Chapter 15: The Other Story

Verity sat in the corner of the guild humming to herself with an amused smile on her face. That dastardly Silver Eyes, he’d gone and done it.

She’d just been sitting there, minding her own business as Nayre and Crook had gone out to buy some supplies for their next dungeon run to the [Hallowed Graveyard], then Silver had burst into the guild behaving like he’d eaten some kind of interesting mushroom.

He’d rushed the counter, waving energetically and shouted, “Hiya Sherry!”

Sherry? Like the alcohol? It was an expensive one…

Smokey looked at him with a mixture of amusement and confusion, "Hello Crimson, was your last request so enjoyable?"

Speaking so loudly than was needed he bobbed his head and spoke with a smile, "Yeah! [Priest] Damus was awesome! He had me write a letter for him!”

The whole routine was a lie, she could tell that easily. He went on to detail a “deal” offered by the Temple on [Lesser Litch Hearts]. The more he spoke, the more apparent the lie became.

Well, it was probably only a lie to her. She could see that Silver didn’t have a strong connection to Smokey, in addition to the negative connection of manipulation he was forming with the room around him. It was quite dastardly of him to do that.

Glancing around the room, she noted with a smirk how most of the Adventurers occupying the Silver and Gold ranks were now projecting auras of greed. Having punched several of the [Lesser Litches] out of commission, she knew that it wouldn’t be difficult for a lot of the adventurers here to kill them. They were quite weak, moved individually, and had very low levels for the difficulty of the dungeon they occupied. They were even weaker than the standard zombies in the [Hallowed Graveyard]!

What made them tough to kill then? They called for “friends.”

Verity and the rest of [Cliff] were skilled enough that even if one did call for its friends they could handle the situation, they just needed to be more and more careful as they moved closer to the center of the dungeon and the [Levels] of the monsters grew - something that wouldn’t be an issue for these wannabe hunters if they stayed on the outskirts and did nothing to bother the mini bosses or the greater monsters of the area.

Since the goal of [Cliff] while they were in Falst was to help Survival get her [Lesser Undead Purification] to Lv.10, giving her a chance to Advance it to [Undead Purification], they had spent a bit of time hunting [Lesser Litches] since Survival could use the weight of her stats to kill them quickly, despite her low [Skill Level].

After facing a few of those, they’d stopped helping her raise the [Skill Level] as the needed experience wasn’t enough, so they’d been forced to seek out new prey.

As Crimson turned and left the room, he saw the amusement on her face, and made an unconscious expression of condescension. Whatever his plan was, he thought that she couldn’t interfere with it. His connection to her also had a feeling of mild competition, but it was probably something he wasn’t aware of. If she had to guess, he wanted to be stronger and she, as a Black Gold rank, was definitely strong.

While the feeling of competition felt nice, the condescension was nothing short of infuriating. With him out of the room, she felt the desire to ruin whatever his plan was.

She stood and called out loudly to the room, “I don’t know why you believe what he just said, he’s just trying to trick you all.”

Instead of the expected reaction of outraged support, she got booed and jeered at. An entire room of men and women mocking her and saying that she wouldn’t get the money all for herself.

Her face turning red, she was about the beat the lot of them until their HP was 10%, but a weighty gaze made her freeze. Turning, she made eye contact with the Guild Suppressor who was sending a silent threat: “Go on, start a fight, but be prepared to deal with the consequences.”

Gritting her teeth, she clenched her fists and forced herself to sit down. The rest of the rough spent another minute laughing at her, then turned to more “important” matters - like falling for a simple trick. After another minute listening, the rest of her party walked up, and she jumped up to run over and meet them.

——

The next day, Verity stood in the guild training field in the backyard of the guild. She was squared off against Nayre, and they were both standing in the sand biome training arena. The logic behind using that arena was preparing for the looser soil of the [Hallowed Graveyard] by using a more extreme terrain. If they really wanted to prepare, they would swap between this one and the mud biome, but they couldn’t really afford to be that dirty due to the plans they had later.

