“How did you get soaked again?” Liliana asked Corbin, who was utterly drenched in questionable pond water and looked miserable.

“I was pushed.” Corbin muttered, glaring at Emyr, who shrugged his shoulders, unrepentant.

“If no one saw it, there was no crime.” Emyr said, examining his fingernails.

Corbin let out a long whine. “That’s not how it works.” He groaned, turning to Liliana with a pout.

“If there're no witnesses, there’s no evidence.” Liliana held up her hands helplessly.

Corbin’s face crumpled, and he looked ready to cry. “You’re supposed to be on my side!” he whined.

“Technically, I’m on no one’s side but my own.” Liliana pointed out with an amused smirk.

Before Corbin could start whining again, she motioned to his wet clothes. “Don’t you have a skill or spell you can use to clean up?” she asked. Corbin sighed, looking put out, but a second later he was clean of pond scum, and bone dry.

“See, all better.” Liliana comforted him, patting his shoulders while Emyr frowned at the bird beastman. His eyes had a calculating gleam to them that always preceded some mischief or mayhem, and Liliana took a large step away from Corbin to avoid being caught in the crossfire.

“If we’re done with the dramatics, we need to get to the next section before the Kappas respawn and we have to fight in the water again and then we’ll all be wet.” Alistair interrupted whatever Corbin was about to say, or whatever Emyr was about to do.

The group settled and took up their positions again, moving out of the underground reservoir that was this section of the dungeon. The way this dungeon was set up was purposefully confusing. It started at what could be considered a ground floor, then the group had to descend to a basement level to get to the stairs that would take them up to the first floor.

Liliana was convinced there was a hidden way to skip the basement level, but she’d yet to figure out where that was, and her teammates would only put up with her poking random brickwork for so long. They were on a time limit, so she could understand, but still. Sacrifices were necessary in the pursuit of knowledge!

The skulls filled with fire slowly got further and further apart the higher they climbed, leaving great swathes of shadow between them. When they arrived on the next level, there was only a single skull giving light some hundred feet away. The rest of the corridor was pitch black.

“Lights.” Alistair ordered. A ball of light popped into being above their heads, and two fireballs danced merrily next to it.

Liliana looked at them and sighed. She had gotten [Shine] again only for the damned spell to evolve, again this time into [Fox Fire] which wasn’t worth the Mana just to light her way, and it had a limited timer. She’d need to buy the spell if she wanted to use it and hope it didn’t evolve for a third time. At this point she didn’t want to risk it, certain the spell was cursed in some way by the System.

[Light Manipulation] would also work, but it did require some measure of her focus to maintain it and keep its Mana cost consistent. She’d do it if she was alone, as it was worth the trouble then, but not when she had a team with her that could easily do it without the added struggle.

"Lili?” Alistair asked as they started into the corridor. She had by far the best senses out of their group, and the skill most useful for locating enemies, so when they couldn’t see something, it usually fell on her to clear an area.

Liliana stretched her senses to the limit, but all she could sense or hear were her teammates. “Nothing,” she grunted, unsettled.

Silence like this was never natural, and her instincts were screaming at her that something was wrong. The only time anything was this silent was when a large, dangerous predator was lurking nearby, ready to pounce.

Her skin felt like it was twitching, and she had the urge to run screaming in the opposite direction an—.

“They’re here.” Liliana froze, her grip on her naginata going white knuckled and her swords vibrating around her. Her team froze with her, closing ranks and gripping weapons or summoning elements.

“Lili? What do you mean?” Diana asked, hesitantly.

“The fear, it’s not normal. We’re already being hunted,” Liliana hissed, eyes scanning the shadows, but they were too dark even for her [Night Vision] to penetrate.

Alistair snarled quietly, and Liliana could feel the invisible barrier popping into life in front of him. “Gods dammit, have the Bauks learned? They’re ambush hunters. They don’t normally do this.”

“Dungeons can evolve with enough time. That’s nothing unusual, just unexpected.” Emyr murmured comfortingly. Liliana could feel eyes burning a hole in the back of her skull, and she spared a moment to look back, seeing Corbin staring at her. His eyes said enough that he didn’t need to speak. ‘Whenever I join you, it seems the unexpected becomes the expected.’

