Chapter 22

  You received {Gold Coin} x4

  You received {Silver Coin} x17

  You received {Necro Bone} x40

  You received {Necrogryph Claw}

  {Necrogryph Claw}

  Rank: Epic

  Grade: Stellar

  Slot: Neck

  +5 Constitution

  +10 Agility

  +7 Strength

  +12 Endurance

  +50% Attack speed.

  I turned the claw over in my hands, appreciating the smooth keratin. As much as I wanted the Claw, I passed it off to Clara for now. Since this was a dungeon, I got the sense her poison stacks were going to be important against any upcoming boss fights, and the faster she could get those poison arrows out, the better. This was assuming . . . her arrows would stack on whatever the boss was . . . hopefully it wouldn’t be more skeletons. We decided if it was, I would take the necklace back.

  Overall, the loot had been pretty underwhelming for a dungeon, but they had been naked skeletons with nothing but old rusty weapons . . . Not sure what I was expecting. The experience was good, but I remained at level twenty-nine, which meant no new abilities. I wasn’t even sure if level thirty would give me one. That was really starting to piss me off. I was officially crossing my fingers now for level thirty. I’d picked up my last ability at level fifteen . . . during the Blackthorn event. That was ages ago.

  We found the top half of one remaining skeleton still alive. Its arms were gone, and it was barely able to move. Once we took that last mob out, the torches all extinguished at the same time, save one, which hung on the wall behind the pulpit, just to the right of a few layers of choir risers. The torch light shone down on a hidden stone door, which was grinding its way upward. We all approached, taking slow steps. Mie peeked down the long corridor the door had revealed.

  “CHARLIE?!” she shouted.

  We all jumped at the suddenness of it. I face-palmed, looked to the ceiling, and took a calming breath. She was going to get us killed.

  “That wasn’t Charlie at the pulpit?” Fred asked.

  “No way was that Charlie,” said Mie. “Charlie’s awesome.”

  “What is with you and Charlie?” I asked her.

  “What’s with you and Charlie? What do you have against the guy? For all we know he is imprisoned here, and it’s our job to save him.”

  “That’s clearly not what’s going on here—”

  “Sam,” Mie cut me off, looking at the others and making sure she had their attention, “knows a Charlie.”

  Stolen content alert: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

  “Mie,” I said with clear warning in my voice. “Don’t.”

  “Let’s just say . . . he had a vagina.”

  “What the fuck?” Clara said.

  “MIE! THIS IS THE BIG STUFF,” I shouted in a rush. I was panicking. This was a clear breach of trust.

  She was shaking. Then she burst out laughing and sputtered out, “Oh come on. It’s such a good story.”

  “Don’t you dare. Dear God. Never.”

  “Okay. I need to hear this story,” Clara said. Her eyes glazed over as she interacted with her interface. It looked like she had started to DM Mie.

  When Mie’s eyes glazed over too, I slam tackled her into the corridor.

  “AHH!” she cried out. “IT WAS A WET DREAM!”

  “OH COME ON,” I roared. “IT WAS NOT WET! NOTHING WAS WET!”

  “Guys,” Fred said, pointing, as both Fred and Clara joined us in the corridor. I looked up at him, rage and hot embarrassment coursing through my veins.

  SLAM!

  The door behind us dropped downward, closing us all in. It went pitch black and silent, except for Mie’s snickering. I growled. God damn it.

  “Look,” Fred continued.

  I peered down the long hall. There was a short ghostly figure wearing a onesie at the very end of it.

  “Help,” the child said in a high, quiet voice. It sounded muffled, but it carried down to us well enough despite the distance.

  I inspected him.

  Charlie

  Level 47, Spirit.

  HP 0/0

  “Come here, vagina boy!” Mie called.

  “Okay that’s just messed up,” I said.

  “Yeah, not gonna lie, that felt a little weird coming out of my mouth. But . . . also, I told you so,” Mie said.

  “A ghost kid that happens to be named Charlie proves nothing,” I said while watching the little guy walk closer. He must have been three or four? Definitely not tall enough to be in kindergarten at least.

  “He literally just said ‘help,’ ” Mie defended.

  When he reached us, I gripped the hilt of my axe, but he just stood there looking at each of us in turn. Then he said again, “I need help,” in that small muffled high voice. “Dad’s mad.”

  “Ugh. Dads are the worst,” Mie said. “Why are they always so mean?” She got on her knees and squatted so that she could look into his eyes. “Where’s your dad, and why is he mad?”

  “He’s back there,” he said, pointing down the hallway.

  “Wow. Who would have guessed,” I said maybe a little too loudly.

  Mie glared at me like I was the asshole here, then looked back to Charlie and said, “Why don’t you bring us to him and we’ll talk things over?”

  “Okay. But when he’s mad, he does bad things.”

  “Who would have guessed,” I said again.

  Charlie ran off, turned around, and motioned for us to follow. We all looked at each other. I sighed and slowly started toward him.

  Turned out, Charlie’s dad was a touch further away than just down the hall. The hallway turned into a vast cave system with massive rooms and winding tunnels. We traveled downward almost exclusively, from a large cavern with stalagmites and stalactites, to a narrow passage with walls lined with horizontal tombs, then to another room where other pathways came leading in. And on and on it went. As we traveled, we followed Charlie, who was acting like a little fairy would in a video game. When we would reach him, he would run real quick to the next doorway or passage, then wait for us as he glowed faintly blue in the dark.

  Eventually our aches and tired feet forced us to stop. Charlie went running off to the next doorway and motioned us to follow . . . but we held off. I heard Fred mutter under his breath, “Not this time . . . you little shit,” which was surprising. His good mood was usually persistent. But we had been walking a long time. Everyone was sore and tired, and I guess even Fred had his moments.

  The air felt damp and cold and smelled like aged water and algae. There didn’t seem to be great ventilation, so we held off on starting a fire. I went to log out to rest in the Soul Space but got an error.

  Logout unavailable in current location.

  Right. We’d had a whole discussion about that. I sighed and resigned myself to a thin bedroll next to the others. We discussed and decided it would be best to always have someone keep watch throughout the night. I wasn’t super convinced it was needed. Typical dungeon mechanics seemed to always be initiated by the players on the entrance to a boss room, and since we hadn’t seen any pathing mobs . . . eh . . . Still, I didn’t mind the added security.

  Clara took the first watch. I laid back and struggled to fall asleep on the hard floor, tossing and turning. My mind raced, and my heart pounded. It was so dark here. A small part of me recognized the panic attack for what it was before it hit. It broke against my barrier of memories. But the black glass held. I watched the memories as if through thick black tinted glasses that were the wrong prescription. They beckoned me to remember. I saw blood melting its way through snow. My throat was dry from the desert air. I pushed it all away, finally welcoming the exhaustion that swept me away.