The thing that makes Jake’s “rescue” extra ironic is that with his [Enhanced Party], and my lack of [Status Display], he could’ve had a better idea of my HP at a glance than I could.

I’m also sure that he mostly brushed the incident off as “Titus causing problems again,” but if you think about it, what would have happened if another party member had been grabbed? What if Andrew was the one sucked under, and he had to try to get free with his mace? Or if Sam was captured and she had to try to cast spells at the vines wrapped around her own body?

I don’t mean to toot my own horn, but a party member probably would’ve been lost to the swamp.

What? You’re wondering if there would’ve been as many vines if I wasn’t there? Of course there… Hey look over there! The chapter’s starting!

----

After Jake’s close brush with death, we swam back to shore, or I guess shallower swamp, and met up with the rest of the party. I trailed behind Garrett and Jake, just in case more vines tried to get grabby.

“Don’t do anything stupid like that again!” Emilia chastised Jake as soon as we got closer.

He gave a weak grin. “Sorry, but I thought Titus was in danger.”

Emilia hmphed and refused to look at him. Until she sniffed and almost gagged. “Jake, is that you? What is that smell?”

Jake took a sniff of his clothes and recoiled. Garrett and I soon followed suit (with our own clothes. We didn’t both sniff Jake. That would be weird).

It turns out swamp water doesn’t make good cologne.

I belatedly remembered that [Rangers] got the perk [Enhanced Senses], so Emilia was getting an extra dose of the nastiness. She better hope that we find the dungeon quick. The swamp isn’t going to stop smelling just because a princess decided to visit it.

I must have been more irritated than I thought because Jake immediately called out, “Aura.”

I pulled the aura back in, and we made it back to camp without any issue. Jake and Garrett decided to switch back to their adventuring clothes even though they would be a bit cold that night. Meanwhile, I didn’t have another pair of clothes to change into.

I asked to see if Jake or Garrett had another set of clothes I could borrow, but it turned out they didn’t. That’s when I found out the rest of the party didn’t have much in the way of spare clothing. It made me curious for a bit, but I could see the logic behind it. I plucked at my shirt sleeve. You know, I never thought about it, but clothes don’t really get dirty here, do they? I mean, we’ve been traveling for a week, and we didn’t have an issue until the swamp. I thought back to the tutorial cave. And they don’t get damaged either, or I would have lost my shirt to 10,000 ant bites. I chuckled. Or instantly the first time I jumped in lava. I’m glad my immunity carries over to my clothes, or that would’ve been awkward.

It was getting dark, so I gave the party a sloppy salute. “I’m off for the night then, see you tomorrow.”

“Wait one second!” Tim interjected. “We are near the swamp, which houses our objective. We need to keep one of us around Titus at all times!”

Drat, I forgot about that.

Jake sighed. “Look, I know we agreed to that back before we left, but is that really necessary?”

Tim nodded emphatically. “Yes! It is vital now more than ever!”

“Jake, maybe we should have someone keep an eye on him,” Garrett said.

“What? Not you too!” Jake replied.

“No, I mean, if we keep someone around him, we’ll always be able to locate him in a pinch. And given the fact that he’s a magnet for trouble-“

I interjected with an offended, “Hey!”

Garrett just ignored me and kept talking. “It would be a good idea to have someone around in case something bad happens.”

“Okay, I guess you have a point,” Jake said. “Everyone in favor of having an extra person on watch for keeping track of Titus, say aye.”

I was outvoted 8 to 1. “I don’t need a babysitter,” I grumbled.

“Sorry, bud,” Jake shrugged. “You’ve been outvoted.”

Megan held up her hand. “I’ll take first Titus watch.”

Jake looked back and forth between us while grinning. “Ohhh, I see how it is.”

Megan and I scowled, but she beat me to the reply. “Jake, whatever weird idea you have about us is completely off-base.”

He held up his hands in mock surrender. “Okay, okay. Sure. Whatever you say.”

I sighed. “Let’s just go. See you all tomorrow.”

I turned away to start walking, and by the time I looked back for Megan, she was already invisible. We walked in silence for a couple of minutes before I finally spoke up. “You’re still following me, right? Any reason that you took the first watch?”

