Anika waved at Philip as he approached. She noted he was wearing a lamellar style metal cuirass strung together with dark green cord and tied in the front. She’d always liked the way lamellar armor looked in games, especially when she could customize the colors that attached the metal plates to match the undergarments. Philip’s breastplate had attached sleeves that covered his shoulders and biceps with a similar skirted bottom to her own armor, separated to make riding a horse, or a pegasus, in his case, more comfortable. There was an additional protective flap hanging from the waist that looked like it would easily flip up while riding, but for now hung down over the slit in the front. Probably more comfortable than a codpiece, Anika thought to herself.

  Under the armor, it looked like he had a dark green, padded gambeson as opposed to the lightweight tunic she wore. He wore metal vambraces with articulated elbows and similar metal greaves with attached knees. It looked hot and heavy, but Anika supposed if he was going to be fighting with a melee weapon, he needed something a bit more protective than she was wearing.

  While Anika silently examined Philip, Lily was much more vocal.

  “Hi Philip! Hi Epona! Let’s go dungeon party!”

  “Yeah! Let’s go!” Philip said enthusiastically as he halted in front of Leka and looked down at her, the shorter Degeta only coming up to his shoulders.

  “Hi! I’m Philip,” he said as he extended a hand to Leka in greeting.

  “Leka,” she replied, briefly shaking his hand. “You have equipped Epona with her gear and the supplies for our outing?”

  “Yeah! Someone dropped them off at the stable a little bit ago. I got her all set up!” Philip patted Epona, who had just arrived behind him, on the neck.

  Anika looked at Epona, who now wore full barding that looked straight out of a medieval jousting match, with a decorative metal faceplate covering her head from her ears to her nose, but leaving her eyes and nostrils exposed. Articulated metal plates covered her neck and metal plates protected her chest, flank, and hind quarters. Dark green accented the barding to match Philip's gambeson. Attached to her saddle were two large saddle bags, Philip’s trident, and a shield Anika assumed was also for Philip.

  “See! I knew Epona was going to have cool armor! I want some too,” Lily whined as Epona stood regally behind Philip.

  “I’m sure we can find something for you, Lily.” Anika turned to Leka, “Someone can make armor for Lily too, right?”

  Leka looked from Epona to Lily, “I don’t think that would be appropriate. However, there are likely some enchantments that can offer some protection. I will look into it later. For now, follow me.” And she led them down the hill away from the village, but keeping to the left of the pastures and stables.

  Anika nodded as Lily skipped beside her, clearly happy enough with the answer. Philip walked behind them, with Epona bringing up the rear. He chattered to Epona, but Anika tuned him out, though Lily occasionally interjected in their conversation. Anika focused on observing her surroundings, interested in what this new world had to offer. She saw several animals in the pastures behind the stables, some she recognized, and some she didn’t. One of the animals she didn’t recognize looked like a goat, but it had six legs instead of four and was a little unnerving. She also noted what looked like a fluffy, light brown pig with floppy puppy ears and small horns. She knew that pigs could have hair, but she’d never seen one with quite so much floof. It was pretty cute, but all Anika could think about was the fact that seeing a pig meant bacon was a distinct possibility in her new world. That was a relief. Everything was better with bacon.

  They had only walked about 10 minutes when Leka led them off a smaller path to the left side of the road near a large pasture. This pasture was different from the others, with trees and small bushes and at least one small pond that Anika could see. Wildflowers dotted the field, forming patches of red, purple, and yellow. It was quite pretty.

  “Here we are,” Leka said, as she approached a small gate in the simple pasture fence. “The lowest level dungeon.”

  “This is a dungeon?!” Anika cried, staring at the innocuous pasture, “You mean there is like, a portal somewhere that leads to the dungeon, right?”

  “No, once we enter the gate we will be in the dungeon,” Leka replied, starting to open the gate in front of her.

  “Aren’t dungeons supposed to be dark, dreary caves or decrepit underground cities or… something scary?”

  “Dungeons take many forms on the planet. Simply put, a dungeon is an area established by the gods where the ambient magics collect to produce magical beasts, monsters, and magical herbs and resources used for crafting. They have specific magic levels that are maintained through carefully managed adventuring teams… at least, they were maintained until recently. This dungeon, however, is kept at a low level. We use it to breed useful plants and monsters.”

