The person outside the door knocks again. This time louder.

“Just wait a second”, I grumble, while walking over to the door.

I open the door and see that it's one of the servants. He is carrying a plate with a bowl and a spoon on it.

“Your breakfast, sir”, the servant said, while handing the plate, so I could take it.

I quickly take the plate from him.

“Thank you”, I say, while without further notice closing the door in his face.

"Bloody young people", I hear the servant mutter behind the door. While I wanted to say something to it, the taste of my breakfast quickly distracted me.

Breakfast for today was like the oatmeal I had at the Inn but better. It even had some fruit pieces that taste like apples. It was simply delicious.

I quickly ate the breakfast, enjoying every last bite of it. After scraping all the edges free of oatmeal traces, I silently sighed. It's not every day that you get this kind of food.

I stand up from the chair at the table and walk out the door to put the plate on the ground just outside, so a servant could pick it up later. While putting down the plate, I looked to my right and saw a familiar face.

“Thought you would be ´out´ a few more hours”, I said, with a grin.

Eros grinned back at that.

“Well, we do have an appointment today. It's time to begin questing again, and I wouldn't want to be late”, Eros said.

Oh yeah. We can begin questing again now.

“Let's get ready then”, I said as I walked in our room again.

We both changed into suitable attires and walked out of the room with all the essentials needed.

We get out of the mansion and begin steadily walking towards the adventuring guild.

“So, what kind of quest do you want to do?”, I ask Eros.

He was the quest expert among us, after all.

Eros puts on a thinking face, for a few seconds.

“Well, we could try out the advanced extermination quests. We do have the minimum requirements for it”, Eros said.

Advanced extermination?

“What do you mean advanced? Is it, like more powerful creatures we have to kill?”, I asked him.

“No and yes. While most creatures you kill for the advanced extermination quest are more powerful than the simple extermination quest, it is not a prerequisite for it. Most of the times, it's the environment around the creatures that make the difference in labeling the quests”, Eros explained.

Environment? Do we not have the same environment in the last city? Maybe it's due to the hills?

“What makes this environment special? Didn't we have the same environment in the other city?”, I ask.

“Oh, I think you misunderstood. I am talking about the dungeon this city has. I take it that, you didn't know that”, Eros said.

How could I possibly know that this city had a dungeon? I don't even know what a dungeon is. Is it a hive-mind? Is it a rift in space? I don't have any freaking clue!

“No, I didn't know that this city had a dungeon. Could you explain what a dungeon is exactly?”, I asked, in a calm voice.

Eros just stared at me, before beginning to slightly chuckle.

“Glautru really talked the truth when he told me about you. You know almost nothing about the world outside the farm”, Eros said with a smile.

Seems that the Innkeeper and Glautru still were close friends before we left.

“Yeah, life on the farm was boring. You didn't really get told what was going on in the world. So, about that explanation about dungeons?”, I said, trying to switch to talking about the dungeon.

“Sure, sure. Let's start with how a dungeon is created. It starts with a cluster of mana growing for a very long time. I think that the mana clusters for the stronger dungeons have been growing for millennia, but I'm not sure. When the mana cluster stops growing, it begins to attract monsters with the same levels of mana as it. When that monster comes near the cluster, it gets sucked in and becomes the dungeon boss. The cluster of mana also becomes something called a dungeon core. These cores have been reported to have sapience, but that hasn't been proven yet. Anyway, back to the dungeon itself. The dungeon core needs mana to stay alive. It can get it from absorbing anymore, so it has to make creatures die within its vicinity. To get people to come to it, it shows promise of riches to those that survive. From it, the dungeon core gets the energy to survive, and the people that aren't killed gets some of those promised riches. Was that enough to satisfy your curiosity?”, Eros explained, with a smirk at the end.

So that's how the dungeons work here. I wonder if they actually are sapient.

“Yeah, it was enough. Seems like we are here”, I said, as I looked forward again.

We had arrived at the adventuring guild.

“Ready to head in?”, Eros asked.

“Of course, I am”

When we headed inside the guild, we luckily didn't have to stay on the first floor. It was more crowded than yesterday, and I was amazed that we even got to the stairs.

The second floor was much less crowded. Even if there were many people, it wouldn't be much of a problem, as everything was nicely spaced out.

“Let's get ourselves a quest”, I quietly mumbled to myself.

