They were setting up camp to rest after the long arduous day, their advance slowed to a crawl, in the past two days they barely made it through three floors, the dungeon had turned vicious, not only was it harder but it was cruel too, no longer trying to slow them down or just kill them it was aiming to maim, poison, and cripple them, many of his bonded beasts were wounded, sick and some even died, all in the last two days after three weeks of grinding through the dungeon it has ground them to a halt, every twist was a pitfall to climb, and every turn had deadly traps and ambushes.

Penny had lost his arm to a withering poison he contracted from a trap set with delayed action to baffle his skill, Nat was a wreck from mana poisoning after casting too many spells at a too short period of time, his friends had feared his voice and he had almost lost his will to call them, but they were so close. Ben decided to try something else, after warning Sara he called Emma and Penny from the hunting grounds, the queen had answerd his call and it was a good sign.

As the group of four sat by the fire Sara was oiling the string of her bow and Ben checked Penny's stump they were chatting like some old friends without a care in the world when Ben asked Emma why the dungeon had become so dreadful, her answer surprised him, she said it was angry because Ben had taken Emma away from it, but Ben could hardly believe her words, implying a dungeon had feelings and coherent thought processes had gone beyond his experience and knowlege, only thinking back could he now see a pattern in all his dungeon crawls and dives, this was no different.

Penny had much of the same answer, the Cloud Fortress dungeon where Ben had contracted him was also angry when they left, the only dungeon that was happy to see its creature go was that musty old cave where Puddles came from, and yes they can contact the dungeon but it will try to assert its power over them, being mosters roaming in its halls.

Ben told Sara to prepare, in the morning he will try to do something he has never dreamed possible before, but for now he sent Emma to the Hunting Ground and after checking Penny let him go as well, they had a few hours before the wards on their camp would fall and wake them so they made sure to use those to rest.

Misty Vale could feel its daughter in its halls, but some buzzing noise wouldnt let it find or touch her, those humans were slowed to a more normal pace now and she was ready for any surprise, until it felt something foreign establishing a bond to it. It was the human beastmaster that proved to be a much greater annoyance than any other before him and now that same human has bonded its soul to the will of the dungeon.

Ben felt pain jarring his every muscle the link to the dungeon has been corrupted by a manifestation of rage like he had never seen before, it was a tide that swept everything before it and ground it to dust, he held his ground, clenching his fists and kicking uncontrollably but he held on for dear life and as he held he could feel other presences flocking to his call, every beast he ever pacified had come to anchor him in the storm of that soul link, and the last to come was a fluffy dire bunny that was like a wave breaker that turned all the rage in that flood into droplets of reviving rain, it seemed like the bunny was smiling at him for a last time before bounding away.

Ben woke up covered in sweat, all around him were piles of corpses from every kind of moster in the dungeon, his beasts were there and Sara fell exhausted to the ground covered from head to toe in blood, mostly not hers, the monsters had turned to light and a river of it was making its way away from their camp, a fluffy bunny hopped on the river and glided away, Ben got up and helped Sara stand, they left their equipment on the ground there, all except the golden jeweled chalice with the egg, and followed the river of light.

They entered a great room, at the center was an altar just like in the training cave and he placed the chalice on it, as soon as the chalice was placed the egg cracked and a reptilian head came out, it was a deep purple color like of which Ben had never heard of, in his head words formed THIS MIDNIGHT DRAGON IS YOUR PRIZE, TAKE IT AND NEVER RETURN TO MY DOMAIN, the voice echoed in his mind and he and Sara retreated hastily from the cave, packed their equipment and almost fled the dungeon.

SO LITTLE CHALICE, WHAT HAVE YOU BROUGHT ME the mind of the Misty vale quested and soon a thing happened that was beyond reckoning, it could hear the thoughts of another dungeon.