"You look absolutely geous, Shy." Ara said, examining him from head to foot. Elnor looked at him as well and blushed when Shiloh caught her eye. She offered him a small smile befoing to the ter to collect the rest of his clothing and his sed pair of boots, which she vanished into her iory. Twil nodded her appreciation as well, and Shiloh turo thaher, only to fihrusting six more pairs of underwear at him.

  "Oh, uh, thanks." Shiloh said, taking the garments. "All the outfits look really great, Heather. Thank you so much."

  "You're very wele." The woman smiled widely. "You were an excellent model to work with. I do hope you e again."

  Shiloh smiled back. "I'm sure I will, with how well this all turned out."

  After many more thanks and farewells, they escaped Heather's shop and found themselves ie afternoon streets of Chattery.

  "Are you going to carry those all the way back to the tavern?" Twil asked, indig the underwear Shiloh was still clutg.

  "Um... yeah? Did you want to?" He asked, fused.

  Twil gave him a ed look. "Just stow them in your iory."

  "Oh. Yeah, of course." Shiloh muttered, feeling like an idiot. Having an iory was definitely going to take some getting used to. He focused on the menu, opehe iory, and willed the underwear into it. They vanished from his hands and appeared before his eyes, safe and sound in... what? A pocket dimension? He shrugged the question from his mind. It didn't really matter.

  When they reached their rooms above the tavern, everyone filed into Shiloh and Elnor's room, where they found his bed miraculously ed up from the night before.

  "Did someone e and ge the sheets?" Shiloh asked nervously, imagining a disgusted ing dy handling the ruined fabric.

  "Are they different than the ones you slept on st night?" Elnor asked, fused.

  "They're ." Shiloh responded. Ara snorted.

  "There's a refreshing entment pced upon them." Twil expined. "Every day, usually at noon, the sheets are magically ed. That way there's o ge them out for fresh ones."

  "That's really ve." Shiloh replied, a wave of relief washing over him.

  "Yeah. We'd hate for the owo know you got railed s-" Ara started, but Elnor elbowed her iomach.

  "Enough of that, you impossible woman." She said. "We o show Shiloh his new equipment."

  Ara's eyes lit up at this, and she immediately began pulling stuff out of her iory and tossing them onto his bed. Elnor and Twil followed suit, and Shiloh soon had his bed filled with various items. There were the outfits Heather had made, which Shiloh put in his iory as soon as Elnor had set them down.

  They bought him a Staff of Ice Spikes, which Ara expined ah a mana pool would be able to use by eling their mana into it, though its effects were less potent than someoh an Ice Spike spell offered from their css. This was followed by a Wand of Minor Healing, which would allow him to heal them in bat, though at a lower rate. They also got him a pair of bck bracers, which Twil said were ented to increase casting speed, with staves and wands as well as with any spells he might acquire iure.

  After these magical pieces of gear came the more mundane aspects of dungeon delving. He got a couple of waterskins and a month's supply of rations, which were surprisingly pact. Bs, cloaks, rope, a ntern and oil, flint and steel fhting fires, part and charcoal for writing on the go, and a single red vial, which he reized as another one of the health potions Ara had given him.

  He disappeared all of it into his ietting redder and redder in the face as he saw how much mohey had spent on him. He didn't even know what to say. Of course these things o be purchased, but he had always been an indepe person aed the idea that he had wiped out their savings.

  "Thank you." He finally managed after fighting down his embarrassment and insecurities. "It really means a lot to me that you would go to these lengths."

  "You're very wele." Elnor said with a smile. Ara looked quite awkward as well, not meeting his eye at his heartfelt thanks. Twil simply looked aloof, as she always did unless she was using him.

  Nobody said anything for a moment until Shiloh remembered somethiher had told him. "What are Haufners?"

  Shiloh could have sworn he felt the temperature in the room drop twenty degrees in the silehat greeted this question.

  "They're bad people." Ara finally said.

  At Shiloh's look of fusion, Twil eborated. "They are people who pretend to be looking for an additional party member, theake said party member somewhere dangerous, usually the dungeon, rob them of all their belongings and leave them for dead. Then, they get back to town and look for another member to round out their ranks and do it all ain."

  Shiloh looked aghast at the three of them, and Elnor slowly nodded. "They're called Haufners because of a famous trial from three hundred years ago. A group of adventurers were caught doing this by anroup, and they were brought to the capital of the empire, Ingval, to stand trial. The leader was a man named Igor Haufner, and his only argument was that each adveakes the risk of having bad teammates whehey decide to party up. They were all victed and executed, but the publicity of the trial spread the idea of doing this to bad people all over the empire."

  "That's... horrible..." Shiloh said quietly.

  They all sat silently for several minutes. Shiloh began feeling nervous, regretting that he'd spoiled the mood. He began thinking of other topics t them back up, and suddenly remembered he heir advice.