  Anika gaped at Leka. This was not what she had been expecting at ALL when they talked about dungeons. This was more like a magical biome, not a dungeon! She wondered if this was just a weird quirk of the translation enchantment. They said it made connections between words, which implied it was translating concepts, not just individual words. Whatever word they used for this collection of ambient magic that spawned monsters was most similar to what she knew about dungeons in video games and stories, and so the translation enchantment chose that word. Now that she thought of it, ‘character sheets’ was also a weird thing to call your own magical information and stats, but it made sense when Anika considered that most games had a character sheet or similar character window that showed stats. It was the closest conceptual translation to Anika’s knowledge.

  Knowing that a dungeon could actually just be a pleasant magical meadow, Anika wondered what other forms the dungeons might take. Were there different biomes and they would find ocean dungeons and snow dungeons? Would there be creepy dungeons in abandoned villages or towns? Nilendi had said something about the magic in the early days harming people, so maybe some towns were destroyed and the gods turned them into dungeons? Either way, Anika felt slightly better about today’s adventure in this pretty pasture than she had about going into some dark cave in the mountains.

  Philip bounded past her towards the gate.

  “This is pretty! I like it! It reminds me of home! We have lots of flowers!!” Philip walked straight through the gate Leka held open, Epona right behind him.

  “C’mon Anika, let’s go in too!” Lily cried and skipped forward, stopping next to Leka to wait for Anika to catch up.

  Anika shrugged and moved forward. Once she reached Leka’s side, Leka continued talking.

  “Once you enter the dungeon, you will receive a notification and will notice more options appear in your vision. When in dungeons, the increased magic allows for additional magical functions related to your status and abilities, including the ability to see your health and mana at all times. “

  A case of theft: this story is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation.

  Anika walked through the gate and immediately a translucent window appeared in her vision.

  You are entering a dungeon.

  Advanced status reporting available by default:

  Personal reporting, party reporting, buff display, debuff display

  Would you like to customize reporting?

  Anika had no idea what any of that would look like, so shook her head no. She noticed several things pop up in her vision after closing the notification as Leka described the magical functions. She remembered Nilendi saying something about “advanced status reporting” the first day, but hadn’t known what to expect. In the upper left of her vision were two small, cylindrical bars in red and blue. Anika was relieved to see they were the color she already associated with health and mana – that would make things a lot easier.

  Under the health and mana bars, she saw the name “Lily” next to slightly smaller cylindrical bars. She assumed additional members of a party would show up in a column beneath Lily’s bars, since Lily was permanently in her party. On the right side of her vision, she saw a small icon and made out the word “Capy Cultivation” on it. She focused on the icon and a description popped up in a box, like it had yesterday for her abilities.

  Capy Cultivation: Increase experience for you and your Anima-bonded companion by 5% per party member. This bonus stacks. Non-bonded party members gain a flat 10% bonus experience regardless of the number of party members. Current bonus: 10%

  Anika didn’t have much time to think about the experience buff before Leka continued her instruction.

  “If you have boons or beneficial conditions, they will appear in the upper right of your screen. If you suffer any harmful conditions, they will appear in the upper right as well, below the beneficial conditions. If you think “map”, a map of the dungeon area will open. You focus on a location and think “mark” to leave an ‘X’ on a map that will be visible on your party members’ maps. Occasionally, rituals are performed in dungeons to leave messages that are visible on the map. If these exist, they will be marked with a purple dot. You should see several on this map, notating safe locations within the dungeon as well as the location of several types of magical resources.

  Anika immediately thought “map” and saw a picture of the area, which was roughly oval shaped and looked much larger than she originally thought. Multiple ponds and stands of trees dotted the area within the oval, and one side of the map looked more like a forest. She noted purple dots near some of the stands of trees, two of the ponds, and several areas that looked like open fields. She focused on one near a tree and a dialog box popped up.

  Leshiru Mushrooms

  Anika closed the map and looked at Leka, “What are Leshiru mushrooms?”

  “Ah good,” Leka replied, “You figured out how to use the map quickly. Leshiru mushrooms are a common alchemy supply used in both potions and rituals.”

  Lily jumped into the conversion upon hearing about mushrooms, “Are they tasty? I like trying new plants!”

  “No,” Leka responded, “They are very bitter when eaten alone, and their magical properties are not as useful raw. They can restore a small amount of health, and are sometimes eaten by monsters.”

  “Oh, that’s too bad,” Lily replied glumly.