With a relieved expression, Verity spoke, “Thanks for agreeing to my selfish request, I really need to blow off some steam.”

With a cheerful grin, Nayre responded, “Certainly, I could hone a bit more of my [Skills] as well, but” he cocked his head to the side, “why do you need to blow off steam?”

“Let’s just say that I lost a game that I shouldn’t have.”

Nayre shrugged, then suddenly used his [Shield Call].

Verity felt the pull on her body, but quickly used it to her advantage as she jumped backwards, then used the pull like a slingshot to increase her speed while layering her [Acceleration] [Skill]. Blurring so fast even her own eyes could barely keep up, she arrived in front of Nayre while low to the ground.

Setting her feet, she gave a mighty uppercut with her right arm that would have sent pretty much anyone else flying, but only knocked Nayre back a step as he slid in the sand, he had used his shield to disperse most of the force.

Shrugging it off like nothing, he returned the blow by slashing overhead with his sword then lunged forward into a shield bash when she dodged it. Moving quickly she slid around the shield and was given free access to his torso, which she happily used by slamming her elbow into his gut while grabbing his shield arm with the other hand, and used the force of his movement to flip him over her.

Unfortunately, he didn’t slam flat into the ground as he got his feet under himself and recovered remarkably quickly. Without even turning, and before Verity could react, he stabbed backwards with the sword he’d reversed while in the air. Blow for blow, he’d also nailed her in the gut, but since it was only a wooden sword it just winded her and destroyed the actual weapon since it couldn’t handle the force applied - its durability was depleted instantly.

Their spars continued on, round after round, they shattered three more of the wooden training swords. They remained fairly even throughout the time, with Nayre’s ingenuity and cunning allowing him to bridge the gap created by Verity’s higher [Level], [Skills], and combat instinct. It was that ability to plan and overcome every situation which had won her respect to begin with, and the reason why she was in his party to this day, but all good things must come to an end, and they couldn’t afford to break any more swords since they were charged a fee for each one they broke.

50 Royals each! How expensive!!!

The spar ended with these disheartening words, “Verity, since you’re the one who called for this, you get to pay the fee.”

Morosely, she wandered off, and noticed Silver sitting in the corner of the yard, what was he doing? He seemed to be just sitting against the wall, was he napping? No, a boring looking man walked up to him and ran away a second later as Silver’s eyes turned from fascinating to scary.

Curious, she made her way over to Silver. When she got close, a bright light appeared right in her face, blinding her. Which one was it…[Magic Light], right? The basic lighting spell. Wow, she hadn’t seen this one in years. Specs, the [Mage] for her party, had been using [Weir Light] for the past few years and had been using [Greater Magic Light] for years before that.

She stood rubbing her eyes for a moment and he made his [Magic Light] disappear.

"Why did you do that to me?"

"You walked in on my training, it wasn't intentional."

She let out a low menacing chuckle, "Really? Since I helped you out with your training, you can help me with mine. Oh, by the way, you have a bit of blood on your nose.”

Crimson wiped the blood off, then responded to her comment, "I don't think I'll be any help to someone of your [Level], I don't even have a [Blessing]."

The grin on her face grew wider, "I know, you told me before, but I think you can help with this since you're a mage. You know some attack spells, right?”

Mages were so easy to beat up in a sparring match. Specs now refused to even step in a ring with her because of how many times she’d beaten him.

"No. I just started learning magic earlier this week."

She dropped the smile and stared at him in surprise, "You're kidding! I heard magic was really hard to learn!" she tapped the tip of her chin thoughtfully, "If you only started earlier this week, then I guess it was an exaggeration.”

Specs was always one to exaggerate and worry after all, she’d have to mock him for being an imp. She loved using this monster to insult him; he always hated the comparison between him, and the conniving, cowardly, and pathetic monster.

Putting that thought on hold, a predatory smile spread across her face as she started to continue, she would push him into the training match!