I stopped and looked around to try to locate her. Okay, footprints lead right up to-

She reappeared directly in front of my face, and I nearly jumped out of my skin. “Why do you keep doing that?!” I yelled.

She held her nose and stepped away from me. “Eww, Megan was right. You guys do smell awful.” She paused. “As for why I keep [Sneaking] up on you?” She shrugged indifferently. “Your reactions are entertaining, and I don’t have anything else to do to keep me occupied. You’re also the only one I can actually do it to since the rest of the party can always know where I am.”

I grumbled a bit but then asked again. “So, what do you want? You took the first watch, so you must want something from me, right?”

“Straight to business, okay. Sure. Well, partner, I wanted to know what the plan was. We’re at the southern swamp. The dungeon should be somewhere close to here. How are you going to claim it before the [Hero] does?”

“I have no idea,” I muttered.

“No idea? Really?” She raised an eyebrow. “You traipsed all the way down here, and you don’t even have a plan?”

“I’m kind of flying by the seat of my pants here,” I snapped back. “I’ve never been a criminal, much less a [Demon Lord] before.”

Megan sighed. “Okay, fine. We’ll come up with a plan then. The main goal is to have you complete the dungeon before Jake. So how do we get you the opportunity to do that?”

I thought for a bit. “The first step is finding it, right? So I guess I need to somehow find the dungeon without letting anyone else know.”

Megan nodded. “Okay, that’ll be difficult, but you can at least use the 2 hours a night that I’m watching you to take a look around. That doesn’t exactly give us outstanding odds of you finding it first, but it’s all we can really do since you’ll be with the party the rest of the time. Now, let’s pretend you do manage to find it. Are you planning to try to take on the dungeon all by yourself?”

I thought back to the two giant bosses that I had squared off against and shuddered. “I.. I don’t see any other way that I could do this, so I guess I have to give it a shot.”

“Hmmm, I’m really not liking the odds of plan A,” Megan muttered. “What about plan B? What will you do if the party finds the dungeon first?”

I thought and came to a conclusion. A conclusion I really didn’t like. “Then, I guess in that case, I’ll have no choice but to tell everyone that I’m the [Demon Lord] and that activating the dungeons is the only way I get to go home.” I sighed. “I highly doubt I could convince anyone to go with it, even the [Hero]. They’ll also probably not be too happy about all of the lying I’ve been doing.”

“Great. Both plan A and plan B sound like they have no chance of succeeding. Just what I want to hear.” Megan furrowed her brow. “Let’s rethink plan B. Why not try to clear the dungeon with the party and then just claim it right before Jake does?”

“I mean.. That would allow me to clear this dungeon, but it would also tell the party that I’m the [Demon Lord] in the worst way possible. I think that path ends with me being hunted down before we reach the second dungeon.”

“It sounds like you’re going to be found out either way. Maybe it's best if you just leave the party now while you can still get a head start,” Megan stated flatly.

I flopped into the snow and looked up at the sky. “If only it was that easy,” I muttered.

Megan came and stood next to me, but gave me a bit of room, likely due to the smell. “And why isn’t it that easy? It seems like the obvious play here.”

“I mean it is, but I’m trying not to get anyone killed, you know? And even though the party thinks I’m a trouble magnet, they’re just as bad.” I sat up and looked at her. “Yes, they saved my life from the wolves I aggroed when I just got here. Yes, I wouldn’t have been able to fend off the monster wave alone. However, the [Hero] would’ve been nommed on by a mimic if I hadn’t been there to help. The entire party would’ve died against the Elemental Wolf boss if I hadn’t been there to deal ice damage. And finally, could you imagine what would’ve happened if those vines that we just found had grabbed someone who actually needed to breathe?”

I flopped back down and continued. “Maybe I’m paranoid, but I feel like someone in the party would die if I leave now.” Megan gave me a doubtful look. “Okay, fine. There’s a good chance I would die too.” I shook my head. “I think for now we stick with that plan and hope that somehow AltSys made these dungeons possible for me to solo. If not, I guess it won’t matter either way.”

