When they entered the building Dean looked around. The bottom floor was open and the only things in the whole place were a set of stairs leading to a second floor office and a door under the overhang. “This is perfect to practice in.” Says Dean.

Nadira nods as she walks over to the stairs to take a seat. “I know. Hurry up though, I need to kill something.” Her tone is grumpy but Dean doesn’t take it seriously. He knows that the stress has been getting to her since Sandy disappeared. If he was completely honest with himself he was pretty worried too.

Putting his mind to the task, Dean focuses inside himself. His mana pool is easy to find. It’s something he has been able to feel out from early on after his initiation to the system. This isn’t what he is looking for this time though. The last year of practice has made the process of finding his essence pool much easier though. Dean still finds it more difficult to pin down than his mana pool though, as if his own life essence is interfering.

Still, he has already done this on multiple occasions and Dean is soon drawing his stored essence through his body and to his extended right hand. Before he lets it out of his body though, Dean focuses on the intent behind what he wants to happen. Everything he has done in the past to create a new spell like he is doing now felt like it consisted of two parts. One was the science, the theoretical possibility of what manipulating different types of energy could do.

Mana was an odd energy he learned. It was transformative, changing into different types of energy based on the second portion of what was used to cast magic. Intent. This intent, as far as Dean could determine, was what caused the mana to take on the form he wanted it to. Maybe there was another energy that his mind used to influence the mana and life essence stored within his pools, but Dean had never been able to detect it on his own.

Now, Dean pushed his intent into the essence flowing to his hand, concentrating on what he wanted it to do, along with the reasoning as to why it was possible. In this case, he focused on war and conflict. He wanted the essence that was once a living being's life force to attack and fight any foreign life force. Essentially the idea was for it to cancel out life force when it came into contact with a target and possibly subvert some of it to so the same.

Bodies were funny in some ways. Dean was counting on this in a hopeful side effect. When tissue died and began to decay it usually started a chain reaction. Once his spell killed the immediate life force in the impacted area and the necrotic reaction began, Dean was counting on it continuing and giving the target a debuff. If everything he was attempting to accomplish came to fruition then this spell would cause a debuff that continued to leech HP from the target even after the initial essence used in it ran out.

That was the goal at least.

Purple energy starts to flow out of his hand and clump together. At first it just forms an uneven blob of life energy. Slowly, with an ample application of will, it resolves into an egg shape. The longer he concentrates the more pointed the smaller end becomes. Almost there and the shape gets a wobble to it. Purple energy destabilizes further and goes back to an amorphous blob that only shifts and distorts the harder Dean concentrates on it.

Finally, the energy gets too far out of control and pops like a balloon. Purple, violent feeling energy bursts from the failed spell and hangs in the air. Before it burst, Dean felt that he had completely lost control and abandoned his attempt to recover. Jumping back, he was lucky enough to clear the area before the purple energy came forth. Even then he had to stumble back a few steps to escape the area of effect. He could feel it in the air. Even though the mana came from him, it was still a danger.

Seeing the result of his failed spell Dean had another idea for a new attack, this one an area spell. He was determined to get the hang of what he was trying to do in the first place though. The feel he got from the released energy was promising for what he was trying to do, but it only drove home how dangerous it could be to experiment like he was.

Determined to get this right, Dean continued his trial and error. Test after test ended with Dean running away from his own spell as it destabilized and failed, releasing the violent, intent augmented life essence to run rampant. It only took the energy a minute or two to dissipate, but Dean was getting low on EP to experiment with. Then it happened.

Death Magic is now lvl 48. +48 EXP.

On the next attempt Dean was able to form the essence into the shape of a cone. Holding it there for a moment as his concentration was taxed, he desperately pushed with his will and the magic cone shot forward. Dean was concentrating so much on just forming the magic that he didn’t even think to aim. It showed too, and the purple cone immediately dipped into the ground before bursting.

Learned Skill: Necrotic Bolt lvl 1. +1 EXP.

“Yeah” Dean shouts as he hops in the air. He couldn’t help but think that it was about time. Good thing too, as his supply of EP was almost gone.

“I take it you finally got what you wanted.” Nadira says. She had risen from her perch on the steps to walk over. She looks at the small cloud of purple smoke that is rising from the spot the bolt hit on the floor and wrinkles her nose. “What is that supposed to do?” With a mental command Dean sends her the description he has for the new skill.

Necrotic Bolt: Fire a bolt of negatively charged essence that attacks the life force of the target. The nature of the damage causes the necrosis debuff.

Rarity: Uncommon.

There is a pause as Nadira is reading the notification he shared. The brief pause is over when she takes a quick step back and away from the purple smoke that is almost gone at this point. Dean watches this with a smirk. After her blasé assessment of the new spell he created, Dean felt vindicated by her reaction.

“Okay, that could be useful.” Says Nadira begrudgingly. “So are you ready to go? If anyone is here then they are already inside.”

