Chapter 27

Lock would have liked to describe his and Mia's entrance into the dungeon more dramatically. Something about descending into the abyss, the darkness swallowing their forms as they braved its unexplored depths.

But the truth of the matter was, that their experience was very prosaic. They walked over to the small queue that had formed and waited in line, spending the time analysing the other adventurers also wishing to enter.

The wait, and the adventurers were nothing special really, mostly peasants who looked like they'd picked up a sword yesterday. Some better equipped lads who wore mismatched armour, probably inherited from their unsuccessful adventurer parents. Neither cases looked intimidating or competent

Lock and Mia stood out in comparison, well equipped, slouching with the confident grace of people who had been either arduously trained or experienced real combat.

Mia was also the only woman present, which warranted a few looks. Admiring ones, although the meaning of the word when applied to the looks differed greatly.

Thinking that it couldn't have been comfortable for someone as young as her to have everyone staring at her in that particular manner, compounding this also the fact that she was a Ninja and therefore likely trained to avoid attention (he still had a few doubts about that). Lock squeezed her shoulder reassuringly, feeling a small amount of previously unnoticed tension sliding off of her.

The queue progressed quickly, but the fact that others had also arrived and were standing in line behind him made Lock wonder if the dungeon actually had enough space and monsters for everyone entering it. He was quick to put the thought out of his mind as it finally became their turn however.

The adventurers doing the inspection appeared to be a Paladin. For he was dressed in a full suit of red, yellow and orange armour -leaving only his face bare- with symbols of Lantir covering every part of it. A Warlock, recognizable by his black robes & skull staff. The third inspector meanwhile was a head-sized purple eye with the apparently severed ocular nerve serving as a sort of tentacle. Due to its positioning above the Warlock's left shoulder, Lock assumed it to be a summoned demon instead of a third, horribly transmogrified adventurer.

It was the floating monstrosity that seemed to do most of the work. It used the fact that it was a giant eye to stare quite vigorously at him and Mia. After a few seconds, seemingly done with the task, it turned to the Warlock, probably communicating something through their demonic bond.

The Warlock's clean shaven face went from disinterested to slightly exasperated and he turned to Lock. “Aren't you a bit high Level for this dungeon?” He asked.

Lock simply shrugged, not really thinking that having 18 combat levels was that impressive, but pointed at Mia nonetheless. Letting them interpret that gesture as they wanted.

The Warlock sighed and made to speak again, but the Paladin interrupted him in a slightly amused tone. “Leave the kids alone Garrick. I still remember you boosting your wife several levels in an attempt to ease childbirth with a higher Endurance stat, don't be a hypocrite.” Seemingly taking the very wrong insinuation of the Paladin at face value, Garrick's eyes softened as he looked at the duo and waved them through.

But not without a muttered comment that both of them heard. “A bit young, aren't they?”

Ignoring the odd interaction, and the choking sound from Mia, Lock opened the trapdoor that led into the dungeon and guided the two of them into descending a completely normal set of stairs. The floating fairy lights arranged at the sides bathed everything in a relaxing orange shine.

The stairs weren't very long, and they soon reached the end of them, coming to a halt in a circular stone room that had two wooden doors leading out of it, a gigantic clock hanging on the wall in the middle of the two. The room was also furnished with a large water barrel and two stone benches, one bench in front of every door. The benches were occupied by adventurer's, naturally, who all seemed to be lazing around in varying states of boredom. Oh, and there was also a large glowing circle on the floor right next to the staircase. It occasionally spat out some sparks.

Knowing how this worked, having read about it at the adventurer’s guild, but still amused to see the actual scene, Lock pulled Mia to the rightmost bench and sat down. The man he'd sat down next to, some nineteen-year-old, gave him a brief glance before returning to his task of staring holes into the ceiling and putting on a face as if he was sitting next to a pile of garbage. Looking to the man’s right Lock saw a group of four conversing in slightly too loud tones, the leader occasionally throwing a less than friendly glance at Lock’s neighbour.

Talking about neighbours. The feeling of confusion rolling off of the girl sitting next to him was almost palpable. Lock turned to her to explain, mentally chastising her for not having read up on the place. “As you've probably noticed this place isn't like most dungeons.” He started in a low voice. “It's a very weak constant one, therefore there have been momentous efforts made by the adventurers' guild to add some infrastructure to it. And with infrastructure I mean that they've build rooms around the spawn points of the earth golems inhabiting the dungeon.” He pointed at the doors.

“Those doors are the entrance to the first rooms. They're basically herding them upon spawn into a place that they can't leave since they're too dumb to open doors. The rooms have tunnels between them, which grow shorter and shorter as you reach the end, just as the rooms grow larger, to hold more golems.” He said, wanting to continue, but was interrupted by Mia.

“So it's basically a chicken coop with the difficulty rising every time.” She said with an amused voice, before noticing that she'd interrupted him and urging him to continue.

“Well yes, basically. The blue glowing circle over there is a teleportation circle, in every corridor there is a rune stone that you can touch to instantly return here.” Lock explained, and upon noticing that the glow of the circle was intensifying out of the corner of his eye, pointed towards it. “Look.”

