focus on listed jobs this trip, so weren’t spending too much time harvesting creatures - the exception being darksteel talons, as we could quickly cut off the feet. We were also collecting the bodies of the Flying Raptors that attacked us, with the aim of collecting their feathers later.

It was all going well, so naturally my thoughts had turned to the next stage.

“I know everyone you’ve spoken to has confirmed it,” Felicia said, continuing the conversation. “So what will it take to convince you?”

“I’m sorry to be so stubborn.” I said. “But theres a lot of incidents in my world’s history where everyone was completely certain about something - and completely wrong. Like when they proved the Earth wasn’t flat.”

“Wait. The worlds not flat? What is it then?” Felicia asked quickly.

“One world-shattering revelation at a time,” I said wryly. I paused, considering my words. “I don’t know if Ryvue is the same as Earth, but Earth is a round ball of rock, about eight-and-a-half thousand miles across.” Latoran miles were a little shorter than Earth miles, but [Calculate] gave me effortless conversion regardless.

Felicia boggled for a second at the thought of such a thing, but quickly rallied. “But if we could be wrong, that means you could be wrong just as easily.”

“Yeah,” I said. “So to figure out who’s right, we’ll have to do an experiment.”

Some time later, I was staring at a fairly well-concealed hole in the ground. Felicia and Kyle had gone back out to process and sell our goods, but I’d had her lead me here, to one of the entrances to the Kobold Lair. Hopefully, I’d be able to find my way back.

The lair entrances were always guarded, so I knew there was a warrior hidden in there. If I hadn’t been invisible, he’d have spotted me by now, and either raised the alarm or attacked me. I wanted to lure him out, so I used [Unseen Sound] to mimic the sound of a crying child coming from just out of sight of the hole.

Sure enough, after a few seconds, an ugly lizard face popped out and started creeping towards the sound. He got confused for a second as he tried to identify where it was coming from, and I chose that moment to make my approach.

“I just want to talk,” I said in Kobold. My process was a little awkward. I had to say what I wanted to the Kobold, to let my [Gift of Tongues] provide a translation, and then mimic the result with [Unseen Sound] as he couldn’t hear through [Greater Invisibility]

“Where human! Show yourself!”

“I need you to promise not to attack me.” I said, carefully gauging the effects of my words on the little savage.

“Yes! Promise!”

Not fully trusting his eager acceptance, I made a shadow appear behind a bush using [Static Image] With a cry of triumph, the Kobold launched himself towards it.

“Yes! Kill!” He crashed into the bush, but found no prey. “Tricked! Tricked!” he cried.

It went on like that for a little while. I really didn’t want to believe in this ‘unrelenting hostility’ thing, but I was convinced of it by the end. The little brute wouldn’t stop, attacking anything he thought was me, no matter what I tried to offer, or threaten him with. It was time to move on to phase two. I hadn’t actually run this phase past Felicia, as there was no way she would have helped me get here if she’d known.

“Going to see your Chief now!” I said, making the voice come from the hole. The Kobold shrieked and dived inside. I swallowed my Dark Vision potion and carefully followed him.

The Kobold tunnels were clearly not dug by Kobolds, despite the fact that they were miners. The tunnels were simply too tall to be there for anything other than adventurer convenience. Though narrow and twisting, the rocky ceiling was never less than 8 feet high. There were tunnels that looked made by Kobolds, small offshoots too small for a human to fit down. But the way to the Kobold Chieftain was made for humans to use.

My unwilling guide hurried down the main tunnel, cursing, as he chased after my fictional intruder. Some other Kobolds stuck their heads out of the side tunnels, but he told them to get weapons and guard the entrance.

At one point he stopped and looked confused. Catching up with him, I saw that he was inspecting the gravel on the ground. Surprised that a trap wasn’t triggered? I thought. He turned back, perhaps suspecting that his prey had taken another tunnel, so I made mocking laughter come from further down. He cursed again, and took a running jump over the suspicious gravel.

Then we came to a more open area, that the Kobolds had been using for primitive smelting. Darksteel ore was lying about everywhere and a number of Kobolds were industriously tending to a forge.

“Where intruder?” he yelled. Naturally they professed no knowledge, which enraged him somewhat. “Go search! I warn chief!” he ordered. About half of those in the room did what he said, the others made rude gestures. In the larger room I had no trouble avoiding the obedient ones, as they rushed towards every exit but one. The one my guide headed for. The tunnel that led to the Chief.

Two more traps needed to be avoided, but I got plenty of warning when my guide took a large leap. With Dark vision, I could probably identify the pit traps without a guide, but it was useful to have him point them out to me.