Eros and I began to look around the dungeon related quests. While we wanted to do the extermination quest, it would be a good idea to at least look a little around.

There were three kinds of quests that were prominent in the dungeon. Gathering pieces of certain mobs, escorting a new group of adventures, and the advanced extermination quests. The gathering and escort quests were immediately sorted out of the way. We didn't want to spend hours cutting pieces of monster, and we were not sure if we even qualified for the other.

Extermination quest, it is.

Or to be more specific the culling quest.

All Adventurers unite!

The quantity of monsters on the first floor has reached a new high!

We need to cull these pests before they flood the streets, or many citizens will die.

The aforementioned pests are Lesser Owlbears, Barrow Rats, and Lesser Wolf Spiders.

Requirements:

Must be in a group with two, or more people.

Must be a/with seasoned adventurers.

Rewards:

50 copper for each confirmed mob kill.

35 silvers for each confirmed boss kill.

BE WARNED!

The current boss is a Trollhound.

(For more information, please ask one of the employees manning the counter)

I read it through a couple of times before deciding that this one was for us.

“Should we take it?”, Eros asked, looking over at me. He had been looking through the quest detailing the lower floors.

“Depends. Did you find anything interesting?”, I ask him.

He sighed.

“Nothing that we can take. While we have the power for it, our group has not existed for long enough. We´ll have to stay with some of the easier quests for now”, he said.

“Well, at least with this one, we will have to fight a lot of mobs at the same time”, I said while pointing to the quest I had been reading.

Eros looks over it, and a moment later his eyes begin to slightly glow. Literally.

“Looks perfect. Let's get it”, Eros said.

We note down the quest number and go to the counter.

The last person walks away, just as we near it.

“Hello, how may I help you today?”, the employee asked, in a business voice.

“Hello, we would like to accept this quest”, I said, while handing him the note with the quest number.

“Certainly. If you would just wait a minute”

The employee then proceeds to type the number in.

“Could I have your group identification-card?”

I take the card out of my bag and give it to him.

He scans it, and, after a few, there's a *Ding* indicating a success.

“You have accepted the quest. You have one week until you have to complete, but you can, of course, complete it sooner. Have a great day!”, the employee said before beginning to attend the next in line.

We go out of the line, and sit down on at one of the tables.

“Before we go to this dungeon, do you have any tips for me about the monsters?”, I asked Eros.

I had not heard about those creatures before, and some of them I didn't really understand. Especially that Wolf Spider. Does it have the body of a spider, but a head of a wolf? Maybe it's the opposite. That's some nightmare material, right there.

“Sure. Do you know of any of the creatures, or do I have to explain all of them”, Eros asked, looking like he already knew the answer.

“All of them”, I answered bluntly.

“Okay, let's get this over with. I really need some combat, or I am going to go insane from boredom. Lesser Owlbears are a little smaller than normal bears, but don't let that think they are easy targets. The normal fur on a bear has been replaced with strong feathers that protect it from blunt attacks. It also has the head of an owl, so that looks a little freaky. Barrow Rats are simply oversized rats. While they normally only prey on small animals or already dead prey, in the dungeon, they try to swarm you. If you don't get them off you before they bite, you have to go to a healer to get fixed. Those rats have so much sickness that it's a miracle they even survive. Lesser Wolf Spiders are, for some people, very hard to kill. The lesser Wolf spider grows up to your knees. It has the body of a spider, but with the general shape of a wolf head. Though the wolf head has multiple eyes, and its fangs are replaced with a set of spider-like mandibles. I haven't heard about a Trollhound before, but if I had to guess, it's probably an oversized feral hound with thick skin. Not sure though. It's also very likely that-”

I stopped listening after hearing the height of the Lesser Spider wolf. I was very glad that I didn't have Arachnophobia. If this is the first floor of the dungeon, how do new adventures even survive? Oh, wait. I'm an idiot. They don't go into the dungeon on their first day. They go out questing with experienced adventures as I did. Or maybe they-

“Are you even listening?”, Eros asked, slightly annoyed.

“What? Did you say something?”, I asked, stepping out of my daze.

“I was saying… you know what? Nevermind. Let's just go”, Eros said, clearly irritated by my lack of attention.

He stood up and began walking away.

I quickly followed the agitated moon elf.

Time for the dungeon! I wonder how it's going to be.