A few minutes later, Margie cast Jugger-Hound, and then it was time to face the music.

Steven’s hands shook slightly as he stared down the hall.

Knock that off.

The shaking stopped. Steven paused and glanced down at his hands.

That…that probably shouldn’t be that easy.

He shook his head. No time to dwell on that now. He needed to focus on the death trap.

“Ready.”

Margie lifted her hand from Buford’s head.

“On go.”

Steven took a deep breath, then started counting.

They had done tests upon tests. They knew this would work. Buford was fast enough now, and Steven had triggered the traps enough that he could do it flawlessly.

He would have practiced even more, but summoning and dismissing his shields so many times in a row had exhausted him. He felt like he’d sprinted the length of the hallway a dozen times.

Steven took a deep breath as he hit three. “Go!”

Buford’s legs tensed, heavy muscles bunching as the crimson light around the dog intensified.

Steven called his first shield, a bolt slammed down, then started to pull back.

Buford took off like a rocket.

Steven called, again and again, summoning his next two shields before immediately dismissing the first.

Buford passed the first trap, and Steven’s world narrowed. He called, dismissed, called again and again.

The second a trap started to retract, he dismissed the shield only to add it to the front of the line.

Buford was so fast; he had to keep up!

Red and yellow blurred down the hall, chasing a vanishing line of green.

Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.

The bolts slammed into shield after shield, the steady rhythm seeming to match his pounding heart.

He needed to- Buford reached the end. He cleared the last of the traps and clamped his crackling jaws over the metal nob.

A line of electricity sparked from the nob and rushed to the door. The chains wrapping it clicked, then retracted with the grind of metal on metal.

A moment later, the bars separating the two sides slid into the ground.

Steven gasped and collapsed to his knees. With his focus broken, nothing distracted him from the burning in his lungs or the almost aggressive exhaustion that washed over him.

That had been a lot of shields.

Margie placed a hand on his shoulder. “You good?”

He managed to nod through his gasping.

Buford trotted over from the kitchen side. He paused for a second, waiting for the sword to stab out, but the oven stayed shut. After ten seconds of waiting, Buford opted to just jump over the oven. He made it look easy.

After this scenario, they needed to test just how strong Jugger-Hound made him.

Micheal crouched next to Steven and gave him a thumbs up with a raised brow.

Steven returned the thumbs up.

God, he never wanted to call his shields like that again.

He doubted he’d get his wish.

Steven leaned against Buford as the dog returned. He chuffed happily.

“Good- boy.” He gasped out.

They all joined him in praising Buford. While the malamute squirmed under the praise, Michael frowned.

“No prompts or anything? Did we not finish the puzzle?”

Margie cast a wary glance around the room. “Maybe we just need to walk through the door.”

“Give me- like two minutes.” Steven gasped. “And we’ll find out.”

True to his word, Steven managed to climb to his feet two minutes later.

Though the others had argued, they eventually agreed that Steven should open the door since it was easier for him to protect himself if something attacked.

He gripped the cool metal handle. His heart was still beating a little too fast, but at least he wasn’t breathing like a racehorse.

He slowly pulled the door open, making sure that no one would be in a line of fire.

Once again, nothing happened as he opened the door.

Starting to feel kind of stupid for the extreme caution.

Well, better to feel stupid than get dead.

“Someone wanna peek?” He called out.

A couple of seconds later, Micheal yelled back. “Clear!”

Steven looked inside the room. It was…nice. A platter of food and drinks sat in the middle of a dark wooden table. He could smell the food from the doorway, causing his mouth to water. The table was ringed with cushy chairs and couches, and the whole space had a cozy feel to it.

Steven was instantly suspicious.

The others caught up, and Buford slowly went inside, Steven on his heels.

They all flinched as a prompt filled their vision.

“CONGRATULATIONS!!!” The System bellowed into his head.

“Shit!”

It laughed. “Whoow, that was fun. I love seeing people figure out puzzle rooms. It’s like the whole monkeys with typewriters joke for me.”

“Fuck you.”