“Well-“

A sudden bang stopped her following words as she whirled to see the cause. It was two bear-kin who had burst out of the back door and…which one was the Guild Master again?

It was the bigger one, right? Or was it the second big one? She couldn’t remember, and they looked too similar.

They shared a weird moment with an extremely calm looking Silver, and ignored the boring guy as they went back inside. A moment later, her came back out.

"Um...if the [Brass] rank class could come to me..." his voice echoed weakly across the area, barely intelligible.

Silver sighed, closed the book he’d been holding, and stood.

"We'll talk later, Verity."

She looked at him, surprised, "You remember my name?"

"You stand out," he responded simply and walked away.

She stands out? What does that mean? Between her and him, he…yeah, she probably stood out more. Here hair was a golden blonde that really stood out in a crowd, in addition to being an elf with [Aural Reading], plus her high level…but that didn’t stop him from standing out in his own way.

Yet it was definitely weird, he should stand out far more, but he had a relatively weak presence, he wasn’t the type to be remembered or to stand out, unless you made eye contact, then he became unforgettable.

Verity had noticed it, the weight of will behind his eyes. Put in physical terms, it was like most people were carrying 5 pound weights in their eyes, while Silver was carrying 100 pounds. That kind of strength was hard to forget, even if it was hard to see.

Shrugging, Verity walked away and started humming. She’d need to meet up with him later, she still needed her revenge.

————

A few days later, on Dasday, [Cliff] stood outside the white misty barrier that led to the [Hallowed Graveyard]. The gate was nestled at the bottom of a valley, about three and a half miles from Falst, a quick jaunt for people of the strength of their [Level].

The fog itself was nestled in a giant gate, one tall enough that even if everyone in her party stood on each other’s shoulders they still wouldn’t be high enough to touch the top and wide enough that a party double their size could walk in side by side with space to spare. There was a rusted iron fence that extended a short distance on both sides of the gate and the moss covered, partially rotten doors stood wide open to welcome challengers.

Taking a few steps to either side, Verity could see that there was nothing interesting behind the actual structure, just a plain field, the gate itself was a portal.

Turning to the party, Nayre spoke, “Well, I hope you’re all ready once more, our goal today is to venture in deeper than we have before. We’ve moved on from small fry like [Lesser Litches], [Zombies], or [Ghouls]. Our goal today, is a [Blood Wight]” with a sly glance at Verity and an amused smirk, Nayre turned to Specs, “Specs, please review [Blood Wights] for us.”

With a fine finger adjustment of his glasses and his stark white hair spilling over his face and clear eyes, Specs responded in a low voice, “Don’t you start calling me that too, I still haven’t been able to get Verity to stop after all these years!”

The party started laughing at him, and he blushed furiously as Verity began to proudly smack Nayre on the back while raucously laughing.

Snapping, he spoke, “Shut you mouths! You want an explanation? Listen and you’ll get it!”

The laughter subsided aside from a few gasping giggles from Verity, who was ignored by Specs as he started his explanation.

“[Blood Wights] are a [Profane] type monster, they take the appearance of long-limbed humans, lacking anything that is not bone, and this bone appears to be coated in blood. They fight primarily with their claws. The primary danger with them is that they have [Skills] based around recovery, they wound their opponents and steal their health to recover, they can also cause a [Curse] that reduces our ability to heal. While they aren't undead, they are [Profane], which means that Ruth will be able to use her [Lesser Undead Purification] on them, though the effect won’t be as apparent.”

Verity cocked her head, “How is that supposed to work then? [Lesser Undead Purification] is for use against undead, but if our target isn’t undead…how is that supposed to work?”

Specs let out a long sigh that made her irritated enough to want to punch him, “Would you please learn more about this stuff? You’re such a [Barbarian].”

She took a swing at him, “Hey, my [Sub-Class] is [Berserker], not [Barbarian]. Don’t insult me!”

“My apologies…to [Barbarians] everywhere for the comparison. They at least have some form of mental capacity - even if it is simple. [Berserkers] lack even that.”