“Not a fan of the plan, but I guess it will have to do for now,” Megan said. She held her nose. “You really need to find somewhere to wash up, though.”

We looked for a river or stream but didn’t end up finding anything during her watch. I decided to have the same goal during the others’ turns but didn’t succeed then either. There were also still several wolf attacks that night, but they were basically routine by that point.

The night went quicker, always having someone to talk to instead of just daves, and soon enough, it was morning. Everyone changed out of their winter gear and back into their tutorial-issued garb to deal with the increased heat. We were ready to start tackling the swamp.

I took point since I was functionally immune to the vines that we had encountered the day before. That sparked a discussion. “So, ya think they were enemies or just a weird terrain thing for the swamp?” Jake asked.

“I just assumed they were enemies, but I guess no one bothered to [Identify] them,” I replied. “I’ll have to try that on the next one I see.” I barely finished talking when a vine shot up from the water and wrapped around my leg. I sighed. “Speak of the devil. Don’t come in after me unless I start losing HP, okay?”

The vine yanked me deeper into the water, and I barely managed to squeak out the word, “[Identify]” in time. I’m being pulled by a level 5 stranglevine, okay. How does that make sense? These things are so weak! I reached down and was about to give the vine an [Earth Strike] when I paused. Unless these are just a part of the mob, and the real body is somewhere else? I looked around in the murky water. Even with [Dark Vision], there was barely any visibility. I looked back down at the vine. I guess you’re my ticket. Lead the way!

I grabbed hold of the vine and started pulling myself along it. Other vines started appearing and trying to latch onto me, so I had to let go and start playing defense. The first vine that wrapped around me was treated to an [Earth Strike], the second to an ice one, and even air worked for the third. Yup. One hit for everything. Then I had a thought. Does fire work underwater? I shrugged and [Fire Striked] the fourth. I was only a little surprised that it worked.

Fire does, in fact, work underwater. Huh. I tucked that mental note aside and went back to defending against the vines. I had cleared out about a dozen when I didn’t see any more coming. Alright, now back to following you. I grabbed the vine and started pulling myself along it again.

I soon found the source. It was a pile of vines wrapping around each other about the size of a fire hydrant. “[Identify],” I gurgled out into the water and immediately regretted it. Eww. Accidentally let some swamp in my mouth. I managed to not gag, and I did confirm that the monster was the actual stranglevine.

Okay, but how tanky are you, and do you have any other defenses besides the vines? I pulled myself even closer and prepared to be attacked. Nothing happened.

I punched it with no skill active. Still no response. I shrugged and just kept hitting it. It only took 4 more hits to die. Dang. These are really weak. I thought back to Jake, nearly drowning. Okay, I guess they have their purpose just like the daves. Also, I suppose it isn’t fair for me to make that judgment when I hard-counter them.

Since the vine let go of me after I killed the monster, I decided I may as well drag it back to let the party loot it. I took hold and started swimming up.

Another vine shot out and grabbed me. Oh. There’s more than one down here. That makes sense. When another vine wasn’t forthcoming, I started pulling myself along with one hand while still holding onto my dead foe with the other. I reached the second strangle vine and punched it to death as well.

I now had two dead monster bodies. I was debating leaving one, but I wasn’t sure if I would find it again. I stared at it for a bit before shrugging and picking it up in my free hand. Well, there’s no way I’d be able to swim like this in the real world, but let’s give it a go.

I started swimming by just kicking my legs and was surprised when I actually made decent headway, even with my two dead passengers. Level 8 adventurer bodies are insane.

I finally surfaced.

“Oh, there you are!” Jake called out. “We were starting to get worried.”

I started swimming towards him. “Nope, no need to worry about me,” I replied. “Oh, and they are monsters, by the way. I’m bringing back 2 of them for looting.”

“Sweet! Let’s take a look.”

When I finally reached shallow enough swamp that I could stand upright, I showed the rest of the party the vine monsters.

The party wasn’t overly impressed by their appearance once they could see them, and it did raise the question of how things that were so small relatively were able to keep me underwater. We just assumed weird new world physics and left it at that.

Jake looted both bodies, got 29 gold total, and then we decided to move on.