They both turned to watch as the circle began to glow brighter and brighter before it exploded in a small flash of light, an adventurer party suddenly appearing within it. They looked quite bedraggled, and stumbled up the stairs as soon as they gained their bearings.

“Before you ask,” Lock continued, “the way to where I suspect we need to go will take us through exactly twelve rooms, at the end of which we will be facing about 19-21 golems. The path is simple, we take the door on the right, and continue down the path until the end.” He explained, Mia nodding along the way, before she suddenly halted and nodded in the direction of something at his back.

He turned around to see that there was a party of three that had stood up from their bench and were in the process of opening the door. Lock followed the shift to the right that his bench experienced due to people leaving it and watched curiously as the party disappeared into the room.

Was it a coincidence that they had entered the mettle the moment another party had flashed back into the room with the use of the teleportation circle?

He expressed his curiosity to his bench neighbour who seemed quite experienced with the whole procedure and who answered after staring at him blankly for a few seconds. “Nah, it ain't like that. What we do is give the person behind us the time we think we need to clear the first room, plus the time it takes for the goms to respawn, bout four minutes by the way. Just coincidence basically” The older teen answered with a slightly accented voice.

Lock nodded at the words, it made more sense than his previous hypothesis. Parties might after all wait a few minutes in-between rooms trying to regain their stamina or courage before finally deciding against advancement.

Something about this system bothered him though, and he couldn't quite put his finger on it until Mia -having also listened- asked him two very simple questions. “How many golems are in the first room? How many approximate minutes will we need to clear it?”

“It's three golems in the first room, if the spawn time is four minutes we'll indicate the party after us to wait six I guess.” Lock answered casually, and noticed what had been bothering him.

If one party was superior in combat prowess than another, then wouldn't they eventually meet up due to their faster clearing speed? He asked his bench neighbour again, who seemed slightly annoyed but willing to answer his questions.

His attitude changed into happy and eager to answer his questions after Lock pressed a bronze coin into his hand however.

“Well yeah, that happens I guess, not often, but when it happens, the faster party gets to skip over the slower one.” The teen said, seemed to think for a moment and continued. “You prolly don't know, but if you're in one of the tunnels and the room in front of you is still in use, there will be a red cross glowing on its door, it'll stay there till the goms respawn. The only chance you have of catching someone is if they take a break in the tunnels for longer than four minutes.” He continued.

“Why isn't it like that here as well?” Lock couldn't help but ask, at which his neighbour rolled his eyes.

“Guild said something about forcing us to talk to each other, but people just use this to be toerags.” He answered with a sneer.

As if to punctuate his statement the party to the right of his tour guide stood up, turned to room and loudly exclaimed, “seven minutes,” before dramatically turning around and all four of them disappearing behind the door.

Lock's neighbour muttered a quiet 'dickhead', while Lock himself wondered how a party of four could be proud of being able to beat three golems in three minutes.

Another shift to the right occurred on the bench, and Mia quietly muttered that there was only one more party in front of them. Which he'd very well know, having just watched them stand up, but he thanked her nonetheless and moved to the right with his neighbour, who on his lonesome seemed to constitute the one party left before it was their turn.

Ballsy of him to enter the dungeon alone, Lock thought to himself, as he analysed the teen out of the corner of his eye. Nothing special that would seem to back up the apparent confidence however. Dressed in rough linen and wool clothing the only thing that even marked him as a combatant was the overly long sword balanced on its tip on the ground before him. Interesting, but being able to balance on its tip, an amazing sword did not make.

Eventually Lock stretched out his hand to the teen, who took it immediately. “Lock.” He introduced himself as they shook hands.

“Harald.” The other teen answered as he stood up and made his way to the door.

“Eight minutes.” He simply said as he closed the wooden door behind him gently. Lock raised an eyebrow.

If the party of four before Harald had been proud enough of their time of seven minutes to announce it to the room, which when subtracted by four meant they could beat the golems in three minutes. Then how good exactly was Harald that he was able to claim he could do the same feat, alone, with just one more minute of time?

Well, he glanced at Mia, maybe he was simply trying to impress a certain someone. Looking at the surrounding adventurers, who were almost all sneaking glances at his subordinate, if not outright slobbering over her, he considered it to be a likely possibility.

Lock could understand why of course. If an adventurer didn't attain at least the rank of bronze after registering, they probably didn't have much potential. This statement was probably unfair to those with no backing. It was also nonetheless true.

He could respect the attempt yes, but anyone could see that the rank of iron was mostly composed of street dogs who were so far outside the social hierarchy that they didn't even have a designation. They most likely hadn't had a woman in possession of any redeemable physical qualities even talk to them since they were toddlers.

Well, looking at the clock, it was about time for him and Mia to enter, and with that entrance to derail any future attempts at communication between the other parties and them. Lock was not overly interested in having to listen to amateurish and -he scowled- brutish advances just because his subordinate had had the misfortune of being born female.

Lock stood up decisively, Mia following shortly after, and flung open the door to the first room, making sure the golems had respawned. They had. Striding inside he turned his head around as if it were an afterthought, directing his proclamation at the scraggly adventurer in line behind him, and spoke in a conversational tone, but loud enough for everyone in the room to hear. “Five minutes.”

He slammed the door shut.