“Why you-“

Baggage cut in, the oddly stout -dwarf like- Elf wasn’t a fan of wasting time, “Could you two cut it out or start dating already? We need to get a move on.”

““I would never date him/her!””

With a sigh, Nayre smacked them both on the back of the head, “He’s right, we don’t have time to waste on this, please continue Nathaniel.”

Specs took a deep breath, shot another glare at her, then spoke, “Nayre, Ruth, and I reviewed our options, and we believe [Blood Wights] to be our best target for the moment. Their high survival, plus the weakness [Profane] type enemies have toward the [Holy] [Affinity] means that we can spend a decent amount of time fighting the same one and pinning it in place so that Ruth can keep casting [Lesser Undead Purification] on it over and over again. We’re going to just give this a try and see if it is effective since, if this works, [Blood Wights] would be the best enemy to face at our current strength.”

Verity nodded, that made sense. The most important thing for leveling a [Skill] like [Lesser Undead Purification] was sheer volume of casting. Survival had mentioned that the [Skill] had stopped at Lv.3 after all, better to find a bit of a tougher enemy to temper the [Skill] on since the other enemies died to quickly to make them worth the time taken to find a replacement.

Nayre spoke up, “Any questions at this point?”

“How far in do we need to go, and what dangers might we run into?” Crook asked.

He and his sister, Survival, were both from the southern desert and had the dark skin of the people from there, though Crook had shaved his head, his hair color was still apparent from the thick black beard, his eyes matching the same color.

“We’ll circle around the outside to come in from the east, then have to go about mid way to to the Derelict Mausoleum, the location of one of the three bosses of the Graveyard. The danger is..or should be, rather minimal. There is a wandering mini boss, but she usually spends her time near the Monolith at the center of the Graveyard, guarding the Tomb of…well, what is probably the third boss.” Specs said uncertainly.

“Probably?” Asked Crook.

“Well, a good rule of thumb is that the amount of bosses matches the amount of mini bosses, with rare exceptions like the Goblin Manor. There are other clues to indicate that there is a third boss, drawings on walls, wandering patterns of enemies, and other reasons, but it’s way too deep for us to go into here, we need Verity awake.” Specs said.

The team glanced at her, and she nodded sagely in agreement.

Returning to the discussion, Nayre asked, “So if there are three mini bosses, do we need to be worried about the other two?”

“Well, they both fall under hunting ground type mini bosses, they stay in a fixed area, and both are guarding actual bosses. Both are vicious in their own right, but we won’t have to worry about either with the route we’re taking, but as is we may only be strong enough to face one of them, so we’ll need to make sure we don’t wander out of the area we’ll be in.” Specs said.

With that, Nayre finalized a few other details that Verity didn’t find important, they all checked their equipment one last time.

Line up in front of the misty wall, Verity pressed her hand up against it, then pushed her way into the mist, as per her usual habit - she’d run into too many other parties face first to not be cautious. It was practically a form of initiation for new Adventurers to crash into another party while entering or exiting a dungeon.

Walking through the mist was always just a few steps, but it was always an unpleasant experience since the mist buffeted at her like a dry gritty wind. It didn’t have any of the cool comfort -or water content- of real mist. Whenever they passed through the mist it always felt like it was passing straight through her, an uncomfortable feeling that had never disappeared no matter how many times she entered a dungeon.

Stepping out on the other side, she was greeted by thick coat of fog rolling gently over a plain of black soil, with interspersed graves of different styles and ages, from brand new to weathered, and everything in between.

There was no clear path made by the spacing of the graves, but the wearing of thousands of footsteps had formed several meandering paths that lead into the fog. Normally, a dungeon would repair any damage done to itself, but apparently the path wasn’t considered damage…unless it had always been there.

Verity didn’t know, and she couldn’t be bothered to wonder which way, the only reason she even knew that little detail was because Specs was standing next to her talking to himself, again. This is why he couldn’t get a wife.

