A dungeon's administrator is a lot like the warden of a prison--if you catch sight of them from the outside, in passing, you can kind of academically say "Oh, that's the guy in charge of that place." When you've spent time inside their dungeon, though, you can't help but recognize that they are the reason people have suffered and died, and they are also your only chance at success and possible redemption. It's a complex set of emotions.

The administrator for this dungeon was someone I'd met before--or more likely, I met his avatar, then and now. I doubt he really was exposing himself to danger to talk to my dumb ass. The avatar was, to be generous, a pencil-necked dweeb: everything about him was long and not thick, whether you're talking about his neck, torso, legs, arms, or fingers. A hawaiian shirt of appropriate length but wide enough for two of him hung loosely over his shoulders, and a pair of big circular glasses that were mirrored to hide his eyes sat atop his narrow little nose. He stood awkwardly at attention like someone who'd been told to do so by a P.E. teacher and just wanted everything to be done with.

This guy was the one who made the dungeon what it was--complete with cannibals, devils, skeletons, and lots of other nastiness. He set the trap that had me sacrificing human lives for power, and he redesigned the fights after I demonstrated that they were, perhaps, too easy, so that they would kill more people.

"So I see you made changes," I said as an opener, not really sure where to begin.

I thought I saw the muscles of his face furrow like he was squinting, but the big round glasses made it hard to tell.

"So was I... supposed... to feel something for the Devil? Like, were you thinking he was not going to be evil?"

"Not really." There was a highly nasal quality to the Administrator's voice, like he was always suffering a headcold. "I think that's just a side effect of his high wisdom score. I gave him authority to make a few trades, but I didn't really do anything to change his personality."

"Are the trades... evil?" It was difficult to phrase the question in a way that didn't sound really stupid.

"Yes of course they are." The Administrator's reply... made me sound really stupid. Go figure.

"So I should not feel bad at all about him crying while I killed him, because he's a devil." I kept my voice as deadpan as I could.

"I'm not going to tell you how you should live your life." The Administrator's reply was as catty as I should have expected from a person designing deathtraps.

"What about the redemption thing? Am I supposed to accept that at face value? Because there is nothing coming out of a devil's mouth--"

"I'm not going to give you the solutions to my puzzles." The Administrator's head tilted down towards me just a little bit, as though the looming nature of his new posture was supposed to be threatening on his frame. Granted, as Administrator, he was likely capable of completely erasing me with a thought, but... physically? Not intimidating.

"I just wondered because redemption was also a thing that came up in real life. Is the skull only for this dungeon? Are they useless when I leave? Because I hit the level cap already."

He rolled his head back and took a deep breath, letting it out as an exasperated sigh. "I imported the template," he admitted after a moment. "That item has uses in a few other dungeons. I'm not going to tell you which ones. The others might actually be mad at me about it, because they're supposed to be harder to get."

"Harder than solo diving a dungeon? After getting blooded?" I gave a wry twist to my voice.

"You only have to solo one fight to get the item." The administrator's eyes tilted back down to look at me. "And compared to some of the puzzles that grant you Devil's Skulls, sacrificing one human life to get an infinite supply is nothing."

That was an unpleasant thought, and I swallowed. "So... the skulls are probably worth a lot more than the halo."

"To most people, perhaps. Did you really look at the halo?" The administrator's lips quirked up into a smile. "That whole fight was designed to crush you, in particular. Good job, by the way. You're a lot faster than I thought you'd be. So of course the loot for this enemy has to be something that would be worth it for you, both the first time you came... and every time after. But yes, I suspect you'd get... a fair price for any skulls you decided to put up on the market. Just understand that you'll be... tacitly encouraging people to figure out where they came from."

That thought stopped me cold. "That's cruel."

"Life is cruel. Death is inevitable. That's the administrator mantra... more or less." The administrator's thin lips peeled back into a nasty looking grin. "Any more questions?"

"Is he going to keep whining like a child if I kill him again?"

"Probably."

I sighed. "No more questions, administrator."

A few moments later, I was back in the room, the countdown timer in the middle of the room slowly ticking by. I went over to the entrance and locked it, just to be safe, and sat down to wait out the hour. I took out the halo and looked at it, going over each of the attributes and trying to figure out the trick.

[ FALLEN ANGEL'S HALO - Lv 50 ] [ WISDOM +10 ] [ INTELLIGENCE +10 ] [ RESISTANCE +10 ] [ AURA OF MAJESTY - Lv 10 ] [ AURA OF LOST SOULS - Lv 5 ] [ AURA OF DISCORD - Lv 10 ] [ WINGS OF MALICE - Lv 15 ] [ CLOAK OF SHAME - Lv 5 ] [ AURA DRAIN - Lv 1 ]

I studied it, nodding. 'Wings of Malice' was probably a movement ability that would end up another telekinetic booster, and 'Cloak of Shame' was probably a stealth ability that would become a booster for that. If the three 'Aura' skills were like the elemental auras I'd played with, they would have different versions depending on whether I put them on offensive or defensive items. And 'Aura Drain'... that sounded like a specific skill booster but not one I recognized. I didn't need to recognize it, though. If I got a booster, practicing with it would give me the skill legitimately.

The levels were good, too; only Aura Drain was a trivial skill level, with Shame and Lost Souls being Minor and the rest being various higher levels. 15 might be too high of a skill level for me to absorb right now, which made it a risk to try right now.