  "I'm Level 5!" He excimed. The girls jumped at the sudden hen began gratuting him.

  "I thought you were only Level 3 yesterday!" Ara said.

  "I was. I gaiwo levels this m." Shiloh smiled.

  Ara and Twil both turo look at Elnor, who buried her extremely red fa her hands. Ara's mouth split into a chesire grin and she elbowed Elnor.

  "You fucked two whole levels into Shy? In one night? What a stud!" Ara grinned wolfishly.

  "I must say that is quite impressive." Twil added calmly.

  "Sh-sh-shut u-up." Elnor stammered.

  "e on, you've got to be at least a little proud of that." Ara tickled Elnor in the ribs. Elnhed and swatted the offending hands away.

  "Oh, don't tease her." Shiloh said, grinning. "It's not her fault she's a mania the sheets."

  Ara ughed so hard she choked while Elnor turned her mortified gaze on Shiloh. "Sh-Shiloh!" She excimed in e.

  "He does make a good point." Twil stated. "It's not your fault, Elnor, if you go longer and harder than the rest of us."

  Elnor's face turned so red, Shiloh was afraid she would soon die from the embarrassment. "Okay, okay. That's enough." He said graciously, stepping over and hugging Elnhtly. "Thank you for helping me level up."

  Elnor didn't say anything for a while, theually whispered. "Y-you're ele."

  Ara fought to stifle her giggles long enough to speak. "So, Shy, what cool sex things do we get to do now?"

  "Well, the level four skills were kind of useless, to be ho, so I went ahead and took Aphrodite's Advocate." Shiloh said.

  "That's the ohat makes it easier for you to iate for us, right?" Elnor asked, fighting down her blush.

  "Yeah that's it." Shiloh responded. "It's not great for bat, but after the way I saw you all being treated here in town..."

  "That's very sweet of you, Shiloh." Twil said. "It's really not a great skill. We make do as is, but the thought is very sweet."

  "Oh." Shiloh said, his face falling a bit. "Well, maybe it will e in useful ter."

  "I'm sure it will." Elnor reassured him.

  "What did you do with your stat points?" Ara asked.

  "I put them in Divinity." Shiloh said, suddenly w if he was making all the wrong choices.

  "That was smart." Twil stated. "You definitely want to focus your main stat in the early levels."

  "How about the skill?" Elnor cut in.

  "I haven't chose. I was hoping to get your opinions." Shiloh admitted. "The first one is called Intercessor, and it makes me take reduced damage if I take a hit meant for one of you."

  All three of them shook their heads emphatically, and Shiloh tinued with a chuckle. "Yeah, I kind of figured that one was a bust. The other one is called Feat of Persistence."

  "You got a feat?!" Ara blurted out.

  "Um... yeah? I guess so." Shiloh replied. "It's name includes 'Feat'."

  "Anything called a 'Feat' is generally a very powerful skill, which you only get by aplishiraordinary acts." Twil ented. "What does 'Feat of Persistence' say?"

  "It says, 'You have proven yourself capable of going the distance. You no longer incur exhaustion by missing sleep. Gain +5 Endurand +5 Focus.' My only wonder is what exhaustion is, and how important avoiding it is." Shiloh said.

  "That's an incredibly powerful skill." Elnor informed him. "Besides gettiat points in a skill at level five, which is already very good, exhaustion is something you always want to avoid. It's a status effect that show up if you go for too long without sleeping, or if your sleep isn't restful enough, or if you push yourself too hard for too long. Once you get exhaustion, you have to rest for a full day in order to get rid of it."

  "What does it actually do, though?" Shiloh asked.

  "It reduces all of your stats to fifty pert of their totals." Ara replied. "It's about the most debilitating status effect you get, except for curses."

  "Oh, yeah. That sounds horrible." Shiloh murmured. "I guess that would be an excellent skill to take, then."

  "Absolutely!" Ara agreed, a grin creeping bato her face. She looked over at Elnor. "I am curious what extraordinary act you performed to earn it, though. Perhaps some kind orous interpersonal activity that took all night?"

  Elnor elbowed Ara, but didn't respond. Shiloh had ahough. "Do you think Elnor will qualify for it as well? She was asleep for most of the night, but she was still... um..."

  Ara's grin grew even wider as she eyeballed the elf o her. "You fucked him in your sleep for so long you earned him a feat?! You really are a monster, El!"

  Elnor shut her eyes and took two deep breaths before responding. "I think it would be better if we focused on something more productive."

  "Well, I think you ought to take the Feat of Persistence, Shiloh." Twil said. "It is incredibly powerful, and the free stats definitely won't hurt."

  "Okay. I'll go ahead and lock that in." Shiloh replied. He brought up the sele and firmed Feat of Persistence. "So, I think we should find a real tank if possible, and we should probably level up a bit more befoing back to the dungeon. What do you all think?"