It was slow going. Even if the party didn’t have to stop every thirty minutes or so when I would get dragged under the water, the swampy ground wasn’t very conducive for traveling quickly. That, combined with our camp being set up outside the swamp, meant we didn’t get very far that day. Or the next day. Or the day after.

The next several days fell to the same routine. Wake up, travel into the swamp, I get dragged under the murky water by enemies, head back, and then I get babysat by random party members during the night.

Well, I say random party members, but I noticed a distinct lack of time alone with Emilia, Tim, or Andrew. I was grateful for that. I don’t know who decided it was best to keep me away from the three people who hated my guts, but I assumed it was Jake.

Speaking of Jake, we got along a lot better now that he was no longer continually fighting back his anger. When it was his turn to babysit me, we mostly talked about the new world and things that he hoped we would find. Chief among those were dragons, but he was also hoping that he would find a way to cast magic.

“I mean, I’m a bit jealous of Tim’s [Fire Ball],” Jake said. “Isn’t that every guy’s dream when they hear of magic? To be able to cast that?”

I shrugged. “I guess it makes sense why you don’t get to cast it, though. Could you imagine if your class was allowed to have the best AOE spell and also have [Sunder]?”

Jake chuckled. “Yeah, I guess that’s fair. May as well also ask for [Heal] at that point and be my own party.”

The chats with Jake were the most pleasant, but also the ones that planted the worst feeling in the pit of my gut. Am I really okay with betraying him? He’s just… A good guy. I don’t want to have to stab him in the back. I thought of the rest of the party, and the feeling just got worse. Is that really what it will take to get back to my parents? And is it even worth the cost? The quest said that if I fail, I’ll be stuck here forever. How do I know Admin was telling the truth? And.. Is it actually so bad being here?

Fortunately, a wolf attack happened right around then, so Jake didn’t have overly long to worry about my sudden morose mood.

I managed to shake those thoughts off until the end of his watch and was fortunate that the next party member to babysit me was Megan. We had initially planned to search the swamp during her 2-hour shifts, but we couldn’t get to any unexplored territory in that amount of time.

That left me plenty of time alone with my thoughts since she wasn’t the chattiest when we weren’t planning our next moves.

I still want to go home. I miss my old life, but I guess if it comes down to sacrificing anyone else to get there… It’s not worth it. I thought about how flimsy my current plans to claim the dungeon were. I mean, it’s looking more and more like this dungeon is where it’s going to end anyway. So, if the party finds the dungeon first, I guess I come clean. If I find the dungeon first, give it a peek, and don’t think I can clear it, I’ll come clean. If I feel like this plan is putting anyone in the party in too much danger… I thought about our party and sighed. I guess even Emilia, Andrew, and Tim. They were right about me in some ways, so I shouldn’t hold too big of a grudge against them. I shouldn’t let them die just because I don’t like them.

“It’s looking more and more like I won’t be able to ensure the party gets a big reward for defeating me,” I said aloud to Megan. The woman who I had lost track of and was currently invisible.

After appearing in front of me and giving me yet another heart attack. She asked, “And why do you say that?”

“I think you were on the mark with the party finding out about me. Except instead of the third dungeon, I think they’ll find me out before the first. We need everything to fall in line perfectly for this to work, and when has anything our party’s done ever come close to perfect?” I chuckled.

She scowled. “You aren’t giving up, are you? You can’t! I still have leverage, remember?”

I laughed. “Go ahead. Tell everyone I’m the [Demon Lord].” I looked her dead in the eye. “Will they even believe you? A liar and a [Thief]? And even if they do, by some grand miracle, I’ll be fine at this point. Yeah, I’m 90 percent certain I won’t get to go home, but Jake isn’t just going to up and murder me. And I’m confident he won’t let anyone else either.”

I could tell the usually unflappable Megan was getting nervous. “What about the monster wave, huh? They aren’t just going to let that slide.”

I frowned. “You’re right. I’ll probably have to answer for that. I bet that I can talk them down to a fine or something once they know it was a complete accident.” I chewed on that. “I hope they don’t go for prison. Prison would suck. At least I wouldn’t have to eat the food.”

