I was still standing before the exit of the boss chamber, the massive doors firmly sealed, waiting to be thrown open.

  My mind was a total circus—thoughts, fears (not that I’d ever admit to them—so much for that Fear immunity), and that damn se spinning around like a wild carousel. I k was just the lingering effects of the weaver’s head games; it had to be. But why did it feel like a punch to the clit?

  It’s a bitter pill to swallow, but here’s the truth bomb: my childhood wasly a sob story. Sure, my stepdad could win an award for World’s Biggest Ass, and maybe my mom was a bit absent. Oh, and yeah, I lost my dad young, but don’t go crafting some dark, twisted vilin in story for me. No creepy uncles, no s in the basement—shocker, right?

  I guess I popped out of the womb with a restless spirit, always chasing the big thing, holding onto the hope that maybe, just maybe, the grass was greener oher side. Spoiler alert: it wasn’t. I’ve jumped in and out of more beds than I care to t, always on the hunt for something more—anything to fill that gaping void, pun totally intended. It’s always felt like something was off, like there’s a piece missing inside me—maybe it’s a cra my soul, or heck, maybe there was never anything there to begin with.

  Shaking off thoughts that seemed even more unhihan my usual brand of crazy—and trust me, that’s setting the bar pretty high—I noticed the status page still gring at me. There were three new immunities listed that I only vaguely remembered acquiring; it was all such a blur that the details had slipped through my grasp. However, my eyes were inexplicably drawn to Ethereal Awakening, as if it were some kind of lifeline or forbidden fruit.

  I let out a huff, half ughter, half despair, and hit cast. Why the hell not? Something in my bones screamed that I o know more. Scratch that—I was starving for more!

  As quickly as I could blink my eyes—wait, did I eveo blink? I knew I didn’t o breathe (or so I suspected). Yet here I was, huffing like a high-maintenance bride who didn’t get the cake she wanted—I do that a lot when I’m anxious, not that I’m admitting to any nerves. Nope. Not me. Still, it really made me wonder how much of Polymorph was just my subscious pulling the strings. But let’s be real, now wasn’t the time to dive into aential crisis or pohe meiy shapeshifting. I gnced around, finding myself ba the snowy, eerily picturesque winter wondernd of the forest.

  It was still night, and the fire that once roared in the background had dwio sm embers. Their glow cast eerie shadows across the snow, mingling with the wind-swept fkes to create a hauntingly desote ndscape. No sign of the soldiers remained, only two bodies lying in the crimson-stained snow. I approached with unsteady steps, my heart inexplicably heavy as I passed the man and k beside the woman—Aislinn, as the corpse beside her had shouted during the fray. Her lifeless eyes seemed to hold mine, sparking a wave of sadness I couldn’t expin.

  With a trembling hand, I brushed back her hair, startled to find myself in the form of my past life, tattoos and all. I quickly shoved that thought aside. What felt even stranger was the touch of her soft, cold skin against my fingers, making this pce seem far more real than st time. And suddenly, I found myself in tears once more—that was starting to get really annoying!

  “Who are you?” I whispered gently, not uanding why my voice was thick with emotion and why this stranger’s lifeless face would tug so sharply at something deep withi seemed my new immuo Fear, Dread, and Sorrow didn’t do squat against the natural versions of them.

  Ugh, that’s such bullshit!

  “He’s still breathing,” someone hissed from behind me.

  I spun around to find three figures patched-together fur rags standing over the man I had thought was dead.

  “Bloody Romans,” one cursed uheir breath.

  “Do ynize him?” another asked, their voice tight with .

  “He’s one of the Ii, but I ’t pce his he third replied. “We should get him back to Queen Boudicca.”

  “I don’t think he’ll survive the journey,” the seurmured skeptically.

  “We have to try,” the first insisted, their tone firm with resolve.

  “What about the girl?”

  “Her soul has gone off with the spirits. We o bandage his wounds and move quickly before the Romans find us.”

  There I stood, an unseen presence, eyebrows raised, as I watched the three men strip the man, exposing his brutal wounds in a desperate hope of saving him—but even I knew he was doomed. Their eyes darted around, vigint and expeg trouble at any moment. I gnced down at Aislinn’s lifeless form. Oddly, the se before me began to blur, the figures dissolving into the encroag shadows.

