Epilogue

It took a week to prepare, a week spent constantly draining my mana to grow mushrooms faster, a week where I exhausted my meagre coffers to buy supplies. A week where I tried to spend a bit more time with my mom than usual while convincing Bet to help me craft a lie.

I didn’t need mom knowing where I was going. She wasn’t exactly headstrong, but I thought she’d put her foot down if she discovered that I was going to venture into such a dangerous place.

It was better if she didn’t know.

In the end, I had everything packed as best I could. I had a backpack--a gift from Bet who said they were relatively common with the children sent into the dungeon to gather materials--I had a few little utensils, a lamp which I could use for light or for cooking, a tin of oil, and a good sturdy knife in a sheath hidden in the small of my back.

I brought food, of course. A couple of cans of spam, some beans, a couple of changes of clothes. Really, I wanted to have everything that I thought I might need down in the Ditz Dungeon.

Most of all, I had mushrooms. Samples of nearly every mushroom I’d ever found useful, and some of mushrooms that had the potential to be. Fully grown mushrooms as well, of all the sorts that I was accustomed to.

Most of these were in my satchel, which I decided to carry along too.

I regretted not moving around with my full gear more often, since it was rather heavy, but I could manage it. The stuff I used up along the way would be discarded, decreasing the weight as I went.

“Sample jars, can’t forget those,” I muttered as I picked up a few, wrapped them in cloth, then stuffed them into my satchel. I didn’t want the trip to be a waste, after all. If we couldn’t make it to the bottom, I might at least be able to come back up with a few interesting new fungi to play with.

Sir Nibbles chittered at me, and I rolled my eyes.

“Yes, I’m bringing your snacks too,” I said. I opened the backpack and half-pulled out a little cloth bag. I’d stitched--rather poorly--a badger face to the side. It had dried mushrooms in it, those that had gone a little too hard when I tried to make mushroom jerky and subsequently failed because I didn't know what I was doing.

I checked everything one last time, but at that point it was pretty much just paranoia.

“Alright, I think that’s everything,” I said as I buckled everything down.

I reached a hand to Sir Nibbles and he scampered up my arm and around my neck. The badger was getting a little chubby, and big. I didn’t know how big normal badgers got, but I was starting to suspect that panbadgers like Nibbles were on the bigger side. Soon carrying him like this wouldn’t be an option.

With everything set up, I made sure the notes for Bet were in plain sight, then I headed out. She’d have to take care of the farm while I was out. Fortunately, that was mostly just picking mushrooms at the right time. I’d culled my local supply of the more lethal stuff. I didn’t want to return to find that Bet had poked a [Dead Man’s Cough] and died.

The moved mushrooms would grow nice and quietly in a few different spots around the slums. The nice thing about them was that they were their own theft-deterrent.

Sir Nibbles and I crossed the slums. It was weird how much they’d changed without me really noticing. Some homes had burned down, some buildings were ripped apart, and yet all of that had been replaced with newer, worse construction.

The slums were like a spreading fungal body. It weakened and died, then came back to flourish in its own death, ever changing, but always producing the same result in the end. There were new faces, there were old ones, and there was more rust and more smog.

So, everything was changing, but nothing changed at all.

Introducing a spark was why I was taking this risk, why I was willing to try and use [Sporemageddon]. Maybe it was a mistake, but I’d only know that once it was done.

I arrived at the Ditz Dungeon to find it quieter than when I’d ever seen it before. To be fair, the sun hadn’t risen yet. The yard had a few very early workers, some cleaning people, and a few guards milling around, but it wasn’t the hive of activity it would be the moment the sun rose.

Misters Greene and Greene were waiting for me on the edge of the dungeon’s plaza. “Hello, sirs,” I said.

Philipe grinned. “You look kitted out,” he said. “Are you ready?”

“As I’ll ever be, I suspect,” I said before flashing him a grin. “Let’s see what kind of trouble we can get into, shall we?”

***

Feronie smiled. It was a weak thing, but it was present. A little grin for a little victory.

“Go on, loyal-one. Turn that loyalty into the death of our enemy.”

The pain was growing less bearable by the day. But she didn’t give up. She couldn’t. At the moment, she was being fed the most potent of all anaesthetics; hope, and with that she couldn’t help but fight on.

There was still time.

***