“Now, now, no need for that. I come bearing good news. And loot. A respectable haul at that!”

It paused. “Though you know you could have just used Margie’s daily charge of Shock-Surge to clear the puzzle.”

Steven groaned. He was an idiot!

“This will cheer you up!”

More prompts filled his vision.

For being the first group to clear a puzzle room, the rewards have been altered.

Augment gained

I AM Seeing Enough Movement

Rarity: rare

Effect: the more one uses the augmented Skill as fast as possible, the faster it can be used. At max effect, cooldowns will be reduced by 50%.

The drawbacks from backlash and broken focus scale with effect.

If one stops using Skill off cooldown, the Augments effects will reset.

‘Note: is incompatible with certain Skills.’

---

Steven read over the description several times. That was a powerful augment. Powerful and dangerous. If he understood it correctly, it would let him do what he had done with the traps, only on a much grander scale.

Though how would 50% reduced cooldown interact with Hand-Shield?

It didn't have a cooldown, maybe it would reduce the half-second delay between shields? Unless that didn't count as a cooldown.

If it worked that way, it would be strong on Hand-Shield, but he was betting there were other shield Skills that the Augment could be downright broken on.

But that Augment came with risks. He’d felt like he was about to pass out after that last bout of rapid calling. He didn’t want to imagine the kind of exhaustion he’d be hit with if he summoned his shields even faster.

Hell, that kind of exertion might just kill him outright.

And what was the backlash the description mentioned? The only backlash he’d felt so far was from his shields breaking.

But if the breaking backlash scaled with this Augment, then breaking a shield while it was going might knock him out.

And broken focus?

“System. What’s broken focus?”

“It's when you’re focusing on something, and that focus is broken. Moron.”

Steven opened his mouth to snap back, but the System cut him off.

“I’m just messing with you. I know what you’re asking. Certain Skills require extended focus to cast, unlike your Hand-Shield, which just needs a moment. That focus getting interrupted brings drawbacks. And rapid casting like you just did requires extended focus, so breaking that can bring drawbacks as well.”

Steven mulled that over for a second before pausing.

He had just thought about how he hoped he’d never need to do something like that again, and the System had gone and given him a Skill that made him better at it.

“…Did…did you give me an Augment just to troll me?”

“System out!”

“You motherfu-“ he stopped. Noddle was staring at him. His apathetic stare had a slightly judging cast to it. Or he was just projecting. “Don’t judge me. You don’t have to deal with the asshole.”

Noodle grunted, then made his way to one of the couches.

“Wait, is this room saf-“

Entered Rest

Rests are safe spaces in a dungeon. Entering one prevents basic monsters from drawing aggro on you, and all energy is recovered faster in Rests. You may not attack monsters outside of the Rest while inside one.

“E,” he finished lamely. “Well, I won’t turn down a rest after that. Especially if we recover faster here.”

They shut the door behind them and quickly grabbed seats.

Margie and Micheal were still staring at their character sheets with a far-off look, only focusing on their surroundings enough to grab a seat.

Steven reached for a drink, then paused. Would the System try to poison them?

“No. Well, scratch that. I wouldn’t do it in a Rest. These are truly safe spaces unless stated otherwise by me. No food or drink from these places will harm you. Not from my hand.”

Having a thought plucked from your head like that was unnerving, but at least he got an answer. The System hadn’t lied to him yet, as far as he was aware, and had no reason to.

He grabbed a wooden tankard and took a sip. The liquid was bright pink and reminded him of strawberry lemonade. It was fantastic. He finished the drink in one pull. It was the most refreshing thing he’d ever drunk.

It did say that energy recovered faster here. He guessed that included the drinks.

While the Rests were a nice thing to have in concept, they said some worrying things about the dungeon design. The need for safe rooms between encounters meant this would be a very long dungeon crawl or a very intense one.

You didn’t need to rest if the dungeon was short or easy.

Steven glanced at the others. Still reading.

“Mind sending me your prompts?”

“Send.”

“Send.”

---

Skill: Passive

The Damsel Runs Into Distress

Rarity: rare

Effect: the Damsel is better at putting themselves in danger.