  “Shit, he’s stopped breathing!” the closest one shouted, paniging his voice. “Damnit, he’s not going to make it.”

  The darkhied, swallowing the details of the se until only the forest remained.

  “He’s dead,” was the st thing I heard as the shadows retreated, leavierly alone.

  I gnced down to where Aislinn’s corpse had been, but there was nothing. fused, I stepped further into the forest, hoping to uncover more of this elusive se, desperate to see what came , to learn why it affected me so deeply.

  “I wouldn’t go any further into the woods, dear,” a voice called out from behind me.

  By the way, I was seriously getting tired of that happening.

  I turo find an elderly woman staring at me, a pronounced hun her twisted back. Her skin was like part, one eye clouded and milky, givihe look of a withered hag. Yet, despite her frail and a appearahe forest seemed to bend arouhe trees almost leaning in as if paying homage. Her tattered bck dress fluttered in the breeze, adding to the aura of quiet power she exuded.

  “Why not?” I asked curiously, uo tear my eyes away from her.

  “There’s nothing but old nightmares that will haunt your soul the further you go.”

  “Old nightmares?”

  “Things better left unknown, dear,” she replied with a ki sad smile, devoid of aion or malice. “That being said, I’m very curious how you found your way here.”

  “I used a skill called Ethereal Awakening.”

  “Fasating, that’s ahereal Horror Weaver’s ability. Though, I do not sense any of them having perished withihereal Pne,” she tilted her head as if verifying what she just stated.

  “I—I fought it in a dungeon,” I answered, feeling surprisingly self-scious. I couldn’t say why; I’ve never hesitated to speak my mind or tell off a boomer when needed, but I liked this old hag for the oddest reason I couldn’t expin.

  “Oh, well, that expins a great deal. Still, I haven’t seen one of your kind here in so, so very long,” she stared at me with that clouded eye as if she were looking at my very soul. “So very long,” she all but whispered.

  “Um, okay? What is this pce?” I asked, unsure what to make of that. “And what was it that I just witnessed?” I added, trying to collect my thoughts.

  “Just think of this part of the forest and all you’ve seen as a bad dream, deeply rooted in your very soul, dear. That said, it seems your time here is about to e to an end,” she said with a ki pained smile. As she spoke, the trees moved around her, shading her as she disappeared into the shadows of the forest. “I’m sorry I don’t have time to tell you more, but you’re wanted elsewhere,” her voice echoed from nowhere a everywhere.

  I turned, sensing something immensely beyond my prehension behind me, a, I could only feel a bit disgru everyone sneaking up on me like it was some ic prank.

  “There you are,” the—at times, third—voi my head chimed in, sounding both annoyed and desding.

  My eyes nded on a translut woman’s hand made of swirling soft blue mist with flickers of pink vapor, reag out of nothingness.

  “I have need of you, my Hopeless Crusader,” she tinued in that smug tone, you know, the one Karens use to address those they fih them. “Time to wake up and grow—quickly, if you are to be of any use. My patienly goes so far if I’m to take advantage of what’s already started. plete your task, and assion shall be yours.”

  And then, muy annoyand surprise, she flicked me in the forehead, sendiumbling onto my ass.

  “Ouch!” I reached up with a gooey bck hand, rubbing my forehead. “What the fuck, you bitch,” I swore as I gred up, only to find the imposing iron doors of the Bat Cave before me.

  “No time to dwell on old memories of a past you’ll never remember,” she said, her tone dripping with dession, whily added to my fusion. But what came really pissed me off.

  V:\Assion>SAFE_MODE

  AdminSystemOverride

  Admin:\Magic>Login_

  System Access Granted     [SAG]

  USER_Skills_Override.

  Deleting: [Ethereal Awakening]

  Refiguring...

  Data Accepted.

  Skill Deleted.

  Reinitializing Character Skills...

  Used Skill Poiurned.

  _

  V:\ActivateSpell_Override

  [Stelr Void]

  Description: Summon a pocket dimension by tearing through the veil into the void, creating an ephemeral space betweeies where the normal ws of physics are suspended.

