For the moment though, all I upended was everyone’s nap time. Tamara and Simon cried out in alarm when I arrived, jumping up from the campfire and raising their weapons. Whoops. I might or might not have forgotten to warn them about Vuplu. It took some back and forth between us before the Ratkin hiding behind my legs was allowed to stay—but at the mention of a Quest, Imaya took over the conversation just as I had expected. Pell and Teva’ryn chose that moment to return from their scouting trip, so in the end all eight of us settled down by the fire to hear Vuplu’s tale.

I listened to the others with half an ear, throwing pieces of wood – the remains of a broken chair – into the flames as I did so. We tried to keep the smoke on the minimum, though given the size of the cavern we didn’t really need to worry about it much. The flames gave off warmth that felt great in this damp and chilly place, and more importantly they provided light. We had spent so much time squinting in the pale glow of our collars that the light of the fire felt wonderful. I had trouble imagining how the Thardos had been able to live down here, without light. Had they been using some sort of magical lamps to see, or had they relied on their other senses instead? I would have asked Vuplu about it, if the rest of the group hadn’t been so busy interrogating him.

Quest received: Purging Stonehearth

Looking at the notification in front of me, I groaned inwardly. Why did I get this Quest when I explicitly said that I didn’t want it? Did the collars grant Quests without any regard to the Player’s wishes? In that case, there had to be an option for abandoning my already-received Quests. I navigated to Quests tab of my collar to find it.

Purging Stonehearth

Description: The people of Stonehearth unleashed a dark curse upon their city, turning it into a forsaken, hostile place.

Objective: Kill the hive-mother and secure the Dungeon Core.

Rewards: 1 attribute point, 2500 credits to your Player Allowance, “Dungeon Crawler” skin for your user interface.

I noted with mild interest that Vuplu had said nothing about his own people being the ones unleashing the curse. Putting that thought aside, I decided to try to cancel the Quest first. I swiped at the entry, willed it to slide off my screen, and even made a finger gun to blast it to pieces, but nothing seemed to work. It didn’t make much sense to me. What if I got flooded with Quests and had no way to find the one I wanted to read? I didn’t see any filter options either, though perhaps it would appear when I had more entries. So far I had only four Quests: First contact, Oddity in the woods, The stalking giant, and Purging Stonehearth. My completed Quests weren’t visible on the list.

The more I thought about it, the stranger this system seemed to me; the collar was missing some important features for those who wanted to take this Player stuff seriously. I didn’t believe that the three-eyed aliens weren’t able to code a better interface, so this current configuration had to be deliberate. Perhaps the Players had to unlock the more advanced features, like that Dungeon Crawler skin that our latest Quest had mentioned. I would have to consult Imaya about this later; at the moment she was glaring at Simon as he informed Vuplu about our hidden fifth quest, the Get Out Of This Dungeon Alive quest.

If Vuplu was bothered by our unwillingness to avenge the fallen Thardos, he showed none of it. Although he had talked a whole bunch about his family and the calamity that had befallen on them, he didn’t try to persuade us to do anything. His tale about the wrath of gods and the unleashed curse had been about as generic as it got, with plenty of details that didn’t matter to us. I did feel some sympathy for him when he talked about his lost relatives, but it was all tainted with doubt. Was he telling us the truth? Vuplu’s alien features made it difficult for me to judge how genuine he was. Aside from how to eat the moss that grew on the walls, he claimed to not know anything about the Dungeon. A mighty suspicious thing to say in his position, but I wasn’t going to start calling him a liar.

“You’re lying,” Tamara said.

“I do not,” Vuplu said, his large ears flopping wildly as he shook his head. “The Dungeon has changed the environment in, uh, unexpected ways. I could tell you how Stonehearth looked before the calamity, but … I fear that it would be misleading.”

“There must be something that you can tell us,” Tamara insisted. “If not about the Dungeon, then at least about this cavern.”

“If he’s an NPC, he might not be allowed to help,” Imaya commented. I wondered if calling someone a Non-Player Character could be considered an insult, even if it was technically true.

“We saw a stone gate at the end of the main road,” Pell said, addressing Vuplu. “Do you know where it leads?”

“Straight to the, uh, central cavern,” Vuplu replied. “Aside from the tunnel that you came from, that’s the only way out of here. That is, uh, it was so in the past. Only the gods know where it leads now.”

“What do these gods look like?” I asked. “Do they have three eyes?”

“Three?” Vuplu asked, his whiskers twitching. “What an odd notion. No, the gods do not have eyes. Unless you were referring to, uh, symbolic eyes?”

“Probably not,” I said. “Never mind.”

“Vuplu, do you know how to open that gate?” Pell asked. “Like we said, we’d like to reach the central cavern and choose another exit from there.”

