Sam: Hey guys, you got a minute?

Annie: Of course Sam.

Jack: What’s on your mind, son?

Sam: I just realized we never got the chance to have that talk we were gonna have. Back before all this, y’know?

Annie: Oh stars, you’re right. Are you alright Sam?

Jack: Pressure getting to you, boy? It’s understandable. We can meet you wherever you want.

Sam stared at the chat messages projected into his mind, then heaved a sigh. It would have been easier if it had been just the pressure. Back before all this started, he’d been planning on sitting down with Ma and Pop and getting some much-needed advice on how to deal with the death of Rakun, killed in front of him by Lich King Araxesendenak. But now… It was a different talk he needed to have.

Sam: No Pop, it’s not about that. It’s about…

He stopped. Then he cursed himself. He’d gone toe to toe with a revenant that had almost ripped his soul from his body, and he’d felt less fear in that instance than he did right now.

Sam: It’s about Cora. And the room. And…

Jack: And what we knew.

Annie: Oh damn, I didn’t even think of that.

Sam: Yeah. And I think I need to know about it. All of it.

Jack: I think you’re right.

Sam: Not over chat though. I… I need to see you guys, y’know?

Annie: Of course. And not in the dungeon either. This should be just between us.

Sam: Yeah. How about home?

Jack: Is it still standing?

Annie: Oh lord the mess those undead bastards must have made…

Sam: It is. I checked.

Jack: Twenty minutes? That’ll give your mother and I time to disengage from our tour guide.

Annie: Rashun is the sweetest little thing. And so earnest!

Sam: Twenty minutes works. And… Maybe bring Buggs too?

Jack: Bugruk doesn’t know.

Sam: What? But—

Annie: He knows that we were looking for something, Sammie. But not the details. Only my Jack and I know.

Jack: And… Well. I was about to say that’s how it needed to stay. But after this last week…

Sam: Yeah. This last week.

Annie: We’ll see you at home in twenty minutes, Sam.

Sam: Thanks guys. I’ll see you there.

* * *

The stench of roasting flesh and oily blood roiled in the air as Sam walked through the side-streets of Melloram. The undead corpses that had fallen within the town during the battle against Rakun the revenant were still in the process of being cleaned up. Which, in this case, meant heaping the corpses in piles every thirty feet or so and putting the torch to them. Sam had set a dozen of his workers to the task, not wanting to burden the residents of the town further.

And also because many of the corpses now staining the sky with foul smoke may have once been loved ones.

The battle against Rakun had started in the valley outside the dungeon complex Sam and the others had carved out of the heart of God’s Thumb, the towering peak that overshadowed the little town. Most of the ReTurned had been slain there, but there had been a fair clump of them struck down within the town proper, and Sam did not want to leave it to chance. Melloram had suffered enough.

A pang of guilt washed through him, along with treacherous thoughts. If only he’d come sooner, if only he’d been faster… He’d been inside the mountain almost a week, while an undead horror held the town in its grip. He could have gotten out sooner—

“And gotten my dumb ass killed,” he muttered to himself, smirking softly. “So stop trying to make it your fault, dummy.”

The voices retreated, quieted for now until the next time they decided to surge forward again. It was becoming a familiar battle, and would probably remain one for some time to come.

He turned left at the intersection and paused as his destination came into view amid the squat stone buildings that made up the bulk of Melloram’s architecture. There were few bodies on this street, the bulk of the fighting having been on the main roads and the side streets to the east and north. It was a residential neighborhood, and a richer one at that, with the houses going up two stories and sporting decorative scrollwork on the windows and doors.

His family’s house was the third one down on the left.

Melancholia mixed with surreality as he stepped across the threshold into what had been the home he and his family had first rented almost a month ago. Now it was a gutted shell of a building; the furniture had been overturned and ripped apart by undead claws, the glazed window glass had all been smashed out, and the kitchen had been set on fire at some point.

The kitchen table, by some miracle, was still whole and in the exact same place Sam had seen it last. Even the tablecloth was still there, barely rumpled, with a small smudge of grease still on it from the dungeon core he’d been dismantling that morning.

“I’ll be damned,” he said, laughing softly as he ran his hand over the silken fabric. “Even undead horrors are afraid of messing up Ma’s good tablecloth.”

He moved through the house slowly, checking into the bedrooms and the indoor bath. Everything was smashed or ripped up, and the pantry had been set alight. But the building was sturdy brick-and-stone construction, and hadn’t gone up in flame. The scorch marks on the walls told about how the fire had lost that particular battle.

His room had been on the second floor, and strangely enough was almost as untouched as his ma’s tablecloth. His old bed was shoved into a corner, and his writing desk had a leg snapped off, but other than that it was just the way he had left it.

Including the chest in the corner, which contained his old toolkit, and the decommissioned opal core he’d been working on. He moved over to the chest and opened it, and sure enough everything was right where he had left it. The pale blue opal gemstone seemed to glow slightly in the dim light.

