Before adventurers came to the world, if you had told anyone that Faroff would come to be so vital to its history, most would have laughed it off. If they had even heard of the small town in the middle of nowhere, of course.

However, fortunately for the poor village, this is the last tale of importance that I have to tell about them for many years.

---

I made my way back to Faroff and linked back up with Rich and the rest of the party.

“Find anything?” he asked.

I had debated what I was going to tell them, and I decided something adjacent to the truth was probably my best bet.

“The trails led south but hit a dead end,” I said and shook my head. “There was nothing there to show what could have caused this.”

“Dang,” Ethan said. “The king was hoping that we’d be able to tell him why this happened.”

I shrugged. “Sorry, I got nothing.” I decided to change the topic. “Any other undead attack while I was gone?”

Richard shook his head. “Nope, so you clearing out that boss must have done the trick. We were actually just about to go see the [Village Elder] to call the all-clear.”

“Oh, sounds good. I’ll come with you,” I replied.

They shared a look.

“Is something the matter?” I asked.

“Rich, we have to tell him,” Samuel said.

Richard sighed. “I know, I know. Uhh, Titus. We haven’t said anything the past few days since you were busy pulling our bacon out of the fire, but uhhh…” He whispered the next part. “You kinda smell. Bad. Real bad.”

What do they…? I thought and then finally caught on. “Oh. Right. Swamp. Sorry, my party got used to it since we were in there for a month.” They nodded along, and I noticed they were attempting to stand upwind from me. “Know of any place to wash up?” I asked.

They directed me to a nearby stream, and I gave both myself and my clothes a thorough scrubbing.

Ethan was the closest to my height, and he was also kind enough to leave me a spare set of clothes to change into after my bath. It was a kind gesture, but one that was surprisingly unhelpful.

I had just finished drying off and putting on my change of clothes when they phased off my body and fell to the ground.

I was left standing there in my undergarments, staring at the fallen clothes as if they were somehow responsible.

Let me guess. Clothes count as equipment? I mused. I looked over at my soaking wet adventurer’s clothes. “Wait, was it a bug that I could wear you?” I asked the inanimate garb.

When it didn’t respond, I decided I had to test. “Well, I’m not about to put on wet clothes,” I muttered. I remembered my quick-dry technique from the swamp and figured I would give it a go.

I hit a part of my shirt with a [Fire Strike]. It immediately dried out and also singed a bit in the shape of my fist.

I was growing even more confused. It didn’t do that last time. I pondered what was going on and then realized the difference. I was still wearing it last time. So if I put this back on…

I quickly threw the shirt on and shuddered a bit since it was still wet. Then I hit myself in the chest with a [Fire Strike]. Just like back in the swamp, both the shirt and I were completely fine, but it did dry out a bit.

“So, my [Fire Immunity] carries over to my equipment when I’m wearing it, but I can damage my equipment that isn’t worn?” I hypothesized. “Wait. No.” I murmured. “I think clothing doesn’t take any sort of damage when you’re wearing it. Otherwise, all of my gear would be full of bites from ants and wolves. Weird.”

My bathing session took longer than I or Costume Mercury anticipated, and they were already done meeting with Wilfred, the [Village Elder], by the time I got back.

I gave Ethan back his clothes, along with an explanation that I couldn’t equip them, and they immediately noticed the new singe marks on my shirt.

“Everything okay, Titus?” Samuel asked.

“Just some trouble with my dryer,” I joked. “Now that the village is saved, what is the grand party Doubloon Bury up to next?” I asked.

“We still had our sights on the dungeon-“ Richard started and then finally caught up to what I said. He gave me a flat look. “You’re messing up our party’s name on purpose, aren’t you? I thought it might have actually been an honest mistake in the tutorial, but it wasn’t. Was it?”

I shrugged. “Honestly, it’s kinda become a habit, and I can’t seem to stop.”

It’s a testament to how much Rich had grown that he didn’t immediately resort to violence like last time. “Listen,” he said. “I can handle you making fun of me, but when you mock our party’s name, you mock my friends and everything that we’ve built together. And I won’t stand for that. So, I’ll ask you politely. Please use our party’s name correctly.”

I gave a half-hearted shrug and an unconvincing, “I’ll try.”

Richard sighed. He knew as well as I did that my response wasn’t genuine. “Then there’s only one way that we can settle this,” Richard said as he pulled out his sword.