Finally we made it to the Chieftain’s quarters. To my surprise, they were blocked off from the tunnel by a proper door. My guide opened it hastily and called out as he entered.

“Boss! Boss! We got intruders!” He looked around widely, perhaps expecting his mysterious enemy to be waiting for him. Instead, the room contained only the Chieftain and the Shaman, looking at him with dumb looking expressions. His enemy casually strolled in behind him.

“Where!” the Chieftain demanded, but he never got an answer. Instead both he and my guide stared dumfounded at the empty space where the Shaman used to be.

The shaman was still there of course, somewhat confused as to what the others were going on about. He soon found out though.

[Greater Invisibility]

This time I targeted the Chieftain, and it was the turn of the Shaman to be surprised.

[Greater Invisibility]

Casting it on the guard kobold might have been overkill, but I wanted the others to not realise what was going on for as long as I could.

You have dealt 57 damage!

My guide just looked at his wound in surprise. It seemed greater intelligence wasn’t always helpful, as his incomprehension delayed his return attack.

You have dealt 55 damage!

For killing a Kobold, you have earned 80 XP

He fell to the floor, and I cancelled the [Greater Invisibility] spell. Now the Kobolds realised they were under attack. The shaman cast his spells, and the Chieftain drew his sword and called for reinforcements. Neither of those actions worked when you couldn’t make a sound though.

You have dealt 59 damage!

The shaman could only swing widely with his staff, he wasn’t combat trained. I easily avoided his strike, and went for the kill.

You have dealt 62 damage!

For killing a Kobold Shaman, you have earned 150 XP

That just left the Chief. He had moved over his man and was wildly swinging his sword. I took a few steps to one side and canceled the Shaman’s invisibility. As expected, he rushed over, leaving himself wide open.

You have dealt 50 damage!

At the moment he felt my dagger, he twisted, turning for a strike of his own. I barely parried it with my other blade. Then, as I tried to strike again with my main blade, he somehow managed to disengage and parry me.

Shit. I backed off. He’s this good when he can’t see me? I wasn’t sure if it was blind-fighting or his skill, but he definitely couldn’t see me. When I backed off, he stayed in place, moving his sword around, as if to block possible strikes. I started to wonder if I hadn’t been too hasty. Maybe I could have worked out how to get Kyle into these tunnels?

Still, I was committed now. No sense in holding back.

[Blind]

I wasn’t sure if it would make a difference, but it couldn’t hurt to try. He didn’t panic, but his movements became more uncertain. I moved in behind him and tried another strike. He spun and parried me at the last minute, and once again, I barely managed to parry his return strike. He looked a little unsteady after spinning though, which gave me an idea.

Moving over to the shaman’s corpse, I sheathed my parrying dagger and grabbed the corpse. Kobolds are pretty small, and I was easily able to toss it one handed, not at him, but at his feet. He must have felt something - air from the fall perhaps, because he whirled to face that direction.

I was already redrawing my blade and moving around again. Even as he was trying to figure out what was going on, I was rushing in from behind again. I’d noticed that his parry and return strike involved a backward step, so this should…

You have taken 12 damage!

Ow! But he was down, having been tripped by the corpse. Open again! I jumped on top of him, letting my blade lead.

You have dealt 53 damage!

You have taken 37 damage!

He couldn’t bring his sword to bear, but he could still bite and kick, and now he knew where I was. We struggled furiously on the ground, and I stabbed him as quickly as I could.

You have dealt 51 damage!

You have taken 29 damage!

You have dealt 58 damage

For killing a Kobold Chieftain, you have earned 280 XP

For clearing the second level of Oakdale dungeon for the first time, you have earned 500 XP

For clearing the second level of Oakdale dungeon you have earned a reward

For clearing the second level of Oakdale dungeon alone for the first time, you have earned 500 XP and a reward.

I made myself crawl a few feet away from the bodies, before letting myself slump to the ground. 102/180 HP. Time to try that healing potion. I’d bought two healing potions of the next grade from Oliver for 5 gold. Taking one out and drinking it, I felt the exquisite feeling of my wounds closing. It healed me 50 points, almost back to full. It seemed a waste to take the other one, so I just let myself rest.

After a minute, I raised my head to look around. There was a new tunnel and two silver chests. Bigger ones than last time. Energised again by the thought of rewards, I went and opened them.

One contained 20 gold coins, and a weird looking doll. The other contained 20 gold coins and… an exact copy of my new dagger, only made in Darksteel? I identified the items.

