Frank felt good. It was unfamiliar. To almost anyone else, the situation would have been dire and terrifying, but given Frank’s experiences, the last few days had been fresh air in a stale cave. He hadn’t been content, even for a moment, for so long he’d forgotten what it was.

He thought it ironic that a worldview upending realization had just occurred a short while ago, yet had done nothing to his long term mood. That it was the second time, and the first hadn’t really affected him either, was testament to something. Frank couldn’t exactly articulate it completely, even to himself, but he understood it. Time travel hadn’t changed him. Making the decision to save Bill had though. Not the circumstance, but the decision he made.

Rina cursed in frustration, unable to figure out the sling. Frank got up and walked over to her. Maybe he could hash something out.

“You have any luck?” He asked her.

“No.” Rina said, frustrated. “I have absolutely no idea how this is supposed to work.”

“Well, I’ve never used one but lets see if I can be of assistance.” Frank said.

“Here.” Rina handed him the sling.

Frank examined it. Two pieces of rope, the same length, attached to a little cloth pouch. One was looped on the end, one was knotted.

“Have you tried attaching the loop to your finger?” he asked.

“Is that what that’s for?” Rina responded.

“Probably. Never used one to be able to tell you for sure.”

“I’ll try that.” she said, taking the sling back. She stuck her right pointer finger through the loop, and started examining the whole contraption.

Frank left her to her devices, returning to sit behind the shelter he’d constructed.

“Do you think she will figure it out any time soon?” Maria asked him.

“No idea, I’ll give her an hour at least though.” Frank said, shrugging.

“What if she doesn’t?” Maria insisted.

“Then it comes down to whether she’s made progress.” Frank turned to look at Maria directly. “I know you are nervous about your dad. That’s not going to make me hasty when I don’t need to be.”

Maria grimaced, a irritation plain on her face. She didn’t argue any further though.

Frank looked away. He felt awkward. Leadership felt easy until you confronted disagreement. The feeling soon faded away. Frank just rested, without thinking too much.

“Yes!” Rina shouted.

Frank stood up, followed by Bill. Maria glanced over but didn’t elect to move. The two men walked over to check on Rina. She stood, posed excitedly, looking at a bunch of rocks laying on the ground across the room.

“I finally did it!” she excitedly told them when they came into view.

“You hit where you were aiming?” asked Frank.

“Yea! Twice in a row!” Rina replied.

“Can you do it again?” he asked.

“I think so.” Rina replied, slightly less enthusiastic.

Frank gestured for her to go ahead.

Rina grabbed a stone, placing it in the leather pouch. The loop remained around her finger, and she held the knot in her hand. Then she began to swing it in a figure eight around her torso. After a short windup, she released the stone. It flew generally in front of her, impacting the wall a few feet left of directly where she was facing.

She deflated a bit. “It was still in front of me though.” “Where exactly were you aiming?” Frank asked her.

She gestured to the wall directly in front of her.

Frank shrugged. “Good enough for now. I want to see what the effect does to the things here.” He turned back to the hallway. “Get your things together, leave them in the hallway. We are going to start fighting the first enemy on the floor over and over.”

Frank strapped his shield back on, and picked up his sword. Maria stood up, looking determined and holding the longer of the two spears. Bill grabbed his sword. Rina secured the pouch of stones to her pants, and held the sling in one hand.

“I’ll lead the way. Rina behind me, then Bill and Maria. We see something, Rina tries to hit it with her sling and then we engage as a group.” Frank informed them, then started walking down the hall.

A few minutes of travel led to a simple octagon shaped room, perhaps seventy feet across, with a single armour standing at attention, halberd in hand. It took a stance at their arrival.

Decrepit Iron Armour Animated by a Forgery of the Flame of Vitality

Level 2

“Rina, try and hit it.” Frank ordered, stepping back.

Rina gave it an honest effort, but both attempts missed and the armour lumbered towards them, getting close enough to prevent a third.

“I’ll draw it’s attention, move to flank it. Only attack when its extended itself on me.” Frank told Bill and Maria.

He stepped past Rina and immediately looked to engage. The armour attacked, but this time Frank simply deflected it to his side. The fact it had a halberd and not a pike was a huge advantage for the group. His shield easily turned aside the blow.

“We need to knock it over like before.” Frank told Maria and Bill, who were circling to the armour’s flank. The armour drew back and threw out another blow towards Frank, but again, his shield simply rendered the attack useless. With his strength, so long as he diverted the blow instead of take it head on, the armour could do little.

Bill and Maria had made it into position by then, and so when Frank blocked the third blow he shouted to them to move in.

“Now!”

They rushed towards the armour. It was stronger and faster than the level ones they’d done this to before, but that didn’t mean it was actually that strong or fast. Frank hooked his leg behind it before he shoved, and that, combined with Maria’s efforts, sent it tumbling back. Maria didn’t hesitate, and jammed her spear in the gap in its throat, wedging off the head to finish it.

Decrepit Iron Armour Animated by a Forgery of the Flame of Vitality(Level 2) defeated. Maria recieves 125 EXP. Frank recieves 70 EXP. Bill recieves 70 EXP.

The slain thing began to dissipate. Frank looked around for any potential rewards. None were forthcoming. Rina appeared disappointed she hadn’t got any EXP.

“That went well, now we repeat.” He turned back to the hallway, and the others followed. Arriving in the starting room after picking up his pack, he called for everyone else to leave and re enter the dungeon, and followed his own instructions.

The room was exactly the same as before. “This is going to be the routine until you are too tired to continue safely.” He told them, immediately walking out into the hall and depositing his pack once more. The others followed suit.