“Dude, no!” Samuel said.

Richard ignored them and said, “I challenge you to a duel! If I win, you have to stop messing up our party name!”

“You don’t have to accept it, Titus. He does this-“ Samuel tried to warn me.

I ignored the voice of reason and said, “Sure. But if I win…” Crud. What do I want if I win? I tried to make my pause seem like I was just being overly dramatic, but really I had no idea what I would ask him. Finally, I came up with a great idea. “You have to change your party name!”

Richard blanched slightly at that but recovered. “Very well. What should we use as our cutoff point? First to lose 50 HP?”

I didn’t notice the gleam in his eyes as he proposed that number. “Sure, 50 HP works for me.” Mistake number one.

The frustrated [Cleric] threw his hands up in the air and said in a flat voice, “Alright, you know the drill. Circle up.” I missed a vital clue there. Mistake number two.

We filled out the duel interface exactly as we said we would, and the duel started.

I assumed that with all the monster fighting that I had done, I would be more than able to dodge the sword swings of a single [Warrior].

For the first few swings, I was right.

I dodged to the left of an overhead swing, jumped back from a horizontal slash, and I thought I had it in the bag as soon as I could get an opening.

I was overconfident and treating the fight like I was fighting a monster. That was my third and final mistake.

The one thing that monsters don’t do? Feint.

I completely off-balanced myself dodging Richard’s fake attack, and he shouted the words to his skill as his sword slashed through me. “[Power Strike]!”

Game. Set. Match. His single attack did 67 damage to me, and I gasped in pain as the duel ended.

“Guys! I got an achievement!” Rich said.

Ethan immediately pulled out his quill and parchment. “What is it?!”

“I got [Duelist] and [First Duelist]! It must be for winning a certain number of duels!”

“How many perk points?” the [Wizard] demanded. “And how many duels have you had?”

“Uhh, it was one each,” Richard replied. “And… At least a few dozen. Maybe… 50?”

Ah. I finally recognized my hubris. I guess I shouldn’t have expected to win when he has that much more experience fighting actual people.

“That will have to do, for now, I guess,” Ethan mumbled and wrote. “What perk are you going to get?”

Richard was about to reply when he realized I was still standing there with a frown on my face and holding my stomach where he had slashed me. “Oh. Sorry, Titus. I got excited.” He extended a hand towards me. “Good game.”

I reluctantly took it. “Good game.”

They went back to discussing the perk options while I thought about what just happened. He tricked me, right? 50 HP as the cutoff because that’s just a single [Power Strike]. He also had reach on me, so that means it wasn’t fair. I thought about it a bit more. Or am I just thinking that because I lost? Yeah, he had reach on me, but if I had gotten in close, he would’ve been a goner.

I sighed. Oh well. It’s not like I lost much. I just can’t make fun of Vroom--- I felt a headache coming on. I waited a second, and it cleared up.

“There’s no way,” I muttered. I can’t make fun of Vroom— It flared back up. “No,” I whispered. “No!” I said out loud and drew looks from the arguing Doom Fury. I can’t even think it in the solace of my own mind! I won’t stand for this! So I invoked the ritual that every salty younger brother has when they got trounced by their older sibling at something.

“Best 2 out of 3!” I shouted.

Rich grinned. “Sure, but if I win the next one, you have to apologize for every time you’ve mangled our party’s name.”

I swallowed. That’s… A lot of apologies. I shook my head and grit my teeth. No. Focus, Titus. You can do this! Just make the duel settings better for you!

“You’re on,” I said. “If I win this one, the result of the first match is nullified. If you win, I have to apologize.”

“Agreed,” Rich replied. “Same settings as last time?” I snorted. “Yeah, I thought not. What’re you thinking?”

“100 HP,” I said. He raised an eyebrow. “You’re level 7, right? You should have at least that much to spare.”

“For this match, yeah. But you probably need some healing then.” He turned to Samuel. “You mind?”

“Wait, no!” I shouted.

It was too late. The magical energy of the spell was already headed my way. I watched my body absorb it.

“I hate this part,” I said.

I may have hammed it up by falling to the ground and writhing a bit, but, to be fair, it hurt a lot. Possibly even more than the [Power Strike] earlier, even though it did about half the damage.

