It was a quick trip down to the lobby to warm up, and back to the fourth floor. Much of the frigid bite of the floor itself had lessened after the clear, making the after-battle clean up far less complicated than it would have been otherwise.

I had only received one text on my freshly unpackaged burner.

What would you even put your thumb on? I guess it would make sense if the contract magically appeared out of the air, but even then, you’d need ink. Kinsley’s in-person contract required a pen and ink to sign. It all made me curious. Ironically, Mom seemed far more cryptic in text now that she was aboard our little conspiracy than ever before.

And I had a bigger problem to deal with.

At first, it only seemed like a good thing. But the more I thought about it, the more dubious the idea became. I liked Audrey—personality quirks aside—because her needs were simple. She wanted to eat, a lot, and it was an easy enough motivator to keep a handle on.

And the wolf’s motivations were not so straightforward. Not to mention, like Audrey, it would probably keep its memories. If I’d already been the target of its rage when I left the elevator, I couldn’t imagine that aspect would get any better given the tactics I’d used to bring it down. It didn’t matter that it would have restrictions in terms of direct harm. If I summoned it unprepared, and it inherited Suggestion like Audrey had, and its base intelligence was higher than mine, I was in serious trouble.

I decided to keep it, but to wait to consume it until I either had higher intelligence or a better feat. This made deciding where to place my stats even more difficult.

Level: 7

Strength: 6

Toughness: 6

Agility: 10

Intelligence: 15

Perception: 8

Will: 11

Companionship: 1

Active Title: Born Nihilist

Feats: Double-Blind, Ordinator’s Guile I, Ordinator’s Emulation, Stealth I, Awareness I.

Skills: Probability Spiral, LVL 9. Suggestion, LVL 12. One-handed, LVL 6

Summons: Audrey — Flowerfang Hybrid. Bond LVL 3

Selve: 561 (-100 per week)

Skill Points Available: 3. Feat points available: 2.

<>

I had been leaning away from power-leveling Intelligence before finding this monster core. Agility would keep me alive, as had been proven over and over again. Will linked directly to my summons, and the more damage I could do with them, the less my deficit of Strength and Toughness would matter. Perception was still important—for situations like having to choose between the three elevators at the beginning, but slightly less-so now that I had

I scrolled through the ever-expanding list of feats rapidly, trying to find anything that would help with my anti-suggestion measures. There were surprisingly few general perks that had anything to do with summoning. Most of them were straight health or damage boosts.

There were a few perks in the Ordinator tree that were on the verge of being unlocked, and if it flowed the way it had been so far, probably would be by the time I hit level 8. The best decision was to bank the feat points for now. had cost five feat points, a level’s worth of feat points plus the entire bonus I’d received for defeating the high-level pack leader. Making my final decision, I placed two more points in Agility, and one in Will. If I didn’t unlock anything that helped with my summon predicament next level, I’d just stat dump into Intelligence once I figured out the safest way to test the summon.

And I wasn’t the only one dealing with the prospect of delayed gratification. Audrey was skinning the Arctic Wolf. I’d noticed little bladed growths at the end of her vines. I couldn’t be completely sure, but I was fairly certain they hadn’t been there before my level—but they were razor sharp. When I told her of a way to make meat tastier, by separating it from its fur, she was initially thrilled. Only after an hour of prep did the reality begin to sink in. Still, even as she grumbled in low, scrabbling sounds, I had to respect the quality of the work. My sloppy-eating plant apparently had a perfectionist streak.

My new title was something else.

I frowned. Maybe I took things a little far, but my life was on the line. It seemed contrived to extrapolate from that battle that I was a cruel person. It was a survival situation. I focused on it to pull up the description.

The fact that the title primarily served a social focus did nothing to underscore how useful it was. Having more insight into a person was invaluable. The bit at the end about “none escaping” the title’s gaze gave me pause. Self-awareness wasn’t an issue, but I wasn’t sure I wanted that level of insight into everyone close to me.

Still, not utilizing something so promising was a clear mistake. Especially with the open forum tomorrow.

And that was it. I scoured the rest of the tundra and found nothing but snow. It wasn’t all that surprising. Though the challenge had been significant, this room had really only held one enemy. A monstrous, terrifying enemy that nearly killed me, but a singular one.

If the dungeon followed a traditional structure, the most significant rewards would be on the fifth floor, marking the end of the quest. Unfortunately, looking at the pattern of what had just happened, I wasn’t sure when I’d feel comfortable taking that on. The black-silhouetted-ghoul lady wasn’t guaranteed to be on the next floor, but knowing what I did about this dungeon, it was almost a sure thing.

I’d gone out of my way to prepare for this floor, prepared for the risks, and still found myself in an almost untenable position. I wanted to avoid pushing to the next level until I actually felt ready.

It took some effort to push myself to my feet, the pain from my shoulder almost unbearable. I pulled at the collar of my ruined armor, glancing beneath. The wounds had closed quickly, though not quickly enough for the entire top half of my armor to not be stained in blood. Hopefully, the potions had some sort of latent effect, or I was going to be in a world of pain tomorrow.

“Come on, we’re going.” I said aloud, ready to get out of the frost-stricken floor and back into the sun. The snow crunched under my soaked shoes.

“But… meat.” Audrey said, her voice mournful as we passed by the three frozen pups.

“Haven’t you had enough?” I asked. It made no sense to deny her, but the thought of it turned my stomach.

“No… but too much work…”

“To eat them?” I asked.

“To skin them.” Audrey shuddered.

I headed to the elevator. The state of my dress was nagging at the back of my mind until I remembered the Once I put it on, no one gave me a second look on the way to Kinsley’s door. A few eyebrows and double-takes, but that was it. No one followed me or asked questions. I walked right by a beat cop, watched his eyes slide down to the state of my clothes, then ignore me altogether.

Even if I didn’t have the mask, I might have been okay. He’d probably seen enough in the last twenty-four hours that someone in a torn up hoody was the least of his concerns.

My thoughts strayed to the open forum. It would be a perfect testing stage for my new title. If it all went as planned, the merchant’s guild would be in business, and hopefully, we’d all have a better idea of what was coming next.