  Good to know that health potions exist, Anika thought to herself. Having healing potions on hand was always a wise idea, even if you had healing spells. You could never be too careful.

  Closing the map and looking around, Anika realized Philip and Epona had wandered away, Philip picking wildflowers and using them to decorate Epona’s armor. Anika hoped he had paid attention to figure out what everything on the interface meant before they started wandering away.

  “So… anything else I need to know?” Anika asked Leka.

  “The last thing you will see in a dungeon is a monster aura. When you encounter a monster or magical creature in the dungeon with levels, it will have a green aura if it is within 1 or two levels of your own. That aura will turn yellow and then red the higher level a monster is. Monsters that are well below your level will show blue. You gain more experience for equal or higher level monsters, and experience decreases as you kill things under your level.”

  “That makes sense to me.” Anika looked around, not seeing any monsters or glowing auras nearby.

  “How close do we have to be to see a monster?”

  “If you can see the monster clearly, then the monster aura should appear. If a monster or animal is hiding, however, their aura will not appear until you see them.”

  Lily, who had decided to run over to Epona and Philip, suddenly squealed. “Ooo! I see a monster!”

  Anika looked in Lily’s direction, but didn’t see anything. Glancing at Leka, she started to move towards Lily.

  “What kind of monster?”

  Philip turned as well to look where Lily was looking. “Oh cool it’s like a ball of goo!”

  “That is likely a Scouring Slime,” Leka spoke from behind them. “They are one of the most common monsters in dungeons, and quite useful.”

  Anika was a few steps from Lily when she finally saw the tennis ball sized ooze hiding in the leaves of a wildflower. It had a lightly glowing blue aura around it, indicating it was lower level than she was. Why was it always slimes in low level areas? Anika had already killed more than her share of slimes, oozes, and other gelatinous creatures in games, and they were always annoying, never useful.

  “How can a monster be useful?” Anika asked Leka.

  “Scouring Slimes are frequently used for cleaning. They feed on surface levels of grime and gore and excrete a surfactant that cleanses almost anything. Like soap, but mana enhanced. They multiply quickly and are spawned frequently by dungeons. We keep a stock in the temple and use them to clean armor, weapons, and other areas – under close supervision of course!”

  Leka reached down to pick up the ball of ooze and handed it to Anika, who examined the off-white, partially opaque creature in her hand. As she watched, two stalks rose from the goo with little eyes on the ends. It looked like a critter straight out of a cartoon.

  Philip ran over to look at it closer in Anika’s hand. “It’s kinda cute,” he said, raising a finger to poke at it.

  “Can we keep it?” Lily looked up from where she was on the ground and jumped a little.

  Leka took the critter back from Anika. “Scouring slimes are harmless and useful at low levels, but if they are left to grow unhindered, they become highly destructive.”

  “How so?” Anika asked.

  “They double in size for each level they gain. This one is level 2, based on its size. Their scouring ability at low levels is not harmful, but it also becomes more powerful. Eventually, they can eat not just the dirt and grime, but anything and everything. If you run into a high-level Scouring Slime, it can absorb you fully into its body and slowly disintegrate you until there is nothing left.”

  Lily sat down suddenly with a thump and looked up. “Never mind, I don’t want to keep it.”

  “So.. uh…” Anika inquired, “At what level do they start devouring flesh? Just, y’know… for reference.”

  “Level 15. We start culling at level 10 to ensure they don’t make it to level 15.” Leka responded.

  “Good to know…” Anika replied, examining the tiny creature in Leka’s hand and imagining it the size of a car ready to just plow through her and slowly digest her body. So much for being an adorable slime monster.

  “Now,” Leka continued, unaware of Anika’s imagination, “This slime is a perfect opportunity for your first magic lesson.”

  “It is?” Anika startled.

  “Yes,” Leka held out her hand with the slime in it. “Let’s try your water spell, Splash. Simply hold up your hand and think of the spell you want to cast.” Leka paused to give Anika a chance to follow the directions, but Anika didn’t immediately move. Leka gestured to the slime she held. “Now then, cast Splash on the slime.”

  “Yay! Magic time! You can do it Anika!” Lily immediately turned into her personal cheering squad.

  Anika awkwardly held up her hand towards Leka’s hand as if she was waving at the slime and thought about casting ‘Splash.’ A moment later, water burst out of her hand in all directions, spurting back into her face as well as splashing onto Lily on the ground beneath her.

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