After a quick explanation of [Healing Inversion] and a rest to get HP back, Richard and I were ready for round 2. The rest also gave me time to plan and think, so I made sure to add an additional clause to the restrictions.

“Wait, you want there to be the possibility of ring out?” Richard asked. “Why should we add that?”

“No reason,” I said innocently.

“Okay, I’ll bite just because I’m curious now.” He accepted the terms, which were first to lose 100 HP or to leave the ring made by the rest of his party (which was actually a square since there were only 4 of them) would be declared the loser.

We squared up, and the fight started.

I rushed him, and his eyes widened in surprise as he activated his [Power Strike]. I surprised him further when I didn’t even try to dodge.

I had realized another thing during our wait. I had been fighting as if I had to absolutely avoid his attacks. With how HP worked, that was simply not true.

I took the heavy blow and grunted, but I smiled. I got you now. I was in range.

My fist impacted with an [Air Strike], and 4 fingers also followed up with [Air Strike] flicks. If that type of punch was attempted in a world with real physics, I probably would have broken a finger or two.

Instead, 10 feet of knockback combined with the inertia of my punch practically sent Rich flying out of the arena.

The entire Vroom Bunny party stood in silence as I relished in the fact that I could make fun of them again.

Richard got up and stalked over to me.

Uh-oh. He might be mad.

“How,” he said.

Yup. He’s mad. I prepared for another fight or for him to yell about me cheating. I was not prepared for what he did next.

“How did you do that!?” he exclaimed. “That was awesome! That was just [Elemental Strike], right? Is [Martial Arts] secretly OP?”

I ended up having to explain to the party quite a bit about it. Yes, that was [Elemental Strike]. No, fists were probably not OP since that attack took me 15 SP to pull off (3 per strike), and it would be even more at lower levels.

I also tempered their mood, even more, when I reminded them that fist attacks only did 1 damage without [Martial Arts] and that they didn’t do that much more even when you had it. That, combined with the fact that his [Power Strike] was already doing more than 60 damage, meant that it wasn’t hard to convince Rich to stick with being an actual [Warrior].

As we waited for a bit of my HP to come back, Rich and I discussed how we would setup the next round. “So,” I said. “First round favored you. The second round favored me. How do we make the tie-breaker fair?”

He stroked his chin. “Well, for starters, no ring outs. Either that or no [Air Strike]. I’m leaning towards the second.”

“That should be fine,” I nodded.

He looked at me suspiciously. “There isn’t anything else with your skills that you’re hiding to get another free win, is there?”

I thought through [Elemental Strike]. I mean, I could slow him down or stagger him… “I guess it’s mostly the fact that flicking applies it that’s the problem point. We could just say no flicking and no [Air Strike] just to be fair?”

Rich nodded. “Okay, good with me. What concessions do you want from me? No [Power Strike]?”

He looked relieved when I shook my head. “No, I think just bumping up the damage to 100 HP was enough of a concession.” I had already formulated my plan for how I was going to deal that damage too.

My maniacal thought must have turned into an equally maniacal grin because Richard shuddered. “Is it too late to back out?” he asked. “We have a draw. We could just leave it.”

I shook my head. “Nope! Richard of …Badoom…. Terry.” I paused. “Okay, that one was just awful, and I apologize. It’s hard to keep coming up with names.”

“Oh, no worries,” Richard said. Then he realized what I was apologizing for and scowled at me. “Or you could just save yourself the trouble and use our actual name!”

I stuck out my tongue like a second-grader. “Nuhuh. Not unless you make me.”

He sighed. “I feel like I’m going to regret this, but okay. Duel 3 of 3. First to lose 100 HP loses. No use of [Elemental Strike] flicks or [Air Strike]. If I win, you have to stop making fun of our name. If you win, we have to change it.”

I nodded and filled out the interface mostly like he just said. Then we began.

Unlike our second duel, I didn’t rush him. That immediately made him wary.

“You know,” I said. “I’ve learned a lot about this world.” We started circling each other, and I continued. “A lot of things are simplified. How tired are you? Just check your SP. Injured? It doesn’t matter as long as you have HP left. Just take a nap, and you’ll be good to go.”

He continued eyeing me warily. “And where are you going with all of this?”

“Somewhere painful,” I said. “And I ask in advance that you forgive me.”