“Wow. You’re the worst partner I have ever had. And that’s saying something,” she sneered.

I shrugged. “Hey, the plan’s still on for now. I mean, there may be some miracle where we find the dungeon first, don’t alert the party, and find a way to not get anyone killed. I’m just letting you know to not get your hopes up.”

A curt, “Noted,” ended our discussion, and we stayed in awkward silence the rest of her watch.

Garrett had the next shift after her, and she stalked off as soon as he came to relieve her. He watched her go with a raised eyebrow and then looked at me. “Girl trouble?”

I snorted. “Nope, not in the slightest.”

“If you say so.” The [Berserker] shrugged and dropped the matter. “If you do need someone to listen to your girl troubles, I’m all ears, though.” Okay, he mostly dropped the matter.

I snorted. “I think the [Hero] needs your help there more than me.”

“With Emilia?” he asked.

“Uh.. Yeah. How’d you know?”

Garrett chuckled. “He already told me. He also told me that he really doesn’t want to make the party weird by asking her out or anything, but I think he should just get on with it already.” He gestured me closer and then started whispering even though we were the only two there. “Those two have been having late night chats together during each other’s watch.”

I mock gasped. “Oh, how degenerate! Next, you’ll tell me that you caught them holding hands!”

Garrett chuckled. “Knowing Jake, it’ll be ages before we see that. He isn’t the most confident around the ladies.”

The conversation died down a bit, so I asked a question that I had wondered about those two for quite a while. “By the way, you mentioned being the [Hero’s] guardian, but aren’t you only like 12 years older than him? How did you two meet, and how did you end up becoming his guardian?”

“Yeah, I’m about 12 years older than him. As for our meeting…” Garrett looked like he was trying to find what to say. “That’s a really personal story for both me and Jake. I wouldn’t mind you hearing it, but I think that decision should be up to him. As for how I became his guardian…” Garrett shook his head and laughed. “To this day, I’m not quite sure how we managed it.”

He had piqued my interest. “Oh?”

“Picture this. An angry teen that has been running away from foster home after foster home and a washed-up drunk happen to meet.” Garrett cut off my unasked question. “Yes, the washed-up drunk was me. At that point, I was struggling to keep sober, much less keep a job. Then I met that angry young teen that reminded me so much of my late younger brother, and I thought that I had to help him.”

“I decided to apply to be his foster parent,” Garrett continued. “And somehow, instead of laughing me off, they must have decided that nothing else was working. They may as well hand him off to be my problem for a few days until either he runs away or child services finds out I’ve been abusing him like the drunk I am.” Garrett laughed. “What they didn’t expect? For him to stay put and agree to anger management courses and counseling. For me to quit drinking, join AA, and to clean up my act. We saw countless visits from DHS when it first started, but they never found anything worth taking him from me.”

I stared at him. “How would that even be possible? Don’t they normally have a long process you have to go through to become a foster parent? And don’t they normally only go to couples?”

Garrett shrugged. “Best I can tell? They either expedited the process because they really wanted me to fail for some reason, or we were the paperwork mishap of the century. Either way, by the time 3 years had passed, and I applied to actually adopt him, he’d seen such marked improvements that no one could argue.” Garrett chuckled. “Though, it definitely wasn’t a one-way street. I would probably have upgraded from a washed-up drunk to a homeless drunk if it hadn’t been for him. So we really ended up saving each other.” Garrett’s far off look came back. “In more ways than one,” he muttered.

“Wow,” I tried to process all that. “So legally, you’re his dad?”

“Yup,” he nodded. “We both thought that was really awkward, so we went with guardian instead whenever he was introducing me to people. That and I always felt more like an older brother than an actual father to him.” He chuckled. “Though I guess he mostly calls me old geezer.”

I chuckled along with him.

“By the way, how are you two getting along?” Garrett asked. “He mentioned that it was a lot easier being around you without wrath aura, and you seem more at ease together, but I’m just curious if that was the only change.”

I thought it over. “I guess we’re getting along fine? Our one-on-one chats have been nice. I feel like I’m actually getting to know him for real.”

