“Rohan?” Alisa watched the scene sixty feet below in sheer bafflement. The figure in plate armor ran around the room with a trail of monsters after him. He was about to get surrounded.

  A four-armed goblin clung onto Rohan’s armor. He grabbed the goblin from the head and threw it at an approaching ghost-blade. The ghost-blade side-stepped and counterattacked, aiming its daggers at Rohan’s visor.

  Rohan threw an uppercut with his gauntlets, killing the ghost blade. Simultaneously, he slashed with his sword, cutting down two little goblins. He began running again, avoiding all monsters, not killing anything he didn’t need to. He didn’t even collect the ether from his kills.

  “What is that idiot doing?” Alisa asked. “He barely has any ether!”

  Alisa watched the struggle for a moment longer before sighing. “Vivi, want to head over to help?”

  “Yes!” Lucius said before Vivi could even consider. “Can we kill the monsters?”

  “Yes,” Alisa said. “Get rid of everything. We’re no longer in the hidden dungeon. Use as little ether as possible so that your aura doesn’t flow into the next room over.”

  “Can I make the fall?” Vivi asked. The cavern was tall. Vivi was at least sixty feet from the ground.

  “You can,” Lucius said out loud. “It looks scary, but a proficient hunter can fall from any height without damage.”

  Vivi prepared herself. She didn’t consider herself a proficient hunter yet, but she trusted Lucius. She dropped down.

  Her body filled with ether anticipating impact. Most wisps moved to her lower body, but her whole body needed to be protected.

  Directly below, a stone leaf was trotting toward Rohan. Upon Vivi’s fall, its attention shifted. The monsters sensed Vivi’s presence.

  The vine attack shot upward, directly at Vivi.

  Red claws grew on her left hand. She swiped at the vines. The vines were cut into pieces, and the attack fell limp.

  Vivi summoned her runesword, holding it upside down as she fell on the stone-leaf. The sword pierced through, crushing the monster. Vivi braced the impact with her feet. A wave of pressure jolted through her, but she survived the landing.

  Monsters surrounded her in all directions. Vivi’s aura was larger than Rohan’s. Her presence drew the monsters’ attention, as if she was a meal that fell from the heavens. The four-armed goblins ran at her like excited children. Ghost blades used larger monsters as points of cover, dashing toward Vivi steadily but cautiously. Over fifty monsters total faced her.

  A projectile of ether flew at her head. Vivi felt it coming. Her perception of ether was growing. She leaned to the side as a ghost blade’s thrown dagger flew past her head.

  “Let the slaughter begin,” Lucius said. He brimmed with gluttonous excitement.

  Vivi swiped with her claws, cutting down goblins, ghost blades—monsters she hadn’t even identified before they died. The little monsters died in one hit without a chance of dodging.

  She killed multiple monsters each second. Lucius’s claws were perfect for cutting down fodder enemies. The charged attack devoured anything in its path, cutting through anything but the stone-leafs.

  Less ether, Lucius, Vivi thought. We don’t need this much. You’re growing too excited.

  Lucius protested for a moment. He was into this. Cutting down little monsters at maximum power was what he lived for. But he understood the orders. Too much ether oozed out of Vivi’s body. He calmed down, instead focusing on collecting the ether from their kills.

  The remaining monsters fell with relative ease. Even with less ether powering Vivi’s claws, she cut open every charging monster, as if she was an impenetrable defense tower that nothing could approach. From there, Vivi ran to each stone leaf, slashing them open with her runesword.

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  Fighting really was a game of domination. With enough ether and with powerful weapons, lower level monsters didn’t have a chance of survival. Vivi felt like an insect terminator burning down a colony of oversized roaches.

  The last monster fell. Lucius collected all of the ether in the room. His ether reserves grew to 4285.

  That number immediately fell down to 4244. Wisps of ether escaped from his grasp, flowing as mist into the air.

  What happened? Vivi asked. You just lost ether?

  “Uh, I ate it,” Lucius said. “Spirits need ether to live as well.”

  You’ve been eating ether constantly, Vivi said. At least twenty a day. I’ve seen it. But those wisps were lost to air.

  Lucius hid deeper in Vivi’s core, feeling uncomfortable. “Don’t worry about it, Vivi. Everything is going well.”