With that, I finally charged him. He landed his [Power Strike] on me, and I grunted once again. He tried to dodge out of the way of my punch, but I wasn’t trying to punch him. I managed to grab hold of him, and then when I did, I lashed out with my secret weapon.

A [Fire Strike] knee to the groin.

He immediately bent over out of reflex, even though I knew from experience that it didn’t deal any more damage or hurt any more to be hit there. My goal achieved, I reached up behind him and cast, “[Summon Dave]!”

I pushed the ball of slime into his back between the shoulder blades, and it obediently clung on.

I beat a hasty retreat while Richard recovered and fumed. He tried to dislodge the dave, but he couldn’t. Then he eyed me. “Guess I’ll just have to beat you first!” he yelled.

He struggled to move for a few more seconds and said, “Why can’t I-“

I was declared the winner of the duel, and I immediately ordered my dave to get off him.

He scowled. “Okay, I want an explanation. What the hail was that?”

“It turns out there are no critical hit points in this world, so hits to the groin aren’t actually cheap shots-“ I started explaining.

He cut me off. “Not that. I figured that out.” He gave me a disapproving headshake. “That was still a really dirty move, though. I meant the grapple thing. Why couldn’t I move?”

“Ohhh. That,” I chuckled. “Welcome to grappling, the buggiest place on earth-uhh. Placeholder. Anyway, that part’s pretty simple. When you’re grappled, you can’t move. You can still swing your arms around and stuff, but actually walking around is a no-no.”

He looked down at the dave that was sitting there obediently. “And these little guys are capable of grappling me even though they’re that much smaller?” I only nodded in response. “Lovely.” He turned to Ethan. “Make sure to note that. That little fact makes those guys way scarier to face.” Ethan hadn’t needed prompting and was already scribbling notes.

“Alright, I’m going to get my health back, and then we should head towards the dungeon,” Richard said.

“Isn’t it a bit late for that now, Rich?” Samuel asked.

The party and I looked up at the sky where the sun was a couple of hours from setting.

“Wow, the day kinda got away from me,” Rich said. “I guess Doom Fury marches on the dungeon tomorrow! Let’s all get some rest and head out first thing in the morning!”

“You mean, party-which-is-yet-to-be-renamed-by-Titus marches on the dungeon tomorrow,” I said with a grin.

Richard’s eyes widened. “Wait. That’s what you put on the duel? I thought we would get to rename it ourselves!” He sighed and looked defeated. “Alright. Do your worst.”

I thought about what I could do. All the many different ways that I could troll them. I also saw Richard looking almost completely brokenhearted, and my slightly sadistic thoughts vanished. I can’t make fun of them if I name them anyway, right?

“I have decided. Your new party name…” I said, and Richard tensed. “Will be Doom Fury.”

Richard blinked. “But we’re already Doom Fury. How can you rename us to what we already are?”

I shrugged. “I said I would get to choose your name, so the System should be okay with it.” Richard beamed and turned towards his party members. Jake’s excitement mirrored Rich’s, Ethan and Nick seemed indifferent, but Samuel was facepalming.

Oh. I guess they weren’t all in on the name. I also realized something else. “And uh.. For the dungeon run tomorrow, you guys want a 6th?” I asked. If I didn’t go with them to the dungeon, I would have nothing to do the next day.

“I mean, we’d love to have you, but what if Jake gets back before we’re done clearing it?” Richard asked. Jake perked up and was about to say something, but Rich cut him off. “Obviously not you. [Hero] Jake. Not [Sorcerer] Jake.”

“Hmm, you have a point,” I said.

“If only we had some means of instantly communicating with someone wherever they were!” Nick said while nudging Ethan.

“Oh, fine,” Ethan said. “We probably should also let him know that the threat has been dealt with.” He thought for a few seconds. “[Message] Jake. Attacking boss killed by Titus. Want to borrow him for dungeon. ETA?”

“How does that work, by the way?” I asked.

Ethan looked confused by my question. “It sends a message to the person I say on their screen.”

I groaned. “I understood that.” I pointed at the [Sorcerer]. “Why doesn’t your [Message] go to him instead? Both he and the [Hero] have the same name.”

“Hmm. Well, I think-“ Ethan paused for a second. “Got a response from Jake. Delayed in swamp by stranglevines. 2 days out. Stay safe. Good luck.” He looked at me. “You should be good to join us then.”