Range: self

Energy cost: none

Cooldown: none

---

Steven read over the Skill twice before turning an incredulous stare to Micheal. The redhead was already staring back, a sour expression on his face.

“The System seems to want me dead.”

“…Yeah. I’m not sure what to make of that one. Like, I guess it makes it easier to trigger your buff, but…”

“It still makes me more likely to die horribly?”

“Pretty much.”

Steven searched for an upside. “Maybe it will mesh with a future Skill?”

Micheal sighed. “Let’s hope…but it could be a dud Skill. They can’t all be good.”

He raised a red brow at Steven. “Can I see what you got?”

“Send.”

Micheal was quiet for a minute before looking up. “That’s strong, but…”

“Dangerous.” Steven nodded. “Definitely going to need to run some tests with that in a safe environment. I don’t want to kill myself with exhaustion.”

He shook that awful thought away and turned his attention to Margie’s prompt.

---

Skill: Passive

Jugger-Rush.

Rarity: rare

Effect: hounds affected by Jugger-Hound gain a stacking momentum buff, becoming harder to stop or knock from their feet the closer they get to full speed.

At max charge, impacting something will disperse the built-up momentum in a cone-shaped blast.

Range: touch

Energy cost: none

Cooldown: none

---

Steven turned to Micheal. “Whatever beef the System has with you, it certainly doesn’t share it with Margie.”

He squinted. “What did she get?”

Margie pointed at him. “Share.”

His eyes flicked back and forth a few times before he groaned. “That’s so cool! And actually useful. You got a Skill to make Buford into even more of a tank, and I got an assisted suicide Skill.”

He rubbed his face.

“I’m getting punked by a cosmic entity.”

Margie patted him on the shoulder. “You’re Class isn’t useless. I don’t know how much longer I could have carried this damned gun for without your buff.”

Steven nodded and pointed to Buford. “Plus, I think it balances Jugger-Hound.”

Micheal arched a brow. “What do you mean?”

“Jugger is focused on strength and durability. Buford was still making some leaps and bounds, but how he moved after your buff was different. He got faster but also more graceful.”

Steven flexed his hands. “I’m feeling it too. I feel lighter on my feet. Like I could touch my toes and do a handstand.”

Micheal grinned for a second before scratching his chin. “Actually, while we’re resting, why don’t we see just what my buff can do?”

Steven felt like he’d had a power nap from that one drink and a few minutes on the couch.

The Rest bonus was no joke.

He climbed to his feet. “I’m down.”

“Why don’t we try something you could do before the buff,” Micheal walked over to the corner. It was a little tight, but Steven had enough room to do some basic exercises.

“How many push up’s could you do?”

He shrugged and got onto his hands. “Like twenty-something? I was more into cardio than strength training or bodyweight exercises.”

“My man!” Micheal grinned. “But while I can respect a fellow follower of cardio, that makes this a little harder to gauge my buff. I don’t think we can really time your mile in here.”

Margie waved at them from the couch, a dark amber drink with bubbles in hand. “Don’t tire yourself out too much. We still have the rest of the manor to go through.”

They nodded. Steven paused mid-push-up. “Actually, how long are we staying in this room? Should we wait for Jugger-Hound to refresh again?”

Micheal walked over to the table and grabbed a bowl of steaming stew.

How was it still that hot?

“I’m not a fan of waiting longer. The slower we are, the higher chance more people get hurt. But…”

Margie scowled. “But we might be the only people in the region with Classes.“

Steven sighed and rose from his push-up. His urge to test the power of the Skill diminished slightly.

“If we die, we might be screwing everyone else.” Steven’s gut churned at the words, but he forced them out. “We need to wait for the refresh. If we run into someone like the giant, we can’t have Jugger-Hound dropping halfway through.”

Both Margie and Micheal looked like they’d bitten into lemons, but they nodded.

“Agreed.”

Michael’s smile returned. “But if we’re waiting in here for the next fifteen minutes or so, let’s do some tests, shall we?”