He opened up his menu system as he bent down to pick up the core. It appeared, projected onto the lenses of the glasses he wore, as a pale blue pane with white text and bronze edging. His quick-slots were arranged on the left side, half-full of powers and abilities that had seen heavy use during the battle. His health and mana bars were at the top right, just below the readout that told him how many supplies and resources his dungeon currently possessed.

The core and his toolkit went into his inventory, the extra-dimensional space granted to him by the glasses and the spells he’d baked into them what felt like a lifetime ago. Half of the reason he’d come back to the house was to retrieve his belongings, to see if maybe he could do something with the decommissioned core that would make it valuable to him and the dungeon in the coming days.

The other half of the reason he’d come here came a moment later, accompanied by the sound of a slamming door and familiar voices.

“Sam?” Pop’s deep baritone echoed weirdly through the empty house. “You here?”

“He’s probably upstairs,” Ma’s voice came a moment later.

“Coming,” he hollered down to his parents, shutting the chest… Then blinking and rolling his eyes before pulling the whole thing into his inventory. He still wasn’t used to thinking about the fact that he had access to near-infinite interdimensional space. Then he gave his old bedroom one last glance before heading downstairs.

His parents stood in the middle of the blasted kitchen, peering grimly around. This was their first time back in the house since… Well, since the earthquake, their death, and their resurrection thanks to Cora.

“Just look at this place,” said Annie Tolliver, Sam’s ma. “Disgraceful. Those undead fuckers had no decorum whatsoever. All my good china is shattered!”

“Undead always did have a tendency towards random destruction when left to their own devices,” Jackson Tolliver replied to his wife. “Little surprised they left anything standing.”

“I figure they got wind of who’s house this was,” Sam said with a wry grin, debarking from the stairs. “Not even undead want to risk getting Ma riled at them.”

“Then they should have left my good china alone,” Ma said with a scowl.

For a brief second Sam was tempted to close his eyes and just drink in their voices. It had been a week and a day since Cora’s awakening had triggered an earthquake that had killed Sam, his parents, and every single one of Tolliver’s Dungeoneers, the dungeon building company his father owned. It had been a week since he’d been brought back by Cora and made her Guardian, tasked to protect her and build a dungeon.

And only a day since he’d accumulated enough Essence and raw materials to recover his parents from Cora’s spawn lists. The warmth of their presence had not yet faded from his soul.

But no, much as he might like to pretend he was back home and nothing had changed, the truth of the matter was almost completely the opposite.

“So we need to talk,” he said, opening his eyes.

You might have thought he’d cursed in church the way the silence fell in the room. His parents both turned to look at him, their expressions schooled into varying degrees of seriousness.

“Yeah,” Pop rumbled, “I reckon we do.”

“That’s what we’re here for, after all,” Ma said, moving to lean against what had once been a stove and was now a ruined metal husk.

Sam took in a deep breath and let it out slowly. “You guys knew about Cora.”

“Not about her specifically,” Pop said, hitching around to sit on the corner of the kitchen table.

“Off,” Ma said, glaring at him.

“Dearest, it’s in shambles,” Pop said, glancing over at her. “Does it really matter?”

Ma said nothing, just raised an eyebrow.

“Right.” Pop chuckled and slid back to his feet. “Stupid question.”

“We knew something was there,” Ma said, nodding. “Well. More than something. Jack?”

Sam’s pop nodded at his wife’s urging and reached into the inside pocket of his heavy leather vest, and withdrew a small object. It was flat and circular and black as pitch, and it sparkled in the light.

“I feel like I should know what that is,” Sam said, narrowing his eyes.

“It’s a message stone,” Pop said, rolling the little disc between his fingers. “It’s ancient magic, something that predates mana as we know it. Only a few have been found, and those in the hearts of volcanoes or deep in the deepest dungeons. Usually they’re just blank, or have thousands of years of natural noises recorded on them.”

“Oh yeah,” Sam snapped his fingers. “Bankroft wrote a paper on them, before he went nuts. Claimed they were proof of ancient civilizations. But he never proved it because they never contained anything of substance on them.”

“Right,” Pop set the shimmering disc onto the table. “Well. Almost right.”

He stroked the top of the disc in a peculiar way, and suddenly the room was filled with sound. It seemed to just appear in Sam’s ears, as though projected straight from the little disc into his brain. At first there was nothing but a rushing noise, as if it had recorded the noise of a high wind. Then, without any fanfare, it suddenly resolved into words.

“They will claim the wandering dungeon is a fake, that it is only legend. But I have seen it, and spoken with its master.”

Sam blinked, then stared at the little disc as it continued on.

“It cannot be found except by one who already knows where it is, and none exist anymore who still remember it. Save, perhaps, one. In speaking with the master, he let slip the existence of a core unlike anything the world has ever seen. And spoke of it as if it had once been a friend, or perhaps an ancient enemy. With that one, it is hard to tell.”