Checking his EP, Dean finds it down to only five. At least he got what he was working for. Now he had to refill his EP, and the only way to do that is to kill some stuff. “Ready when you are.” He responds.

Nadira heads toward the door under the stairs and opens it. There is a stairwell there that leads down. It’s dark and Dean quickly casts Spark. A candle sized flame pope into existence above his hand and then floats in front of them to illuminate the stairwell. Concrete steps led down into the underbelly of the building as they descended.

At the bottom was a basement only about half the size of the main floor. The whole thing was empty save for a single eye catching feature. In the center of the concrete room was a floating circle of energy. All the colors of the rainbow seemed to be contained within this portal, for Dean knew that is exactly what it was. The shifting colors formed a circle about ten feet in diameter.

The otherworldly doorway didn’t seem to phase Nadira, which made sense as she had traversed it before. For Dean it was another story. The mana from it felt odd, almost ominous, but in a cold uncaring way. Like looking into the eyes of a tiger when there was nothing you could do to stop it from devouring you. There was no malice in the way it felt, just the cold logic of inevitable danger. The need to feed.

Standing only a step away, Dean could sense hunger coming off the entrance like waves. It made him wonder if these rips in space and time were somehow alive. Maybe not in the sense of an organic being like him or Nadira, but in some fundamental way that an intelligence, even a basic one, was in control of the space they would be entering.

Dean’s musings are cut short a moment later as his cat-like companion steps through without another word. With no other choice than to abandon her to her fate within such a beast, he follows her lead. The transition is disconcerting as up became down, left became up. Feelings of falling and jumping all mixed in a crazy singular sensation that caused his stomach to turn.

Seconds felt like years and then suddenly it was no time at all as Dean emerged on the other side of the portal. His gorge lurching, Dean desperately focused on keeping his belly from revolting. During this harrowing time for his dignity he paid no attention to his surroundings. If he had, he surely would have noticed the smug look from Nadira as she stood there watching his distress.

By the time he had regained control of himself she had already schooled her features and began studying the area they arrived in. Dean was no fool though. After all the information she had given him about the dungeon and what to expect, she made no mention of the effects the transition would cause. He could only conclude that it was intentional for her enjoyment.

In the end there was nothing for it though. Dean just pretended not to know and looked around himself. They were in some sort of building. It wasn’t the same kind they had left though. Where they came from the building was made of solid concrete, maybe reinforced with rebar. But where they were now was a building constructed of rocks held together by hardened clay.

Another oddity was that they were no longer underground. The small room they were in along with the portal they entered from had a couple windows and a soft orange light was filtering through them. Dean didn’t really know what to expect when he entered the dungeon, but he was imagining a dark cave or something, not a primitive house as it looked like they arrived in.

Nadira doesn’t wait around as Dean gawked at what is essentially a whole other world. Walking over to one side of the room she steps through a doorway with no door. Rushing after her Dean starts asking questions. “Why is this place called Galgorath? It looks like an abandoned medieval town.”

Outside, Nadira takes a look around before going left down a wide street and answering. “As far as anyone can tell that is exactly what it is. Though it’s likely not from Earth. And it’s called Galgorath because there are signs near the gate through the city wall. By the way, don’t go through the gates or try to climb over the wall around this place, weird things happen if you do.”

Dean almost completely stopped listening to what she was saying after she mentioned it not being from Earth. That comment has Dean’s eyes bulging, and when she finishes speaking he can’t help but blurt out his next question. “Are you talking about aliens here? This could be the town of some long dead alien race?”

Nadira shrugs as she makes a right down another street. They have passed a few more buildings just like the one they first emerged from, though they all looked a lot worse off, as most of the roofs were caved in. Stopping in front of a mostly intact building that might have been a house at one point she turns back to Dean again.

“No one knows. This whole place could be a fragment of another world in a different dimension for all anyone knows. Since there is no one here to ask, any theory has so far gone unproven. Hell, it could even be the original home for one of the races currently living on our Earth and the inhabitants fled from here to avoid what made it a dungeon in the first place.”

Standing beside her, Dean starts to imagine all sorts of wild things. Maybe grays are real and they came through here before building spaceships in hiding. That and many others ran through his mind before it all came to a halt. He heard something inside the building. All his daydreaming ends at the reminder that this is not an empty place, that there are things here designed to kill the unwary.

Looking over to Nadira earns him a raised eyebrow and a shooing motion toward the building. Slowly, Dean approaches the empty doorway. As he gets closer to the building, the sound, which sounded like a bunch of wet plops, stops. poking his head into the small building allows him to find the source of the sound. A light blue slime is in the middle of the room. At first it isn’t moving other than some minor jiggling.

The dungeon monster doesn't stay passive for long though. As Dean watches it starts to shake more violently. From within the small beach ball sized slime comes a fast moving projectile headed straight for Dean’s exposed face. If he hadn’t been on alert for such a thing it would have hit him too. Quickly pulling back his head he is just in time, a gust of wind on his face testament to how close the attack came.

