[Chapter 131. Dungeon 101]

The iron braziers flanking the entrance flickered with a weak, dying firelight as Searanox approached the mouth of the level five dungeon. The dancing flames cast long, jagged shadows across the gathered crowd of survivors, making their haggard faces look even more hollow in the gloom. He came to a halt, his heavy, armored boots crunching on the gravel, and his eyes swept over the group with the detached efficiency of a predator counting its prey. He performed a quick mental tally.

"Good. It seems you can follow basic instructions. No need for me to drag any more of you out of your beds tonight," he said, his voice carrying its usual tone of cold indifference. He paused, his gaze narrowing as he looked at the line of faces. "But I notice a distinct lack of variety. Why are there only men here?"

Samantha, standing slightly off to the side and looking smaller than ever in the presence of the agitated crowd, started to explain. "Thomas always said—" she began, her voice shaky, but she cut herself short the moment Searanox raised a single, gauntleted hand.

"Look at me, Samantha," Searanox commanded, his voice dropping into a low, dangerous register. He waited in the heavy silence, the only sound the crackling of the braziers, until she finally forced herself to meet his gaze. "Do I look like Thomas to you? Do I sound like a man who cares about how things used to be done in this graveyard of a city?"

She swallowed hard and slowly shook her head.

"Then we’ve cleared that up. From this moment forward, assume everything Thomas told you was the rambling of a short-sighted amateur." He gestured sharply back toward the residential ruins of the city. "Go. Bring me four women. Now."

As she turned and ran off into the darkness, Searanox turned his attention back to the men. They were muttering among themselves, a low ripple of discontent spreading through the ranks. "The rest of you can use this time productively. Decide among yourselves which five of you won't be entering the portal. I have a quota, and you currently exceed it."

A heated, frantic debate erupted almost instantly. The night air was filled with a cacophony of overlapping voices, each man desperate to avoid whatever fate lay beyond the swirling blue rift.

"I have two kids to feed! I can't risk it!" one man shouted.

"My wife is sick; she needs me there in case the fever breaks!" another countered.

Excuses, pleas, and frantic justifications flew back and forth like shrapnel. Searanox watched them for a moment, then pressed his gauntleted fingers to his temples, rubbing them in a slow, rhythmic motion to stave off the headache their cowardice was giving him.

"Silence!" he roared.

The murmurs died down instantly, the sudden quiet heavy and oppressive. When he spoke again, his voice was like a chilled blade. "I don't care about your personal problems. I don't care about your families, and I certainly don't care about your opinions. I have a rough idea of the 'training' Thomas provided, which is to say, he provided none. I refuse to waste potential assets by haphazardly clearing a level five dungeon with a disorganized mob."

He scanned the crowd, his eyes lingering on a few men who looked ready to bolt. "If even one of you were to die in there tonight, it wouldn't be a tragedy—it would be a fucking insult to my competence. To lose a single person to a level five dungeon while I am physically present? No. That won't happen. Not under my watch."

A wave of confused murmurs spread through the men. They looked at each other, unsure if they should feel insulted or strangely reassured. Before the conversation could evolve, Samantha returned, four women trailing behind her. They looked terrified, their eyes darting toward the portal and then back to Searanox.

"Come on, pick up the pace," Searanox told the group, stepping toward the line of men. "Now, as I said... four—no, make it five people. You go home."

When another minute of tense, circular discussion passed with no resolution, Searanox lost his patience. He stepped forward with a predatory grace, physically reaching into the crowd. He grabbed five men by their shoulders or clothes, his grip unyielding, and pushed them back away from the group. They stumbled over their own feet, shock registering on their faces.

"You five. Go home. Now. The rest of you? Follow me."

Without waiting for a response, Searanox turned and walked through the swirling blue energy of the portal. The world blurred for a micro-second before he arrived inside the Corpse Lantern Cave.

The interior was exactly as he remembered it—damp, smelling of ancient dust and stagnant water. The cyan lanterns lining the stone walls pulsed with an eerie light, pushing back the oppressive darkness of the deep tunnels. One by one, the men and women filed in behind him, their shoes echoing hollowly as they filled the narrow entry tunnel.

Searanox performed another headcount, his brow furrowing as the numbers didn't add up. "One is missing. I count only nineteen."

Before anyone could offer an excuse, a man in his mid-twenties with an average build and alert eyes did something unexpected. Without saying a word, he simply turned around and walked back through the portal, vanishing into the blue light.

Searanox watched the spot where the man had disappeared, his internal clock ticking. A moment later, the young man stepped back through the rift, returning to the dungeon.

`So, the dungeon allows for immediate re-entry without a cooldown or penalty. Good to know. The system doesn't lock the instance.`

"Samantha asked if she should go back and get another person to fill the spot," the young man said, speaking up with a surprising amount of composure compared to the others. It was only then that Searanox realized Samantha hadn't followed them inside yet.

"No, but she should come in," Searanox responded.

The man nodded, ducked back through the portal once more, and returned a few seconds later with Samantha trailing behind him. She looked pale, her breath hitching as she took in the skeletal remains scattered near the entrance.

"Good. Now that we're all here, get comfortable," Searanox said, stepping further into the tunnel. "The majority of you will stay right here. Two of you, however, will follow me. I have questions that need answering, and I intend to provide a live demonstration of how a professional clears a zone."