Pop came forward and picked up the disc, and the sound immediately cut off.

“It goes on from there to describe Cora’s mind chamber, and how it formed,” he rumbled, closing his fist around the little enchantment. “And while it doesn’t go into detail, it told us enough for us to think that she… Could lead us to the dungeon.”

“Marie,” Sam breathed, closing his eyes. “You were searching for a way to find Marie.”

“Or the son of a bitch that took her from us,” Ma said, nodding slowly. “If she was alive, we could bring her back. If she was dead…”

“We could avenge her,” Pop finished, rubbing a knuckle into his eyepatch. “We assumed it would most likely be the latter.”

“And Buggs didn’t know?”

“Not the specifics,” Ma said, coming to stand beside Pop and laying a hand on his shoulder. “But he knew we were looking for something. And when Araxesendenak sent us the plans for his dungeon…”

“That’s why you took the lich’s job,” Sam blurted, that particular piece suddenly clicking into place. “You knew Cora would be there!”

“It met the conditions,” Pop said with a nod. “Lone mountain, deep wells of mana underneath it, mineral composition…”

“Not every job since Marie has been a ‘search for the weird core thing’ job though,” Sam said, frowning as he thought back.

“No,” Pop agreed. “Most of them were legit jobs. But every now and again—“

Sam snapped his fingers as more pieces fell into place. “That god-damned winter-resort job in Lessen last year!”

“Yeah,” Ma chuckled. “That one sure and didn’t pan out.”

“I got frostbite,” Sam gave his parents the fish-eye. “I almost lost my fingers.”

“I told you not to accept gifts from a yeti,” Pop said, rolling his shoulders in a shrug. “If you’re dumb enough to ignore my advice, that’s on you son.”

Sam snorted. “Next time, just come out and tell me you’re looking for a world-altering dungeon core with the ability to track down—“

He stopped and blinked as the realization of what he’d just said settled in on him.

“Cora can find the wandering dungeon?” he breathed the question. And as he said it he saw twin moues of surprise on his parents’ faces.

“Lords and ladies,” Ma whispered. “I hadn’t even thought to put that together.”

“Son of a bitch,” Pop grunted. “I’m an idiot.”

“She might not be able,” Sam said, trying to tamp down the rising excitement. “Her memory’s damaged. But maybe… Maybe Sally. Or her sister. Or—“

Char: Ware. You have a problem incoming.

Sam looked away from the map as the chat message went off in his mind. Char was the de-facto leader of the kobold contingent who had taken up residence in the dungeon, and a friend.

Sam: What’s up?

Char: Araxes has had an… Idea.

Sam: Oh lordy. Where is he?

Char: On his way to your home in town. He will likely be there in moments.

Sam: Thanks for the head’s-up, Char.

Char: You are welcome.

Sam rolled his eyes and relayed the information to his parents, who muttered various unkind things under their breaths.

“I still think you’re going to regret having that one around,” Ma said. “He’s trouble, and no mistake.”

“I don’t really have a choice Ma,” Sam said. “He’s tied to Cora. Even if I wanted him dead, I don’t know how.”

“I bet I have a spell or two that would do it,” Ma grumbled.

“Now Annie,” Pop’s voice was conciliatory as he turned to his wife. “You’ve seen as well as I that Sam’s having an effect on the bastard. Might be there’s some good he can yet do.”

“And might be I’ll shit diamonds and wipe me arse with gold bricks,” Ma shot back.

This time Sam did close his eyes and let their amiable bickering wash over him like a warm blanket. God it was nice to have them back.

Then a heavy rapping on the front door interrupted the moment, and Sam rolled his eyes.

“Coming Araxes,” he called and moved to the door. “Char warned me you were coming. So what’s this big idea of yours that couldn’t—“

He swung the door open and blinked in surprise. It wasn’t Araxes. Five men stood there in the uniform of the town watch. And behind them a sixth man with a golden chain of office around his neck, though Sam couldn’t see what office it was.

The watchman in the lead, who apparently had also knocked on the door, cleared his throat and met Sam’s eyes.

“Samuel Tolliver?” he asked in a tone of voice that said he hoped it wasn’t.

“Ye-es?” Sam raised an eyebrow. “Something wrong?” His eyes flicked over the uniformed men. He recognized a couple of them; they’d been in the revenant’s dungeons when Sam and his friends had broken them out during the battle.

He also noticed that they were all armed, and the blades were loose in their scabbards.

“I’m Captain Ard Shi of the Melloram town watch,” he was a big man with a long moustache that curled up at the end. And he was sweating in a way that had nothing to do with the cool morning air.

“In the name of King Araxesendenak and pursuant to his direct command, I hereby arrest you for crimes against his royal person and for treason. Please come with us.”