[Identification] : Darksteel Dagger - Quality : Great - Properties: Silent, Steel-piercing

[Identification] : Oakway Token - Properties: Teleport

Ah, I’d heard of this token, but no one had mentioned it looking like that. And the dagger was nice? Customised to me I guess?

It occurred to me that my victims might also have items, so I went and searched the bodies. I was getting quite inured to corpses by now, though I still hadn’t seen a human body. The Chieftain had Mediocre quality darksteel sword, which was worth taking for the metal if nothing else. The Shaman’s staff was also Mediocre, but it did have a Mana Crystal about one centimetre across tied to the end of it. I was a little leery about disassembling it, but it didn’t look like anything special to [Mana Sense], so I took my knife to the string and removed the crystal.

[Identification] : Mana Crystal - 20/45 capacity

Nice. From what Noah had said, this should be worth 90 gold on its own, but I had other plans for it. There wasn’t really anything of note. I took a dagger and spearhead since they were made of darksteel, but left the Shaman’s collection of fetishes and herbs. I couldn’t tell if they were worth anything and they smelled really bad. Then it was time to face the music.

I channeled mana into the doll, and the world disappeared, getting replaced a second later with the entrance to the first level. I sighed, and started heading down. I’d agreed to meet Felicia outside the first bosses chambers. Since I was still invisible, it was no real effort to get down to where she was.

“What happened to you?” was the first question she asked, her tone halfway to a scream.

“Its fine, really,” I said, waving away her concern. It was mostly true. Being thirty HP down would have crippled me at level one, but now I just had some deep scratches and bruising. Painful, but even that had faded. I sat down on the ground and slowly fell over.

“Katherine!” Felicia rushed over.

“Sorry, don’t worry,” I said. “I guess I ran out of adrenaline.”

“Whats that?” she asked, checking over my partially healed wounds.

“Hmm? Oh… its a drug your body makes for stressful moments. Makes the heart beat faster, increases blood flow… makes you fight or run. I’m sure you’ve felt it a few times in the last few days.” I laughed, but Felicia’s hands faltered as she went over my wounds.

“The body… makes drugs?”

“Yeah, lots of different drugs for every occasion. Thats how the stuff you do with [Herbalism] works. It just mimics the drugs that the body uses to have the same effects.”

Felicia was silent as she finished checking me. Eventually, she sighed and sat back. “You’re fine.” she conceded.

“Told you. And….” I pulled out the dungeon token. “I beat the Kobold Chieftain!”

“You…” She looked exasperated. I heard a snort from over where Kyle was. “That was way too dangerous!”

“There’s no way you killed all those Kobolds though,” Kyle said. “You’d have run out of [Endurance].”

“Ah, but they can’t summon their minions if they’re invisible.” I smirked. It took Kyle a second to get it, but then he laughed.

“You turned them invisible?”

“Yep! The chief was a pretty hard fight, but other than that it went pretty well.”

“Don’t encourage her, Kyle.” Felicia scolded, but her heart wasn’t in it. “She was still taking crazy risks.”

“Yeah, it was crazy,” he agreed. “But she didn’t put yo- us at risk. So she kept her promise.” He gave me a direct look, and I nodded.

“Incidentally, there’s a special reward for completing it solo,” I said, taking out my new dagger.

“Did it turn your dagger into darksteel?” Felicia asked incredulously.

“No, this is a new one. Just the same, but better quality.” I replied.

“Perfect for your new assassin profession,” Kyle joked.

“Don’t even.” I said with a scowl. “But, seeing as its a magical material, it will be the first thing I enchant properly.”

“So you say, but I have a hard time believing you can enchant things.” Kyle said doubtfully.

“Well, I can’t yet.” I said. “Its very frustrating. Also I don’t really want anyone knowing that I’ve got the skill, so… thats another difficulty. But I have a plan.”

Felicia and Kyle groaned.

That afternoon, a man emerged from between two buildings off the main square. He was dressed in a black hooded cloak, subtly embroidered with mystic symbols that glinted darkly silver. He didn’t look around, but headed straight towards the only jeweller that this town possessed.

“Hello…” said the shopkeeper, his voice trailing off as he beheld his mysterious visitor. “Sir?”

“You are a goldsmith, are you not?” I said. [Disguise] didn’t actually cover my voice, so I was forced to use [Unseen Sound] to project a male voice. My face was obscured by the shadows of the hood, so he couldn’t quite see that my mouth wasn’t moving… but he must have suspected something was off, because he looked quite shaken from the simple question.