Liliana hated that she couldn’t shake the feeling that this was somehow her fault. Because bad luck seemed to follow her like a lost puppy. Logically, she knew dungeons evolved and changed to deal with adventurers delving into them, and the Mana they gained passively over time aided that. Dungeons and the creatures inside of them changing their tactics wasn’t rare, it was simply uncommon, but it happened often enough that everyone knew to never expect a dungeon to be the same, even if they’d dived it a hundred times before.

Yet still, she felt like somehow she had done something to cause this because she couldn’t go a week without something odd and dangerous happening to her. Whether it be Gorgons, Fiends or Bauks changing their hunting patterns.

“Right. We’ll proceed as we would with an invisible foe,” Alistair decided, but even he looked scared. Knowing the fear was artificial didn’t entirely dissipate it, though it made it easier to fight against. Still, fear was one of the hardest artificial emotions to completely break through, second only to rage in Liliana’s experience.

Liliana activated [Battle Clarity] and almost spat like a cat with its tail stepped on when the artificial fear still lingered. Thrice damned debuffs. Liliana was ready to stab something when she activated [Soul Sight]. She rarely used that skill in dungeons as the heavy concentration of beasts could give her a migraine, but it was her best tool to see invisible or stealthed foes.

Immediately her sight lit up with the grey-colored souls of Bauks just ahead of them, an entire pack of them fifteen strong. [Identify] didn’t ping even though she could now see the irritating beasts, which meant they’d gained some kind of deception type skill. So they’d be fighting them blind in several ways. Lovely, just perfect. Liliana should stop gambling with this kind of luck. She’d be a pauper in a week.

“Fifteen ahead of us, [Identify] is blocked.” Liliana warned her brother, who nodded, lips set in a grim line. His sword crashed into his shield as he let out a booming war cry. The noise echoed and bounced off the walls, filling the oppressive silence.

Liliana let her Set Up combo wash over her, feeling her Speed and Strength shoot up even as [War Maiden’s Waltz] almost doubled her Mana and Mana Regeneration. She’d need every scrap of it to keep her skills and spells going. It just barely let her keep most of them active, with enough to spare to use some of her non-channeled abilities. Ahead of them the darkness writhed, and it was so unnatural it almost set Liliana’s stomach rolling, but she could see the Bauks still. Theri unnatural darkness couldn’t hide their souls from her, at least.

Behind her, she thought she heard Corbin whine, but she dismissed it from her mind. Shortly afterwards, flute music filled the air, bolstering her courage and diminishing the effect of the Bauk’s fear skill. Just in time, too, for the shadows finally flooded the light around them as the Bauks charged at Alistair.

They hit the barrier and lights flashed, the Bauks hissing and flinching as they were burned by the element they were weak to. But Alistair’s shield was made of Light and it was weak to the Bauks in turn. Already, Liliana could see cracks forming. This, at least, was going to plan. If the Bauks had changed elements and were something asinine like Life elemented on top of the rest, she’d have thrown a full fit.

Liliana moved, activating her next combo, Bedlam and Terror. [Dance Of The Fox], [Dance Of The Ephemeral], [Ballet Of Bedlam], [Wildeheart Walts], [Blade Song] and [Fox Fire] activated simultaneously. She wanted to see how these Bauks enjoyed having mind games played on them. It would strain her Mana temporarily, but most of the skills and spells she’d be using weren’t channels, and her Mana could handle the strain for a few minutes until it regenerated.

Six doubles peeled off from her, their own illusory blades flying around them. The only thing that showed they were fake was the slightly transparent quality to them and the dulled colors of them, like a faded photograph or a printer that had run out of ink. [Ballet of Bedlam] was an effective skill, but she still hadn’t gotten it to the point where her doubles looked indistinguishable from her.

The doubles dispersed into the Bauks, and already the fear effect from the skill was bearing down on the Bauks, causing painful shrieks that sounded like nails on chalkboards and made Liliana want to claw at her own ears just to make it stop. Her naginata jolted for a moment, taking off a long-limbed shadowy arm rather than biting into a neck, and her swords shuddered in the air.

She could hear a new melody coming from Corbin, and gradually the pain from the shrieks vanished. Liliana kept fighting, ignoring the pain until it faded, her glowing blades cutting and slicing as she moved like the wind.