He paused, looking directly at the young man who had shown initiative by stepping out of the dungeon without being told. "And since you acted on your own accord and showed a modicum of initiative, you've qualified to be my primary student."

"Me?" the young man asked, pointing a thumb at his own chest, his voice tensed with a mix of fear and curiosity.

"Yes, you. Come forward. And bring Samantha with you."

As they both approached and stood before him, Searanox held out his gauntleted hand in a rare gesture of formality. "My name is Searanox. What’s yours?"

The man took the hand hesitantly, his grip firm but shaking slightly. "Rayan."

Searanox nodded, then his gaze dropped to Samantha’s feet. She was standing on the cold, damp stone floor entirely barefoot, her toes curling against the grit. "You don't want to be walking through a dungeon barefoot, Samantha. The ground is covered in bone shards and filth. Put these on."

He reached into his storage ring and retrieved a pair of spare, rugged leather boots, handing them to her. As she took them, he flicked his wrist, and a Basic Air Drone materialized beside him with a soft, electrical hum.

"For the rest of you," Searanox called out to the group huddled near the entrance, "you will sit here. Read your books, talk quietly, do whatever you need to pass the time. But you do not leave this dungeon until this drone disappears. You don't need to walk any further into the tunnels. You stay in this safe zone. Is that clear? Any questions?"

"Does this mean... we're safe here?" one man asked, his voice echoing.

"Uh, what exactly are we supposed to be doing while you're gone?" another asked.

A woman spoke up from the side, "Sir, what if we have to use the bathroom?"

Searanox gave a sharp, dismissive nod. "Great. No questions. Fantastic to hear that you all understood exactly what I said."

A small gasp escaped Samantha’s lips as she pulled on the boots. The leather seemed to ripple and flex, magically shrinking and adjusting its shape to perfectly fit her slender feet. "They... they shrunk. They fit perfectly."

"Yes, it’s a standard enchantment. Very fascinating. Now, come along," he said, turning his back on the group.

As he walked further down the tunnel, he summoned two Basic Assault Drones and a Cargo Drone. The assault drones immediately accelerated, zipping off into the tunnels ahead to scout for threats. The cargo drone took up a lumbering position at the rear of their small trio.

As they moved deeper in, the ground became littered with random, weathered piles of bones. Behind them, the cargo drone began to work plucking the cyan lanterns from the stone walls and store them in its hold.

"Rayan, I want the both of you to memorize the layout of this section. Pay attention to everything I point out," Searanox said flatly. The sound of their boots echoed against the damp stone walls, creating a rhythmic, hollow cadence. "This dungeon is on the lower end of the threat spectrum, provided you don't get trapped in the narrow tunnels that come later. Control the space, and you control the outcome."

"Okay," Rayan said, his eyes darting around the tunnel, trying to adjust to the dim, pulsating cyan glow.

"As you two probably haven't noticed yet... my drone is gathering every lantern we pass," Searanox noted. "In the future, you’ll want to do the same. Light sources like these will come in handy when you're deeper in the dungeon." After a beat, he added, "Oh, and bring a sturdy stick with you next time."

Samantha, who was still looking down at her new boots with a look of wonder, looked up, perplexed. "A stick? Why would we need a stick?"

"To hang your lantern on, dear. You’ll want it a bit further out front," Searanox explained as they rounded a corner and entered the first major chamber—the Pit of Bones. "This will be our first stop."

He came to a halt and turned to face them. As he did, one of his hovering drones was already firing at everything that moved, the sharp crack-hiss of energy beams filling the room. Skeletons were beginning to pull themselves together from the massive piles of bones on the floor, their ribcages clicking and clattering.

A sharp shriek erupted from Samantha as she saw the undead rising. Rayan flinched back, his body tensing, his knuckles turning white as he clenched his fists, but to his credit, he remained silent.

"This is the spot where you will have to do some counting..." Searanox ignored their visible terror and continued his lecture with clinical detachment. "You'll want to aim for the heads. Shatter the skull, and the magical anchor holding the bones together dissipates. It’s exactly like the movies you’ve seen."

Rayan found his voice as the last of the initial wave of bone fragments settled back into the dust. "Do we have to destroy a certain number of them? Why do we need to count?"

"Close enough to the truth." Searanox watched as his drone vaporized another skeleton's skull mid-rise. "The goal is to stay under nine hundred total kills in this specific chamber. They won't all spawn at once—usually five at a time, maximum. The faster you clear each wave, the faster you can move through. But you do not leave this room until you've killed at least eight hundred."

Samantha’s new boots scraped against the bone fragments as she shifted uncomfortably. "Why would we want to stay under nine hundred? Is there a penalty?"

"You'll see soon enough, dear." Searanox stepped over a shattered femur and started down the next tunnel without looking back to see if they were following. "This time, I’ll be pushing the limit. I intend to do roughly twelve hundred kills myself."

"Wait, twelve hundred?" Rayan fell into step behind him, his brow furrowed. "Didn't you just say that was bad? Why would you do that if it's dangerous?"

"Yes," Searanox replied, the word hanging in the damp, heavy air of the cave. "But I can handle the consequences. You cannot."

Searanox's voice echoed against the stone walls, sounding deeper and more resonant in the confined space. "Now, we're going to talk. This is going to take a while."