  "I definitely agree with finding a real tank." Ara said immediately. "Leveling up is less of a priority, I think."

  "Leveling up is important as well." Elnor rebutted. "Shiloh doesn't have our natural strength or resistances. If we're only going in with five people, he should probably be at least Level 8."

  "Oh I don't think that'll be a problem." Ara replied with with a sly smile. "We'll just have to leave him aloh you for a few more nights."

  Elnor flushed and looked at the floor.

  "So, where do we go about looking for a tank?" Shiloh asked, sparing Elnor further embarrassment by ging the subject.

  "The Adventurer's Guild." Twil told him. "We'll o get you officially signed up, first, though. Also, we'll o officially designate ourselves as a party."

  "Why aren't you already?" Shiloh looked at her, puzzled.

  "There was no reason to. Designating ourselves as a party just allows the Guild to solicit us, or for us to solicit other members. We weren't ied in finding additional members when we went into the dungeon, so there was o form a true party." Twil expined. "We all had tister to be given the current location of the closest dungeorance, but that was where our affiliation with the Guild ended."

  "Current location? Closest entrawil's answer only gave Shiloh even more questions. "You're saying the dungeon we were in had multiple exits? Exits that move around?"

  "It's slightly more plex than that." Elnor interjected, the blush finally having faded from her normally pale face. "The dungeon only ever has o, but it has tless entrahat shift around on the surface. Wherever you ehe dungeon, that's where you'll exit the dungeon. On entrance has been used, it bees uo be found by anyone else until whoever entered either dies or leaves."

  "Well then how was Haufner caught, if nobody was able to go in after him?"

  "Once you're ihe dungeon, it's possible to run into other parties, though unlikely. We aren't sure exactly how it works, but every time you ehe dungeon it seems to be in a new figuration. Adventurers have been trying to record as many figurations as possible to see if there is a pattern that help us navigate it, but we haven't met with much luck."

  "So far, there are over three huhousand unique figurations that have been recorded by parties who made it safely back." Twil stated. "There has only been oed figuration, as far as I'm aware, and the sed instance of it occurred hundreds of years after the first."

  "It seems kind of poio keep rec figurations then, doesn't it?" Shiloh asked. "If there's already a sample size that rge with only o, it seems like a waste of effort. It's not like you carry around a record of all three huhousand figurations with you, so even if you do end up getting a copy, it won't do you any good while you're inside."

  At this, Elnor withdrew a small device. It was shaped like an oval, about three inches long and half as wide, and perhaps half an inch thick. There was a small i on the surface, which Elnor pressed her thumb into before setting it down on her bed. The four of them crowded around and, after a brief dey, a holograph appeared above the device. It looked kind of like the system they used for characters, but it didn't follow Shiloh's vision around, instead remaining right where it was.

  "This is an archive key." Elnor said. "It tains all recorded figurations of the dungeon, and it maps our own figuration wheer. It usually takes between five and ten rooms to find out if you have a repeat figuration, but o detects a patterween your current yout and one in the records, it will alert you."

  "Wow." Shiloh breathed, watg as Ara flicked between figurations on the hologram, showing him a diverse colle of rooms on eae. He noticed as she went through that there were quite a few, perhaps one ien, that didn't have more than two rooms, while most of them ranged between ten and thirty rooms, with the rger quantities being far rarer. He also noticed a very small portion with huge amounts of rooms, upwards of a hundred crammed onto the s.

  "What are those?" He asked when Ara passed one such figuration.

  "Raids." Ara said with a wrinkle of her nose. "Every so often, the empire will offer a portion of the treasury as a bounty for anyone who access the floor of the dungeon. When that happens, there's often a rge, well-known party who will recruit many other parties to help them in clearing a floor and finding the boss. Defeating the boss unlocks the floor for everyone."

  "How many floors are there?"

  "Seventeen." Twil replied. "The seveh floor was unlocked two years ago after the most ret raid. The Fires of Desotion, the party leading the raid, went in with a total of three hundred and thirty-three adventurers, all of them level eighty and above, aed the boss of the sixteenth floor. Only nine people survived. Sihat raid sisted of nearly every high-level adventurer in the empire, there hasn't been a raid si would be foolish to offer the bounty just to have lower level adventurers get themselves killed trying to colle it, so the Emperor hasn't set one sihen."

  "Only nine people survived out of over three hundred?" Shiloh whispered. "Is a boss fight really that lethal?"

  "The entire dungeon is lethal, Shiloh." Elnor said with steel in her voice. "Acc to the survivors, there were only seventy of them left when they challehe boss. Every time you go into the dungeon, you are risking your life against forces that are not found anywhere else in the world."

  "Then why do you do it?"

  "Some people do it for the loot that be taken from chests within the dungeon. That be quite lucrative, if you don't get killed." Twil said ftly. "But the orying to delver deeper do it to reach the Dungeon Core."