It turned out that Dimension magic was incredibly useful when you needed precise timekeeping.

I marveled at the spell, which I had ended up jury-rigging on my own by extrapolating from my understanding of all the other Sight spells I knew. While these spells were usually called something like Sight or Vision, this was mostly a simplification, based on how they tended to manifest — specifically, most of them showed up as visual cues superimposed on the world, only slightly touching the other senses.

Dimension Sense (because I could not in good faith call it Sight) was nothing like the others. While the spatial component did show up as a grid-like three-dimensional array covering the entire world, the time component I could feel inside my mind. I could start tracking time, then stop after a few heartbeats, and I would simply know that 10.72 seconds had elapsed. If I concentrated hard enough, I knew I could improve the accuracy even further, but for the moment, two digits were more than enough.

Sarah zoomed past me in a blur of limbs, only slowing once she was past the line I had marked in chalk on the stone floor, then skidding to a halt barely in time to stop herself from crashing into the wall.

I jotted down the time — 4.42 seconds, bringing the current average to an even 4.4 seconds — while Sarah made her way back to me.

“Can’t we do this somewhere else? One more point in Dexterity or two and I’ll be too fast to stop before the wall,” she asked as she stretched her limbs.

“Stopping gracefully is also aided by your Dexterity, is it not? You should be fine,” I countered, earning myself a glare.

We had found a reasonably smooth stretch of a tunnel near the place where we’d set our camp for the night. It was about 60 meters long, in all, with a dead-end at one end and a sharp turn at the other.

“Whatever, you’re the one who’ll have to scrape me off the wall if it happens,” she said as she raised her arms in a shrug. “That’s five runs. Should I add one more point, then?”

I nodded, and she waved her hands in front of her — manipulating a Status looked weird from an outside perspective — after which she sauntered to the other end of the tunnel and readied herself into a sprinter’s crouch.

I gave her the signal to start running, and she broke into a dash much like the one from before. My magically enhanced inner clock knew better, however, and as she ran past the finish line, I recorded her new time of 4.21.

We were soon done, Sarah not having that many points to spare for Dexterity, but finally we had some solid data — contrary to the linear increase in health we’d seen from Shiro, Sarah’s 50-meter sprint had improved by 5% for each point, a difference which we were now hotly debating.

“It’s probably because health is another arbitrary stat made up by the System,” Shiro whispered. Leon was, after all, sleeping not too far away, and it wouldn’t do to wake him up.

“Maybe, maybe not. I still think Constitution probably influences some other aspects you haven’t discovered yet, and those could be exponential as well,” Sarah argued

“Maybe something like how strong your bones are?” I speculated.

“I’m not breaking my bones to test that out,” Shiro said a bit too loudly, earning a shush from Sarah. “Anyway, by that logic, you might find some linear improvements to Dexterity as well?”

“Could be,” Sarah agreed, “we don’t have the equipment to test something like reaction speed here, but it might be worth looking into it when we get back.”

I nodded. “Try to conserve your points until we’re done here, the.” I glanced at Shiro, continuing, “Both of you.” Alarm grew on his face before I interjected, rolling my eyes, “We’re not breaking your bones, calm down. We’ll figure something out.”

He still looked a bit uneasy, perhaps not fully believing me.

“In any case,” I said, “there’s not much point speculating right now. We’ve only mapped a small part of this System and trying to extrapolate from the little data that we have is foolish at best.”

The two nodded at the implied dismissal. A shiver went down my back, bringing with it that nagging feeling of being watched, and I turned around, squinting at the tunnels before me. Nothing but darkness greeted me, and on instinct I activated Soul Sight, giving the area a thorough look-over.

I thought I could see a faint magical shimmer far along one of the tunnels, but with all the magical moss covering the walls, it was hard to tell what it was. Another magical beastie, most likely, one that could hide fairly well. We would need to keep a good watch.

Turning back towards our camp, I glanced at my two young minions — who, of course, had wasted no time to bring out the deck of cards and were already absorbed by their game — waving to grab their attention.

“Don’t let your guards down,” I told them, “There is something skulking about.”

Shiro raised a hand in acknowledgment, accidentally showing Sarah his cards in the process.

Smiling, I retrieved a book from the luggage wight and sat down next to the fire.

The next few days passed in a blur of fighting monsters coupled with brutal training from Leon. He was a great fighter, and doubly so a great teacher, and from the looks of it the Heroes’ Skills progressed much quicker when Leon was instructing them.

As we went deeper into the dungeon, new monsters began appearing as well; at first, we were set upon by Silverwing Bats, which Shiro and Sarah had little counter for, both being melee fighters.

That had been my time to shine, and I actually got a fair bit of practice from the Bats. Carefully weaving Dimension, I was able to increase the effect of gravity on the flying rodents, forcing them to the ground where they were at the mercy of the two overpowered undead teenagers.