  Vivi wanted to sigh. Lucius was acting weird again. This must have been the reason why ether hunters carried their ether within the human’s reserves. Spirits got unstable on higher counts of ether. Lucius was hungry for more and more ether, but he struggled to control it all. Perhaps the ether they gained from now on should have gone to clearing her debts?

  Vivi didn’t think any of her doubts out loud. Lucius could read her emotions, of course, but after a week speaking in her thoughts, Vivi was starting to get used to thinking without forming words.

  Around her, Rohan and Alisa showed themselves. The two were locked at three hundred ether and had watched from the side while Vivi cleared the monsters.

  “Rohan, what a sparking genius you are,” Alisa said. “I thought we told you to clear a safe landing for us.”

  Rohan scratched the back of his head. He laughed, then fell into a coughing fit. Sweat dropped from his forehead. He spoke between heavy breaths. “I thought I’d provide a good warm-up for Vivi and myself. I pulled every monster from nearby respawn points and brought them here. Could you help take off my armor? It’ll be easier to practice without.”

  Alisa stared at Rohan in silence. She shook her head, rolling her eyes. She started unwrapping the plates.

  “Where are we?” Vivi asked. She glanced up at the ceiling. The crawl space was hidden well. Even if Vivi squinted with ether-fueled eyes, she couldn’t see where they’d come from.

  The cavern around them was grey and monotone like the upper levels of the public dungeon. The floor was left empty, but for a small section to the edge of the cavern. There were lacquered weapon racks and water barrels, the usual equipment a respawn zone had.

  “This area is known amongst the union as ‘Aang’s private hunting ground,’” Alisa said. “Location wise, we’re in a basic respawn-zone on a branch of the gang-controlled dungeons. The Phantoms use this area as a second base. It’s not as secure as home, as the Stewards or guards are free to barge in at any moment, but we won’t be bothered by nimrods.”

  “And as Stewards are free to enter, we do not keep any contraband here,” Rohan said. “Our reserves will stay below three hundred.”

  “Yes,” Alisa said. “Finally something sane coming from your mouth.”

  “I saw Ven in the free dungeon with more than three hundred ether,” Vivi said. “Was he breaking rules?”

  “Ah, that’s done intentionally,” Alisa said. “Every gang needs a few breakers just to defend turf. If we all played by the rules, the union would be attacked and destroyed. Ven has the job of acting as our arrogant breaker. He has a risky job, but a necessary one. Being caught a few hundred ether above the limit will only earn a whipping. Ven still has a slash mark for getting caught a few years ago.”

  Behind Alisa, pebbles on the ground rustled, then began bouncing. A monster was forming. It had been a while since Vivi saw one spawn right in front of her. Monsters spawned more commonly on the upper levels for some reason.

  Alisa stabbed the current of ether, breaking it before Vivi could identify what was spawning. The runes on Alisa’s daggers were gone. She’d switched them for regular, non-runic weapons. Vivi hadn’t seen when.

  “The union’s public grounds will become familiar to you soon,” Alisa said. “Before that, I think you deserve a small break from exploration. Rohan will take you from here.”

  “Indeed, I have been offered an honorable task,” Rohan said. He stood proudly. “We will fight, Vivi, and I will turn you into a true Knight. I have seen you fight three times now. I believe I have a grasp of your strengths and weaknesses. You and your spirit are amazing at cutting down weak monsters. Nobody in the gang could have cleared this mob of monsters faster than you. You have wits, and those wits translate into power. You are also easy to underestimate. Your runeswords look like ordinary blades. Yet they carry the power of a god’s boulder. These strengths were enough to overpower me in our duels.

  “Your weaknesses, however, are the reason I almost stood a chance, even though I carried thousands of ether less than you. You lack fundamentals.”

  Alisa sighed. “There comes the big word.”

  “Fundamentals?” Vivi asked.

  “Indeed,” Rohan said. “You have the wits, and you have the power. But those powers are not used with thought. You go all out with the goal of defeating your opponent, but you don’t know how you’re going to defeat your opponent.”

  Now without his armor, Rohan put on a leather coat. He walked over to the weapon racks at the edge of the room. He picked up one of the swords. An ordinary steel sword.

  “We’re going to change that,” Rohan said. “Choose the blade and scabbard that suits you best. We will start by learning how to unsheath a weapon correctly.”

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