I nodded. This will technically be the third time clearing this dungeon. Then I remembered that Ethan still hadn’t answered my question, so I prodded him. “Oh, and what were you saying about [Message]?”

“Oh, right. I think that it uses who you’re thinking of at the time. So, I said Jake, and since I was thinking of the [Hero] one it sends to that Jake.”

“That’s a bit weird.”

“Yeah, but what else would it use?”

I shrugged. He had a point.

Richard replied, “I dunno. Couldn’t it just use last name?”

We all nodded in agreement, and then I realized something. Wait. What is my last name? And no one else has mentioned one either. I watched them all come to the same realization, and then they each grabbed their heads.

I sighed. Another patch. Here we go.

I felt the entire world slow down to a grinding halt. My body refused to move, and things slowed down so much that I could even watch my eyelids close when I blinked.

Even my thinking felt sluggish. Wow… this… is… a… big… one…

Then just like that, everything was back to normal. All five of them grabbed their heads and made various complaints about a sudden headache while I was just fine.

“What were we talking about?” Ethan asked.

Time to see what new changes I didn’t learn about due to [Memory Protection]! Oh, joy! I didn’t let my internal sarcasm leak out, though. “We were talking about [Message] and were wondering why it doesn’t use last name,” I said.

Ethan shook his head. “No, that can’t be right. [Message] does use last name!”

“It does?” I asked.

“Of course! I just showed you when I [Messaged] Jake. I had to [Message] Jake Smith to make sure it didn’t go to our [Sorcerer] over there.”

You definitely didn’t, but if I argue, it will be my word against 5 people who will all have had that memory retconned the same way. I sighed. “Ah, must have missed it. Also, how did you know that the [Hero’s] last name was Smith?”

Ethan grabbed his head. “Wow, another headache.”

Yes, Ethan. Stare directly at the retcon!

He winced a bit more but eventually just shook his head. “I don’t know, must have just heard it somewhere. Or maybe it was the prophecy that had it?”

Darn. I was hoping he would figure it out.

“By the way, Titus,” the [Wizard] said. “What is your last name? I don’t think you ever told us, and I’m just worried we might run into another Titus somewhere along the way.”

“Ah, yeah,” I said. Meanwhile, I was panicking internally. What was my last name? I had no idea! I finally remembered a place to check. Status.

It still only had “Titus” for my name.

Ah. [Memory Protection] strikes again. It couldn’t give me a last name, could it?

“Uhh, Titus?” Ethan asked.

I guess I tell them the truth. I thought. “My class is pretty buggy, and it’s made me lose a lot of my memories from Earth. Long story short, I don’t know what my last name is.” It tells you how much I had gotten used to lying and deceiving people that I basically considered that “telling the truth.”

“Oh, that’s rough,” he said. “Shouldn’t it be on your status?”

I shook my head. “First thing I checked. It just says, Titus.”

“Maybe you didn’t have one,” he muttered. “That was rare on Earth, but not completely unheard of.”

I just shrugged since I really didn’t want to get into it. “Maybe.”

After that, Richard decided to formally introduce the party again since I had “forgotten” their last names.

Their leader was Richard Williams, the [Warrior]. Their [Rogue] was Nick Barker. Their [Wizard], Ethan Chambers. Their [Cleric], Samuel Gray.

When he got to the [Sorcerer] he paused. “And… There’s Jake.”

Jake huffed. “If you won’t introduce me, I will introduce myself!” He gave a bow with a flourish. “I am Jake The Magnificent Master of Earth and Fire!”

I nodded. “Uhh. Nice to meet you. But what was your last name?”

Richard just sighed while Ethan replied for him. “That was his last name. He legally changed it when he got here.”

“Indeed, don’t you think that the name fits me much better than Patterson?” the [Sorcerer] excitedly asked.

“Uhh, yeah. It sure does suit you,” I replied. How did they manage to find someone even more chuuni[1]?

After that, we turned in for the night. However, Richard did make a quick stop to spend his perk points, and I ended up convincing him to get the [Enhanced Party] perk because it would let him see my resources when I joined his party for the dungeon run the next day.

My night was uneventful. I didn’t do much besides spawn more daves and wait for the morning to come.

