Michelle was surprised to have gotten what seemed like a random message from a stranger overnight. Through her Dungeon Messenger, not her phone; that wasn't an item that usually got spam or anything like it. Her first glance at the message, though, clarified everything.

  "Jerry says you're looking for party members. A friend and I split from our group recently. We both live in the Houston area as well if you'd like to meet sometime."

  The sender was one Nikki Sugarsnap, which was not a name she recognized. Instead of replying, she pulled out her phone and texted Nin with a summary, then finished getting up.

  She came out of the shower to find a missed call but no voicemail, so she got dressed quickly and called back. "Hey, Nin," she said, as she finished pulling on her shorts.

  "Hey yourself," Nin answered, sounding amused. "I assume Jerry didn't say anything to you?"

  "No. I guess I could ask." Michelle shrugged to herself. "What do you think about meeting them?"

  "I mean, we only have their word that Jerry is the one who passed along the invitation. That, even before the question of whether you trust his judgment."

  That was a point, so Michelle used her messenger to bounce a message to Jerry. Predictably, the response was almost instantaneous.

  "Yes, I recommended you to Nikki. She and Jenna are both more experienced in the Run than y'all, but they separated from their group for personal reasons, and have had a bad time filling in for other groups recently. Neither are going to do anything weird."

  That last bit... well, she supposed she appreciated that Jerry was thinking about it, but she also took it as a given that if Jerry was recommending her to them, they weren't... like Jon. Or criminals in any other sense. Probably.

  "He says he recommended us," Michelle said out loud, so that Nin could hear her thoughts. "Apparently they're more experienced than us but have had a hard time finding a new group."

  "More experienced than us means anyone who has more than one Run behind them," Nin said, deadpan. "I assume he means, by a lot."

  "I would guess so."

  "I'm pretty free tomorrow if you want to try to schedule something. I'd assume it'd be meeting in the Alpha portal somewhere."

  "I mean we could, but if they're local, we might be able to find a restaurant?" She wasn't sure how much she was convinced, herself. "I should ask where in the Houston area they are."

  A few more back-and-forth messages pinned Nikki and her friend as also on the south side of the beltway, more to the east, past I-45 and south of the battlescar. That close, if they were to meet in the Alpha Dungeon, they would be entering through Pearland themselves, so meeting at a restaurant outside or something would work just as well.

  It took some doing to sync everything up, mostly because Reese had a plan to spend time with his sister that afternoon, but afternoon was all Nikki's friend Jenna was willing to commit to. Eventually, they agreed to meet sans Reese, mid-afternoon at a local frozen yogurt place.

  Once that was all worked out, Nin said she had stuff to do, so Michelle gave her some space, and sat and thought about what she would ask at a meeting like that. It had bothered her that Lauren hadn't asked her role, so obviously that was going to be part of it. Takes... for most people, they could shift a little bit, since they'd be leaving their class behind when they entered their avatar, but that was also kind of beside the point. Part of the Run was focusing on your skills, so picking some off-skill just to mesh with a group wasn't a great idea. It might work, for a while, but if you ever wanted to leave the Run and go back to Dungeoneering, you'd want to be training up the skills you actually plan to use.

  It took some thinking before Michelle realized that... wasn't necessarily a given. You didn't level up in the Run, of course, but you did get experience as a reward. Just mechanically leveling up was missing the point, but maybe that was the point of the Arena battles? To do real fights and prove your stats and skills before you level? Because the Run also would take experience back from you as a currency, if you felt like you were doing a shit job at proving your stats, you could reset it before you leveled.

  Like a lot of the Run, it made a frightening amount of sense, though she had no idea if anyone else had come to the same conclusion.

  Instead of thinking too hard about it, Michelle spent the morning drilling Hikari in more basic sword fighting. After her experience with Jerry, she had given up on the suburban Kendo club she had previously joined, and had to decide for herself what she considered the basics. The group had kept her going before then, when she needed someone to push her to master the basics, but they were also... suburban. There was something to them that really wasn't serious.