The party formed up and, as planned, they circled around the outside of the dungeon, very carefully avoiding the center as the reached the eastern side, having entered from the western side. Along the way, they came across small groups of extremely weak zombies and ghouls that Nayre took care of using his killer combo of [Shield Call], [Burning Shield], and [Shield Bash]. Two of those three [Skills] had been sitting at Lv.10 for years, and Nayre had been praying to the Gods every day that they would evolve.

The fact that Verity had evolved her [Gusting Blow] into [WindFist] had made him cry: “The Bloody Tears of Jealousy.”

Regardless, Verity always found it funny to see ten or so zombies flying through the air all at once at Nayre who was trying not to retch at the doubly horrible smells of rotting, then burning flesh in change. Afterwords he would always curse the dungeon.

Despite the time and importance the [Hallowed Graveyard] held for their party, none of them liked it there. Undead gave horrible rewards, stunk, and were always disgusting to look at. Not to mention the low visibility, gloomy atmosphere, and high danger presented by the terrain of the dungeon. It was such a miserable experience that they had actually decreased the amount of time they spent in the dungeon in comparison to their usual raiding strategy.

Not only that, but since the drops from undead were so bad, they could barely afford to pay for their lodging! They’d been forced to cut down their time in the [Hallowed Graveyard] even more, so that they could hit up the [Crystal Cavern] to make money to support their stay. Well, Nayre, Survival, and Specs went. It was low level enough that they didn’t need the entire party.

That said, nobody was particularly mad about spending less time in the [Hallowed Graveyard], which just went to show how nasty it was since they usually put about forty hours a week into dungeon diving, but with the [Hallowed Graveyard] they barely put in ten.

Admittedly, they hadn’t been diving the [Hallowed Graveyard] too long, but that didn’t make it any less miserable.

Verity sighed as a punch from her sent a [Bone Wight] - apparently a weaker cousin of the [Blood Wight] - flying a fair distance to crash into another group of [Bone Wights] that were all neatly line up as they charged her, and made them all tumble to the ground. With perfect timing that matched her pace, Specs cast a [Flame Pillar] right after they all hit the ground, burning through their heath instantly.

He quickly put it out to avoid burning the treasures they left behind, and Baggage used a quick [Skill] to call them over to him to collect them, where upon he grunted in frustration.

“By the gods Specs,” he heavily stressed the nickname the mage hated, “stop burning everything. Its value is already low enough, if it’s damaged then it looses whatever value it had!”

Specs was truly repentant as he responded, “Sorry Lund, I missed the timing with putting the fire out, it’s really hard to judge when these things are so weak.”

With a glance, Verity was amused enough to smother a giggle as she noticed the shared bond of greed between them grow stronger.

Not noticing the troublesome elf, the two comrades threw away the scraps of bone and joined the rest of the group as they pressed further and further to the center.

They paused for a break at one point, and Crook and Specs used that time to consult with each other while inspecting a roughly drawn map. After whispering with each other for a few minutes, Crook addressed Nayre,

“We aren’t far from where [Blood Wights] will start to spawn, about five more minutes of walking. Since they’re a patrolling monster we’ll stay put once we reach that point, no point in increasing the risk presented to ourselves. Is that acceptable, Leader?”

Nayre nodded in response, “Sounds good, about how often can we expect to see them?”

Specs considered the question for a moment, “Well, if I recall correctly, it should be every half hour, but I’m not sure how accurate information of that type is.”

After a few more moments of deliberation where Verity spent her time boredly playing keep away with a [Skeleton’s] skull, the rest of the team came to a conclusion,

“Verity, break’s over, stop bullying that [Skeleton] and put it out of its misery, we need to get going.”

“Yessir!” With a mischievous grin, she drop kicked the skull off into the mist, and watched as the rest of the body ran desperately after it, before joining up with the rest of her team.