“To open that gate, you’ll have to, uh, complete a challenge,” Vuplu said. “Come, it’s easier to explain if I just show you.”

He clambered to his feet with the help of his staff, and we stood up as well.

“Just a moment, before we go,” Pell said. He picked up his rusted sword and his small shield, then walked over to Tamara.

“Yes?” Tamara asked, brushing a lock of blonde hair our of her eyes as she looked up at the tall man.

“I’m thinking about passing on this shield,” Pell said. “With my Protective Shell Ability, I think there are people in this team who need it more. Would you like to have it?”

Tamara seemed to consider this for a moment, then shook her head.

“Thanks, but I’ll be fine without it. I think you should give it to Imaya instead. She lost almost all of her arrows, so that shield would go well with her dagger.”

“Alright,” Pell said, but I caught a hint of disappointment on his face. “Imaya?”

“I’m here!” Imaya said, her voice eager. “Can I really have it?”

“Yes, you can,” Pell said, holding the shield out to her.

“That’s so cool. Thanks! Would you like my bow in return? I’ve been thinking about trying out different builds at first, before committing myself to one. You know, trying to find the best fit for me. I think I’ll put archery on hold—”

I shuffled away while Imaya babbled on, joining Teva’ryn at packing up our things. Our bags were getting lighter and lighter, but after the last fight I was just glad that we had bags at all. Our dwindling packed food would last for a few more days—perhaps even more, if we were willing to eat the bodies of the spider creatures. No one even suggested doing it so far; the creepy bodies and the blue blood didn’t strike any of us as appetizing.

By the time I got back to the extinguished campfire, Pell had finally extracted himself from Imaya.

“Devi’lynn?” he hesitantly asked, approaching the Sylven girl.

“Call me Devi, please.”

“Ah, sure,” Pell said, pausing briefly. “Devi?”

I found it interesting how uncomfortable Pell was at talking to her. Could it be because he found it strange that they could now converse properly, or was it simply because she was technically an alien? Funnily enough, he seemed to be less intimidated by Vuplu than her.

“Yes?” Devi asked.

“Do you want this sword?” Pell asked, holding out his weapon hilt-first. “I don’t need it anymore.”

Devi took the sword from him, inspecting the straight blade and the slightly askew handguard with a critical eye. It was obvious that she didn’t like what she saw—after a superior spoon like Soul Eater, I supposed she was a little bit spoiled. She didn’t complain however, just lowered the weapon and nodded at Pell.

“Thank you,” she said.

“You’re welcome,” Pell replied, taking a step back. He glanced at me for a moment. “Where is Soul Eater, by the way?”

“At water-bottom,” Devi said, pointing at the river.

Pell blinked in surprise. “Why?”

“Imaya flung it in the water after calling me a cheater,” I said, walking closer to them. “I think it’s because Soul Eater grants me knowledge about how to fight.”

Imaya looked up from admiring her new shield and puffed up her cheeks. “T-That’s not why I called you a cheater!”

“Oh? Then what is it?”

“You wouldn’t understand, you stupid normie,” she said with a sniff. “And don’t complain, you can get your dagger back anytime!”

I scratched my chin, wondering what was up with her. Could it be envy? Between Soul Eater’s versatility and my teleportation powers, Imaya’s first Ability seemed a little … uninspired. Not to say that it wasn’t useful, but in terms of, ugh, power-levels, Spatial Symbiosis scored certainly higher than Arcane Sight. For someone like Imaya, this had to be extremely frustrating. She was staying uncharacteristically silent about what she had chosen for her second Ability, so most likely it didn’t compare with Soul Eater either—hence, her bad mood.

As our little party got up and headed out to the gate, I kept thinking about what I’d do if I was given the opportunity to swap Abilities with Imaya. Would I do it to cheer her up? I didn’t care too much about being a Player, so someone like her could have made better use of these powers. If Imaya had Soul Eater, she could have saved my hide from the sweller horde and my muscles wouldn’t be aching right now.

However, the more I thought about it the less I wanted to trade Soul Eater away. As conceited as it sounded, the prototype weapon made me special. Special in the Inspector’s eyes, at least. Being special meant being unusual—and I liked to be unusual. It forced others to react in ways they hadn’t been expecting. It made others show more of their hands than they wanted. It gave me an edge over them.

If I could do it in everyday conversations, why wouldn’t it work against mind-reading, meddling gods? Easy-peasy! I just needed to think of so many crass jokes that they lost interest in reading my mind—unless they secretly enjoyed them, those sick bastards. Either way, it seemed obvious to me that Soul Eater was a key in my hand that could change my current predicament. For this reason alone, I wouldn’t have traded the prototype away.

Then there was also the fact that I could shape the metal into funny shapes with nothing but my mind. Spoon-bending mentalist powers! Who in their right mind would give up such a thing?