  Kind of like the various skill trainers she'd tried once or twice in the local area. It was more like the people involved were trying to find a niche to fill, and less like they really...

  Less like they were really experts at the Dungeon system? She supposed that made sense. Why would an expert at the Dungeon system sit around tutoring random people? Especially for chump change?

  As she watched Hikari struggling with her blade aura, Michelle considered that. There was so much to the world right now that made absolutely no sense. The whole concept of suburban Dungeon Skill trainers was ridiculous. It felt like it was meant to fit in another world, one that maybe the Earth would become someday, but it wasn't yet. It kind of felt like... no, she couldn't quite find the right words.

  "You're not being serious about this," Michelle noted, and Hikari looked at her with a frown. "The skill is activating, but most of the time, you aren't trying to really use it."

  "I'm only so smart, Chelle," Hikari said, but it rang hollow, like an excuse. With the AI upgrade...

  Michelle frowned back at the woman, and then suddenly pulled out the card. In addition to having an AI level, Hikari also had an Intelligence stat, and it... wasn't high. If anything, the Minion seemed focused on toughness and strength, like a generic melee monster. She flicked through her deck to confirm, but even White Fang had a higher intelligence score, mostly because the Mob was well rounded.

  "Right," Michelle stood up. "I'm gonna take you back to the Dungeon. Let's see if we can sort this out."

  A half hour later, Michelle was back in a practice space with another (or possibly the same) assistant.

  "Okay," she said, once she had summoned Hikari back into the room, and focused on the Assistant. "Let's talk about Minion stats. Obviously they upgrade with levels, but Minions and Mobs don't have classes, and I don't see anything on the cards about how they level up."

  The assistant gave her the kind of deeper smile that told her she was putting her finger on the right kind of question. "That's correct, there is no stored data about how Units level up. Like Runners, their stats are generally determined by what they do while gaining experience; that means that if you want to influence how your Units advance, you need to give them orders that reflect your focus."

  Another reason for Runners to train their Minions outside of the Run. But... Michelle frowned. There was a whole lot there that needed explaining. How could she give Hikari orders if she was too dumb to understand them? "What about starting stats? Can I adjust those?"

  "You can adjust starting stats with a point-buy system," the assistant answered. "There are also Defect traits that act as a Seal. They cause negative conditions until you buy them off, in exchange for more starting points." A listing came up in the periphery of her interface, and Michelle glanced through it.

  There weren't a lot on the list, and as she might have expected, the least-meaningful Defects also gave her the fewest points back. Michelle considered one with a frown. "Can I give commands to a Minion who's deaf?"

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  "If you use Zone Authority, or non-verbal cues, yes."

  Michelle gave the NPC a look. "Authority?"

  "Zone Authority is what allows you to command units and start construction projects. By default, it is only available at your Headquarters Overhead Map."

  By default. "Meaning you can purchase Advantages to use Authority elsewhere."

  "There are Advantages that give you additional options, yes."

  Michelle sighed. That was deliberately unhelpful, and since Jon had been commander last time, it's not like she knew what the options were. "So if I made Hikari start deaf..." She saw Hikari grimace at that, but continued the question, "I could still communicate with hand gestures, or issue orders if I was at the Headquarters Map."

  "Correct."

  "Great." She could understand why that Defect granted a fair number of starting points. It wouldn't be cheap to buy off, either. "I understand why that's a high-cost defect, but what about Mute? Basic minions don't talk much anyway."

  "The Mute Defect seals all outgoing data channels, including non-verbal communication and Zone Insight."

  Michelle just gave the Assistant a look, and after a moment, the NPC got the hint.

  "Insight is used by the Headquarters Overhead Map to show the position and status of your units. Some Advantages use the Insight link, for example, to report enemies to the Headquarters Overhead Map automatically."

  That made more sense. "So if Hikari were Mute, and I had the Unit Link and a Minimap, I wouldn't be able to see her or any enemies she knew about."