This time, the first enemy was within the hall.

Dapper Two Piece Suit Animated by a Forgery of the Flame of Intelligence

Level 1

“Rina try and hit it, otherwise stay back. These guys are actually skilled with weapons, and there’s not enough room for you to attack from the sides.”

Rina tried once again, but only got one missed attempt. Upon the release of the projectile, the suit charged instead of waiting as it normally did.

Frank stepped forward, and defeated it in a very quick exchange. Skill was only so relevant when the other party had an absolute advantage like higher stats and a shield.

Dapper Two Piece Suit Animated by a Forgery of the Flame of Intelligence(Level 1) defeated. Frank awarded 200 EXP.

Once again, there was no drop. The suit, and it’s rapier, simply lay on the floor giving off blue motes.

The cycle repeated, three, four, and finally five times. Twice more there were suits, which Frank handled himself. Once, there was a suit of armour, but as it was only level one, and not the most threatening agility or strength varieties, it suffered the same fate as the previous. Rina, despite trying, had yet to hit anything, and had not gotten any experience. She was obviously getting frustrated. Bill and Maria on the other hand, had each reached level 5.

The sixth time through, they faced an armour once again, this time in a huge open space that lacked any point of reference except the wall they had emerged from, and the floor.

Decrepit Iron Armour Animated by a Forgery of the Flame of Agility

Level 2

“Rina!” Frank called out.

She responded by quickly swinging her sling and releasing a shot. It missed entirely. The armour had broke into a decent jog, it’s speed threatening. There was no time for another attempt.

Frank moved ahead. “This’ll be on me.”

Rina shouted in frustration. Maria had already broken the first crude spear Frank had fashioned, so there wasn’t a weapon she could use in the immediate besides the borderline useless fishing spears. Angrily, she picked a stone from her pouch and threw it.

Unlike the sling, which required much skill, throwing a rock at a suit of armour was quite easy. It hit the armour square on the chest. Much to the surprise of everyone, there was a flash of sparks and the armour collapsed to the ground.

It was only incapacitated for a moment. Almost immediately, it tried to rise to its feet. Frank didn’t give it the opportunity though, running up and crippling it with a few well placed blows, before finishing it off via head removal.

Decrepit Iron Armour Animated by a Forgery of the Flame of Agility(Level 2) defeated. 70 EXP awarded to Rina. 195 EXP awarded to Frank.

Frank thought the system was giving him a lot of credit for providing the pouch.

“Why didn’t you tell me I could just throw them?” Rina asked, a mixture of happiness and confusion.

“Didn’t know.” Frank replied. “Guess I just didn’t think things through enough.”

Frank considered why he’d failed on something so basic. The obvious answer was that he was fallible. He knew that, but it was trivial. If he accepted the hypothesis that either the system or someone acting through the system was communicating with him, the fact he’d been primed to associate the sling and pouch together by the system made sense. That didn’t account for him not realizing that until now though.

He settled on his current happiness combined with his lowered mental stats. His stability previously prevented emotions from affecting his behaviour erratically, and his wisdom allowed him to intuit things without effort. He motioned everyone to start walking back as he pondered it.

He’d already concluded that his behaviour had been affected by the stats previously, could it be that his happiness had distracted him from careful reasoning, because he wasn’t used to requiring conscious effort to maintain self control?

It fit with what David had thought about the system’s integration with each person. You couldn’t necessarily separate the person and their stats. And that implied that Frank was not the same person, in a real sense, since coming back. His stats after all, had all reset.

There wasn’t really a verifiable answer to that. He’d just have to be more cognizant of any potential oversights caused by his changed mental status. He grabbed his pack as he re entered the room, as did everyone but Rina, who, not fighting in front, kept hers the entire time so they had medical supplies on hand.

They all left and entered the dungeon again. Frank could see that everyone was still in decent shape, but also that they were starting to get stressed.

“Last one, then we rest.” he said.

The other three nodded, and they once more proceeded down the path. They soon found the last one, an armour, standing in the featureless square of the first room.

Decrepit Iron Armour Animated by a Forgery of the Flame of Wisdom

Level 3

“Be careful, this one is smarter, but otherwise tackle it the same way as the others.” Frank said. “Go in when I say, but for now just move to the flank.”

Rina tried her sling in vain, and then resorted to throwing. The armour seemed to recognize the threat though, and blocked her two throws with it’s pike before it got close enough to engage. Despite it having a range advantage, it chose not to use it, instead immediately closing the distance and fighting with it’s grip on the pike choked up.

Frank was surprised but not unprepared for this behaviour. It must be reacting to the threat of the thrown rocks.

It managed to get close enough Rina wasn’t confident throwing more rocks, though Frank managed to slow it with a strike to the left leg as a consequence. Several short exchanges were to its disadvantage, a pike ill suited to close quarters combat, especially when a long bit of haft trailed behind. Finally, he managed to outright disable its left leg, and moved in for the kill. Two short back and forths later, and Frank had hurt it’s other leg enough it couldn’t walk.

Despite the fact he hadn’t said anything, the situation was similar to when he had called in Maria and Bill to help him finish armour off before. Bill crowded in anticipating Frank’s order. He moved to hastily, and before Frank could warn him off, the armour reversed and struck behind it with the blunt haft end, cracking Bill in the head. He fell bonelessly, face hitting the stone floor as he did.

Rina screamed in surprise and horror, and Maria unwillingly took a step back in shock and fear. Frank’s heart starting pounding, and he hastily finished the enemy off, before running to Bill’s stricken form.