The Bauks had more Health than the Redcaps or Kappas, they weren’t swarm creatures. It took her longer, even using their weakness, to defeat each Bauk. She could see fires raging around her, lights flashing and lava rising, but she kept herself moving. [Perception] and [Bestial Instincts] kept her safe from friendly and unfriendly fire as she flitted about the battlefield, her blades never slowing as she struck and evaded and danced circles around the slower and larger Bauks.

She kicked off the back of one Bauk only to land on another, her blade driving deep with a vicious [Pierce] and [Radiant Ignition] combination that had the thing screaming in pain as it bucked, but she was already gone. Three glowing swords impaled another Bauk, an explosion ripping one of its spindly limbs clean off.

Her naginata spun around her as she twirled, sending a [Wind Blade] into the legs of another Bauk to knock it off balance so she could rip her blade through its more vulnerable underbelly and leave its guts hanging out of it. She twisted away from it, using [Blink] to appear behind another.

“Lili! Light it up!” Alistair ordered. Liliana paused long enough to check her Mana before she judged it had recovered enough and activated [Light Domain], letting it drain her Mana as she channeled it.

The Bauks screamed as one, and it was deafening. Liliana winced as she felt her eardrums pop, granting her blessed silence in return for a dull, aching pain radiating from her ears. Something hot leaked down her neck. Seconds later, her hearing was back, and she wished her Health regeneration wasn’t so fast because her eardrums burst again since the Bauks were still screaming. Her swords dipped and swerved, her aim off with the disorientation of her hearing going in and out every few seconds.

The 2,200 or so damage per minute from [Light Domain’s] secondary effect must be rather unpleasant to the creatures. Their skin was literately burning off of them and it was about as pleasant to witness as it was to experience, she was sure. There was a scent like rancid meat burning and combined with her eardrums, Liliana felt herself sway, a wave of nausea and vertigo sending her off balance. The only thing that saved her from being torn apart by the Bauks was that the beasts were too distracted by their own pain to bother attacking her.

“Corbin, Diana! Do something about the screeching.” Alistair barked out during one of the moments between Liliana’s eardrums repairing and rupturing again.

She assumed they cobbled together some kind of protection because the next time Liliana could hear, her eardrums didn’t burst. She could still hear the wretched screaming, and it was enough to give her a migraine, but she could handle that. Pain was manageable, a lack of hearing was off balancing and undesirable in the middle of a fight.

She dived back into the fight, taking advantage of the weakened and disorientated Bauks to carve her way through two of them before they rallied and started fighting back.

Liliana continued her deadly dance, her blades singing to her as they shot through the air, leaving blood and gore in their wake as she turned the battlefield into a macabre stage for her dance. Every twist, every turn, every jump, and flip left blood flying behind her.

The clash of metal and the screams of the Bauks was a rich accompaniment to the music Corbin was weaving over it all, and Liliana was the only one who knew the steps to this dance. It was beautiful; it was deadly; it was terrifying and Liliana felt utterly at home. Her blood thrummed in her veins, adrenaline a potent magic all its own as it rushed through her.

Liliana moved, and the Bauks screeched. She flew, feet hardly touching the ground. She never stayed still, always moving, a blur of wind, light and steel that trailed crimson ribbons behind her. A smile cut across her face, sharp as her swords. Blood painted her skin like twisted makeup and she wanted to laugh at the wonder of it all.

She never felt more alive than when she was fighting or flying, adrenaline hot and heavy in her body, heart pounding loudly in her ears and the music of battle and death singing in the air around her.

Liliana shoved her Naginata through the chest of a Bauk, [Pierce], [Soul Shred] and [Radiant Ignition] sending it flying, dead before it touched the ground. She turned, blades ready and chest heaving, only to find no more Bauks left alive.

She stood still for a moment, senses straining, [Soul Sight] activating and raking the area as she turned on her heel and examined the entire corridor. Only when she was utterly certain no threats remained did her posture relax, her skills and spells deactivating except for [Threads Of Control].

Liliana trotted back to her team, casting [Cleanse] between one step and the next, leaving the blood coating her behind. She could feel the itch of various cuts and bruises healing as she moved, and she paid it no heed. She had taken no serious damage in the fight and the minor injuries would heal quickly enough. She activated [Healing Harmony] when she got close enough to her team, bolstering Corbin’s own healing song and whatever Diana was doing.