They moved for a few more minutes, then stopped and settled in to wait. Fortunately it wasn’t a long one as a [Blood Wight] made its way jerkily out of the fog heading their way. There may have been a [Zombie] that started forcing itself out of the ground to help it, but Verity “accidentally” stomped on its head as she charged the [Blood Wight].

Ew, now her boots were covered in brain bits and rotted pieces of flesh and bone.

Making a mental note to hire someone to clean them later, she took in the appearance of the [Blood Wight] as she tried to figure out the best place to attack it.

Her role for the moment was to lead the thing around like a beast-kin on a leash and let Survival cast her [Lesser Undead Purification] on the thing over and over again. When Verity got tired, she’d swap with Nayre, who would swap with Crook, and loop. Baggage was to keep a look out so they wouldn’t be ambushed, and Specs was keeping an eye on things to step in if anything went wrong.

The light of [Lesser Undead Purification] surrounded the thing and it flinched. It was an odd mixture of effective and in-effective as the [Skill] was used against an opponent other than its intended purpose, but who also carried a weakness to similar types of [Skills].

Verity gave it a few seconds, and those few seconds were all it took for the thing to recover, the wounds on its body closing.

[Blood Wights] looked like in-humanoid skeletons made of blood. The proportions were way too off to be human or any of the other blessed races with extremely narrow and long bones, and arms that were way too long and drug a foot on the ground behind them, tipped with long claws.

After the [Blood Wight] looked ready to move once more, Verity gave it a rough love tap right in what passed for its face, and proceeded to run in circles around a group of a few graves near the party, the [Blood Wight] being shockingly fast as it did it’s best to keep up with her. About every eight seconds it would be hit with another light, but the amount of time it was staggered decreased with every casting of the spell, to the point where it was entirely unfazed by the damage it received every time the spell hit.

Verity also had to give it a bop on the nose with every cast of the [Spell] to ensure that the thing didn’t stop hating her, and kept up the process until her [Fatigue] hit 30, where she called for a swap.

Nayre’s strategy was different from hers, rather than running around he chose to slowly push the thing back with his shield and pursue it to gently push it back a few times, from there he would back up to his starting point where he would stand in place and wait for the [Blood Wight] to charge him, deflect the claws, push it back, and repeat.

Crook had a similar strategy to her, once Nayre had him take over, and things were going smoothly, until a low tension warning came from Baggage, “Hey Verity, isn’t that the [Skeleton] you were playing with earlier?”

Standing up from where she’d been dealing with the depressing state known as boredom, Verity looked over to where he was pointing.

“Hey yeah, I think it is.” She laughed, “You can even see my boot-print on its skull!”

Nayre and the rest of the team’s tension shot through the roof at her words, then the [Skeleton] pointed at them while turning its head to gibber behind itself. Panicking, Nayre shouted, “Amos, kill the [Blood Wight] now!”

Without hesitation, Crook turned to kill the [Blood Wight], but a knife flew out of the fog right next to the [Skeleton], crossing the distance to strike him in the arm, his last second dodge had saved him from it hitting him in the heart, but unfortunately he had a [Blood Wight] right on his tail whose claws were instantly taking advantage of the sudden decrease in distance.

Before any of them could react, the claws tore huge gashes into his shoulder, and he stumbled back, his armor had fortunately prevented a fatal injury.

Quick as he could, Specs used a high level [Cutting Gale] to shear apart the [Blood Wight] while Verity rushed in to grab Crook, Survival sent a healing spell over Verity’s shoulder to heal him as her dash was interrupted by another knife.

Having more advanced warning than Crook, she quickly used her right gauntlet to deflect the knife, but received a minor cut in the process. Instead of falling to the ground after her deflection, the entire knife started to glow red and pursue her.

It had locked on to her using her blood!

Yet another four knives flew, past Verity to strike the rest of her group, all of them neatly deflected by Nayre who was far, far more cautious after seeing what happened to Verity.