That thought had me looking at my class. I hadn't done any serious leveling up since I returned to the dungeon, so I had more than two hundred class points to spend, enough for two Tier 2 Class Features, or four Tier 1s, but far short of a Tier 3. As a self-made class, I was setting precedent that I probably didn't want to set, but... I really just wanted to spend it all at on features instead of stat or skill boosts. Those were the interesting ones, the ones that bent the rules.

I couldn't help thinking of the poor sonofabitch whining on the Soulforged forum, though. I made a mental note to encourage him to do a Class Variant as soon as he could, because my whole shtick of power leveling and then spending it all randomly was going to get old for anyone else really fast.

I ended up starting with two Tier 1's, before I got tempted by the thought of two 2's . I collected fifty class points in my mental "hand" and focused on the concept of a 'Peerless Appraise' ability that would give me extra information on the item and any enchantments on it, including what could be absorbed, roughly how long it would take, and gave me hints if something was hidden. Something (presumably the Administrator) sent me mental feedback suggesting a toned down version that improved my Appraise and Skill Sage skills, in addition to a one-time boost of five skill levels to each; I wrestled with him for a little bit, eventually dropping it to two skill levels for each and some information on items that was specific to Soulforged abilities.

The second class feature I tried for was immediately categorized as a Tier 2--the ability to combine or split enchantments. I frowned, thinking that seemed inconsistent on a power level scale, but didn't really argue. Instead, I used my next fifty points on an ability to alter the visual style of items--specifically because the glowing item auras were getting in the way of my stealth abilities, and I was sick of it. Because that feature by itself wasn't much, I ended up also able to blur or conceal a duplicate so that it was difficult to determine that I was wearing it, or what it used to be. It was still pretty obvious, though, that it was an ability and not a real item, which was fine by me.

I tried, just to see if the Administrator had changed his mind, but no, the ability to reform duplicates into real items was still a Tier 4 ability, well out of my range. No surprise there.

Instead of going for a Tier 2 right away, I spent a few of my class points on skills, mostly Skill Sage. The next time I got into a dungeon, I would have enough points for my Tier 2, and there was no need to rush. With that and my new class feature, I re-examined the Fallen Angel's Halo:

[ FALLEN ANGEL'S HALO - Lv 50 ] [ WISDOM +10 ] [ INTELLIGENCE +10 ] [ RESISTANCE +10 ] [ ??? -2 ] [ AURA OF MAJESTY - Lv 10 ] [ AURA OF LOST SOULS - Lv 5 ] [ AURA OF DISCORD - Lv 10 ] [ WINGS OF MALICE - Lv 15 ] [ CLOAK OF SHAME - Lv 5 ] [ AURA DRAIN - Lv 1 ] [ ??? - Lv 0 ]

This item contains the regret of one who could have been a saint, but fell from grace.

Soulforged: Projector. Absorb time 7H

[ AURA OF MAJESTY ] An intimidating aura. May inflict [ Hesitation ]. [ AURA OF LOST SOULS ] A corrupt aura. Acts as [ Leadership ] [+5] on [ Lost Soul ], [ Slave ] only. [ AURA OF DISCORD ] A perplexing aura. May inflict [ Strife ]. [ WINGS OF MALICE ]

Acts as [ Flight ] [+5]. [ Evil ]. May cause [ Environment: Wither ].

Soulforged: [ 2 ] Absorbed Effects.

[ CLOAK OF SHAME] Acts as [ Stealth ] [-3]. Vulnerable to [ Empathy ]. During [ Stealth ] add [ Minor ] [ Death ] damage. Soulforged: [ 2 ] Absorbed Effects. [ AURA DRAIN ] Acts as [ Aura Drain ] [-1]. [ ??? ] Soulforged: [0] Absorbed Effects.

There were a few interesting notes there; the mystery hidden stat penalty and the mystery hidden ability were both obvious ones. Cloak of Shame's level modifier would turn it from a Minor to a Trivial Stealth boost; most likely, the other two effects would be in a stack, meaning that I could take the extra stealth for free but only do extra damage only against enemies with no empathic sense. In contrast, the +5 modifier for Wings of Malice was a significant boost, whether Flight turned into Telekinesis or something else; if (as I'd expect) the Wither effect was the one that was detected as Evil, that ability pair could just be ignored, stuck on something I didn't care for.

The note about the item being a "Projector" was interesting, as much because it wasn't a system tag as because the system still decided I had to know it. Most likely, that was a hidden attribute that most people didn't need to know, which converted defensive auras into offensive ones. Otherwise, any enhancement tagged as an "aura" would be a resistance, rather than inflicting status or damage on an enemy. In other words, the halo was an offensive item, even if I wore it on my head. That was interesting.

Meanwhile, Aura of Lost Souls... acting as a Moderate leadership ability, effective on slaves? I grit my teeth. I wasn't sure what types of monsters--or people--would get the 'Lost Soul' tag added to them, but I suppose it was worth keeping around for that alone.

What about my existing abilities? Were any of them double-edged like these?

I spent the next half hour going through my enhancements to find that yes, many of them especially the ones from the Devil's Swords, were actually abilities with a dual nature, one good and one bad, though the bad was usually not terrible. I removed the ones I was pretty sure I didn't need, and the effect on my stats wasn't huge.

At about the hour mark, the Devil was on his throne again. My inventory popped up, the Devil's Skull highlighted... again.

The Devil looked at me, and for the life of me, I thought he just looked so tired.