“Good job team. We had to adapt quickly to an unexpected variable, but no one got badly hurt and we finished them off in record time.” Alistair was smiling at the team proudly, and Liliana really didn’t know how he expected them to stop calling him mom. He was looking at them like a proud mama after being told her children did particularly well on a test from a tutor.

“I’d also like for it be noted that I did not ruin my clothes,” Corbin chimed in. Liliana smacked her hand onto her forehead hard enough to drop her Health by two hundred.

Almost immediately afterwards, entrails flew through air and smacked Corbin in the face, sliding slowly down his horrified face and dripping down his front, coating him in viscera, blood and other undesirable bodily secretions.

Corbin looked so shocked and disgusted he couldn’t form words. A high reedy noise in a pitch Liliana was surprised she could even hear, emerged from him instead of comprehensible language. Liliana shot a look towards Anya, who was whistling innocently and kicking around a Bauk’s dismembered leg. Anya caught her look and grinned wolfishly at her, without a shred of remorse for the mental damage she’d just inflicted.

The wolf girl had better be prepared to pay for Corbin’s Psyche healer bills, because he looked like he’d need it by the end of this dungeon at this rate.

“I hate it here,” Corbin whimpered, shuddering violently. He started casting an array of cleansing spells on himself, gagging and retching. “It got in my mouth! My mouth! See if I help any of you next time! Try fighting without me buffing and healing your ungrateful asses. Let’s see if you throw anything at me then!” his words were a mixture of whispers and shouts. The rest of the team was watching with amused expressions, giggles breaking free every few seconds.

Liliana wondered when he’d figure out they liked to tease him so much because his reactions were always hilarious. She hoped never. The free entertainment was priceless and kept her spirits up whenever she was reminded that one of her friends could be a traitor. Which was still lurking on the edges of her mind, jumping to the forefront of her mind whenever she started to relax and making her stress shoot through the roof and her shoulder blades itch as if expecting a dagger to slide between them at any moment.

Liliana checked the time when Corbin had stopped being the impromptu entertainment of the day. “We’re at the six-hour mark,” she warned Alistair, who nodded.

It always took a fraction of the time to get back through a dungeon, and the time they’d be in the dungeon for wouldn’t be enough for all the beasts to entirely respawn, so they’d probably wait to head back at the ten-hour mark at the earliest.

Depending on how the team was holding up, they might push it to twelve or thirteen. Thirteen would mean blitzing their way back, but they’d done it before. If they were cutting it too close, Liliana would just send her bonds out to clear the way, and they’d book it. They’d be exhausted and dead on their feet afterwards, but the experience they’d gain would be worth cutting it so close.

“Well, let’s get to skinning. Bauk pelts are valuable,” Alistair ordered the group. Corbin’s face fell when he realized he was probably going to get dirty right after cleaning himself. Liliana huffed out a quiet laugh, shaking her head as she wandered off to get started.

It took close to ten minutes, Bauks were big. Liliana and Koth’talan ended up doing most of the skinning. Both of their Dexterity stats were high enough that they could get through three Bauks by the time some of their teammates finished one.

Corbin had screamed no less than five times because he kept getting random organs thrown at him, which of course just encouraged the rest of the gremlins they were in the dungeon with. Liliana was almost certain there was some game being played with point values assigned based on how loud Corbin screamed.

She wasn’t too concerned. Corbin knew what they were all like, and if he didn’t like it, he would’ve gotten actually mad and wouldn’t go into a dungeon with them. He was likely playing it up because it did make everyone laugh, and with how stressed they all had been, laughter had become a rare commodity. Or he was just that dense, which she doubted, but anything was possible, really.

Liliana handed the last of her pelts and cores off to Alistair, who slid them into storage and looked over at the group. “Alright, time to move on.” He ordered.

The group slowly converged again and then they were off, Liliana trying to keep her hand off her dagger at her side. A warm hand wrapped around her wrist, squeezing gently. Liliana looked up and met Emyr’s steel eyes. He didn’t say a word, but his eyes were warm and understanding, and his grip on her wrist tightened for a moment before he let go. She let her smile say her thanks for her.

One of her friends was a traitor, but she wasn’t in this alone. They were in a dangerous position, but she had someone there to watch her back. She let that knowledge buoy her and her left hand stopped twitching towards her dagger as she pulled forward.