  "Correct."

  That stung more than just not being able to talk. Though... that part of it was only really a downside if she had a couple Advantages, or was standing at her Headquarters Map. Possibly the Insight thing had even more uses than the assistant was letting on, or else she would discover that not knowing what your minion was doing was a much bigger deal than she thought.

  Actually, now that she thought about it... that wasn't great. Especially if Insight meant she didn't even know if Hikari was alive or dead.

  After another few moments staring at the list, Michelle slid it away. "Show me Hikari's starting stats. Hikari, tell me what you think about this, too."

  As she had guessed from her current stats, Hikari's template looked like a generic melee unit, more like a brawler with maybe a little dexterity than anything she would call a Kensei. Michelle traded down Hikari's toughness for agility, and strength for dexterity, without a second thought. After a few moments of hesitation, she looked to her Minion.

  "If you want me to be smarter, it's probably better to start with more than that," Hikari said, nodding at the stat page.

  "I know," Michelle said. "The question is what we trade down for it."

  "Toughness, and maybe agility. I saw the way you fight. If you want me to emulate you at all, I need to understand what you were doing. And, I guess, maybe understand the enemy, too."

  Michelle looked back over the numbers nervously. In the end, all of the battle stats were important. What could she afford to do to Hikari in order to get a few more points back? Without crippling her?

  Michelle pulled up the Defects again, but they were far harsher than she wanted to experiment with. In the end, she lowered Hikari's strength and toughness again, boosting both her Intelligence and Willpower. Her minion was on her way to becoming a glass cannon, relying on the Skill and her own teaching for attack power and defense, but maybe it would work out.

  With a grimace, she added a Bad Ankle defect, that would randomly trip her up when she was moving around. It was just enough points to bring Hikari's starting intelligence up another two notches – not an insignificant boost for a level one character.

  "We should try practicing," Michelle decided, and looked at the assistant. "Can we reset her level to one for this training session?"

  "The correct way to adjust your Minion's levels is with overlay cards," the assistant said. "Level overlays can only ever be adjusted downwards. Currently, you only have her current level overlay; if you adjust it downwards, she won't be able to return to her current form."

  Michelle stared at the assistant for a moment, and sighed. "So I guess I'm supposed to buy another one."

  The assistant smiled brightly at her, and another interface window popped up.

  In the end, Michelle bought two more overlay cards – one for herself, and one for Hikari. That thought made her to adjust her own Avatar's starting stats, ending up with a spread similar to Hikari's, though since she was a Runner, she had a larger starting budget. Most of that budget she put into her own intelligence, since she had hated the fuzzy feeling in her head that came with the lowered level.

  With that, though, Michelle found herself tapping her Avatar card – with a Level 1 overlay, and her normal Takes – to a glowing blue panel that showed up when she moved towards the spawn door. A familiar splitting and pulling sensation left her standing in that familiar Pavilion. Moments later, Hikari was there as well.

  Michelle took a moment to look around. The structure was the same as it had been; it had no walls, with only thick square wood beams, painted brown, supporting a roof that sloped in two directions, leaving two ends of it with a wide open five-sided "house" shape, and two long sides that would have been curtains of water if the place ever rained. About two thirds of the building's length was reserved for a sitting area, with three brown-painted wood picnic tables on either side of a central aisle. In the middle of the "house" side was a doorway marked "Exit", freestanding without any wall or other support.

  The last third, on the other side, was where they had gone to start the Run. The very end of the pavilion was divided in half with a head-height wall, and on either side were five shiny chrome turnstiles, like she might expect to see in a subway or theme park. At the near end of that wall was a panel where Jon, as team captain, had signaled his assent to start. Presumably, it had more functions in a real Run, and different functions now. Outside the pavilion was a horizontal bar that Michelle assumed only served to block off access from the other side... not that it mattered.

  Michelle looked at the minion's face for a moment, coming back to what she was here to do.

