Path of the Pioneers

Adeline stumbled forward, peering at the place where the portal had been. As far as I could tell, it looked like a normal entrance to a normal mineshaft now. “T-this..” She carefully reached a hand out, as if she was worried it would pass through something. She was able to extend her arm all the way out. “It’s.. Gone?”

She looked back towards me, “S-Sybil.. Dungeons don’t just disappear. D-did we..”

My status window opened, flickering in an odd way before returning to normal.

[Congratulations! You are one of the first awakened to close a Gate!]

I could see Adeline’s eyes dart towards something in front of her face, her own window, I assumed.

[Congratulations! You have acquired the title “Gate Sentry”]

Gate Sentry

You are able to detect the presence of gates within 100 miles of your location. Additionally, you may analyze a gate to find its rank and view how much time is left until its convergence.

Adeline laughed beside me, a mix of exhilaration and raw nerves. “We seriously closed a dungeon gate. This..” She sat down on the ground, leaning against one of the rock walls of the cave. “Did you get the title as well? ‘Gate Sentry’?” I nodded, prompting her to continue, “What in the hells does it mean by ‘convergence’ anyways? The threshold breaking?”

I sat down beside Adeline, leaning against her. “It must be something like that. Surely we’ll have a better understanding when we next get to a dungeon.”

“The kobolds must be happy, anyways. The dwarves are going to be able to mine here again.” Adeline laughed, “Bet we could go tell Cairbre about this. Probably’d be good to take a little break, anyways. And he might have a little bit of insight about what we just went through.”

I nodded again, “I.. Wouldn’t mind a bath, either..” Which prompted another chuckle from Adeline.

She rubbed the back of my head, ruffling my hair a bit. I tried to not pay attention to the shiver running down my spine from that. She didn’t seem to notice, though. “They’re addicting, right? I still would’ve visited Tirsollain a bunch even if I wasn’t having swords made all the time, just for those baths.”

I glanced over at the freshly opened mines, “Do you think it’ll stay like that forever?”

Adeline shrugged, “No clue. But it’d be really nice, wouldn’t it? If we were able to close this one, then maybe…” She laughed, cutting herself short, “Ha.. Probably not..”

She was doubtful, but some small part of me believed it was a possibility. If one dungeon gate could be closed, then why couldn’t every single other one? We were hardly strong enough for that, but… Wasn’t it still worth considering?

“How many dungeons are there in the world, again?” I was thinking aloud, trying to connect the dots.

Adeline seemed to mull it over for a few moments before giving her retort, “If it were an issue of numbers, we would probably be fine. But there are two other barriers that put a stop to that plan.”

She stuck a finger up, “One. Dungeons vary wildly in location. They’re all over the world, quite literally. I’ve heard of one hidden away in the frigid wastes of the south, even, despite there being no settlements nearby. We would need hundreds of scouts working as one, just to get a cooperative list made up. Even if they do generally appear near settled places, we would never be certain if we found every single one.”

Another finger went up, “Two. Dungeons vary wildly in difficulty. The dungeon that we just did today was a challenge for us, yes, but it would have been as a walk in a meadow to a Pioneer, or even a high-level awakened. We don’t have the strength to take on the highest-ranking dungeons. In fact, we’d need a party even if we did reach those upper levels.”

“And I don’t think I have to explain to you that certain powers that be may not be interested in us attempting to clear their dungeons…” She sighed, “But, I mean, I’m sure if we were elves or something it might be feasible, but.. Just regular old human lifespans for us. It couldn’t happen in our lifespan.”

That was a grim thing. There was a very tangible limit on how much we could achieve within our lives, confined by time itself.

Best not to think about it.

“W-well..” I fidgeted with my hands for a moment before continuing, “At the very least, perhaps what happened to us today represents a new trend towards this behavior of dungeons closing?”

Adeline chuckled, “It sure would be nice.” She went back to rubbing the back of my head, which I was quite embarrassed about enjoying so much. It took a great deal of effort to not lean into her hand. “We might be getting ahead of ourselves, though. Who knows if more dungeons will spring up to make up for lost time.”