  Status: Inactive

  Type: Unique

  Activation: Cast

  [Stelr Void] is now set as an active-cast.

  V:\>

  “You’ve got to be shitting me! What the actual fuck is this?” I yelled into the air, hands on my hips. Now, knowing without a doubt that the voice I’d often heard in my head wasn’t just a sign of mental illhough, let’s be real, that didn’t mean there wasn’t any. I now knew who it was: an admin, this Magic bitch. “I don’t sent!” I screamed, throwing my arms up and adding an exaggerated eye roll for emphasis.

  Sileno snarky ebao omnipote. Just me, sitting on my ass in the boss chamber, gring at the closed exit. Or was I alone? In my righteous tirade, I’d overlooked oiny, inve detail.

  I gnced down at my waist and spotted a long, pink, tongue-like tentacle ing around me.

  What the hell?

  I twisted around to find the treasure chest from the ter of the room, now wide open, revealing rows of sharp teeth.

  “Oh, you’ve got to be—”

  Its tongue yanked me off my ass, cutting my bitg short as it dragged me toward its gaping maw.

  ~

  Redtail paced in front of the boss chamber’s massive iron doors, his steps heavy with growing worry. Doubts about the slime’s survival cwed relentlessly at his sce. Initially, he had wished for its demise—it seemed far-fetched that some mythical system user from legend would swoop in to save them all.

  But this slime wasn’t just any system user; it recursor, a herald to a world that hadn’t yet joihe Moons of V?luspá. That reality he couldn’t ignore, especially after witnessing his own homeworld’s dramativergeh this damnable realm.

  Now, the stakes were entirely different. The slime o survive, not for itself, nor even for his own sake irieving the dungeon core, but for its people. As Drake Redtail tinued his anxious pag, the weight of guilt increasingly pressed down on his shoulders. He was many things, but he would not doom aire race—even if they were all slimes—by letting their Precursor perish. The guilt from his earlier iions mixed with a growing sense ency, deepening the lines of worry etched into his drakaran face.

  Redtail jumped, scales almost shaking loose, as the two doors burst open! A wave of greeinged with flickers of purple, surged from the chamber, f him to stumble back. The ford suddenness knocked him off his feet, sending him sprawling to the cold stone floor to narrowly avoid the inferno. Though the fmes came perilously close, they radiated ; instead, a chilling wave of death mana emanated from the fire.

  Gazing into the chamber, he saw a dark, feminine figure approag. Initially, he had dismissed her as an it—a mere slime—but now she appeared more elven-like, albeit without the majestic pointy ears, her features instead bearing the rounded simplicity akin to dwarfs and hyumans. Yet, she retained her slick, shiny bck exteriiving her a menag aura as she walked unscathed through what could only be ic fire, emerging from the doorway like a dark goddess reborn.

  Swallowing his fear, Redtail mao ask the obvious, “I take it you won?”

  Her response came with a gre that could curdle blood, her haunting, glowing e eyes pinning him like an i. “I. Fug. Hate. Mimics!” she growled furiously. “Please tell me that’s the st of those fuckers in this dungeon!”

  “S-Sadly, no. This dueems with them, though most should have perished when the dungeon core was removed. But a few of the stronger ones might still linger,” Redtail replied, each word cautious, his body tensing for any backsh.

  “Fuck!” she exploded, then quickly regained posure. “It’s fine, Bke. Yeah, it’s fine. No, it’s not fine! Yes, it is, I said it is, so it’s fine,” she muttered to herself, a bizarre self-reassurahat made Redtail edge away, only to freeze at her and.

  “I need something to beat the shit out of,” she hissed. “Lizard! Where’s the boss? I’d prefer something that doesn’t mess with my head! I just want a fistfight.”

  Redtail blinked, processing her demands. “Umm—wouldn’t it be best to guide you to the dungeo?”

  “Boss!” she snapped impatiently.

  “The Red Toad should be a straightforward brawl, but it’s closer to the entrance.”

  “Don’t care, take me now!”

  “Y-Yes,” Redtail stammered, nodding eagerly yet fearfully as he cmbered back to his feet.

  1

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