“You think that Andarit is the other person in the dungeon with Entherys.” That was the only possible reason Verit would have told Serenity about Entherys when he asked about Andarit.

“We found out she was missing the same day that we found out about the mystery pair in the dungeon. I don’t know how he got her to go in with him; did she actually want to marry him?” Verit sounded hopeful, but Serenity didn’t think she actually believed that was the answer.

Serenity shook his head. “She mentioned the broken betrothal to me in passing, that’s all. I can’t remember her ever talking about Entherys; I know she never mentioned his name. I’d remember it. I don’t think she cared for him; I know she wasn’t interested in his brother.”

Verit sighed. “That’s what I expected. Well, as you can see, we’re stuck waiting until they come out. We can’t get in, so…” She shrugged. It was pretty obvious that she’d decided to tell him the story to prevent him from trying to dig and find out about it some other way. She might well also have slanted it in her favor; that was pretty common. It didn’t bother Serenity, since it made his job a lot easier.

Serenity knew that definitely wasn’t true. If someone destroyed an instanced dungeon, it would force everyone out. This had to be an instanced dungeon or it wouldn’t, probably couldn’t, stop people from entering. It was possible that Verit didn’t know that, but Serenity thought it was more likely that she simply didn’t want to kill another dungeon over a couple of teenagers. Serenity couldn’t say she was wrong; that was a reasonable decision.

On the other hand, she didn’t know about Serenity. “I assume there are multiple instances of the Cliff Dungeon?”

“Yes, but you can’t get from one instance to another.” Verit frowned. “What are you thinking?”

Serenity smiled. She probably assumed he was intending to destroy the dungeon; he’d really rather not do that. The dungeon wasn’t at fault. “You can’t. That doesn’t mean I can’t. I assume you don’t have anyone with a proper dungeon management Path?”

“A dungeon management Path?” Verit sounded incredulous. “What are you talking about?”

That was really helpful in some ways. Serenity didn’t think Raz’s Path would let him do what [Ghost in the System] let Serenity do, but Verit wouldn’t know that. “They’re exactly what they sound like, ways to manage a dungeon. There are a lot of them; generally, someone moving into dungeon management will end up managing a single dungeon, guiding its growth, but there are also Paths that let people work with any dungeon. The general ones are usually a lot more limited. Personally, I can often get into locked instances, though I may have to reach the dungeon core in a different instance to do that.”

Everything he’d said was true, even if it wasn’t because he had a dungeon management Path. He still didn’t know what the Dungeon Deity Evolution did for him, but he’d be shocked if it didn’t help. Even without it, he could probably do something by talking to the dungeon core even if [Ghost in the System] wasn’t enough.

“You’re not going to destroy the dungeon core?” Verit’s question was flat, more like a statement than a question. She definitely knew that that would get them out.

Serenity shook his head. He was about to say he definitely wouldn’t, but he remembered the Corn Maze. It hadn’t given him any option other than destruction when he tried to talk to it. He’d ended up destroying it; had he even had the option to take control instead? He thought he might have, but he wasn’t certain. It was before Aide, which meant he had to depend on his own fallible memory and that seemed to be getting worse rather than better. “I’ll do everything I can to avoid destroying it; I’ll even promise that the only way the core will be destroyed is if it makes me destroy it to save myself. I don’t think I can promise more than that, but if you want I can agree to a contract for that much.”

Verit shook her head immediately. “No contract. If you’re going in the dungeon, I’ll be going in with you.”

It was obvious to Serenity that Verit didn’t want any of this in writing. That made sense with talking about it in a secured, warded area like this one. That was fine; he’d rather not make a contract anyway. Taking her would probably work as long as he was going into a different instance. “I don’t think I can take you in with me if we enter the same instance they’re in, but if I can get into that instance there’s no reason to destroy the dungeon core at all. If I have to try it through another instance, I’ll be happy to have you with me.”

That promise was enough. They talked for another few minutes, but as far as Serenity was concerned neither of them said anything of substance. Verit wanted Entherys alive if possible and a body if he died; other than that, she wanted the dungeon to survive. Andarit was less important on her list as long as the situation didn’t come back to bite her or her Sect.

Serenity had the feeling that Verit was completely willing to kill him to keep her issues secret, but he wasn’t that worried about it. Even if she could, he was pretty sure she’d only choose to try in an emergency. That wasn’t because she was unwilling to kill; instead, she seemed to have a pretty good appreciation for politics. Serenity represented and knew Duke Lowpeak and his Daughter-Heir; if he disappeared in the same place Andarit had, there would definitely be issues.

The route to the dungeon was even more winding and indirect than the route to the Sect. Serenity carefully didn’t mention that he knew exactly where he was; that might be information that would overcome the political disasters that killing him might cause. He didn’t think she’d succeed, but that was no reason to piss her off. If nothing else, her cooperation was useful.