Garrett nodded. “That’s good. I’m glad that you two are getting to be friends and not just party members.”

The sick feeling in my gut was back at the mention of the word friends. Great. Thanks for making me feel even worse about my plan, Garrett. I tried to ignore it and just laughed. “Yeah, the party seems a bit disjointed for a group that’s supposed to go save the world.”

Garrett agreed, and mercifully the talk turned less serious after that.

Eventually, his two hours were up, and he was replaced by Lindsey. Being watched by Lindsey was always awkward because she had yet to say a word to me. Instead of having another silent 2 hours, I decided to try something else.

“Hey, Lindsey. Wanna spar?”

She put her sword and shield away, shrugged in a gesture that I took to mean acceptance, gave me a curt bow (that I awkwardly returned), and then we started.

Our first spar was over with a single punch from me… I like to phrase it that way because it makes me feel better. What actually happened was I took a single swing at her, she dodged it, grabbed my arm, and before I knew it, I was facedown in the snow with her pinning me.

It turns out that punching a bunch of mostly mindless monsters doesn’t help too much with fighting an actual martial artist.

I struggled feebly against her for a bit before sighing and saying, “Okay, I give.”

She got off me, and I got back up to my feet.

Well, at least I didn’t lose any HP to that. Wait a second. “Were you trying to use a pressure point on me?” I asked the silent [Knight].

She cocked her head quizzically before giving a brief nod.

“Huh,” I said. “I don’t think it worked. The pin was still effective, but it wasn’t painful or anything. I wonder if our new bodies don’t have pressure points?”

She frowned but said nothing, just as I had come to expect.

I suddenly had a half-baked plan. That I really didn’t like the sound of, but I couldn’t stop myself because now I was curious. “I guess we could have you keep trying them on me and see if that was the case for all of them?”

Lindsey’s wide grin told me that I had made a colossal mistake.

The rest of her watch was spent with her putting me in various holds and hitting different places on my body. None of them worked as expected, and I could tell her frustration was mounting. Eventually, she had me just stand up, and she kneed me in the groin.

Years of conditioning made me fall to the ground immediately. “Why would you do that!” I shouted. She looked at me with a flash of concern, and then I realized. That had hurt no more than a strike to anywhere else.

I stood back up and shook my head. “Huh. No more groin shots here, either.” I muttered under my breath. “Unless I have some type of special immunity or something.”

I could tell that she wasn’t too happy about the results of our totally rigorous scientific research, so I tried to cheer her up. “Hey, you can still kick my butt even without all the fancy pressure points and weak spots, don’t worry about it!” She didn’t look convinced, but our time was up, so we headed back to the camp.

The camp that was being taken down.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

“Oh, welcome back, Titus,” Jake said. “Since we ran out of places that we can reach in half a day, we figured we’d have to go deeper in the swamp. That means actually camping out in there. We already got a place figured out.”

“Thanks for consulting me,” I grumbled to myself. I guess it doesn’t matter much. I don’t stay at camp anyway.

Jake led us to the spot, and the trip wasn’t much to speak of. Well, there were still 3 times that I got dragged underwater by stranglevines, but that was barely even worth mentioning at this point.

Anyway, the new campsite was definitely on the Beverly Hills end of swamp real estate. I mean, it had solid ground that wasn’t covered in murky gross water! That automatically put it in the top 1% for me.

While the party got to work setting things up, I decided to summon a dave and plop it in the middle of the camp. I started talking to it. “I’ve forgotten to summon you guys each day, haven’t I? Even after I promised that I would practice that spell. My bad, Dave.” I looked at him. I also never confirmed that they last for a day. I mean, there’s no way they could last for more, but I should at least check for real. “Your name is now Science Dave. Stay in the middle of camp, don’t move, and only attack if you are attacked,” I ordered the gelatinous orb.

It obediently sat there.

That taken care of, I waited a bit until I had enough MP to cast the spell again, and I decided to do another experiment. “[Summon Dave].” The dave appeared, flopped to the ground, and I picked it up. “Your name is Submarine Dave, and you are going on a critical mission.”

I found an area with swamp water that went up to my knees and dropped it in. The dave was fully submerged. “Okay, now we wait to see what it does,” I said to myself as I watched it.