I had one eye closed, trying not to fall asleep from the sensation on my head. “Mm.. T-that’s.. Certainly a fair point..” It took me a moment to form anymore words, but I eventually managed to force them out, “E-even if we could.. Get rid of all of the dungeons, what would be the point of the awakened?”

Adeline’s hand stopped for a moment, “Huh..” Her hand continued, and she started speaking, “I hadn’t really thought about it like that. But I guess you’re right. I mean, some awakened might be pretty good for other stuff, but me? I guess I could chop trees pretty fast, but besides that..”

Oh.. I had brought the mood down.

Adeline leaned over, smiling at me, “You got some new boots, right? You wanna try ‘em out?”

I raised up, much more awake once I remembered that I had a new item to try out. There was something exciting about it. ‘Boots of Levitation’ sprung fantastical ideas into my mind. I was hoping that they were even half as good as those thoughts made them out to be. “Right.” I diligently sat the sack of loot I had gotten onto the ground in front of me. Reaching inside, I pulled out the pair of boots.

They were slightly taller than the boots I had bought in Tirsollain, made of simple, brown leather with an excellent sheen to it. Etched on the outer-facing sides of either one was an image of a wing and a breeze underneath it.

I slipped off my old boots, and put on the new ones. They were far more comfortable, which was nice on its own. Almost like walking on air (which, I must stress is not intended as a pun, as well as it does work.)

I stood up, tapping the boots against the ground to get them on better. “Err.. They’re comfortable? Do you suppose it goes beyond that?”

Adeline scratched her head, “If it doesn’t, you got pretty unlucky. Seems to me like this must be your main item reward, so it probably does something else. But.. Well, we don’t have a good way of finding that out until we get to Cairbre, so. For now we’ll just have to wait and see?”

I nodded, taking a seat next to her once again. She went back to rubbing the back of my head, which was nice.

“If I had to guess, they might cushion your falls, or lift you up.. Something in that vein.” She eyed the boots up and down, “With the wings, that might hint towards something more movement oriented.. Either way, I think they’ll be quite handy. I have a good feeling about them, and you’re usually pretty lucky.”

I smiled. To be quite honest, I was more than fine just getting a comfortable pair of boots. It felt as if I could walk for miles in the things with ease.

The two of us camped there for the night(?), subsisting off of pocket soup and hardtack. It wasn’t particularly amazing, especially after I had been exposed to the culinary delights of Tirsollain, but we were beginning to reach the less good parts of our rations. Besides, my grumbling stomach wasn’t exactly in a picky mood.

The journey back to Tirsollain was an interesting one. No more floating lights, but I did see more of the giant bats I witnessed on the way to the dungeon. This time around, I saw what appeared to be two of them working in tandem in order to carry off what looked like a piece of a giant mushroom. I tried pointing it out to Adeline, but the pair had made it out of sight before she could see. She believed me, which I was quite appreciative of.

I was shocked at how well my eyes became acquainted with the darkness of this place. It wasn’t dark per se, far brighter than I thought it had any right to be. Still, it was quite dark compared to the outside, given its lack of a sun. I was slightly worried about how my eyes would adjust to the outside light, especially after Adeline informed me that her typical strategy for dealing with the shift in brightness was to “just leave with your eyes closed and open them when it feels right.”

At that, I spent a great deal of time marveling at my new boots. For one, they didn’t seem to accrue very much dirt or dust despite the climes we were venturing through. Second, my theory about them being comfortable to walk in was proven very correct. My feet were the last thing to become fatigued with them on. These boots would surely prove their worth just from those two points alone, even if they didn’t have another use to them.

Four days of travel passed by, and we could once again see the bright light of Tirsollain on the ‘horizon’. A day more and we would be back within the comfortable walls of the dwarven city. The baths, the food, and the comfortable beds.. I silently swore to myself in that moment to live in that city should I ever retire from adventure.

Adeline had told me about all manner of delicious-sounding foods that we could get within the city, all ones that I hadn’t tried. I was especially intent on trying something called cur-

A voice came from behind us, dripping with hostile intent. The sound of shuffling metal followed suit.

“Adeline Cirix, halt at once.”