On the way to the Cliff Dungeon, they passed another dungeon. Serenity didn’t mention it, but he noted to himself that it was only a few hundred yards from the path they were on. It was underground but not very deep, less than fifty feet.

Serenity knew where the dungeon was even without seeing it; he didn’t know how he knew but as soon as he was within a half mile of the dungeon he knew it. It wasn’t enough to place it precisely on a map, but he had a rough idea of the distance and direction. He probably could place it on a map if he triangulated it.

The Cliff Dungeon was located above ground, unsurprisingly at the base of a cliff. It was clear that something was there; there was a path that led directly to the entrance. There were a number of people “casually” standing near that end of the path. Serenity had the feeling that they were there specifically to watch for Entherys’s emergence. They watched Verit and Serenity, but after she waved them away they didn’t do anything.

[Dungeon: Cliff Dungeon]

[The Cliffs of Iron Mountain have always been treacherous, but the coming of monsters made them more so. Can you conquer the mountain and the monsters that live on it?]

[Status: Active]

[Tier: Two]

[Type: Exploration, Athletics, Flying]

[Maximum capacity per group: 5]

[Maximum group slots: 8 per day. Number used today: 7]

[Slot Availability: [Closed], [Closed], [2//full], [Closed], [Open], [Closed], [5], [5]]

[Enter Dungeon?]

Yes. He wanted Slot 3.

[Slot 3 is //full]

[Attempting to enter Slot 3]

[Entry failed]

Serenity had never seen anything like that before. It made him hopeful; the dungeon certainly wasn’t being difficult about letting him in, even if it didn’t seem to be able to. He turned towards Verit. “Looks like we’ll have to take the open slot, the dungeon can’t override whatever Entherys did.”

Verit nodded; she had her hand on the cliff as well. “Slot five, then. No one else is going to use it anyway.”

[Slot 5 entry complete] flashed in front of Serenity’s vision for a moment. The world shifted and he found himself standing on a ledge above a sheer drop with rocks twenty feet below him. It was enough to make him wish he could actually fly; even in his wyrmling form, his flight was poor. He couldn’t shift now anyway; that wasn’t something he wanted to show to Verit. He couldn’t even shift to his chimera form so that he’d have claws; that was annoying.

The dungeon turned out to be more or less what its description said, a combination of walking and climbing up the mountain while fending off monster attacks. The ones that came flying at them while they were climbing sheer cliffs were especially annoying, but Serenity couldn’t call them more than that.

Even though his shield was tuned primarily to protect from magical attacks, it blunted their physical attacks enough that they were little more than scratches that healed almost instantly even if they hit his face or hands. Anywhere that was covered by his dragonscale armor was effectively immune to the Tier Two enemies even without the shield.

Verit had a little more trouble, but still not much. She didn’t seem to have a shield and instead relied upon killing them before they reached her; even with his help and more than a few Death Magebolts aimed at her attackers, she took a few hits. They did more damage to her than to him, but that simply meant they were deep scratches that she’d have to get healed once they left the dungeon.

At the end of the dungeon, Serenity tossed the reward, a nice pair of boots with a fairly basic no-slip enchantment, to Verit. It was her organization that owned the dungeon; they should get the reward since they were simply letting him use the dungeon to deal with a problem. She seemed surprised, but Serenity didn’t really care.

When he knelt in front of the dungeon core, Verit hurried over. “You can’t break it.”

Serenity shook his head with a smile. “I’m not going to; I just need to make good contact with it so that I can talk to it.” He leaned forward and tapped one of his silver horns lightly against the dungeon core before she could object again. It wouldn’t harm the core; he wasn’t trying to break it, after all. Simply being high Tier wasn’t enough to accidentally break a dungeon core, at least not with only a six-Tier difference.

As expected, Serenity found himself floating in darkness. “Cliff dungeon? Are you there?”

“Who are you? No, what are you?” Serenity couldn’t see where the response came from, but once the core spoke, he saw it appear in the darkness. “You are not like any who has ever come here before.”

Serenity tried to shrug. He didn’t think the core would understand the gesture, but it couldn’t hurt. “My Name is Serenity. I can talk to dungeon cores; as for what I am, I’m an Essence Dragon. Shapeshifted at the moment, so don’t expect other dragons to look like me.”

“I’ve never seen a dragon. I wanted a dragonet, but they’re too expensive to be worth spawning. I’d have to reduce my number of slots and I don’t want to do that. I really do like them, but I just can’t.” The Cliff Dungeon’s core sounded almost like a sulking child as it described why it couldn’t have dragonets.

Serenity hoped that it meant miniature dragon-like animals and not baby dragons. Either could be called a dragonet. He was fine with the animal-like ones being dungeon creatures but not baby dragons. They were still babies!

He’d just assume that the dungeon core meant the animals. They’d be better defenders anyway.