Soon enough, the time came. I left the [Hero’s] party and officially, albeit temporarily, joined Subsume Degree. We headed off to the dungeon with the daves in tow, but Richard was worried about that.

“Shouldn’t we get to the dungeon as quickly as possible?” he asked. “We don’t want any random encounters on the way.”

I snorted. “The wolves here are friendly now, remember?” At their confused looks, I realized. “Oh. Right. You came in during the undead wave. Anyway, the [Hero] claimed the dungeon, and now the zone spawns noble wolves. They’re friendly.”

We heard some howls, and the rest of the party readied their weapons.

I chuckled. “Relax, you’ll see!”

The wolves burst into the clearing, and I was mostly right. They didn’t attack the rest of the party. However, they did immediately attack me.

I was so surprised that the first one got a clean bite on me. However, that was the last one. I started throwing fists and putting down the heroic doggos left and right.

Richard sprang into action too, “Help Titus! Ranged support!” He must not have remembered the [Enhanced Party] perk because he didn’t even need to do that. However, it was a good thing he did.

I immediately remembered something from the swamp dungeon. The System had tried to kick me from the faction for damaging friendlies. I yelled out, “No! Don’t help!”

That shocked them enough that they froze, and I had a chance to better explain.

I dodged a leaping wolf and killed another, and said, “If they’re friendly, the System might permanently change the hero faction to be your enemy or something! Don’t risk it! I can handle these small fry!”

A larger howl and an alpha wolf burst onto the scene.

They almost targeted that one, but I stopped them. “I got it!” I scooped up two daves and chucked them at it.

They both landed true, and in just a few seconds, the alpha was no more.

Soon enough, I had cleared all the enemies. I wasn’t the party lead, but I yelled out orders anyway. “Loot those bodies, everyone grab some daves, and we’re running the rest of the way!”

After a quick change in the daves’ orders to basically not attack anything, we sprinted off. We only had one more encounter on the way, and it was a noble bear. I managed to solve that one by chucking daves at it until it died, though I did lose a couple of daves to its powerful attacks.

Then we were finally in the dungeon.

“So, what can we expect?” Richard asked as we walked along with the daves hopping behind us.

“So, there are these stalactite enemy things. They function basically like traps, but they’re actually monsters,” I replied.

Rich nodded. “Yeah, we know about those. And then there are the spiders with the poison attack too.”

I also nodded. “Yup. You got it. That and they’re tough to see since they’re black and blend in with all the darkness. You’ll have to be on your toes.”

We made it to the intersection. I started heading left immediately, but they asked about the other paths. I gave them a quick overview that left was the way to the boss, straight went on for ages, and we never actually cleared all of it, and that right was an immediate dead end that had a high-level mimic the last time our party was here.

Speaking of the mimic’s level gave me an idea. “Hey,” I said. “Do you mind if we go check out the right branch first? I want to see something.”

Richard shook his head. “No, I think we really should conserve everything we can for the boss.”

“There might be loooooooot,” I said. I looked at the [Rogue] as I said that. “An actual treasure chest and everything.”

Nick looked imploringly at Richard, and he finally gave in. “Oh, fine. But if this takes too much out of us, we’re going to have to head back for the day.”

We came to the room, and we all immediately noticed the brightly colored spiders.

“Really hard to see, eh?” Nick asked.

“Oh, shut it,” I grumbled. “I fought them back when they were still dark spiders, okay? I didn’t realize they turned into hero faction colors too!”

“I fought the dark spiders before they were cool!” Nick said with a mocking voice. I glared at him, but he didn’t seem to care.

After that, we talked tactics. We quickly came to the same conclusion that our party had come to when they were clearing the dungeon for the second time. We stood at the cave entrance and had our two mages [Mage Bolt] all of the spiders.

Then, when it came to the stalacfights and stalagfights, I just soloed them since it was only 3SP per kill.

Then we saw the chest.

I was about to warn them when Ethan said, “Let me guess. That’s the mimic.”

I nodded. “Yup. Pretty high level. It leveled everyone up to 8.”

“Nice,” Richard said. “Let’s take it out from range then.”

I held up a hand. “Actually, I want to see if I could get the kill on it. I won’t be getting any boss XP, so I figured this could be my payment instead.”

Rich frowned. “Aren’t these things terrifying at close range? How are you going to do that?”

I grinned. “With minions, of course!” I grabbed a dave and then ordered it. “Go attack that mimic!”