The dave just sat there.

I waited a few seconds. Then a few more. “Uh, Submarine Dave, do you not have to breathe? Or are you just too stupid to realize you’re drowning?”

I waited a minute before scooping the dave back up. “Okay, well, the results are inconclusive but seem to show that you don’t care about air. That’s pretty handy in a swamp. Just to make sure, though… Stay here, and don’t move. Only attack if you’re attacked.” I dropped the dave back in the water and walked back to camp.

When I got back, the party ended up getting into a discussion about what to do with me. Did they still want me to camp away from them so that I didn’t aggro monsters? Or did they want to keep me in camp since people didn’t want to go out into the swamp at night?

I managed to convince them that it would be best if I stayed outside of camp. Unlike the wolves that gave us a nice warning before attacking, the stranglevines were eerily quiet when they grabbed someone. I wasn’t sure that even with 2 of us on watch that we’d be able to ensure one didn’t grab someone in their sleep.

“Besides, if I stay outside of camp, I can do some extra scouting during the night. That’ll get us to the earth dungeon sooner!” I concluded. I was sure that everyone would go along with that since I could tell the swamp was wearing on the entire party.

To my surprise, Garrett shook his head. “I don’t think that’s a good idea. Or at least… Not yet?”

“Why do ya say that geezer?” Jake asked. “It’s not like the stranglevines are a threat to him.”

“They’re not what I’m worried about. I’m worried about what other monsters we’re going to find here,” Garrett stated. “In the tutorial, there were giant ants as a normal enemy, fire ants as a special, and then elite ones as well.. elite. In the forest, we encountered wolves as the normal enemy, and then alpha wolves were the elite mob.” He shook his head. “I guess if you throw in the bears too, that would bump the alphas down to special, but that’s beside the point. We’ve only seen 1 type of enemy so far in the swamp. It’s also been level 5. I’m worried about what the ‘elite’ mob will look like here. Until we know, I really don’t like sending Titus off with just one other party member watching his back.”

We argued a bit about that, but the party agreed with Garrett’s cautious approach, and I was voted down.

As I sighed and began my trek out of camp with Jake, I couldn’t help but grumble a bit. “There may be another mob type, but I’m sure it’s nothing I can’t handle.”

Jake laughed. “What if it’s something stronger than a dark bear? Those were only level 7, and an elite in this area might be level 10.”

I shrugged. “Then at least we’d be able to get some experience. I don’t think you get any for fighting stuff that’s lower level than you.”

“Huh, never thought of it that way…” Jake trailed off.

The watches that night were uneventful. I was mostly just waiting for Megan’s turn. If she’s watching me, we could probably manage to get a bit of exploring done anyway. It’s not like she would tell the party.

I was surprised to find out that she didn’t take a turn babysitting me at all that night. Sam took her place.

I was a little upset about that. Don’t get me wrong, it was entertaining talking with Sam. She spent most of the time regaling me with stories of her best video game triumphs, and the time went quickly. However, I was upset that Megan was ruining what little chance we had of me finding the dungeon first. On the other hand, I was getting more and more at peace with the fact that I was going to have to tell the party sooner rather than later that I was the [Demon Lord].

With the final watch of the night ended, we headed back to camp. I saw Science Dave exactly where I left him, and that reminded me. Oh, yeah. Need to see if Submarine Dave survived the night.

Submarine Dave was still alive and oozing, so I was pretty confident that my summons also didn’t need to breathe. Huh. I guess that means they’re just as much of a hard counter to stranglevines as I am. I should have them fight to see how it goes.

When we got back to camp, I realized I still hadn’t seen Megan since we argued on her watch. Which I grant you, wasn’t that unusual, but I was getting concerned because she hadn’t jump-scared me in quite a while. I decided to ask Jake about it. “Have you seen Megan around?”

Jake shook his head. “Nah. She’s been around, but she’s been even more antisocial than usual. I don’t think that she’s left [Sneak] once since she came back from watching you.” He gave me a curious look. “Did something happen between you two?”

“Just an argument,” I answered truthfully. I managed to leave it at just that somehow.