“Ice slime.” Nadira’s voice comes from right next to his ear and makes Dean jump. Other than his lungs being in his throat, Dean’s heart is trying to beat out of his chest. Looking back to his friend with a glare, she seems utterly unfazed by his ire. That only makes it worse and her pretty face and cute cat ears do nothing to assuage his anger. He is about to yell at her for sneaking up on him when she speaks up again.

“I got your back. Now go kill that one, it should be easy for you.”

Taking a second to let go of the anger, Dean realized that she was just trying to protect him while he was focused inside the building. She could have let him know she was there though, he thought with his anger flickering once more before dying. Focusing on the task at hand, Dean charges a spell.

Mana flows and changes to electricity as he prepares to counter attack. It didn’t take long for the slime to fire its attack so he wanted to be prepared before he stuck his neck out again. His Arc spell was ready for release and he stepped into the house pushing his arm toward the bouncy monster. before it could attack again, blue-white lightning flies from his fingertips.

In a flash the strike is over and the slime ceases its jiggling. The slime is completely still for a moment and Dean can see little discharges of his power flow through the gelatinous body before it just melts into a puddle on the dirt floor. Lowering the hand, Dean finally gets a good look at the room. It looks like a small living room with a kitchen to the right and a hall across from the front door.

Nadira comes in a moment later. “Good job with that one,” She says. “Go collect the core and then help me harvest the quest items in here.” And she was right. As Dean took a closer look around the otherwise empty room he could see some sort of moss growing in a corner. In a different corner where the light probably never reached was a patch of mushroom caps.

Still a little mad at her earlier antics, Dean just decides to get to work. In the middle of the light blue puddle of goo that once was an ice slime is a golf ball size gem. it was perfectly round and translucent blue, the same color as the slime itself. Figuring that was the slime core Nadira was talking about, Dean placed it in his bag. Then he moves on to the rest of the room. There wasn’t anything special about harvesting moss and mushrooms. Dean just went around stuffing them in his bag.

When they were done in the living room area they moved down the hall. The smaller rooms were obviously supposed to be bedrooms, but any furniture in them had long ago turned to dust. They only found one more patch of moss and a couple mushroom caps in the rest of the building. There were no more slimes either.

By the time they were done in the building Dean was no longer angry with Nadira. Before they left Dean tested his Death Magic on the slime puddle. He was surprised when it actually worked and essence was pulled from the dead monster to fill his pool. It wasn’t a lot of EP, but it would add up eventually.

Continuing through the city and investigating the more intact buildings allowed Dean to kill and drain the essence from even more slimes until he was topped off. He killed more ice slimes as well as red fire slimes and a few green colored poison slimes. Each core was collected and any resources they found in the buildings were stored away.

As they traveled deeper into the city Dean noticed that the sun was a much redder color than he was used to. At first, when they entered the dungeon he just thought it was early or late in the day here, but in actuality it was the sun itself that was so red. It made him think that maybe this world’s sun had changed into a red giant. If that was the case then it was likely the society that had built this city had always lived under a red sun.

His musings took a different turn as he blasted more slimes and traversed the city. Nadira was definitely leading him toward the center of the city. Likely that was where the boss monster of this dungeon was located. Deciding to break the long silence between them, he just asked. “Where are we going?”

Nadira glances at him and then lets out a big sigh. “Sorry to be such a buzzkill. I’m just really worried about Sandy. She has been there for me the whole year you were gone, and now I feel lost.”

Dean places a hand on her shoulder as they walk, just trying to offer her whatever comfort he can before answering. “I’m worried too, but we are doing everything we can. It doesn’t seem like The Lost Sheep are here, so the best thing we can do is move forward and get as much from this experience as we can so we’re prepared when we do find her.”

A small smile graces her features for a second before it’s overcome by something else. Determination suffuses her whole demeanor and she straightens up. No longer does she look like she is just trudging along through the street. She struts alongside Dean as though she was the queen of this place and ready to take on all challengers. “Your right Dean. Let's finish this place off and get our friend back.”

“And where are we headed?” Dean reminds her of his question.

Lips shifting to a sheepish smile she gives him his answer. “Right, sorry. I was wallowing a little wasn’t I?” Without waiting for an answer she moves on.” This place is a big city, but there is a temple or something close to the middle. It’s the biggest building around and that is where the exit portal is. Of course it’s guarded by the strongest monster in the whole dungeon.”

“What is it?” Dean asks.

Palms up and shrugging her shoulders let’s Dean know she is unsure. “It changes,” she says. “It’s always a colossal slime, but the type changes. We won’t know until we get there.”

With new confidence in her stride, the sexy cat-woman leads him onward. A few more stops get them all they need for the guild post they picked up. Soon after their conversation Dean can see a steeple poking out above the tops of the buildings, and he knew they were close to the end. One more major fight and they would be back to the real world, back to their quest of finding Sandy.