  "Hikari is still unsealed, right? Her AI level is where it was?" She asked the empty air, knowing the assistant would hear.

  "Yes," the answer came from nowhere in particular. "You can seal and unseal it freely during a practice session."

  Right.

  "Keep her unsealed for now, but seal both of our Skills, like they would be at the start of a match." Michelle started to move out of the pavilion, but stopped. "Can we actually go out into the field here?"

  "Yes. Unlike the real Parlay Pavilion, this is a normal structure in a Field-sized terrain map."

  "'Kay. Come on, Hikari."

  A minute later, the two faced each other. The surrounding grass field almost felt too... innocent for a duel, even a practice one. The Run's moody forest terrain was better, but she didn't want to mess with it now.

  "Ignite your aura," Michelle commanded.

  Hikari did, but only for a moment. It flickered into being for a few seconds, seeming to range across the blade before vanishing. Not enough MP, she knew. For the first few levels, that fragile light was all they'd have to defend themselves with.

  There was some thought there, but it wasn't something that she could put a finger on, so she ignored it.

  "Right," Michelle said, nodding. "It's covering random parts of the sword because you didn't put any intent into it. You need to focus on what you want the aura doing, which will probably be attacking. If you can focus on that, the aura should only ignite on the blade itself, like this." She ignited hers, pleased to find that the additional Intelligence left her able to control more aura at once... even if her MP gauge was still shit, and it guttered out after only a moment.

  She looked up at the sky. "Can you reset both of our MP gauges?"

  "Of course," the assistant said. "I can also just give you a button to do the same."

  "Sure." An interface element popped up for her, but she mentally nudged it out of the way. The assistant had restored them both. "Now, Hikari, try again."

  The minion's next three tries had her progressing slowly towards covering only the cutting edge with blade aura. Michelle demonstrated in between each attempt, using that as an excuse to practice focusing her own cutting edge down to the finest possible line. Anything else would be a waste of energy – and what was a cutting edge if not the finest possible line, anyway?

  "Good enough for now." Michelle considered. "Try to cover your blade with aura like you were going to block an attack."

  That command left Hikari flummoxed, and her first attempts were either reinforcing the cutting edge again, or leaving it uncontrolled. Michelle wasn't exactly sure what that version of the blade aura ought to look like, so she experimented on her own as Hikari tried to mimic her. Eventually, as she studied the weapon in her hands, a weird thought came to mind.

  She'd gone back to the fight that Jerry had been overseeing, in the Pearland dungeon, before he took over. And unbidden, she couldn't help remembering the devastatingly powerful monster getting flattened by the lid of its own sarcophagus, sent flying due to its own rage.

  Dungeons still use physics, to some degree. Right.

  "I need something, a training dummy," she said to nobody, and one appeared. "Make it cast harmless spells at me. Projectiles, something I can deflect."

  Over and over, she tried to twist her blade aura to better reflect the idea she had in her mind. It was hard, with her artificially lowered brainpower, but within a dozen tries, she had a success. The incoming spell – a ball of cleaning magic; who would ever make a projectile of out cleaning magic? What hare-brained idiot made a skill like that? – was coming at her straight, and she raised her blade into it, focusing on the sword's weight, its strength, and the reflection of light off its blade. She knew the concept was right, but finding the exact trigger...

  This time, as she ignited the aura and lifted her sword, she felt the aura flicker through both the blade and her arm, just for a moment, and the ball of cleaning magic was smashed away, breaking to pieces in the process. That was what she wanted... but why did it come through her arm as well?

  "Interesting," Hikari said, clapping mostly without sarcasm. "That was weird, though."

  "Yeah." Michelle reviewed it in her mind, but couldn't make heads or tails of it, not yet. She shook her head. "This might be too advanced for you. I was trying to just focus on knocking it away... for now, you can focus on practice on using it for cutting." She glanced up. "I'm going to think about this for a while, so can you just reset her MP when she needs it?"

  "Of course," the assistant replied, and Michelle nodded, staring at her sword and thinking deeply.