The dave hopped forward obediently, and soon enough latched onto the chest-looking monster. Its giant maw opened up, its tongue shot out, and soon the dave was swallowed whole.

“Hm,” I said. “About what I expected. I’ll need to send a lot more.” I ordered the rest of the daves to attack as well.

They all hopped forward while Rich said, “I thought you were saving those to help with the boss?”

I shrugged. “At least some of them should survive. Also, I can just summon more if we need them.”

I watched the daves all glomp onto the mimic, and I was surprised. “Why isn’t it attacking any of them?”

“Maybe it’s still focused on the one it ate?” Ethan said.

“Shouldn’t that one be dead by now?” I muttered.

Soon enough, the daves defeated it, and my question was answered. The dave that had been swallowed flopped to the ground from the disappearing monster’s stomach.

I went over and picked it up. “You… Don’t take acid damage, do you? And the mimic was too dumb to let go.”

The ball of ooze didn’t reply, but Ethan did. “It would seem like it. Yeah.”

I shook my head in amazement. “Wow. These summons just keep punching above their weight.”

Ethan agreed. “They do seem pretty terrifying.”

When I was finished with my shock about my minions being incredibly OP, I realized that I hadn’t gained a level like I hoped to. Darn. [Heavily Decreased Class Experience Gain] is terrible.

After my internal complaining, I showed them where the chest was stored inside the illusion. We got close to the same loot as last time. We still got 2 mana potions, but we got a health potion instead of a bow and a stamina potion.

Honestly, if I had a good way to carry it, I would have taken one of the mana potions. That was an extra emergency dave. Instead, the mana potions were split between Jake and Ethan, and Samuel was given the health potion.

After that, we headed towards the boss and slowly cleared our way there. When we got there, I found a pleasant surprise.

“You guys are still alive?” I asked the daves that I had left in the boss room more than a month ago. I guess it makes sense. They didn’t exactly have anything that would come target them while they were in here.

I looked at the daves I had also brought in. “Yeah, this may be a bit overkill.”

After that, I explained each of the boss waves in detail and how we could cheese out rests with my [Fire Immunity].

The boss fight itself was almost boring for me, all things told. I had already done it twice, and the only thing that was different this time was that I didn’t have an OP [Hero] to [Sunder] the boss when it was vulnerable.

We planned around that by stationing daves in specific trees around the perimeter and then baiting the boss under them so that they could drop on top of it and add to our DPS.

Since the mages in the party still had pretty low max MP, we also had to do the cheesier version of the fight where we fought air, then took a break at fire, then did earth, then took a break again, and then finally prepared to do ice.

One interesting thing did happen during the breaks, though.

“Could you stop doing that?” Richard scowled at Jake.

“Doing what, oh glorious leader?” the [Sorcerer] asked.

“You know what you’re doing! Stop broadcasting your intent to fire every single spell as if everything revolved around you!”

“But my targeting is vital to this heroic endeavor! Surely it is of the utmost importance that everyone knows it!”

Richard looked like he was about to say something but thought better of it. I did see him trading whispers with the rest of the party, though.

I shrugged and ignored it. It really wasn’t my problem.

We readied up for ice, and it went about the same as the first three sections, though there were a lot more dave casualties.

The boss appeared, and Ethan shot it with [Ice Bolts] until it was vulnerable, and I had the daves attack until the boss’ health bar was at nothing.

I ordered the daves off and gestured to Richard. “Would you like to do the honors?”

He charged forward. “[Power Strike]!”

He cleaved through the boss. It gave one final howl and then vanished.

“Victory for Doom Fury!” Richard yelled and thrust his sword into the air. He then immediately overbalanced with his now level 10 body and fell on the ground. The rest of the party laughed at him, and he stewed for a few seconds before joining them.

We were getting ready to head out, and I decided I may as well just leave the daves there. Once Richard figured that out, he actually had a request for me. He wanted me to leave all the daves with orders to drop onto the boss and then go back up into the tree when they were done.

I guess they’re planning on farming[2] the boss for a bit? I shrugged and went along with it. No idea if the daves can handle an order that complex, but I guess they’ll find out the next time they fight.

We walked over to the obelisk, and I saw Richard share a nod with Ethan. Just like that I was kicked from the party.

I looked at them. “Hey, what gives?”