The ones that I missed, Leon used for target practice, and the wide grin on his face told me he was having the time of his life. I wasn’t sure he was aware I was guiding his arrows with Fate.

Not long after that, we began encountering bigger and more dangerous monsters. While the Steelsilk Grotto was named after the Spiders that lived near the entrance, they were far from its most numerous inhabitants. The Grotto was gigantic, and with most Adventurers only braving the first few rooms, they were simply some of the few monsters within that people lived to talk about.

By the third day, Sarah and Shiro could handle a full group of monsters each without much trouble, a vast improvement over their early performance. With both of them holding back on using their stat points, it was clear it wasn’t just the System’s empowerment pushing them forward, though it certainly helped with their Skills. It was more as if they were natural Adventurers, much like Leon had been in his youth.

On the fourth day, things became challenging again. Despite being giant spiders, bats, lizards, and a number of other mutated animals, they were still giant versions of small critters.

When you took an already dangerous cave lion and added inordinate amounts of mana to it…

Well, the result was more than a bit spectacular, to say the least.

I had finally managed to catch our stalker in the act (thereby proving I was not, in fact, going insane) by using Fate to set traps as we advanced through the corridors. It had somehow managed to avoid triggering most of them, but once it did, the trap dispelled the Lion’s magical stealth.

It was maybe seven meters long, its fur replaced with moss, and instead of eyes, it had a pair of sapphires as big as my head. And, to top it off, it had antlers.

Clearly surprised at finding itself exposed, and with no places to hide within the cavernous corridor, it went for the only other option that remained to it.

Unlike the giant Spider we encountered on the first day, which had been fragile, if very fast, the Mossy Cave Lion was big, fast, and built like a brick — and it knew it.

It was upon us in mere moments, and we barely had enough time to scramble away from its path before it could barrel through us.

I saw Sarah strike at its left paw as it passed her, and even though the sword bit into the Lion’s flesh, it seemed to leave barely more than a scratch. The Lion didn’t even seem to notice.

“What do we do?” Shiro shouted as the Lion turned around to face us.

“Wear it down, I think,” Sarah replied, uncertainty clear in her voice. “You can take a beating, right? Grab its attention while the rest of us try to inflict as much damage as we can—”

Before she could finish the sentence, the Lion locked its gaze on her and began to charge. I quickly cast Haste and True Strike on Sarah as she prepared herself to meet the incoming charge. She threw herself to the left as the monster approached, swiping at the Lion’s face with her sword. A tear opened along the Lion’s jaw, letting us peek the inside of its mouth.

I quickly buffed the rest of us and then threw almost all my available mana into slowing and weighing down the Lion.

Enraged at having its cheek split open, the Lion roared, sending tremors through the cavern, then turned around looking for an easier target.

From its point of view, Shiro must have looked like one, being a baby-faced, lightly armored kid with no weapon, because the Lion pounced on the boy, goring him and sending him flying into the wall with a swipe of its paw.

“Shiro!” Sarah yelled, causing the Lion to turn around and lock her down with its gaze. “Fuck you, you oversized house cat,” she swore as she readied her sword.

The Lion moved to charge, and then… didn’t.

Confusion bloomed on its face, and it turned its head around to look for whatever it had gotten stuck in. What it saw was a very bloody young Hero holding onto its tail as if his life depended on it.

I felt a bit bad for the kid — to hold that big of a monster in place, he must have been hurting all over.

Sarah wasted no time seizing onto the Lion’s lapse in attention, closing the gap between them in an instant and lunging for the monster’s throat.

Blood sprayed, and the Lion thrashed in defiance, wounded but not yet out. Shiro still held fast, and the monster lunged at him in an attempt to escape. Two consecutive arrows hit it in the throat while Sarah prepared for another assault.

The monster closed its jaw around Shiro in a final desperate, desperate attempt, but the boy didn’t even stagger.

Sarah’s sword found the Lion’s throat once more, slicing cleanly through an artery. Seconds later, the blood loss finally caught up with the monster, going still for the last time.

Sarah rushed to the monster’s head, prying open its jaw to free Shiro from its grasp.

I followed after her, releasing my buffs, and gathering Force and Matter around me, weaving together a spell of healing.

“Ah, fuck,” Shiro whined as Sarah finally managed to free him from his toothy prison. “I thought chew toys were supposed to be for dogs, not cats.”

Sarah enveloped him into a hug. “Idiot. Though, if you have the energy to make jokes, you’re probably okay.”

I allowed the healing spell to engulf him, checking for damage and fixing whatever I found along the way.

“Well, at least that’s one question answered,” I mused out loud as I inspected the Revenant.

“What? How many licks does it take to get to the center of a Hero?” he asked, causing Sarah to punch him lightly in the shoulder.

“No broken bones,” I explained.

“Oh, that,” Shiro nodded, “yeah, if it wasn’t for that I would have been cat food. But still,” he paused, and looked me in the eye, an uncharacteristically serious expression on his face.

“We are not breaking my bones for science.”