“Uh, yes? Sir?

“I require an enchanting scribe. I understand its manufacture is the provenance of goldsmiths.”

“Why do you want an enchanting scribe?” he asked, before thinking. I didn’t answer, figuring the answer was obvious, and the silence would be more intimidating. I watched his face as he thought it through. If I wanted a scribe, then I wanted to do Enchanting, and if I had [Enchanting] than that meant… he was standing in front of a level seven wizard. The blood drained from his face.

“Uh, yes, yes, that item does come within my skill. Requirements are…” he blanched further. “Sir, that item requires a mana crystal - I don’t normally stock such-“

I interrupted him by placing the shaman’s stone on the counter. “Will that suffice?” I asked. He stared at it, skill clicking to life behind his frightened eyes.

“Yes, that will- I can have it ready in 2 days, for 5 gold.”

I wanted to [Bargain], but that didn’t seem in character for Mysterious Wizard, so I just put 5 gold down on the counter.

“I will also require gemstones. Diamond, Sapphire and Tourmaline. Your lowest grades will do.”

“Yes, of course.” He quickly headed to the back, leaving the gold on the counter. He came back with two trays of gemstones for my inspection. I just put 15 gold on the table.

“Diamond.” I said. He dutifully started placing the smallest diamonds on the counter. He stopped when there were about 12 in the pile. They were the tiniest things. I cleared my throat, and he put another two on the pile.

“Thats all I can do sir, theres no local source for these!” I looked at him. Was that going to be enough? I didn’t actually know. My rune list just said diamond dust, not how much. If it isn’t enough, I’ll just have to spend more, I thought. I put 10 more coins on the table.

“Sapphire.” I made myself say, and the man started adding blue gems in a separate pile. Some of these were larger, almost half a centimetre across, but it still made for a pitifully small pile. Five more gold coins. “Tourmaline.” I said. My cash reserves were running out as quickly as they had arrived. I still had the money from our latest expedition, but I still had more purchases to make.

The tourmalines were the largest yet, three murky green stones about a centimetre across. I got the impression they weren’t of great quality, but they still cost five gold. I just nodded, and the merchant sighed in relief. He brought out three small ceramic containers and put each pile in one. Then he tied lids to each small pot, one green, one blue and one unglazed. I gathered all three pots, then turned to leave. “I shall return in 2 days for the scriber.”

Walking across the town square, I could see that I’d attracted some attention, but no one came near. I did look over my shoulder to see someone slip into the jeweller’s store, but I didn’t let that distract me. I headed over to Noah’s alchemy store.

“I require enchanting dust.” Noah responded better than the jeweller had to my demands, perhaps alchemists dealt with the higher levelled more often.

“Of course, sir.” he said, examining me closely. “I’m afraid, I don’t stock any, but if you have the raw materials, I could produce some in a day?”

I nodded. I’d expected this - why would he stock the stuff when there were no enchanters around? I put the cups down on the counter, and he opened them up and examined the contents.

“I see,” he said. He brought out a small balance scale and carefully weighed the contents of each pot, noting down the measured weights. “3 gold to powderise each sample… I presume you will want them combined with purified gold dust at the usual ratio?”

I nodded. Wait, gold dust now? There hadn’t been a mention of it in my so-called help file, but at least this meant my dust would go further. Noah continued:

“Then an additional 6 gold to cover costs and to purify down to a suitable grade.”

I managed to maintain my composure as I casually handed over almost all of my gold. Just one coin left, I berated myself. This had better be worth it!

“I will return in 2 days.” I said.

That night, the talk of the tavern was all about the mysterious Enchanter who had visited. I was learning a lot, as speculation about who he was covered various mages from the capital and the frontier, as well as rumours from the other nations. All of it way off base of course. They were all confused by the fact that he’d ‘only’ picked up 30 gold worth of gems. They seemed to think that an Enchanter would have cleaned out Ethan’s (that was the goldsmith’s name) shop entirely.

Ethan was actually in the tavern that night, enjoying free drinks from the other townsfolk pumping him for every word that the stranger had said. Some speculated that the stranger was scouting out the town, preparing for an eventual takeover. Others said that this was a distraction, a way to start rumours of a top-tier mage in Oakway to either attract other forces, diverting them from his true purpose.

Others said that he was here to steal the dungeon core. That was always a concern with mages apparently, but most folk thought that if that was what he was here for, he was pretty stupid to be wandering around town letting everyone see him. Just go in and take it was what he should do.

The debate raged, and I served drinks while noting potentially useful names and locations, while trying to keep the smirk off my face.