Meanwhile, Jake exploded. “You dare kick me, the master of earth and fire, from your party?”

Richard bowed towards us. “Thank you both for your assistance. I greatly appreciated your temporary assistance to our party on our quest.”

I finally realized what he was doing. Ohhhhh, he was mainly just wanting to kick Jake. Got it.

The [Sorcerer] in question was fuming, so I decided I may as well just play along.

“Why, of course, Richard. It was my pleasure to assist Room-“ he gave me a look, and I coughed. “It was my pleasure to assist Doom Fury with your quest.” I had to grit my teeth to actually say their party name, but I somehow managed it.

Richard nodded, but I continued. “However, would you be so kind as to kick us after we’ve teleported out of the dungeon? I’m worried that I could end up trapped in here again if you don’t.”

That made things really awkward as Richard had to invite us, teleport us out, and then kick us again. However, I didn’t stick around to see the aftermath.

Wolves howled, and I immediately booked it back to Faroff without waiting for the party I was no longer in anyway.

Could I have just fought the wolves? Of course! I had fought hundreds of them by that point. However, I was trying something new. It was called “thinking about the possible future consequences of my actions.” I don’t think it’ll ever catch on, though.

Anyway, I was worried about getting hit with some other random consequence for killing a lot of monsters from the hero faction, so I decided to just ignore them and book it to safety.

I ended up with 2 packs of wolves chasing me when I finally saw the glorious sight.

System: Zone entered, Faroff Village. Faction - Vir

I turned around and laughed. “Ha! In your face, monsters!”

And that’s how I learned the hard way that, in addition to the undead, the town obelisk doesn’t keep out allied monsters.

A wolf leaped through the invisible barrier and bit me in the face. I threw it off me and dashed away to quickly climb a tree.

I should be safe here until the [Hero] gets back. Right?

I watched the wolves circling me with a bit of trepidation.

---

Jake had been worried about Titus ever since he left the party. Never more so than when Ethan mentioned they were going to clear the dungeon.

He must have mentioned it one too many times because Garrett finally got exasperated with him.

“Look,” the [Berserker] said. “Titus is the best equipped for that boss of anyone here. He’s fine! And you haven’t gotten another [Message] from Doom Fury, so it’s not like he’s started any more trouble!”

“It’s just, Titus is like a magnet for trouble,” Jake replied. “And then if he doesn’t find any trouble to attract he just makes his own.”

“We’re almost there, then you’ll see that he’s fine,” Garrett said.

A huge crash echoed through the woods, and Jake immediately took off toward it. “10 gold says it’s Titus’ fault!” Jake called out.

He thought he heard a muttered, “No bet,” from the [Berserker] as the rest of the party took off after him.

When Jake finally arrived on the scene, he saw a screaming Titus running from hundreds of white-furred wolves.

As soon as Titus saw him, he started yelling, “Party invite! Party invite!”

Jake was confused but complied. He shot Titus a quick party invite and then prepared to face the absolute horde of monsters that were coming.

Titus accepted, and they all immediately stopped where they were.

Titus breathed a sigh of relief and then said, “Welcome back!”

---

I had waffled back and forth about whether I should start killing the wolves when the third pack joined the first two. However, I still wanted to not kill any of the hero faction monsters, so I held back.

By the time I decided I really should start killing them, it was too late. There were too many of them. I decided I was safer up in my tree, and I was. Until they brought a bear to knock it down.

Fortunately, at that point Jake showed up with the rest of the party, and I rejoined.

After that last bit of drama, we caught up on the events of the past few days, spent the night in Faroff, and then finally got ready to leave.

“You know, I’m almost going to miss this little town,” I said. “It has a lot of memories.”

I thought back over our adventures. Being attacked by wolves. Being threatened by party members. Being attacked by zombies. And, of course, almost dying each of those times.

“Nevermind. Screw this place,” I said as I flipped it the bird (which was also censored), and we started our trek north.

[1] Chuuni – Short for “chuunibyou,” it’s a Japanese term that literally means “Eigth-grade Syndrome” but it refers primarily to people with elaborate delusions of grandeur who believe that they have special powers

[2] Farming – In video games, this usually means “killing the same respawning enemy over and over again.” Usually it is done either to level up off the enemy, or because there is a rare reward from them that only is dropped some of the time.