After that, the party got ready, and we headed off into uncharted territory. I had been getting pretty lax in watching my surroundings since I felt like nothing in the swamp could hurt me, but I was on high alert that day. I kept expecting a [Rogue] to pop out of nowhere and scare me.

My paranoia ended up paying off. We were wandering through a stretch of the swamp where the water was about waist deep when I thought I saw movement in the water. I immediately spun towards it. Nice try, Megan!

The gaping maw that was rapidly coming my way obviously did not belong to a [Rogue]. My mind processed that fact, along with a few others at the same time. Those are red eyes. That is a big crocodile. And then the most vital one of them all. Move! Move! Dang, it! Move!

I barely managed to leap out of the way as the jaws snapped shut.

Jake was the second to move. “[Identify]!” He was already pulling his sword out and moving to me as he called out. “Level 10 dark croc! Help Titus!”

Spells and arrows were shot at the new enemy, but the other melee fighters had been giving me space so that they wouldn’t accidentally be grabbed by the stranglevines. They charged through the water to help, but I knew it was going to be too late.

I managed to barely dodge another bite when I lost it a bit. I refuse to become crocodile chow! I avoided the third bite, which nearly got my leg, and shouted. “You hungry?! Then chew on this!” I reared back my hand and cast. “[Summon Dave]!”

The ball of slime appeared in my hand, and I shoved it down the croc’s waiting maw. My hand barely made it out as it clamped around the unsuspecting dave. The result was both terrifying and hilarious. Which will require some explanation of how that’s possible.

Have you ever seen a crocodile death roll? That’s the terrifying part, a 20-foot long ravenous monster gripping its unsuspecting prey and then putting it through the murder setting of a washing machine.

That was the scenario we were watching. The croc had grabbed the dave, dragged it underwater, and we could just barely make out the rapid spins it was doing on the bottom of the swamp.

I used that time to beat a hasty retreat back to the rest of the party, and we watched in shock. The ranged attackers didn’t even have a good shot at it since it was underwater, so we waited. And waited.

Tim broke the silence first. “Shouldn’t the dave have perished by now? Why is it still spinning?”

“I don’t know,” I answered slowly. “Maybe it’s just dumb? We’ve seen our share of dumb monsters before.”

I had barely finished speaking when it stopped. The party got ready for an immediate attack.

None came. Our nerves were starting to get frayed.

“[Hero]!” I whispered urgently. “Go and see if it’s playing dead.”

Jake chuckled nervously. “Okay, I guess that’s fair. Everyone form up.” He took the lead, and we approached the crocodile.

He wasn’t attacked, and we all shared a look. “Okay, here goes nothing,” he said. He took a deep breath and went underwater.

He came back up, laughing hysterically. The entire party looked at him in a mixture of concern and confusion.

“What is it [Hero]?” I asked.

“The.. the slime… the slime won,” he managed to choke out between laughs and breaths as he held up the victorious dave.

Most of the party laughed while I was flabbergasted. “How could a level 5 dave beat a level 10 croc?! That doesn’t make sense!”

“Well, in our old world, the entire point of the death roll was to shear portions of their opponent with the resulting torsion,” Tim said. “The dave doesn’t have any appendages to apply that force to as the entirety of its being was located in the crocodile’s mouth. What if that means that the death roll simply had no effect on it? And that the crocodile was too unadaptable to attempt a change in tactics?”

“You mean to tell me that the dave won… Because it doesn’t have arms or legs?”

“Precisely.” Tim nodded.

I facepalmed and muttered, “What kind of unbalanced game world is this?”

Jake handed me the dave while still trying to get his laughter under control. “Dude, your class is so OP!”

I almost wanted to snap at him that it wasn’t. That I had started with nothing and that I had to earn it all. That my multiple negative perks and lack of inventory or equipment meant that was patently false. Instead, I remembered all the positive points that had made me straight up ignore things that other people struggled with. I gave him a smile and a nod. “I guess you’re right, [Hero]. Though, I think Dave is the real OP one.”

I hoisted the dave above me like the victor of a championship match. The party laughed, and we headed ever deeper into the swamp.