Mickey gave a friendly smile to the team while he waited for one of them to speak.

As soon as Alphonse opened his Mickey loudly spoke over him.

‘First of all you didn’t prepare any utility equipment. Failing to prepare is preparing to fail. Case in point your first aid kit lacks any real anaesthetic.’

Mickey said, pulling a needle from nowhere with a puff of dark smoke. With a smooth confident motion Mickey pushed it into Cassowaries leg.

‘Hey ask before you stab me with- Oh that’s better.

Said Cassie as the painkiller took effect.

Mickey continued without acknowledging Cassie’s outburst.

‘Next nobody brought a secondary weapon. Which if you had a good spread of weapons might not be a problem but today it meant when you ran up against something that was resistant to being smashed with a blunt object you were shit out of luck.’

Mickey paused and flipped a sheathed machete into the air before catching it.

‘A machete such as this wouldn’t overburden you at all and you would have been able to cut that thing to ribbons so it could bleed to death. Even with blunt clubs you would have done better aiming at the sides to break the membrane rather then going for the centre of mass. Here’s a tip for fighting oddities. Fight it piece by piece. If you find yourself fighting something that’s too big or resistant to beat, focus on beating a single part of it. This works on elephants as much as swarms.

You can’t cut a elephants head off with a sword, but you can kill its legs. And its trunk. And when all of it’s vulnerable parts are taken out you’ll find that killing it is now much easier. The same theory works for swarms or just life in general. If you can’t do everything all at once do the little things you can do and the big things left will be easier.’

With Big Al and Donga suitably told off Mickey turned to the newcomer, Rosa. She took a deep breath and visibly braced herself.

‘Now you archer girl, first I had to give you proper arrowhead and even then you failed to use them well. Now obviously these two meathead were constantly blocking your shots but did it even occur to you to MOVE to the side? This isn’t an archery range and standing still is not a habit you want to have. In combat range may be king but mobility is life. The word tactics comes from the Latin word for positioning or arrangements, So make sure you’re arranged in position. In your case the position is the one which lets you get a shot.’

Turning to Benji and Cassie he continued.

‘You did well enough as a medic. Prompt response. Good job. As for you, What in gods good name were you thinking kicking a charging opponent. “Hur dur I got this!” Would you try to kick a free rolling truck tire coming at you? Because that’s what these bastards are. Learn to dodge goddamn it. Now you’re injured and the team has to decide whether they turn back because of your idiocy, leave you here alone or figure how to carry you with them as a literal burden. Well done.’

‘Now for the rest of you, decision time. Retreat, abandon or escort?’

‘We’re not leaving her.’ Big Al said confidently.

Mickey nodded.

‘Right then. In the future you’re going to need to figure out some way to secure or move injured squad members. For today and today only I’ll help out. I’m here to keep you alive. Not to encourage overreliance.’

Mickey pulled a folded wheel chair out of his pocket dimension and carefully lifted Cassowary into it. Mickey then walked over and tapped the pillar ‘receiving’ the skill. The teenagers quickly followed getting their own rewards.

Benji being first got the Skill which would assist in basic medical care while Cassie received a which would numb her nerves slightly after a certain threshold of pain was reached. Rosa predictably got the skill and Alphonse and Dolphin both received a message

[ Hello There!

Thanks to your hard work your skill has improved to

{Crush! Smash! Every opponent becomes a nail to hammer with this skill. Bonus to using blunt and bludgeoning weapons in combat.}

Thanks to your You have unlocked a skill Choice! Please choose from the options below!

{ Invoke to add extra kinetic force to your next strike!} { Invoke to increase the speed of your next four strikes at a cost of precision!}

Congratulations!]

After they both got the message they stood still in surprise. Impatient and somewhat disappointed by a lack of reaction Mickey spoke up.

‘Hey what did you two get, because I know you got something interesting.’

‘How could you tell?’ Alphonse asked.

Mickey quickly made something up.

‘There’s still a connection between you and the pillar when it’s usually one and done thing so I figured something was up.’

Note to self, alter pillar to work in the way I just said they do.

Mollified Alphonse answered.

‘Well I don’t know about Donga but for me levelled up and I have to pick between two skill choices.’

‘Same.’ Grunted Donga.

‘Well what are they?’ Cassie asked impatiently.

‘ and One hits harder the other is a multi-strike. I’ll get . Hitting harder is always useful.’ Alphonse responded.

‘Hmm. Then I’ll get .’ Said Donga.

Mickey spoke up.

‘Don’t test them out right now. Wait until we have some training dummies set up. I mean you can smash some rocks if you want, but don’t cry when your weapons break.’

After everyone was finished comparing their rewards they moved through the exit doorway into a large empty room.

‘Boss room. Looks like the dungeon hasn’t made a boss for it yet though. Moving on.’ Mikey said before going down the stairs at the back of the room.

While the teens were still discussing how to get Cassie down the stairs Mikey returned and put up a Black and yellow ‘UNDER CONSTRUCTION’ sign in front of the stairway.

‘Okay guys so I’m not going to let you down these stairs. For now this is the limit of the dungeons stable area. So it’s time for us to leave.’

Benjamin frowned.

‘What do you mean stable area?’

Mickey shrugged.

‘Beyond those stair is where the dungeon is still growing. It’s not safe to explore. Pretty sure there isn’t even a anchor pillar yet. Right now it looks like an empty plain of grass, but that could change to a volcano or boiling water at any moment. What’s worse is that there’s a good chance that anything that goes down there will become a part of the ecosystem and won’t be able to leave. So this delve ends here while you’re all capable of going home.’