Desperately dodging the knife, she couldn’t see what the rest of her team was gasping at in horror far behind her, where the knives had been coming from, but she could definitely see whatever it was streak past her to slam a bloody axe into Nayre’s shield, trying to get past him to Survival.

It was a dark haired girl with dead eyes, she was wearing a white voluminous dress with the entire front covered in blood and her throat slit. Her bloodless white feet flashed as she tried, and failed to kick Nayre’s shield out of the way, and was instead forced to use it as a springboard to dodge Specs’ [Spell].

His spell was accompanied by a horrified scream, “It’s [Bloody Mary], the roaming mini boss!”

Verity internally cursed at his words, then gritted her teeth and layered several [Skills] together: [Precise Aim], [Blade Lock], and [Iron Palm], all into her left gauntlet since that one was designed to be better for grabs. Timing carefully, she took some damage as she grabbed, then crushed the knife as it tried to stab her eye out.

Wincing, she could feel as the wound inflicted some kind of curse on her, but gritted her teeth and pushed through as she rushed over to Crook and scooped him up off the ground.

Turning, she could see that Nayre was holding his own against the psycho monster, but neither he not Specs could land a blow against her, the whole mess turning into a dance of blades and magic that could have been pretty if not for the adrenaline and terror coursing through everyone’s veins.

Casually, she smashed the skull of the [Skeleton] who caused this mess as it tried to sneak up on her, then began to sprint at the [Bloody Mary] with Crook over her shoulder. The monster didn’t notice her in time as she slammed her heels into its back, knocking it down.

Nayre bellowed, “Retreat!” And they all started to book it. The [Bloody Mary] recovered almost instantly and was hot on their heels as they sprinted their way back across the dungeon.

Shouted apologies were given to the other parties they ran by, as they were then killed before they knew what hit them by the [Bloody Mary’s] axe. One party saw them coming and was able to start running, but their pure [Stats] were far below [Cliff’s], which meant that they were only able to avoid becoming prey for two seconds longer than the other parties, a new record.

Up ahead, they could see the mist gate and pushed themselves even harder. Specs was now being carried by Nayre, and Survival by Baggage as their [Fatigue] crossed 80 and they couldn’t keep going any more. The time bought by the other parties had been wisely used to pick them up. Verity herself was about to cross 79 [Fatigue] and knew that Nayre wasn’t far behind. Since Baggage had the highest [CON], he was probably doing the best.

Diving, they were barely able to make it through the mist before the [Bloody Mary] made mince meat of them, where they were greeted by an angry crowd of Adventurers that had just been reborn from being killed.

——

The next day, Verity had to weep as her savings were almost entirely emptied to pay the reparations that the Guild Master had ordered her entire party to give. Compensating five full Adventurer parties had been so expensive, and that was after splitting the cost with the rest of the team! They’d also been banned from the [Hallowed Graveyard] for a month!

The only upside to the whole mess was that Survival had gotten her [Lesser Undead Purification] to Lv.4.

On a personal note, Verity’s team blamed her for causing the mess since she hadn’t killed the [Skeleton] before it grabbed the roaming boss, so she was banned as they raided the other dungeon to try and recoup as much of their lost money as possible. Unfortunately, the [Crystal Cavern] was a Lv.35 dungeon, so aside from the money there was no benefit to people of their high level going there - the only thing in there that could give delicious XP was the boss!

Verity felt lost and forlorn, she had nothing to do, there was no-one interesting to train with like back home, and she had no money!

“Are you alright?” The question came from behind her.

Whipping around, she saw Silver standing behind her.

She let out a long sigh, “Not really, no. I messed up really badly yesterday.”

“Did you fix the mistake?”

“As best I could.”

“Did you learn from it?”

Her head drooped down onto the table and she spoke weakly, “Yeah.”

She could see Silver shrug out of the corner of her eye, “Then move on and focus on something else.”

“Like what?”

“Didn’t you say you needed a training partner? I’m currently free since my teacher is busy, wanna spar?”

A broad smile slowly broke through the despair on her face, “Sure!”